"GOOD-BYE!"
Deerfoot directed his course toward the elevation where he and his
friends stood when they first caught sight of the smoke of the
camp-fire. It was an easy matter to determine, whether the Osages
had discovered the horse while in that section. If they had not
done so, the probabilities were against their finding him at all.
An interesting question had already been answered by Deerfoot,
respecting the degree of hostility of the Osage Indians. There was
comfort in the thought that they were not active and malignant in
their enmity. They were not likely to trail a white man for the
sake of taking his life, as their fierce brethren across the
Mississippi loved to do, nor did they possess the courage of the
warlike Shawanoes, whose encounters with the early pioneers of the
West form the most thrilling episodes in its history.
But, like the vagabond red men of to-day, the Osages were of that
character that a white man would much prefer not to meet them in a
lonely place, unless help was present or within call. If they
should come across the two boys, their treatment of them would
depend very much on the mood in which they happened to be. They
would be inclined to rob them of everything worth taking, and might
end the matter by shooting both or turning them adrift without guns
or ammunition.
Had Deerfoot been alone, he would have given them no thought. He
had visited their villages more than once, and though the questions
of several of their warriors showed that they regarded him with
suspicion, they offered no indignity, and made no objection to his
departure.
Had the Osages found the wandering they would refuse to give him up
on the demand of the owner. In that case, as in one already
related, he could be regained only by strategy, in which the boys
were sure to need the help of Deerfoot.
But all this speculation speedily ended. An examination revealed
the fact that the trail of the steed and that of the warriors
crossed, but the latter was fully two hours older than the former,
and from the point of intersection they diverged. Thus it was
proven that the colt had been grazing for a considerable time close
to the Indians without them suspecting it.
The Osages had continued traveling in a southwesterly direction,
while the stray horse had kept on in a course slightly to the north
of west. There could be no doubt that the warriors were making
their way homeward, while the animal seemed guided by an instinct
that promised to place him in the possession of his owner, without
any assistance from the son.
The discovery was most gratifying to all parties, Deerfoot
expressing his pleasure that Otto was not likely to suffer at the
hands of his irate parent for the disaster which was unavoidable on
his part.
"Good fortune awaits my brother," said he; "he may not meet any red
men on his way home, where Deerfoot hopes the horse will greet him
when he arrives."
"Did you see any Indians on this side the Mississippi when you were
riding him?" asked Jack.
Otto shook his head, as he was sure that style of answer could not
be criticized by either of his companions.
"The outlook is a good one indeed," said Jack, heartily; "and what
you have done, Deerfoot, is more than we can ever repay. You need
not be, told that if it ever comes within our power to give you
help, it will not be denied."
To their surprise the young Shawanoe extended his hand to Otto.
"Good-bye, brother."
The lad shook it warmly, and said:
"Ish you going not--I means, will you leave us?"
"Deerfoot must go; good-bye, brother."
The second farewell was addressed to Jack Carleton, who fervently
pressed the soft hand, an said with much feeling:
"Sorry are we to part company, but you your own master. I hope we
shall soon meet again!"
"We shall," was all that the Shawanoe said as he released his hand
and moved off, vanishing almost instantly among the trees.
The boys stood several minutes, silent and thoughtful, looking
toward the point where the Shawanoe was last seen, as though they
expected him to return; but the silence around them continued as
profound as at "creation's morn." They knew that when the young
warrior took such a step, he was in earnest.
He would have been glad to keep them company, but some good reason
took him in another direction.
"We shall meet him again," said Jack Carleton, with a slight sigh of
regret, recalling the last words of Deerfoot; "from all that was
told me about him in Kentucky, he is such a friend to the whites
that he was never away from their settlements for a very long time.
I have been anxious to know him."
"They used to dell von great shtories apout him," said Otto,
speaking with great care.
"And I never believed one half of them. The idea of a young Shawanoe
reading his Bible every day, and being able to write the prettiest
kind of a band, was something that made us laugh, but every word of
it was true, as he proved to us."
"Den vot pig dings be doos in de woods!"
"I should say so. Just think of it, Otto! There we were among a
pile of logs, surrounded as you may say by Indian warriors, bent on
having our scalps, and yet he delivered a letter to us, explaining
the plan he had formed, and then alone scared away the whole lot, so
we could out. When you get back home and tell parents this story,
what will they say?"
"Mine fader will say nodings, but he vill cut pig stick and bang me
as bard as nefer vos lying."
"And I can't wonder much at it," said Jack with a laugh, "but it
will be truth, nevertheless, and it is no more wonderful than many
things he has done."
"Vy doesn't dey calls him Deerfoot--dot ish, why does dey?"
"On account of his fleetness; he is the swiftest runner ever known
in Kentucky. A year or two ago, he was captured by the Wyandots,
who hate him worse than poison. He pretended he was lame, which put
the idea in the head of his capture to have some fun with him. They
took him out on a long clearing and placed him in front of the
swiftest warriors, and then told him to run for his life. Well, he
ran."
"Did they cotch him and kill him, or didn't he get away?"
"Those Indians," said Jack, ignoring the absurdity of Otto's
question, "saw such running as they never looked upon before.
Deerfoot just scooted away from them, as though he had wings. One
of the Hurons had treated him very bad and Deerfoot paid him."
"How vosn't dot?"
"He drove his tomahawk through his skull."
"Yaw; I dinks he doesn't bodder Deerfoot not much more."
"I never heard that he did, but you can't understand why the Indians
hate him as they do. I've heard that Tecumseh offered a dozen
horses, and I don't know how much wampum and other presents, to the
warrior who would bring back his scalp. But I've no doubt he had to
send out a proclamation taking back the offer."
"Vy vosn't dot?"
"I've been told that the rule was when a Huron or Shawanoe went out
to hunt for Deerfoot, that was the last heard of him. He never came
back, and you see that Deerfoot still wears his scalp."
"Vere didn't them goes to vot didn't comes back?"
"To their happy hunting-grounds. Sometimes, their bodies were found
moldering in the woods. And sometimes no one ever knew where they
perished. Deerfoot is a Christian (and, Otto, made me feel ashamed
of myself), but he isn't the kind to sit down and allow any one to
walk off with his scalp. Tecumseh is a young chief, who's is ambitious
to make war upon the whites. He must have concluded that if he didn't
stop his warriors hunting Deerfoot there would be none left for him!
I can't understand, Otto, how it was your father turned him away from
his door, when he stopped there at night in a storm."
"Ah, Jack, you doesn't know how mean mine fader ish," said the
German with a grin though proud of his parent.
"He couldn't have known that it was Deerfoot," said Jack,
reflectively.
"Dot wouldn't make no difference; he treat all Indians de same. One
dimes they stole a pig vot didn't pelongs to him and he whipped me
as hard as nefer vos, and he hates all Indians for dot."
"It is a great mistake," added Jack thoughtfully, "for you know how
revengeful they are, and one of these days some trumping redskin
that he has abused will steal up to his house and shoot him dead."
"Dot is vot I tolds him," said Otto; "and he will be as sorry as
dunderation ven it afift too late."
"Well," added Jack, looking around him, "it isn't worth while to
stand here, when we have such a long ways to travel, and there is no
certainty the colt hasn't changed his course and gone away from the
settlement instead of toward it."
Otto agreed with his friend, and, picking up his damp blanket, he
threw it over his shoulder, and each with his gun in his hand,
resumed the pursuit of the stray, which they hoped was at no great
distance.
The hoof-prints showed that the horse continued to take matters very
philosophically. His fastest gait was a leisurely walk, and often
he stood still and nibbled the buds of the vegetation not yet fully
developed.
It was gratifying to find that in spite of an occasional digression,
his general course was as named. It is pleasant to discover that
the missing wanderer is steadily making his ward, even though he is
a long time in arriving at his destination.
It was comparatively early in the afternoon when Deerfoot the
Shawanoe bade them good-bye, and for two hours the route underwent
little change; but at time, Jack Carleton was forced to admit that
the course they were following was not the one to take them to the
settlement.
Shortly after the departure of their friend, they crossed the trail
over which Otto had ridden some days before, and then the hoof-prints
tended more to the north, so that, in a general way, the boys took
the direction of the Mississippi itself. It could not be expected
that while keeping a considerable distance from water, would follow
its amazing tortuosity, probably surpasses that of any river on the
globe. Thus it came about that sometimes Jack and Otto found
themselves close to the immense stream and then again they were a
long ways inland.
"It seems to me," said Jack, when the afternoon was drawing to a
close, "that we ought be quite near the colt; we have gone steadily
forward, while he has often stopped, and as yet has not traveled
faster than a walk."
"But he starts a long time pefore we starts," said Otto.
"Not so very long. There's one thing quite certain: he doesn't care
whether he finds his way to the settlement or not, for he isn't
trying to do so."
"He changes agin, don't he?"
"Likely enough, and he may turn still further off from the right
course. It is getting so late that we shall have hard work to reach
home with him to-morrow."
"When we fluds him we gots on him and makes him go like he nefer
goes mit pefore."
"We won't be able to travel fast until we get him back to the
regular path, where the trees and limbs won't interfere with us."
"If Deerfoot vos mit us he tells us how close he be to us," said
Otto, alluding to the skill of the Shawanoe in interpreting the age
of a trail.
"He would do so at a glance. Helloa!"
Just then Jack, who was slightly in advance of his friend, caught
sight of a bundle similar that which the Shawanoe found several
hours before.
Hurrying forward, it was seen to be the blanket of Jack Carleton,
which, like the other, had come displaced and fallen from the back
of the wandering horse. Like that, too, it was saturated with
Mississippi water, which, as far as could, the boys wrung from it.