SQUARING ACCOUNTS.
When Simon Kenton was left alone by the missionary, who had been the
means of bringing about this hostile meeting, he knew that a full hour
must pass before his mortal enemy, The Panther, would reach the spot.
The ranger was in need of sleep, and he did a thing which, while the
most sensible act he could perform under the circumstances, was
certainly extraordinary; he sat down on the ground, with his back
against a tree, closed his eyes in slumber, and did not open them again
until the hour had passed. He possessed that ability, which almost any
one can acquire, of awaking at any time previously fixed upon.
Day was breaking, its light steadily spreading and diffusing itself
through the surrounding forest and filling the summer sky with an
increasing glow. Kenton deliberately arose, drank from the neighboring
river, bathing his hands and face in it, and then sauntered to the spot
where he expected to meet the dusky miscreant who was equally eager to
cross weapons with him. Leaning his rifle against a tree, the ranger
took a position and attitude in which nothing could approach or pass
without being noted by him.
"The parson is the best man in the world," he mused; "there ain't
another white man that dare go visitin' 'mong the varmints like him, for
they trust him just as his own kith and kin do.
"When I seed him walk out of the wood, right by them other varmints and
straight up to The Panther, I was sartin it was all over with him, and
he was in for his last sickness sure. The Panther had just had things
slip up on him in a way that must have made him mad enough to bite off
his own head, but the parson fixed it, and The Panther and me are bound
to meet this time.
"There must be something in that thing which he preaches," continued the
ranger, musingly, "which ain't like other things. What he says hits one
so powerful hard that it makes me feel quar. It makes him love the
varmints, the black people and the white all alike; it makes him leave
his home and spend days or weeks in the wood, just as Boone done afore
he brought his family to Kentucky.
"What did the missionary mean by tellin' me a brave man is merciful? I
wonder whether he had any talk with The Panther? It would be just like
him to do so, but it was time throwed away. Howsumever, his words to me
stick in my ears, and keep going back and forth as nothin' that was ever
said to me afore has done.
"The Panther is full of grit; when he comes I'll make him b'leve I think
he was scared and run off. That'll make him so mad, he'll fight harder
than ever, which is what I want.
"But he'll fight like a wounded catamount, He is sure he'll wipe me out
and send me under this time, and that he can go on shootin' settlers in
the back, tomahawking women and children without stoppin' to bother with
me. Somehow or other I don't feel as sartin in this matter as afore, but
I wouldn't let this chance of closing accounts with The Panther pass by
for the whole of Kentucky--sh! there he comes!"
A rustle, such as a quail might have made in walking over the leaves,
caused the ranger to turn his head like a flash. The undergrowth parted,
and Wa-on-mon, chief of the Shawanoes, stepped into full view hardly ten
feet distant, with his glittering eyes fixed upon the face of the
ranger.
The coarse black hair dangled about the shoulders, with a couple of
strands hanging loosely over the chest. Three stained eagle feathers
projected backward from the crown, where the hair was stained with
several hues of paint. The hard, sinister features displayed the same
fantastic daubs that marked them when The Panther was a prisoner on the
flatboat, the white cross showing on the forehead, with streakings of
red and black on the cheeks and chin. The coppery chest was bare to the
waist, where reposed the single weapon of the chieftain--his formidable
hunting knife, which had committed many a dark deed when wielded in the
vicious grip of the dusky miscreant.
Below the breech-clout the iron limbs were encased in leggings and the
small feet were covered with moccasins, now faded and worn by hard
usage. The Panther paused, with his left foot in advance, his right hand
grasping the hilt of his knife at his waist, and his shoulders and head
thrust forward, the attitude of the body being that of an athlete with
his muscles concentrated for a leap across a chasm that yawns in front
of him.
The pose of Kenton was dissimilar, and yet showed some points of
resemblance. In accordance with the custom of his people, he carried his
knife, in a small scabbard, by a string over his left breast. He grasped
the handle, ready to whip it out on the first need. He did not mean that
his antagonist should "get the drop" on him.
Kenton stood with his feet well together, but separated enough to give
his attitude grace and strength. His coonskin cap, fringed hunting
shirt, leggings and shoes were such as were commonly worn by people of
his calling. He was taller, more sinewy and equally active with the
Shawanoe, upon whom his blue eyes were fixed with burning intensity and
a glow that was the "light of battle" itself.
The Panther had brought no weapon except his knife with him. The rifle
of the ranger rested against a tree several paces away, and as near the
Indian as the white man. It was a strange position for two mortal
enemies, thoroughly distrusting each other, but in neither case did it
imply a lessening of that distrust; it simply attested the faith of the
two in a third person--Missionary Finley. He had arranged this meeting,
and both believed in him.
A scornful smile lit up the thin, smooth, handsome face of Kenton, who,
with his fingers still clasping the haft of the weapon at his breast,
said in the Shawanoe tongue:
"The Panther meets his enemy at last, but does he bring no warriors with
him to hide among the trees and rush forward when he begs for mercy from
the white man?"
This question was meant for the cutting taunt it proved to be, for it
was a strange fashion on the frontier, when two enemies came face to
face in deadly encounter, for each to try to goad the other to the point
of what may be termed nervousness before the critical assault took
place.
"The Panther needs no one to help him bring the dog of a white man to
his knees," replied Wa-on-mon, holding his passion well in hand.
"Then why, Shawanoe, did you run away when a short time since you
promised to meet me by the splintered tree near the clearing?"
"The dog of a white man speaks as a fool! He knows that Wa-on-mon
hastened to find his brave warriors, that the pale-faces should not be
allowed to make their way to the fort. He found them, and they shall
never get there."
"The Shawanoes have tried to stop them, but could not; they tried last
night, and more than one of the dogs were brought low. The gun that
leans against the tree there did its part, as it shall continue to do.
The Shawanoes fled as children, and I leaped ashore and chased them, but
they ran too fast for me to catch them."
This was drawing it with a long bow, but as we have intimated, it was in
accordance with the fashion of the times. The chieftain restrained his
temper better than would have been expected, for the reason that he
understood the motive of his enemy; it was the contest preliminary to
the decisive one.
"Why did not the white dogs all come ashore and chase the Shawanoes?" he
asked, with little appearance of passion in voice or manner.
"One of them did--a little child--you, dog of a Shawanoe, made captive
the child and strode back among your warriors, proud and boastful
because it was the first prisoner you ever took. Oh, brave Shawanoe! Oh,
mighty chieftain!"
While uttering these taunts, Kenton did not permit the slightest "sign"
to escape him. He saw he was fast goading his foe to the resistless
point, the object he had in view. There was an almost insensible
tightening of the muscles of the fingers closing around the handle of
the knife, the faintest possible quiver passed through the thighs, or
showed in a single twitch of the toes of the left foot, which inched
forward. The Panther gave a quick inhalation, and while the words
recorded were in the mouth of Kenton, he hissed:
"Die, dog of a pale-face!"
At the same time he bounded forward, as does the animal whose name he
bore when leaping upon his prostrate foe. The intervening space was
cleared at the single leap, and the knife, whipped from the girdle at
the instant of starting, made a fierce sweep through the air, almost too
quick for the eye to follow, and shot like the head of a rattlesnake at
the breast of the ranger.
Nevertheless, it clove through vacancy, for Kenton recoiled a single
step, the hundredth part of a second before the weapon flashed in front
of his face, and struck with equal power and swiftness at the crouching
demon while yet in mid-air; but nothing could have surpassed the
dexterity of The Panther, who, by a flirt of the head, dodged the blow,
and dropping like a cat upon his feet, not only endeavored to strike the
white man in the back, but came within a hair of succeeding. It need
hardly be said that had he done so, the conflict would have been over on
the instant.
But Kenton saved himself, and faced about to receive the assault from
the opposite direction.
Instead of following up the slight and yet possibly fatal advantage thus
obtained, The Panther became more guarded in his attack. The opening
bout made both more cautious; their respect for each other's prowess was
increased.
Neither uttered a syllable; the taunts had ended; there was no call to
goad each other to fury, for the highest point of passion was already
attained. To spend breath in the utterance of words was to place
themselves in the position of the gymnast who breaks into laughter--it
would be a fatal weakening of strength.
The Panther, crouching low, clutching knife, with head thrust forward,
and gleaming eye fixed on his victim, began slowly circling around him,
on the watch for an opening that would permit him to bound forward and
strike his foe to the earth.
Standing thus in the centre of a circle, Kenton had but to turn slowly
so as to keep his face turned toward his assailant. It was the easiest
thing in the world to present indefinitely an unassailable front, and
yet The Panther had barely completed his first circuit when the opening
which he sought offered itself, and he seized it with lightning-like
quickness.
But it was presented purposely; Kenton incited the attack, and when the
Shawanoe demon shot through the air toward him, he steadied himself for
a second, and struck again with all the might and skill at command.
That which the ranger had not counted upon, or which was not likely to
happen once in a thousand times, intervened to save The Panther for the
single instant. He and Kenton struck precisely the same blow, and their
forearms glanced against each other. The stroke of the white man was the
more powerful, and impinging against the less muscular arm of the
Shawanoe with paralyzing force, sent his knife spinning twenty feet away
among the undergrowth. Before the agile Shawanoe could recover himself
the left hand of Kenton griped his throat, he was borne furiously
backward, hurled to the ground as though he were an infant, the knee of
the ranger was at his breast, and the knife was held ready to complete
the fearful work.
"Dog of a Shawanoe!" hissed the infuriated hunter, "you are conquered at
last! Now beg for mercy!"
Had the positions of the two been reversed, the prostrate foe could not
have been more defiant when he hissed back, with flashing eye:
"Dog of a pale-face, that is afraid to strike!"
The words were meant as a taunt to the ranger to do his worst.
Down deep in the heart of every being, no matter how degraded, how
sinful, how wicked, how merciless, is a spark of goodness which, when
fanned by the angel's breath, glows or spreads until it burns out all
the dross that years of wrong-doing have implanted there. Why it was and
how it came about, Simon Kenton to his dying day never fully understood,
but he always insisted that at that moment he heard the voice of
Missionary Finley, with unmistakable distinctness, in his ear:
"Show him mercy, and mercy shall be shown to you when you need it!"
Impelled by a power which he dared not resist, the ranger rose from the
chest of The Panther, and said in tones that sounded like those of
another person:
"Shawanoe, take your life; I give it to you!"