grass park of sandy subsoil, below hills on which wandered the ponies
in times of safety, or lurked the sentinels in time of danger. Above
the lodges, like blazoned arms, were suspended the spears and shields
of the warriors, and before the open flap of each the owner could be
seen sprawled in dignified idleness among his favorite squaws.
Children sat grave and silent near at hand, or whirled in mimic and
noisy warfare farther out over the prairie. Dogs skulked here and
there. Kettles above shallow fire holes bubbled and steamed. About
over the ground was strewn the indescribable litter of a long-used
camp. Through the early summer air rose shrill laughter, the sounds of
good-natured chaff, the yelp of dogs and the hum of lower conversation;
for, no matter how shy or stoical an Indian may seem before strangers,
he is sociable enough among his own people. Near the centre of the
village stood the lodge of Lone Wolf. At his hand sat Michail Lafond.
The half-breed had in the past two years reverted almost to the type of
his more savage parent. His hair was long and worn loose, after the
Sioux fashion. The upper part of his body was naked. About his neck
hung a string of bears' claws. Paint streaked his countenance. White
buckskin leggings, ornamented with beads, covered his legs. Only the
shifty character of his eye and a certain finer modelling of the bold
lines of his face differentiated him from the full-blooded Sioux at his
side. The two were conversing in the Sioux language.
To them the boys brought their stranger. From various directions
squaws and children sidled nearer for a look. The warriors, disdaining
such an exhibition of womanish curiosity, remained placidly smoking in
the sunshine. Near at hand the sounds of laughter and of conversation
died, and the solemnity of ceremony fell.
As he approached, the stranger raised his right hand, palm forward, in
token of peace, and then drew the edge of the same hand across his
throat from left to right. This latter is the "sign" of the Sioux, and
thus Lone Wolf was made aware that he received one of his own nation.
Lone Wolf inclined slightly, and raised his hand with the peace
gesture. The three then sat and the inevitable pipe was produced.
Thus Rain-in-the-Face was received with all ceremony. Later, the first
dip into the kettle of boiling meat was conceded him, and in that
manner he was made free of Lone Wolf's lodge. No question was asked as
to his identity, and he vouchsafed no information; that would come
later, when the warriors gathered for a formal powwow.
And in the meantime, Michail Lafond's roving French eyes took in every
detail of the stranger's appearance, and his keen French mind drew its
own conclusions. Near the close of the afternoon, he left his seat and
addressed the stranger.
"My brother knows ponies," said he. "Will he look upon one of mine?"
It was equivalent to an invitation to call. The savage arose and
stalked by the half-breed's side in the direction of Lafond's fine
lodge of whitened skins. As they approached, two young squaws glided
away. Lafond spoke a word to one of them, and a moment later the boys
of the camp raced eagerly in the direction of the band of ponies on the
hill.
[Illustration: THAT BABY CRY, "MAMA!"]
The lodge of Michail Lafond stood just beyond the village proper and on
a slight elevation. The entire camp lay spread out before it, a
panorama to be seized by a single sweep of the eye.
The savage paused for a moment before entering the doorway, and looked
about him with a little envy. Never had he visited a band so well
supplied with ponies, so efficiently armed, so wealthy in robes and
lodges and kettles and all the other articles of Indian wealth which go
to make up prosperity. Lafond watched him closely. The Indian turned
inside the doorway, and sat down on a heavily furred buffalo skin near
the entrance. In the background wallowed a dim confusion of skins,
robes, and utensils. Lafond placed himself beside his guest and the
pipe was lighted.
The stir following the stranger's arrival had lulled. The women and
children, having satisfied their curiosity as to his personal
appearance, returned to their wonted occupations, so that once again
the mingled noises of the camp rose from the little valley.
In a moment the young squaw led up a pony. The animal was fine above
the average. Its limbs were deer-like in delicacy, its nostrils were
wide, its neck slender and tapering--quite in contrast to the ordinary
Indian pony's clumsiness in this respect--and, above all, it was marked
black and white in the _pinto_ fashion. This last is considered to
indicate superior spirit and is much prized. The woman had twisted
pieces of bright-colored cloth and eagle feathers into the mane and
tail.
At the sight of so beautiful an animal, the stranger exclaimed in
delight.
"It pleases my brother?" inquired Lafond politely. "It is his."
The squaw led the beast forward, touching the young warrior's hand with
the end of the halter in token of proprietorship. Lafond rose and
closed the tent flap. The noises of the camp were at once muffled, and
twilight fell.
"My brother is a great warrior," he began after a moment, "yet he has
need of ponies, for he comes on foot and his moccasins are worn."
The stranger, impassive but watchful, made no answer.
"My brother has come far?" went on Lafond cunningly.
"Far," repeated the youth politely.
"His eyes have seen the waters of the Great River?"
The savage bowed.
"Perhaps his pony was lost there?"
"It may be."
"The sight of the white man frightened him and he was drowned?"
The Indian's eyes flashed.
"It may be so."
"On his back my brother bears great scars," said Lafond suddenly after
a short pause; "but they are the scars of a brave man. He bears other
scars on his face; they are the scars of shame."
He ceased abruptly at the stranger's fierce ejaculation. The Indian
seemed about to spring on him.
"But," the half-breed went on in haste, "my brother will destroy the
shame, and the scars will go." He leaned forward and touched the
savage lightly on his bare shoulder. "They are the scars from the
white man's prison," he said.
For a moment the stranger's face was a study in livid hate. Then all
expression died from it, leaving it stolid as before.
The half-breed smoked in silence. His surmises had been correct. This
was indeed the young hero of the sun dance, the news of whose
imprisonment had, by chance, come to his ears but a short time before.
He considered. Finally, he turned to his guest once more.
"My brother has travelled many miles," he said. "Tell me, has he seen
the lodges of his people?"
"The prairies have been waste."
"I will tell you why. The great white war chief has gone with his
young men beyond Pah-sap-pah. There the warriors will strike him and
destroy him. My brother's people are there."
The hate came back into the Indian's face with a flash. He fingered
the haft of a knife that lay near his hand.
"I will join my people," he said.
"And aid them. It is well. But will my brother go alone and without
arms?"
"What would you?" replied the Indian bitterly. "Am I a chief that I
should go attended? Do arrows and rifles grow on the prairies?"
The half-breed craftily permitted another impressive but momentary
silence to fall.
"But if my brother were to ride with a hundred fighting men; on his own
pony; with a rifle in his hand--would not that be more in accord with
his dignity as a brave warrior?" he suggested suddenly.
"Where are a hundred such?"
Lafond arose and pulled aside the flap of the tent. The camp lay in
the half glow as a flat picture, and its noise burst in through the
open doorway like a blare of music. The Indian's expressive eyes
flashed comprehension.
"And if they go?" he asked.
"I, too, have enemies," replied Lafond.
Rain-in-the-Face smoked meditatively. If this man held the power to
sway thus the policy of the camp, why did he not use it to crush the
enemies of whom he had spoken? What added force could a young, unarmed
stranger bring him that would compensate for the trouble and expense to
which he was putting himself?
Lafond saw the hesitation and dreaded aright.
"My enemies dwell in Pah-sap-pah," said he simply.
In that sentence he exposed the weakness of his position. Pah-sap-pah
was sacred, so sacred that for many years miners fled to it as to a
sanctuary, certain that once within its dark border pursuit would
cease. Hunts in it were undertaken only at certain times of the year,
and under peculiar auspices. War died into peace when it dashed
against those sombre cliffs. The winds in the trees were voices of
Soulless Ones, bewailing always their fate; the frown of sun-red
Harney--or the peak afterward known under that name--was instinct with
the brooding wrath of some great manitou, who slept lightly only when
his children disturbed him not. Even the powerful influence of Michail
Lafond had failed to induce Lone Wolf to enter the Black Hills on an
errand of murder.
But the name of Rain-in-the-Face was one to conjure with in just such
matters as these. He was not only a brave man and a great warrior, but
he was favored of the gods. In the belief of the Sioux nation, his
wonderful endurance in the sun dance was at once evidence and warranty
of it. Without divine favor he could not have endured so long;
enduring so long had brought to him great abundance of divine favor.
So, without actually professing to be a medicine man, he had freely
accorded to him all the confidence a member of the priestcraft usually
enjoys. If Lafond could induce Rain-in-the-Face to lead, the warriors
of the band would follow blindly, even into Pah-sap-pah itself.
The Indian started as he caught the import of Lafond's words.
"My brother has looked upon the face of the angry Manitou," went on
Lafond eagerly; "and he has not been afraid. He has danced the dance
of death, and the great Manitou has stretched out his hand and held him
up. My brother is favored of the Great Spirit, and he is not afraid."
"It is Pah-sap-pah," replied the Indian sombrely.
"Yes, it is Pah-sap-pah, and Pah-sap-pah is sacred. In Pah-sap-pah are
two men, and they go here and there breaking her rocks, cutting her
trees, defiling her streams. They profane the spirits. On the clouds
of the mountain Gitche Manitou frowns because his children permit it.
'Why comes not one to take these away?' he says. 'My children have
forgotten me.'"
"Gitche Manitou is great," said Rain-in-the-Face thoughtfully. "Why
does he not destroy his enemies?"
"Gitche Manitou destroys through his chosen. Destroy thou, and it will
be Gitche Manitou who destroys through thy hand."
The wily half-breed had caught this doctrine of the Jesuit in his old
north country home, and his crafty use of it impressed its force
strongly on the savage's mind. Lafond proceeded--
"And who more fitted than Rain-in-the-Face?"
The Indian glanced at him with new respect at this knowledge of his
name.
"For he stands near to the Great Spirit, and the warriors will follow
him."
The half-breed paused, pretending to consider the difficulties.
"The men are but two and there is a woman. There are here a hundred
warriors, and each warrior has a gun and much powder. When the profane
ones have been destroyed, then Rain-in-the-Face will turn northward and
enter the camp of Sitting Bull at the head of many fighting men. It
little beseems so great a warrior of the Uncpapas to go begging a rifle
from the Tetons!"
The mind of Rain-in-the-Face, thus relieved of some degree of its
superstitious fear, lay fully open to this last appeal to his pride.
He picked up the pipe and puffed stolidly on it twice.
"The enemies of my brother shall die," said he.
Before the formal conference of that evening, Michail Lafond had
arranged to carry out his side of the bargain. He had done this very
simply. After the conversation in the lodge he had gone to Lone Wolf.
"The stranger is Rain-in-the-Face, of the Uncpapas," said he. "He is
pleased with our warriors and he wishes to lead them against the great
white war chief near the Big Horn. There are also strangers in
Pah-sap-pah whom it is the will of Gitche Manitou that Rain-in-the-Face
should destroy, and he desires your help."
Lone Wolf was delighted. That so famous a warrior should choose his
band was honor enough to repay any effort.
In all this transaction, the offices of Michail Lafond could easily
have been dispensed with. If Lone Wolf had gone to Rain-in-the-Face
and said, "Behold, here are my young men. Lead them," the latter would
have accepted the tender with joy. If, on the other hand, the stranger
had merely announced his identity to Lone Wolf, that chieftain would
gladly have furnished him with everything he needed. But each was in
the dark as to one fact, of which Lafond had knowledge.
Rain-in-the-Face did not suspect how his imprisonment had increased his
importance, nor did he know that the deep content which brooded over
Lone Wolf's camp was only apparent, and had been carefully fostered by
Lafond. Nor did Lone Wolf recognize Rain-in-the-Face, nor realize how
anxious the youth was for an escort to uphold his pride. It was by
seeing little things of this sort, and acting upon them, that the
half-breed had gained so much influence.
Four days later, Lone Wolf's camp swept northwestward toward the Big
Horn Mountain. On the 25th of June, Rain-in-the-Face confronted
General Custer, on a knoll near the river of the Little Big Horn. A
great battle was all but over, and the few remaining troopers, their
last cartridges gone, were fighting desperately with sabres.
The savage shot the white man through the heart.
X
THE PRICE OF A CLAIM
All through this time of dread and danger, of plot and counterplot and
intrigue, of brooding war and half-awakened pillage, the doctor went on
peacefully collecting his funny little statistics, utterly oblivious to
everything but their accumulation and arrangement. Every morning of
the warmer months he went out into the hills for the day. There he
would grub about among his ledges and leads, pecking away at the rocks
with his little hand pick, filling his canvas bags, jotting down notes
and statistics in his notebook.
During its progress he was blind to everything but his work. One day,
as he walked along the top of a ridge, a huge bear rose up in his path.
The doctor politely lifted his hat and passed to one side. The decline
of the sun alone he noticed. When the shadow of Harney crept out to
him he turned toward home. As he neared the log cabin his placid eyes
fairly beamed through his spectacles. When he came in sight of it he
ran forward, his specimen bags swinging heavily against his legs,
caught up the child stumbling to meet him and carried her, laughing and
struggling, to the woman in the doorway. Then they had supper all
together--bacon, or perhaps game, with vegetables from the garden, and
corn bread. Occasionally they had white bread and coffee, and always
fresh water from the cold mountain creek. After supper the doctor went
outdoors to arrange his specimens and plot out his notes as long as the
daylight lasted. His wife moved about inside softly. After a time she
brought out the little girl in her nightdress to be kissed. So the
twilight neared, and the long day was done.
As the yellow glow crept down, she came outdoors too, and sat pensively
looking over the peaks of the lower mountains to the distant Cheyenne
and the prairies. Beyond them was the East. There were cities and
books and other women and the beat of human life in the air. Here was
a still, lonely grandeur that even the wind in the pines did not
relieve.
The doctor finally had to put aside his work for lack of light, and sat
at her feet leaning against the logs of the cabin. She looked down on
his little figure, his round shoulders, his forehead even now abstract
and wrinkled with speculation, his kindly blue eyes, his sensitive
mouth, and then she softly reached out and took his hand. The two sat
there until the moon rose over the Bad Lands. Then they went inside.
In moments such as this the woman lived.
In winter time the doctor sat near the fireplace, writing by the
candlelight on his great book. She was in the shadow, looking at him
with tenderness, smiling wearily at the eager quivering of his chin,
and rocking gently back and forth. The little girl played demurely on
the floor within the circle of firelight, her curls falling down on her
forehead. She piled up her blocks, and occasionally, as one would
fall, she would look up in deprecation of her mother's hush. The
golden heads of the mother and child were like sunshine before the dark
walls of the cabin. Against them the firelight gleamed. Outside, the
thin, light snow drifted fitfully by the pane. The doctor wrote. The
woman watched in patience. The child played.
As spring came on, the doctor got out into the hills again.
One day he came back and found the woman murdered and the child gone.
The cabin was ransacked from one end to the other, but no attempt had
been made to fire it.
The doctor put his specimen bags methodically in their places, and then
sat down by his dead wife.
At evening some passing miners found him there holding her hand. With
some difficulty, and by the exercise of a gentle force, they persuaded
him to rise, after which they tenderly laid the body on a couch,
concealing as best they might the red tonsure where the scalp had been.
They set the cabin in order and cooked supper from the provisions in
their wagon. The doctor ate and drank in silence, making no sign when
the men spoke to him.
After supper he went outside and began to arrange his specimens. When
darkness fell he came in, stood undecided for a moment, and then lay
down on a bear-skin, Jim's gift, and slept.
The men looked at one another in a puzzled way, conversing in low
tones. Soon they too rolled themselves up and went to sleep on the
floor.
Early in the morning Jim Buckley came down the gulch with part of a
deer. The men told him the news hurriedly, between mouthfuls of
coffee. Jim looked at the dead woman with a hardening of the mouth and
a softening of the eyes; then he went out and for the first time took
the doctor's hand.
When they had finished breakfast, the men made a rough bier of willow
branches plaited, on which they gently laid the body. Two went down to
the soft earth by the creek bottom and began to dig. The others
followed with their burden, which they laid beside the growing
excavation, and then stood with bared heads, waiting for the diggers.
The doctor would not come. After a little persuasion they left him
sitting on the ground, leaning against the logs of the cabin, looking
out over the bluffs of the Cheyenne to the east.
The men in the trench worked rapidly and skilfully, one loosening the
gravel with his pick, the other shovelling it out on the grass.
Suddenly the latter stopped in the act of tossing a shovelful. He
pushed his stubby forefinger in among the gravel for a moment and drew
out an irregular bit of metal. It was gold.
They buried the young wife elsewhere, and staked out the claim, and
others, lying along the creek.
So Prue slept quietly at last. Her little life was drab-colored in
spite of the lights of adventure and drama that had played over it. It
contained a great love and a great sacrifice. So little of the gold
would have made her happy, and yet all the wealth of these new placers
could not have saved her at the last!
A rider dashed up to them at the cabin, bringing news of the outbreak.
It was directed to the towns of the North, and had only brushed Spanish
Gulch on its destroying way. The men camped on the site of the new
placer. They built cradles and pumped water down from Spanish Creek,
so that in a little time the gulch contained quite a town. The first
discovery is known as the Doctor's Claim, and so you can find it
recorded in the records of Pennington County to-day. It turned out to
be very rich.
And as for the doctor--he died.
XI
THE BEGINNING OF LAFOND'S REVENGE
The day following the conference, Lone Wolf struck camp. The squaws
quickly removed and rolled into convenient bundles the skin coverings
of the tepees. The poles of the latter were strapped on each side of
the ponies in such a manner that, their ends dragging on the ground, a
sort of litter was formed for the transportation of the household goods
and the younger children. Before the sun was an hour high, the caravan
was under way.
From this, the South Fork of the Cheyenne, the main band, under Lone
Wolf, were to push directly through to the Big Horn. Lafond,
Rain-in-the-Face, and the warriors detailed for the expedition were to
carry out the adventure of Pah-sap-pah to the half-breed's
satisfaction, and were then to rejoin the main body as soon as possible.
The smaller band cut in to the Black Hills shortly after daybreak one
morning. It rode up Spanish Gulch a little before noon.
Most of these warriors had never before entered the dark limits of
Pah-sap-pah. They were plainly in awe of its frowning cliffs and
rustling pines. They rode close together, whispering uneasily. Even
Rain-in-the-Face failed to reassure them. Why should he? He was a
little afraid himself.
Lafond's knowledge of the topography of the place was excellent. He
had visited it several times. He had watched the doctor, step by step,
throughout a long day of geological searching. He knew Jim Buckley's
dwelling, where he worked, what hours he kept, and just how late he sat
up at night. Innumerable times he had viewed the doctor, Prue, and the
scout through the buck-horn sights of his long rifle; yet he had never
been even tempted to pull the trigger. Why? Because he was a Latin,
and so theatrical effects were dear to him; because he was an Indian,
and so revenge with him seemed to lie not so much in the mere
infliction of injury as in the victim's realization that he was being
come up with. Lafond not only wanted the doctor and his companions to
be killed, but he wanted them to know why they were killed, and by
whom. It was finer to be able thus to do the thing with all the stage
settings. The dramatic instinct was part of the barbaric quality of
his nature, like a love for red.
So Lafond had let slip innumerable opportunities of picking off his
victims single-handed, merely to gain the local knowledge necessary to
a final _coup de theatre_. Consequently, he knew where the cabin was
situated, and quickly scouted the state of affairs. The coast was
clear. He gave the required signal; the savages silently approached on
foot, and they entered the little house together.
Now at this time of year, in the Black Hills, there occurs a daily
meteorological phenomenon of a rather peculiar character. The hot air
from the prairies sweeps over from the Missouri River, crossing a
number of lesser streams in its passage, until it strikes the slope of
the hills. There it is deflected upward, gradually becoming colder as
the elevation rises, until, at the barrier of Harney, it gathers in
rain clouds. These are at first mere wisps of down, streaming in
ragged ribbons from the peak; but with incredible rapidity they gain in
density and extent, until they spread over a considerable area of the
surrounding country. Then they empty themselves in a terrific deluge
of water and hail, accompanied by thunderclaps so reverberant that they
seem to arise from the rending of the hills themselves. After this
short crisis, the dismembered clouds float out over the prairie and are
dissipated in the hot air, even before they reach the first white
turrets of the Bad Lands.
So rapidly does the storm gather and break, that there is but a short
half hour between the morning and the afternoon clearness of the skies.
To those who have never experienced this phenomenon, it is startling in
the extreme; to those who have, it is a matter of seeking temporary
shelter until the disturbance blows over. In any case, the first
indications are but scant warning.
By the time the little band of Indians had reached the doctor's cabin,
the first wisps of cloud were clinging to Harney. While they were in
the house, the blackness gathered and loomed and darkened until the sun
was obscured and the western hills lost themselves in rain.
The doctor was in the hills. Prue was making the bed in the little
bedroom, and little Miss Prue was asleep on a rug in one corner of the
larger apartment. The savages stole in with noiseless, moccasined feet
behind the stooping woman. Lafond, forgetting in his excitement
everything but the lust of killing, stabbed her deeply twice in the
broad of the back. She fell forward on the bed without a murmur, and
the murderer, seizing the knob of her hair, circled her brow with his
knife's edge, and ripped loose the scalp. Then they all glided back
into the other room.