The Watchers of the Plains: A Tale of the Western Prairies

by Ridgwell Cullum

  CHAPTER III

  AN ALARM IN BEACON CROSSING

  A horseman riding from White River Homestead to Beacon Crossing will findhimself confronted with just eighty-two miles of dreary, flat trail; insummer time, just eighty-two miles of blistering sun, dust and mosquitoes.The trail runs parallel to, and about three miles north of the cool, shadyWhite River, which is a tantalizing invention of those who designed thetrail.

  In the whole eighty-two miles there is but one wayside house; it is calledthe "half-way." No one lives there. It, like the log hut of Nevil Steyneon the bank of the White River, stands alone, a relic of the dim past. Butit serves a good purpose, for one can break the journey there, and sleepthe night in its cheerless shelter. Furthermore, within the ruins of itsold-time stockade is a well, a deep, wide-mouthed well full of cool springwater, which is the very thing needed.

  It is sunrise and a horseman has just ridden away from this shelter. He isa man of considerable height, to judge by the length of his stirrups, andhe has that knack of a horseman in the saddle which comes only to thosewho have learned to ride as soon as they have learned to run.

  He wears fringed chapps over his moleskin trousers, which give him anappearance of greater size than he possesses, for, though stout of frame,he is lean and wiry. His face is wonderfully grave for a young man, whichmay be accounted for by the fact that he has lived through several Indianrisings. And it is a strong face, too, with a decided look of what peopleterm self-reliance in it, also, probably, a product of those dreadedIndian wars. He, like many men who live through strenuous times, is givenmuch to quick thought and slow speech, which, though excellent features incharacter, do not help toward companionship in wild townships like BeaconCrossing.

  Seth is well thought of in that city--whither he is riding now--but he ismore respected than loved. The truth is he has a way of liking slowly, anddisliking thoroughly, and this is a disposition the reckless townsmen ofBeacon Crossing fail to understand, and, failing to understand, like mostpeople, fail to appreciate.

  Just now he is more particularly grave than usual. He has ridden fromWhite River Farm to execute certain business in town for hisfoster-parents, Rube Sampson and his wife; a trifling matter, andcertainly nothing to bring that look of doubt in his eyes, and thethoughtful pucker between his clean-cut brows. His whole attention isgiven up to a contemplation of the land beyond the White River, and thedistance away behind him to the left, which is the direction of theRosebud Indian Reservation.

  Yesterday his attention had been called in these directions, and onreaching the "half-way" he had serious thoughts of returning home, butreflection had kept him to his journey if it had in no way eased hismind.

  Yesterday he had observed a smoky haze spreading slowly northward on thelightest of breezes; and it was coming across the Reservation. It wasearly June, and the prairie was too young and green to burn yet.

  The haze was still hanging in the bright morning air. It had spread rightacross his path in the night, and a strong smell of burning greeted him ashe rode out.

  He urged his horse and rode faster than he had ridden the day before.There was a silent sympathy between horse and rider which displayed itselfin the alertness of the animal's manner; he was traveling with head heldhigh, nostrils distended, as though sniffing at the smell of burning insome alarm. And his gait, too, had become a little uneven, which, in ahorse, means that his attention is distracted.

  Before an hour had passed the man's look changed to one of someapprehension. Smoke was rising in a new direction. He had no need to turnto see it, it was on his left front, far away beyond the horizon, butsomewhere where the railroad track, linking the East with BeaconCrossing, cut through the plains of Nebraska. Suddenly his horse leaptforward into a strong swinging gallop. He had felt the touch of the spur.Seth pulled out a great silver timepiece and consulted it.

  "I ken make it in two hours an' a haf from now," he muttered. "That'll behaf past eight. Good! Put it along, Buck."

  The last was addressed to the horse; and the dust rose in great heavyclouds behind them as the willing beast stretched out to his work.

  Beacon Crossing is called a city by those residents who have lived in itsince the railway brought it into existence. Chance travelers, and thosewho are not prejudiced in its favor, call it a hole. It certainly hasclaims in the latter direction. It is the section terminal on the railway;and that is the source of its questionable prosperity.

  There is a main street parallel to the railroad track with some storesfacing the latter. It has only one sidewalk and only one row of buildings;the other side of the street is given up to piles of metal rails andwooden ties and ballast for the track. The stores are large fronted, witha mockery which would lead the unenlightened to believe they aretwo-storied; but this is make-believe. The upper windows have no roomsbehind them. They are the result of overweening vanity on the part of theCity Council and have nothing to do with the storekeepers.

  The place is unremarkable for anything else, unless it be the dirty andunpaved condition of its street. True there are other houses, privateresidences, but these are set indiscriminately upon the surroundingprairie, and have no relation to any roads. A row of blue gum trees marksthe front of each, and, for the most part, a clothes-line, bearing somearticles of washing, indicates the back. Beacon Crossing would be braggedabout only by those who helped to make it.

  The only building worth consideration is the hotel, opposite the depot.This has a verandah and a tie-post, and there are always horses standingoutside it, and always men standing on the verandah, except when it israining, then they are to be found inside.

  It was only a little after eight in the morning. Breakfast was nearly overin the hotel, and, to judge by the number of saddle-horses at thetie-post, the people of Beacon Crossing were very much astir. Presentlythe verandah began to fill with hard-faced, rough-clad men. And most ofthem as they came were filling their pipes, which suggested that they hadjust eaten.

  Nevil Steyne was one of the earliest to emerge from the breakfast room. Hehad been the last to go in, and the moment he reappeared it was to surveyswiftly the bright blue distance away in the direction of the IndianReservations, and, unseen by those who stood around, he smiled ever soslightly at what he beheld. The two men nearest him were talkingearnestly, and their earnestness was emphasized by the number of matchesthey used in keeping their pipes alight.

  "Them's Injun fires, sure," said one, at the conclusion of a longargument.

  "Maybe they are, Dan," said the other, an angular man who ran a smallhardware store a few yards lower down the street. "But they ain't on thisside of the Reservation anyway."

  The significant selfishness of his last remark brought the other round onhim in a moment.

  "That's all you care for, eh?" Dan said witheringly. "Say. I'm working forthe 'diamond P's,' and they run their stock that aways. Hev you beenthrough one o' them Injun risings?"

  The other shook his head.

  "Jest so."

  Another man, stout and florid, Jack McCabe, the butcher, joined them.

  "Can't make it out. There ain't been any Sun-dance, which is usual 'forethey get busy. Guess it ain't no rising. Big Wolf's too clever. If it wasspring round-up or fall round-up it 'ud seem more likely. Guess somefeller's been and fired the woods. Which, by the way, is around Jason'sfarm. Say, Dan Lawson, you living that way, ain't it right that Jason'sgot a couple of hundred beeves in his corrals?"

  "Yes," replied Dan of the "diamond P's." "He bought up the 'flying S'stock. He's holding 'em up for rebrandin'. Say, Nevil," the cowpuncherwent on, turning to the wood-cutter of White River, "you oughter know howthem red devils is doin'. Did you hear or see anything?"

  Nevil turned with a slight flush tingeing his cheeks. He didn't like theother's tone.

  "I don't know why I should know or see anything," he said shortly.

  "Wal, you're kind o' livin' ad-jacent, as the sayin' is," observed Dan,with a shadowy smile.

  The other men on the v
erandah had come around, and they smiled morebroadly than the cowpuncher. It was easy to see that they were notparticularly favorable toward Nevil Steyne. It was as Dan had said; helived near the Reservation, and, well, these men were frontiersmen whoknew the ways of the country in which they lived.

  Nevil saw the smiling faces and checked his anger. He laughed instead.

  "Well," he said, "since you set such store by my opinions I confess I hadno reason to suspect any disturbance, and, to illustrate my faith in theIndians' peaceful condition, I am going home at noon, and to-morrow intendto cut a load or two of wood on the river."

  Dan had no more to say. He could have said something but refrained, andthe rest of the men turned to watch the white smoke in the distance.Decidedly Steyne had scored a point and should have been content; but hewasn't.

  "I suppose you fellows think a white man can't live near Indians without'taking the blanket,'" he pursued with a sneer.

  There was a brief silence. Then Dan answered him slowly.

  "Jest depends on the man, I guess."

  There was a nasty tone in the cowpuncher's voice and trouble seemedimminent, but it was fortunately nipped in the bud by Jack McCabe.

  "Hello!" the butcher exclaimed excitedly, "there's a feller pushin' hisplug as tho' them Injuns was on his heels. Say, it's Seth o' White RiverFarm, and by the gait he's travelin', I'd gamble, Nevil, you don't cutthat wood to-morrow. Seth don't usually ride hard."

  The whole attention on the verandah was centred on Seth, who was ridingtoward the hotel from across the track as hard as his horse could lay footto the ground.

  In a few moments he drew up at the tie-post and flung off his horse. And achorus of inquiry greeted him from the bystanders.

  The newcomer raised an undisturbed face to them, and his words camewithout any of the excitement that the pace he had ridden in at hadsuggested.

  "The Injuns are out," he said, and bent down to feel his horse's legs.They seemed to be of most interest to him at the moment.

  Curiously enough his words were accepted by the men on the verandahwithout question. That is, by all except Steyne. No doubt he was irritatedby what had gone before, but even so, it hardly warranted, in face of thefires in the south, his obstinate refusal to believe that the Indians wereout on the war-path. Besides, he resented the quiet assurance of thenewcomer. He resented the manner in which the others accepted hisstatement, disliking it as much as he disliked the man who had made it.Nor was the reason of this hatred far to seek. Seth was a loyal white manwho took his life in his own hands and fought strenuously in a savage landfor his existence, a bold, fearless frontiersman; while he, Nevil, knew inhis secret heart that he had lost that caste, had thrown away thatright--that birthright. He had, as these men also knew, "taken theblanket." He had become a white Indian. He lived by the clemency of thatpeople, in their manner, their life. He was one of them, while yet hisskin was white. He was regarded by his own race as an outcast. He was adegenerate. So he hated--hated them all. But Seth he hated most of allbecause he saw more of him, he lived near him. He knew that Seth knew him,knew him down to his heart's core. This was sufficient in a nature likehis to set him hating, but he hated him for yet another reason. Seth wasas strong, brave, honest as he was the reverse. He belonged to anunderworld which nothing could ever drag a nature such as Seth's down to.

  He knocked his pipe out aggressively on the wooden floor of the verandah.

  "I don't believe it," he said loudly, in an offensive way.

  Seth dropped his broncho's hoof, which he had been examining carefully,and turned round. It would be impossible to describe the significance ofhis movement. It suggested the sudden rousing of a real fighting dog thathad been disturbed in some peaceful pursuit. He was not noisy, he did noteven look angry. He was just ready.

  "I guess you ought to know, Nevil Steyne," he said with emphasis. Then heturned his head and looked away down the street, as the clatter of hoofsand rattle of wheels reached the hotel. And for the second time within afew minutes, trouble, such as only Western men fully understand, wasstaved off by a more important interruption.

  A team and buckboard dashed up to the hotel. Dan Somers, the sheriff, andLal Price, the Land Agent, were in the conveyance, and as they drew up,one of the horses dropped to the ground in its harness. The men, watchingthese two plainsmen scrambling from the vehicle, knew that life and deathalone could have sent them into town at a pace sufficient to kill one oftheir horses.

  "Boys!" cried the sheriff at once. "Who's for it? Those durned Injuns areout; they're gittin' round Jason's place. I'm not sure but the woods arefired a'ready. They've come from the south, I guess. They're Rosebuds.Ther's old man Jason and his missis; and ther's the gals--three of 'em.We can't let 'em----"

  Seth interrupted him.

  "And we ain't going to," he observed. He knew, they all knew, what thesheriff would have said.

  Seth's interruption was the cue for suggestions. And they came with arush, which is the way with men such as these, all eager and ready to helpin the rescue of a white family from the hands of a common foe. There wasno hesitation, for they were most of them old hands in this Indianbusiness, and, in the back recesses of their brains, each man heldrecollections of past atrocities, too hideous to be contemplated calmly.

  Those who were later with their breakfast now swelled the crowd on theverandah. The news seemed to have percolated through to the rest of thetown, for men were gathering on all sides, just as men gather in civilizedcities on receipt of news of national importance. They came at once to thecentral public place. The excitement had leapt with the suddenness of aconflagration, and, like a conflagration, there would be considerabledestruction before it died down. The Indians in their savage temeritymight strike Beacon Crossing. Once the Indians were loose it was like thebreaking of a tidal wave on a low shore.

  The sheriff was the man they all looked to, and, veteran warrior that hewas, he quickly got a grip on things. One hard-riding scout, a man as wilyas the Indian himself, he despatched to warn all outlying settlers. Hecould spare no more than one. Then he sent telegraphic messages for themilitary, whose fort a progressive and humane government had located sometwo hundred miles away. Then he divided his volunteers, equipped withtheir own arms, and all the better for that, and detailed one party forthe town's defence, and the other to join him in the work of rescue.

  These things arranged, then came the first check. It was discovered thatthe driver of the only locomotive in the place was sick. The engineitself, a rusty looking ancient machine, was standing coldly idle in theyards.

  A deputation waited upon the sick man, while others went and coupled upsome empty trucks and fired the engine. Seth was among the latter. Thedeputation returned. It was fever; and the man could not come. Being readycampaigners, their thoughts turned on their horses.

  The sheriff was a blank man for the moment. It was a question of time, heknew. He was standing beside the locomotive which had already begun tosnort, and which looked, at that moment, in the eyes of those gatheredround it, despite its rustiness, a truly magnificent proposition. He wasabout to call for volunteers to replace the driver, when Seth, who all thetime had been working in the cab, and who had heard the news of thetrouble, leant over the rail that protected the foot-plate.

  "Say, Dan," he said. "If none of the boys are scared to ride behind me,and I don't figger they are, I'll pump the old kettle along. Guess I'vefired a traction once. I don't calc'late she'll have time to bust up inforty miles. I'll take the chances if they will."

  The sheriff looked up at the thoughtful face above him. He grinned, andothers grinned with him. But their amusement was quite lost on Seth. Hewas trying to estimate the possible result of putting the "kettle," as hecalled the locomotive, at full steam ahead, disregarding every other tapand gauge on the driving plate, and devoting himself to heaping up thefurnace. These things interested him, not as a source of danger, but onlyin the matter of speed.

  "Good for you, Seth," cried Dan Somers. "Now
, boys, all aboard!"

  And Seth turned to the driving plate and sounded a preliminary whistle.