The Project Gutenberg EBook of Wild Bill's Last Trail, by Ned Buntline
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Title: Wild Bill's Last Trail
Author: Ned Buntline
Release Date: April 16, 2007 [EBook #21113]
Language: English
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WILD BILL'S LAST TRAIL ***
Produced by Richard Halsey
* * *
Wild Bill's Last Trail.
By NED BUNTLINE,
Author of "Harry Bluff, The Reefer," "Navigator Ned," etc.
* * *
CHAPTER I.
THE AVENGER.
"Bill! Wild Bill! Is this you, or your ghost? What, in great Creation's name, are you doing here?"
"Gettin' toward sunset, old pard–gettin' toward sunset, before I pass in my checks!"
The first speaker was an old scout and plainsman, Sam Chichester by name, and he spoke to a passenger who had just left the west-ward-bound express train at Laramie, on the U.P.R.R.
That passenger was none other than J. B. Hickok, or "Wild Bill," one of the most noted shots, and certainly the most desperate man of his age and day west of the Mississippi River.
"What do you mean, Bill, when you talk of passing in your checks? You're in the very prime of life, man, and—"
"Hush! Talk low! There are listening ears everywhere, Sam! I don't know why, but there is a chill at my heart, and I know my time has about run out. I've been on East with Buffalo Bill and Texas Jack, trying to show people what our plains life is. But I wasn't at home there. There were crowds on crowds that came to see us, and I couldn't stir on the streets of their big cities without having an army at my heels, and I got sick of it. But that wasn't all. There was a woman that fell in love with me, and made up her mind to marry me. I told her that I was no sort of a man to tie to–that I was likely to be wiped out any day 'twixt sunrise and sunset, for I had more enemies than a candidate for President; but she wouldn't listen to sense, and so–we buckled! Thank Heaven, I've coaxed her to stay East with friends while I've come out here; for, Sam, she'll be a widow inside of six weeks!"
"Bill, you've been hitting benzine heavy of late haven't you?
"No; I never drank lighter in my life than I have for a year past. But there's a shadow cold as ice on my soul! I've never felt right since I pulled on that red-haired Texan at Abilene, in Kansas. You remember, for you was there. It was kill or get killed, you know, and when I let him have his ticket for a six-foot lot of ground he gave one shriek–it rings in my ears yet. He spoke but one word–'Sister!' Yet that word has never left my ears, sleeping or waking, from that time to this. I had a sister once myself, Sam, and I loved her a thousand times more than I did life. In fact I never loved life after I lost her. And I can't tell you all about her–I'd choke if I tried. It is enough that she died, and the cause of her death died soon after, and I wasn't far away when–when he went under. But that isn't here nor there, Sam–let's go and warm up. Where do you hang out?"
"I'm in camp close by. I'm heading a party that is bound in for the Black Hills. Captain Jack Crawford is along. You know him. And California Joe, too."
"Good! It is the first streak of luck I've had in a year. I'll join your crowd, Sam, if you'll let me. Captain Jack and Joe are as good friends as I ever had–always barring one."
"And that is?"
"My old six-shooter here. Truth-Teller I call it. It never speaks without saying something. But come, old boy–I see a sign ahead. I must take in a little benzine to wash the car-dust out of my throat."
Bill pointed to a saloon near at hand, and the two old scouts and companions moved toward it.
As they did so, a young man, roughly dressed, with a face fair and smooth, though shadowed as if by exposure to sun and and wind, stepped from behind a shade tree, where he had stood while these two talked, listening with breathless interest to every word. His hair, a deep, rich auburn, hung in curling masses clear to his shoulders, and his blue eyes seemed to burn with almost feverish fire as he gazed in the direction the scouts had taken.
"So! He remembers Abilene, does he?"
And the tone of the young man was low and fierce us an angered serpent's hiss.
"And he thinks his time is near. So do I. But he shall not die in a second, as his victim did, I would prolong his agonies for years, if every hour was like a living death; a speechless misery. Let him go with Sam Chichester and his crowd. The avenger will be close at hand! His Truth-Teller will lie when he most depends on it. For I–I have sworn that he shall go where he has sent so many victims; go, like them all, unprepared, but not unwarned. No, he thinks that death is near; I'll freeze the thought to his very soul! He is on the death-trail now? With me rests when and where it shall end."
The face of the young man was almost fiendish in its expression as he spoke. It seemed as if his heart was the concentration of hate and a fell desire for revenge.
He strode along the streets swiftly, and, glancing in at the saloon which the two men had entered, paused one second, with his right hand thrust within his vest, as if clutching a weapon, and debating in his mind whether or not to use it.
A second only he paused, and then muttering, "It is not time yet," he passed on.
"He went a little way up the same street and entered a German restaurant. Throwing himself heavily on a seat, he said:
"Give me a steak, quick. I'm hungry and dry. Give me a bottle of the best brandy in your house."
"We've got der steak, und pread, und peer, und Rhein wine, but no prandy," said the German, who kept the place.
"Cook the steak in a hurry, and send for some brandy then!" cried the young man, throwing down a golden eagle. "Your beer and wine are like dishwater to me. I want fire–fire in my veins now."
"Dunder and blixen! I shouldn't dink as you wus want much more fire as dere is in your eyes, young fellow. But I send for your prandy."
The young man threw one glance around the room to see if he were the only occupant.
There was another person there, one who had evidently just come in, a traveler, judging by a good-sized valise that was on the floor beside his chair. This person looked young, for the face, or as much of it as was not hidden by a very full black beard, was fair and smooth as that of a woman; while the hair which shaded his white brow was dark as night, soft and glossy as silk, hanging on short, curling masses about his face and neck.
He was dressed rather better than the usual run of travelers; in a good black broad-cloth suit–wore a heavy gold watch-chain, had on a fine linen shirt, with a diamond pin in the bosom, and appeared to feel quite satisfied with himself, from the cool and easy manner in which he gave his orders for a good, substantial meal, in a voice rather low and musical for one of his apparent age.
The last comer eyed this person very closely, and a smile almost, like contempt rose on his face, when the dark-eyed stranger called for claret wine, or if they had not that, for a cup of tea.
But his own strong drink was now brought in, and pouring out a glassful of undiluted brandy he drank it down and muttered:
"That's the stuff! It will keep up the fire. My veins would stiffen without it. It has carried me so far, and it must to the end. Then–no matter!"
The stranger or traveler looked as if wondering that the young man could take such a fearful dose of fiery liquor, and the wonder must have increased when a second glassful was drained before the food was on the table.
But the latter came
in now, and the traveler and the young man with auburn hair, at separate tables, were apparently too busy in disposing of the eatables to take any further notice of each other.
When the first had finished, he took a roll of cigarettes from one of his pockets, selected one, took a match from a silver box, drawn from the same pocket, and lighting his cigarette, threw a cloud of smoke above his head.
The second, pouring out his third glass of brandy, sipped it quietly–the first two glasses having evidently supplied the fire he craved so fiercely.
The traveler, as we may call him, for want of any other knowledge, now rose, and as if impelled by natural politeness, tendered a cigarette to the other.
The man with auburn hair looked surprised, and his fierce, wild face softened a little, as he said:
"Thank you, no. I drink sometimes, like a fish, but I don't smoke. Tobacco shakes the nerves, they say, and I want my nerves steady.
"Strong drink will shake them more, I've heard," said the traveler, in his low, musical voice. "But you seem to have a steady hand though you take brandy as if used to it."
"My hand is steady, stranger." was the reply. "There is not a man on the Rio Grande border, where I came from, that can strike a center at twenty paces with a revolver as often as I. And with a rifle at one hundred yards I can most generally drop a deer with a ball between his eyes, if he is looking at me, or take a wild turkey's head without hurting his body."
"Then, you are from Texas?"
"Yes, sir. And you?"
"From the East, sir. I have traveled in the South–all over, in fact–but my home is in the old Empire State.
"If it isn't impudent, which way are you bound now?"
"I haven't quite decided. I may go to the Black Hills–may remain around here awhile–it seems to be rather a pleasant place."
"Yes, for them that like it. I'm off for the Black Hills, myself."
"Ah! with a company?"
"Not much! But there's a company going. I'm one of them that don't care much for company, and can take better care of myself alone than with a crowd about me."
"So! Well, it is a good thing to be independent. Do you know the party that is going?"
"Some of 'em, by sight. The captain is Sam Chichester, and he has California Joe, Cap'n Jack, and about twenty more in his party. And Wild Bill has just come on the train, and I heard him say he was going with the crowd."
"Wild Bill!" cried the stranger, flushing up. "Did you say he was going?"
"Yes."
"Then I'd like to go, too–but I'd like to go with another party, either just before or behind that party. Do you know Wild Bill?"
"Know him! Who does not? Hasn't he killed more men than any other white man in the States and Territories–I'll not say how, but is he not a hyena, sopped in blood?"
"You do not like him?"
"Who says I don't?"
"You do! Your eyes flash hate while you speak of him."
"Do they? Well, maybe I don't like him as well as I do a glass of brandy–maybe I have lost some one I loved by his hand. It isn't at all unlikely."
The traveler sighed, and with an anxious look, said:
"You don't bear him any grudge, do you? You wouldn't harm him?"
A strange look passes like a flash over the face of the other: he seemed to read the thoughts or wishes of the traveler in a glance.
"Oh, no," he said, with assumed carelessness. "Accidents will happen in the best families. It's not in me to bear a grudge, because Bill may have wiped out fifteen or twenty Texans, while they were foolin' around in his way. As to harm–he's too ready with his six-shooter, old Truth-Teller, he calls it, to stand in much danger. I'm quick, but he is quicker. You take a good deal of interest in him? Do you know him?"
"Yes; that is, I know him by sight. He is thought a great deal of by an intimate friend of mine, and that is why I feel an interest in him."
"And that friend is a woman?"
"Why do you think so?"
"It is a fancy of mine."
"Well, I will not contradict you. For her sake I would hate to see any evil befall him."
There was a cynical smile on the face of the young man with auburn hair.
"If a woman loved him, she ought, not to leave him, for his life is mighty uncertain," said the latter. "I heard him say to Captain Chichester, not half an hour ago, that he didn't believe he would live long, and such a man as he is sure to die with his boots on!"
"Did he say that?" asked the traveler.
"Yes; and he seemed to feel it, too. He had to do as I do, fire up with something strong to get life into his veins."
"Poor fellow! He had better have staid East when he was there, away from this wild and lawless section."
"Stranger, there mayn't be much law out this way, but justice isn't always blind out here. If you stay long enough, you may learn that."
"Very likely; but you spoke of going to those Black Hills."
"Yes, I'm going."
"Will you let me go with you?"
"You don't look much like roughing it, and the trip is not only hard, but it may be dangerous. The redskins are beginning to act wolfish on the plains."
"I think I can stand as much hardship as you. You are light and slender."
"But tough as an old buffalo bull, for all that. I've been brought up in the saddle, with rifle and lasso in hand. I'm used to wind and weather, sunshine and storm–they're all alike to me."
"And Indians?"
"Yes–to Comanche, Kiowa, and Apache. But these Cheyennes and Sioux are a tougher breed, they tell me. I'll soon learn them too, I reckon. There's one thing sure, I don't go in no crowd of twenty or thirty, with wagons or pack mules along to tempt the cusses with, while they make the travel slow. You want either a big crowd or a very small one, if you travel in an Indian country.
"You have not answered my question yet. Will you let me go through to the Black Hills with you?"
"Why don't you go with the other party? They'll take you, I'll bet."
"I do not want to go where Wild Bill will see me. He may think his wife has sent me as a spy on his movements and actions."
"His wife! Is he married? It must be something new."
"It is. He was married only a short time ago to a woman who almost worships him. She did all she could to keep him from going out into his old life again, but she could not."
"You can go with me!" said the other, abruptly, after a keen and searching look in the traveler's face.
"What is your name?"
"Willie Pond."
"Rather a deep Pond, if I know what water is," said the auburn-haired man, to himself, and then he asked, in a louder tone, "have you horse and arms?"
"No; I just came on the train from the East. But there is money–buy me a good horse, saddle, and bridle. I'll see to getting arms."
And Mr. Willie Pond handed the other a five-hundred dollar treasury note.
"You don't ask my name, and you trust me with money as if you knew I was honest."
"You'll tell me your name when you feel like it!" was the rejoinder. "As to your honesty, if I think you are safe to travel with, you're safe to trust my money with!"
"You're right. Your money is safe. As to my name, call me Jack. It is short, if it isn't sweet. Some time I'll tell you the rest of it."
"All right, Jack. Take your own time. And now get all ready to start either ahead or just behind the other party."
"We'll not go ahead. Where will you stay to-night?"
"Wherever you think best."
"All right. This old Dutchman keeps rooms for lodgers. You'd better stay here, and if you don't want Bill to see you, keep pretty close in doors. He'll be out in the Black Hillers' camp, or in the saloons where they sell benzine and run faro banks. Bill is death on cards."
"So I've heard," said Mr. Pond, with a sigh.
Jack now went out, and Pond called the Dutch landlord to him and engaged a room.
* * *
CHAPTER II.
As soon as the auburn-haired man who called himself Jack had left the German restaurant, he went to a livery-stable near by, called for his own horse, which was kept there, and the instant it was saddled he mounted, and at a gallop rode westward from the town.
He did not draw rein for full an hour, and then he had covered somewhere between eight and ten miles of ground, following no course or trail, but riding in a course as straight as the flight of an arrow.
He halted then in a small ravine, nearly hidden by a growth of thick brush, and gave a peculiar whistle. Thrice had this sounded, when a man came cautiously out of the ravine, or rather out of its mouth. He was tall, slender, yet seemed to possess the bone and muscle of a giant. His eyes were jet black, fierce and flashing, and his face had a stern, almost classic beauty of feature, which would have made him a model in the ancient age of sculpture. He carried a repeating rifle, two revolvers, and a knife in his belt. His dress was buckskin, from head to foot.
"You are Persimmon Bill?" said Jack, in a tone of inquiry. "Yes. Who are you, and how came you by the signal that called me out?"
"A woman in town gave it to me, knowing she could trust me."
"Was her first name Addie?"
"Her last name was Neidic."
"All right. I see she has trusted you. What do you want?"
"Help in a matter of revenge."
"Good! You can have it. How much help is wanted?"
"I want one man taken from a party, alive, when he gets beyond civilized help, so that I can see him tortured. I want him to die by inches."
"How large is his party, and where are they now?"
"The party numbers between twenty and thirty; they are in camp in the edge of Laramie, and will start for the Black Hills in a few days."
"If all the party are wiped out but the one you want, will it matter to you?"
"No; they are his friends, and as such I hate them!"
"All right. Get me a list of their numbers and names, how armed, what animals and stores they have, every fact, so I can be ready. They will never get more than half way to the Hills, and the one you want shall be delivered, bound into your hands. All this, and more, will I do for her who sent you here!"
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