Altsheler, Joseph - [Great West 01]

by The Great Sioux Trail (lit)

  as I do the same way you do, I think we'd better put out our fire and shift to another part of the val- ley."

  "That's a lot of 'thinks/ " said Brady, "but it seems to me that you're both right, and I've no doubt such thoughts are put into our minds to save our lives. Perhaps it would be best for us to start up the slopes at once, but if our time is coming tonight it will come and no flight of ours will alter it."

  Nevertheless they took the precaution to stamp out the last coal, and then moved silently with the animals to another part of the dip. While they were tethering their horses and mules there in a little glade all the animals began to tremble violently and it required Will's utmost efforts to soothe them. The acute ears of Brady detected a low growling on their right, not far from the base of the cliff.

  "Come, Tom," he said to the Little Giant. "You and I will see what it is, and be sure you're ready with that rifle of yours. You ought to shoot beautifully in this clear moonlight."

  They disappeared among the bushes, but returned in a few minutes, although the growling had become louder and was continuous. Both men had lost a little of their ruddiness.

  "What was it?" asked Will.

  "It wuz your friend, the Sioux warrior who held you in the cliff so long," replied the Little Giant, shud- dering. "Half a dozen big mountain wolves are quar- relin' 'bout the right place to bury him in. But, any- way, he's bein' buried, an* mighty fast too."

  196

  THE MOUNTAIN RAM

  Will shuddered also, and over and over again. In fact, his nervous system had been so shaken that it would not recover its full force for a day, and the others, trained to see all things, noticed it.

  "You soothe them animals ag'in, young William," said the Little Giant, "an' we'll spread the blankets fur our beds here in the bushes."

  Bent again showed supreme judgment, as in quiet- ing the fears of the horses and mules for the second time Will found that renewed strength flowed back into his own nervous system, and when he returned to the fireless camp his hand and voice were once more quite steady.

  "There is your bed, William," said Brady. "You lie on one blanket, put the other over you, and also one of the bearskins. It's likely to be a dry and cold night, but anyway, whether it rains or snows, it will rain or snow on the just and the unjust, and blankets and bearskin should keep you dry. That growling in the bushes, too, has ceased, and our friend, the Sioux, who sought your life, has found a dreadful grave."

  Will shuddered once more, but when he crept be- tween the blankets his nerves were soothed rapidly and he soon fell asleep.

  The three men kept watch and watch through the night, and they saw no Indian foe. Once Boyd heard a rustling in the bushes, and he made out the figure of a huge mountain wolf that stood staring at them for a moment. The horses and mules began to stir uneasily, and, picking up a stone, the hunter threw it with such

  197

  THE GREAT SIOUX TRAIL

  good aim that the wolf, struck smartly on the body, ran away.

  The animals relapsed into quiet, and nothing more stirred in the bushes, until the leaves began to move under the light breeze that came at dawn.

  CHAPTER IX

  THE BUFFALO MARCH

  DRAWN by an impulse that he tried to check but could not, Will went in the morning to the point in the bushes whence the growling had come the night before, finding there nothing but the bones of the Sioux, from which every trace of flesh had been removed. He shuddered once more. He, in- stead of the warrior, might have been the victim. His eyes, trained now to look upon the earth as a book and to read what might be printed there, saw clearly the tracks of the wolves among the grass and leaves. After finishing what they had come to do they had gone away some distance and had gathered together in a close group, as if they had meditated an attack, possibly upon the horses and mules.

  Will knew how great and fierce the mountain wolves of the north were, and he was glad to note that, after their council, they had gone on and perhaps had left the valley. At least, he was able to follow their tracks as far as the lower rocks, where they disappeared. When he returned to the little camp he told what he had seen.

  "We're in no danger of a surprise from the big 199

  THE GREAT SIOUX TRAIL

  wolves," said Brady. "They'd have killed and eaten some of the horses and mules if we hadn't been here, but wolves are smart, real smart. Like as not they saw Thomas shoot the Sioux, and they knew that the long stick he carried, from which fire spouted, slaying the warrior, was like the long sticks all of us carry, and that to attack us here was death for them. Oh, I know I'm guessing a lot, but I've observed 'em a long time and I'm convinced wolves can reason that far."

  "All animals are smarter than we think they are," said the Little Giant. "I've lived among 'em a heap, an' know a lot o' their ways. Only they've a difFrent set o' intellectooals from ours. What we're smart in they ain't, an' what they're smart in we ain't. Now, ef I had joined to what I am myself the strength o' a grizzly bear, the cunnin' o' a wolf an' the fleetness o' an antelope I reckon I'd be 'bout the best man that ever trod 'roun' on this planet."

  "I've one thing to suggest before we start," said Will, "and I think it's important."

  "What is it?" asked Boyd.

  "That we make copies of the map. We may become separated for long periods everything indicates that we will I might fall into the hands of Felton, who seems to have a hint about the mine, and, if I saw such a thing about to occur, I would destroy the map, and then you would have the copies. Each of you faced by a similar misfortune could make away with his copy, and if the worst came to the worst I could re- draw it from memory."

  "Good idee! Good idee!" exclaimed the Little 200

  THE BUFFALO MARCH

  Giant with enthusiasm. "I've been tellin' Jim an* Steve that though they mightn't think it, you had the beginnin's o' intelleck in that head o' yours."

  "Thank you," said Will, and they all laughed.

  "It's a good thought," said Boyd, "and we'd better do it at once."

  Will carried in his pack some pens and a small bottle of indelible ink, and with these they drew with the greatest care three more maps on fine deerskin, small but very clear, and then every man stored one in a secure place about his person.

  "Now, remember," said Boyd, "if any one of us is in danger of capture he must get rid of his map."

  Then, their breakfast over, they began the ascent of the slope, leading toward the White Dome, finding it easier than they had thought. As always, difficulties decreased when they faced them boldly, and even the animals, refreshed by their stay in the valley, showed renewed vigor, climbing like goats. The Little Giant whistled merrily, mostly battle songs of the late war which was still so fresh in the minds of all men.

  "I notice that you whistle songs of both sides," said Brady. "Musically, at least, you have no feeling about our great Civil War."

  "Nor any other way, either," rejoined the Little Giant. "I may hev hed my feelin's once, though I ain't sayin' now what they wuz, but fur me the war is all over, done fit clean out. They say six or seven hundred thousand men wuz lost in it, an* now that it's over it's got to stop right than I'm lookin' to the future, I am, to the quarter of a million in gold that's 201

  THE GREAT SIOUX TRAIL

  comin' to me, an* the gorgeous ways in which I'm goin' to spend it. Young William, see that big moun- tain ram standin' out on the side o' the peak over thar. I believe he's the same feller that you tried to stalk yesterday, an* that he's laughin' at you. He's a good mile away, but I kin see the twinkle in his eye, an' ez shore ez I stan' here he lifted his left foot to his nose an' twisted it 'bout in a gesture which among us boys allers meant fight. Do you stan' his dare, young Wil- liam, or are you goin' to climb over thar whar he is an' hev it out with him?"

  "I'll let him alone," laughed William, looking at the splendid ram, outlined so sharply in the clear moun- tain light. "I meant to do him harm, but I'm glad I didn't. Maybe that Indian was engaged in t
he same task, when he saw me and changed his hunting."

  Then he shuddered once more at the growling he had heard and what he had seen in the bushes the next morning, but his feeling of horror did not last long, because they were now climbing well upon the shoulder of the White Dome and the spectacle, magnificent and inspiring, claimed all their attention.

  The last bushes and dwarfed vegetation disappeared. Before them rose terrace on terrace, slope on slope of rock, golden or red in the sun, and beyond them the great snow fields and the glaciers. Over it all towered the White Dome, round and pure, the finest mountain Will had ever seen. He never again saw anything that made a more deep and solemn impression upon him. Far above all the strife and trouble of the world swam the white peak.

  202

  THE BUFFALO MARCH

  Meanwhile the Little Giant continued to whistle merrily. He was not awed, and he was not solemn. Prone to see the best in everything, he enjoyed the magnificent panorama outspread before them, and also drew from it arguments most favorable for their quest.

  "We're absolutely safe from the warriors," he said. "We're above the timber line, and they'd never come up here huntin'. An Indian doesn't do anythin' more than he has to. He ain't goin' to wear hisself out climbin' to the top o' a mounting ten miles high in order to hev a look at the scenery. We won't be troubled by no warriors 'til we go down the shoulder o' your White Dome on the other side."

  He resumed his clear, musical whistling, pouring out in a most wonderful manner the strains of "Dixie," changing impartially to "Yankee Doodle," shifting 1 back to "The Bonnie Blue Flag," and then, with the same lack of prejudice, careering into "Marching Through Georgia."

  The horses and mules that they were now leading felt the uplifting influence, raised their heads and marched forward more sturdily.

  "What makes you so happy?" asked Will.

  "The kindness o' natur' what gave me that kind o' a disposition," replied the Little Giant, "an' added to it the feelin' that all the time I'm drawin' closer to my gold. What did you say my share would be, young William, a matter o' a million or a half million ?"

  "A quarter of a million."

  "Seems to me it wuz a half million, but somehow 203

  THE GREAT SIOUX TRAIL

  it grows ez we go 'long. When you git rich, even in the mind, you keep on gittin' richer."

  Then he began to whistle a gallant battle stave with extraordinary richness and variety of tone, and when he had finished Will asked :

  "What was that song, Tom? It's a new one to me."

  "It's new to most people," replied the Little Giant, "but it's old jest the same. It wuz writ 'way back in the last war with England, an* I'll quote you the first two verses, words an' grammar both correct:

  "Britannia's gallant streamers Float proudly o'er the tide, And fairly wave Columbia's stripes In battle side by side, And ne'er did bolder seamen meet Where ocean surges pour O'er the tide now they ride While the bell'wing thunders roar While the cannon's fire is flashing fast And the bell'wing thunders roar.

  "When Yankee meets the Briton Whose blood congenial flows, By Heaven created to be friends By fortune reckoned foes: Hard then must be the battle fray E'er well the fight is o'er, Now they ride, side by side, While the bell'wing thunders roar, While the cannon's fire is flashing fast And the bell'wing thunders roar.

  204.

  THE BUFFALO MARCH

  "That's a lot more verses, young William, an* it's all 'bout them great naval duels o' the war o' 1812, an* you'll notice that whoever writ 'em had no ill feelin' in his natur*, an* give heaps o' credit to the British. It does seem that we an' the British ought to be friends, bein' so close kin, actin' so much alike, an' havin* institutions just the same, 'cept that whar they hev a king we hev a president. Yet here we are quarrelin' with 'em a lot, though not more than they quarrel with us."

  "The trouble lies in the fact that we speak the same language," said Will. "Every word of abuse spoken by one is understood by the other. Now, if the French or the Spanish or the Russians denounce us we never hear anything about it, don't know even that it's been done."

  "That's good ez fur ez it goes," said the Little Giant. "I've seen a lot o' English that don't speak any Eng- lish, a-tall, fellers that come out o' the minin' regions in England an' some from London, too, that talked a lingo soundin' ez much like English ez Sioux does, but it doesn't alter the fact that them an' us ought to be friends. An' I reckon we will be now, 'cause I hear they're claimin' that our Washington wuz an Englishman, the same immortal George that they would hev hung in the Revolution along with his little hatchet, too, ef they could hev caught him."

  Will laughed with relish.

  "In a way Washington was an Englishman," he said. "That is, he was of pure English stock, trans- planted to another land. The Athenians were Greeks,

  205

  THE GREAT SIOUX TRAIL

  the most famous of the Greeks, but they were not the oldest of the Greeks by any means. They were a colony from Asia Minor, just as we were a colony from England."

  "I don't know much 'bout the Greeks, young Wil- liam, my lad, but ef the English kin lay claim to Washington ez one o' their sons, 'cause he wuz of pure English blood, then me an* most o' the Americans kin lay jest ez good a claim to Shakespeare 'cause, we bein' o' pure British blood, he wuz one o' our an- cestors."

  "Your claim is perfectly good, Giant. By and by, both Washington and Shakespeare will belong to the whole English-speaking world."

  "Its proudest ornyments, so to speak. Now, that bein' settled, I'd like to go back to a p'int that troubles me."

  "If I can help call on me."

  "It's 'bout that song I wuz jest singin'. At the last line o' each verse it says : 'An* the bell' wing thunders roar/ I've thought it over a heap o' times, but I've never rightly made out what a bell'wing thunder is. Thar ain't nothin' 'bout thunder that reminds me o' bells. Now what is it, young William?"

  Will began to laugh.

  "What do you find so funny?" asked the Little Giant suspiciously.

  "Nothing at all! Nothing at all!" replied Will hastily. " 'Bell' wing' is bellowing. The writer meant the bellowing thunders, and it's cut off to bell'wing for the sake of rhyme and metre, a poetical liberty,

  206

  THE BUFFALO MARCH

  so to speak. You see, poets have liberties denied to other people."

  "Wa'al, I reckon they need a few. All that I ever seed did. But I'm mighty glad the p'int hez been settled. It's been botherin' me fur years. Thank you, young William."

  "I think now," said Boyd, "that we'd better be looking for a camp."

  "Among all these canyons and valleys," said Will, "it shouldn't be hard to find a suitable place."

  Canyons were too abundant for easy traveling, and finding a fairly level though narrow place in one of the deepest, they pitched camp there, building a fire with wood which they had added to their packs for this purpose, and feeding to the animals grass which they had cut on the lowef slopes. With the warm food and the fire it was not so bad, although the wind began to whistle fiercely far above their heads. The animals hovered near the fire for warmth, looking to the human beings who guided them for protec- tion.

  "I think we shall pass the highest point of our jour- ney tomorrow," said Brady, "and then for the de- scent along the shoulder of the White Dome. Truly the stars have fought for us and I cannot believe that, after having escaped so many perils, we will succumb to others to come."

  "O' course we won't," said the Little Giant cheer- fully, "an* all the dangers we've passed through will make our gold all the more to us. Things ain't much to you 'less you earn 'em. When I git my million,

  207

  THE GREAT SIOUX TRAIL

  which is to be my share o' that mine, I'll feel like I earned it."

  "A quarter of a million, Tom," laughed Will. "You're getting avaricious as we go on. You raised it to a half million and now you make it a million."

  "It does look ez ef my fancy grew m
ore heated the nearer we come to the gold. I do hev big ex- pectations fur a feller that never found a speck of it. How that wind does howl! Do you think, young William, that a glacier is comin' right squar' down on us?"

  "No, Tom. Glaciers, like tortoises, move slowly. We'll have time to get out of the way of any glacier. It's easy to outrun the fastest one on the globe."

  "I've heard tell that the earth was mostly covered with 'em once. Is that so?"

  "They say there was an Ice Age fifty thousand or so years ago, when everything that lived had to huddle along the equator. I don't vouch fo r it. I'm merely telling what the scholars tell."

  "I'll take your word for it, young William, an* all the same I'm glad I didn't live then. Think o' bein* froze to death all your life. Ez it is I'm ez cold ez I keer to be, layin' here right now in this canyon."

  "If we were not hunting for gold," said Brady, "I'd try to climb to the top of this mountain. I take it to be close on to fourteen thousand feet in height and I often feel the ambition of the explorer. Per- haps that's why I've been willing to search so long and in vain for the great beaver horde. I find so many interesting things by the way, lakes, rivers, mountains,

  208

  THE BUFFALO MARCH

  valleys, game, hot springs, noble forests and many other things that help to make up a splendid world. It's worth while for a man like me, without any ties, just to wander up and down the face of the earth."

  "Do you know anything about the country beyond the White Dome?" asked Will.

  "Very little, except that it slopes down rapidly to a much lower range of mountains, mostly forested, then to hills, forested also, and after that we have the great plains again."

  "Now you've talked enough, young William," said the Little Giant. "It's time for you to sleep, but ez this is goin* to be a mighty cold night up here, fifteen or twenty miles 'bove the clouds, I reckon we'd better git blankets, an' wrap up the hosses an' mules too."