RISING WOLF
Southward, astride of the Rocky Mountains, ranged the Absarokas, the
Sparrowhawks, who were known to the whites as the Crows. For a
decade or so one, if not both, of the Absaroka tribes had been ruled
by a mulatto adventurer Jim Beckwourth. Under his leadership the
hunters were skilled in getting, the women industrious in dressing
bison robes. In trade they abstained from liquor and bought guns and
ammunition. They made themselves dreaded in war, stole plenty of
ponies, danced for scalps beyond all numbering, and were very careful
not to kill a white man. When at last Beckwourth abandoned his wives
and tribe, departing for California, a rival but minor trader began
to prosper among the Absaroka. He claimed to be an Absaroka, called
himself the Crow, but, like Jim Beckwourth, was part negro. I think
he was half negro and half Mexican. Beginning in a small way, he
traded for bison robes with liquor only. As his business grew he got
all the Absaroka robes, but in return the people had nothing but
alcohol. So the two tribes, the richest in the west, were reduced to
poverty, their pony herds became an easy prey, their warriors a mere
supply of scalps for the Blackfoot raiders. The Crow brought the
nation to ruin.
At this stage in the Crow's progress, the chief medicine man of the
Absaroka nation came to the holy lodge and sought Rain's counsel.
She advised him to get consent of his National Council, then have the
Crow's wagon burned, and the man himself expelled with a price on his
head lest he should venture back again. The medicine man departed,
and No-man, traveling in his company, learned from him the whole
advice which Rain had given in secret.
For some months No-man kept the secret, but in the ensuing winter he
came into partnership with another trapper, and to him he told this
story, together with many others, to illustrate the power and
influence of his friends at the holy lodge.
Now does our story follow the other trapper. He was Hugh Monroe, the
son of a Scots colonel and of a French-Canadian mother, born at
Montreal in 1799. At the age of fourteen he joined the Blackfoot
nation, and earned a title of honor--Rising Wolf.
Friends of mine who knew Rising Wolf in his age, spoke of him as not
very much to look at, a little wizened old man deeply sunburned. In
1842, at the age of 43 and the height of his powers, one must think
of him as the head of an Indian household, and as a leader of the
glorious Blackfoot chivalry, unrivaled among horsemen, hunters, and
warriors.
In August with the tribe on the march, Rising Wolf rode one day with
Many Horses, Head Chief of the Blackfoot nation. To him he repeated
No-man's tale concerning the downfall of the Absarokas, the Crow as
organizing their destruction, their chief medicine man as pilgrim to
the holy lodge and Rain's advice for the deliverance of the people.
Many Horses was not pleased. The rescue of his foes the Absarokas
was not his policy or that of the Blackfoot Council. Rain, a
Blackfoot woman, had done a grievous injury to her tribe.
To Rising Wolf, Rain seemed of less importance, not to be taken quite
so seriously. She and her husband Storm were doubtless rogues, but
not likely to influence events or to become a factor in Indian
politics.
"I don't know," said Many Horses. "The faith of the people makes
this woman and her husband powerful. Get me proof that they are
frauds, and I can put a stop to any further mischief."
"Shall I go and see for myself?" asked Rising Wolf.
"Yes. But do not let the people think that I am sending you, or have
a hand in this. An embassy to the holy lodge would give it too much
importance."
"Rain's brother, Heap-of-dogs, wants me to dine with him."
The big chief chuckled. "A young man," said he, "newly admitted to
serve in the Camp Police. The impudence! Why, all the chiefs'
wives, including mine, would take the warpath. If you refused their
feasts and dined with this young upstart, they'd dance your scalp, my
friend. Take him as guide to the holy lodge, but as you love me, do
not dine with him."
"I only said I'd think it over," answered Rising Wolf. "Indeed, he
bores me. Haven't you noticed, Many Horses, that a young man or a
young woman who goes in for being excessively beautiful, as this
young spark does, is always the very dullest company? It's the plain
fellows like you and me who have to be attractive with humor, wit or
skill, learning or valor."
"How you do paint yourself!" The great chief loved a chance of
poking fun at his counselor. "Now, don't blush. Your gifts are most
becoming."
"Let me off, or I'll turn flatterer and sicken you. This
Heap-of-dogs, Rain's brother, is really beautiful."
"A fop, as you say--a fop."
Rain says that white people will not understand her brother's
name--Heap-of-dogs--unless it is explained.
So you must know that in Red Indian custom when a mother carries her
new born baby into the sunshine, she looks about her, and the first
thing she sees amusing or unusual suggests a name for her child.
Thus when Rain's mother, Thunder Feather, had been delivered of her
firstborn child, her son, she went with him to the lodge door, and
looked out at the sun-lit camp. And as it happened, the Stony
Indians, come upon a visit, were pitching their tipis close by the
tribal camp. But though the tribes were at peace, the dogs were at
war, engaged in battle, all of a writhing heap.
So did Thunder Feather name her son Heap-of-dogs.
Rain's brother was strikingly handsome, a showy horseman, a dandy, a
leader of fashion. Moreover, he shone with several different kinds
of reflected glory, as son-in-law to a rich chief, as brother to the
famous prophetess, and presently as guide to Rising Wolf. For this
occasion he sported the top hat of a paleface chief, from which he
had cut out the crown to use the thing as a sort of flowerpot from
whence rose a bush of scalps. From his rump waved the tail of a
horse. Large shaving glasses formed his necklace, which blazed in
the sunshine, visible for miles to friends and enemies. As to the
design of his face-paint, even Blackfoot society was surprised,
ladies of our own tribes would have fainted with envy, and clocks
would have stopped at the sight.
"Take off those mirrors," said Rising Wolf. "I don't want to be
ambushed and scalped."
When this was done, they started, each with a wife to drive the
baggage ponies and make camp, while the two men scouted ahead and
killed meat for each day's provisions. They rode across the Rockies
by way of Crow's Nest Pass, they forded the Upper Columbia below Lake
Windermere, and they threaded the little trail up Toby Creek, this in
the first week of a bright September. So, nearing the sources of
Toby Creek in the heart of the Selkirk Range, they cantered through
glades of bunch grass, by orchards of wild fruit and stately pine
woods, with vistas now and then of glaciers at the head of the valley
and snow-crowned walls against clear azure. The heights were bathed
in a splendor of sunshine, but the vale in a mist of perfume where
the organ of falling waters played for a choir of birds. The beauty
of the place was overwhelming.
"You never told me," Rising Wolf complained, "that it would be like
this."
"There are not words," answered Rain's brother, "or signs to tell
with."
They passed through the herd, two hundred head of spotted and dappled
ponies.
"We call Rain the Kutenai woman," said Heap-of-dogs, "because she
likes the spotted ponies. How the herd grows!"
"Considering," answered Rising Wolf, "that every man in every tribe
is a natural-born horse thief, have these ponies no fear of being
run?"
"They know," said Rain's brother, "that they are the sacred herd.
They expect us to get out of their way because they are important."
Now there opened out a glade commanding the head of the valley, and
the eastward glaciers of the Apse. The westward glaciers were hidden
by the altar hill on the right, a dark wall clothed with juniper and
snow-crowned. At its base nestled the holy tipi and the guest lodge.
As the custom was, the visitors dismounted, approaching the tents on
foot. Both proved to be empty, but when a voice hailed them cheerily
from overhead, they saw the priestess and her husband riding down the
breakneck zigzag trail.
When Storm rode up and greeted him, Heap-of-dogs whispered behind his
hand. "Brother Storm, there's going to be some fun."
"Rising Wolf," was Rain's greeting, "may the Sun bless you."
The white man saw in Rain's face the high cheekbones and pinched
forehead of her people, free from face-paint though, aglow with
health, and in a stern way almost beautiful. She moved with swift,
savage grace, a creature of the wilds. Her smile was charming as she
gave him welcome to her lodge, and asked Storm to make her brother
comfortable. She lighted pipes for her white guest, Rising Wolf, and
her brother Heap-of-dogs, and her husband Storm. Then she settled
modestly in her place, on the woman's side of the hearth, confronting
them.
"Certainly," the white man felt, "she has the manners of a lady, not
of the conjurer, the professional charlatan."
According to Indian custom there was silence for a few minutes before
they came to business. "You know my name, then?" said Rising Wolf.
Rain answered: "No-man, and my dear Storm, and Rising Wolf are the
only Stonehearts in our country."
And the visitor had supposed he could pass for a Blackfoot! He had
actually painted his face "for the mosquitos."
"It's much more comfortable," said Rain out loud, "in the fly season."
So she read his thoughts!
"Perhaps," he said with sharp suspicion, "you know what brings me?"
"Oh, of course." Rain counted on her fingers. "Seven suns ago, you
rode with the big chief Many Horses, and you told him that my man and
I are frauds."
"Rain counts coup!" cried her brother Heap-of-dogs, exultant.
"Didn't I warn you?"
"So," Rising Wolf probed shrewdly, "Many Horses has sent a rider
ahead to prepare you for this visit."
"Hyai yo! You think the head chief too good a sportsman!"
"I did," the white man retorted; "you read my mind."
"That is true, Rising Wolf," answered the priestess, amused by his
chagrin. "You rode leading your painted war horse, who tried to
plead, poor thing, that the trotting was bad for his wound."
"What do you mean?"
"That your war horse has an arrow point behind his off shoulder
blade, but you mistake the lameness for cracked heel."
"The head chief said it was cracked heel, but, by Jove, you may be
right! How on earth----"
"Not on earth," answered the priestess gently, "for you didn't see me
riding your led horse, you didn't hear him pleading to me in his
pain, you didn't remember the red stone arrow points when the Snake
braves attacked you down at the Pisk'un. You will not believe until
the red arrowhead works out to the skin, at Leaf Fall."
"So I'm put off," said Rising Wolf sarcastically, "until Leaf Fall
for your proof!"
"My dear guest," Rain laughed at his ill-humor, "did I ask you to
come? Did I seek your opinion? Will you judge me as you judged your
horse?"
Rising Wolf thought deeply, and his was a quick intellect. If the
Chief Many Horses had sent a messenger, the priestess might know that
his charger was a piebald, lame in the off fore, but not of a red
stone arrowhead behind the shoulderblade. Had the Snake warriors,
who raided his camp beside the old buffalo trap, been here and told
the story? Of course this must be some sort of cheap conjuring. Was
Heap-of-dogs guiding Rain his sister in the sign talk, or how was the
trick worked?
"Even cheap conjuring," Rain answered his unspoken thoughts once
more, "is puzzling until one knows the trick."
Gentle her smile, and womanly her conduct, yet without the least
offense she made him catch his breath, amazed, startled, almost
frightened. Under the straight, strong brows her eyes were shadowed,
but the glance was penetrating, looking right through him. By her
smile she seemed to be sorry for him. And she was beautiful, pure,
austere, making his lurking suspicion feel caddish.
"Many Horses is not pleased," she said, "that his enemies the
Absaroka are being rescued, that the Crow is to be driven from their
camps, that the fire water shall not destroy them any more. Are the
Blackfeet afraid lest their enemies be fit for war? Is Many Horses
frightened? Are you turned coward?"
Then Rising Wolf knew that Many Horses had sent no messenger. This
witch had powers beyond all things possible.
"Poor Doggie!" she whispered. His father had called him that far
back in childhood, a nickname forgotten these forty years.
"Your father," said Rain, "sends you that token."
Nobody in the West knew who his father was, but in quaint, broken
English, unable to pronounce the letters l and r, "Co'on'ee Mon'oe,"
she said.
"Colonel Monroe," said Rising Wolf. "Where is he?"
"At the small Stoneheart town under the hill by the river where foam
of the long falls rides on the salty water."
"Name the town."
"Names do not make thoughts easily," said Rain.
"What is my father's message?"
"In three suns, his spirit will pass over the Wolf Trail."
Rising Wolf jumped to his feet. "I must go quick," he cried.
"Sit down ... think. How far can you ride your animal in three suns?"
That was true.
"You would like to be with your father this evening?"
"Impossible!"
"Poor Stoneheart!" said Rain pitifully. "You refuse to see, you
refuse to hear, you refuse to know. You make yourself just like a
stone which cannot see, or hear, or feel, or know anything at all.
So if I took you to Mont-re-al--I read the word in your mind--you
would come back from the dream saying it was a dream, not real. The
woman is a fraud and plays tricks. You only want to prove that you
are right--and show me up. Your heart is bad to my man and to me.
You fool my brother to bring you here, and think that is so clever.
I am sorry for you, my poor little enemy!"
"You don't mince your words."
"I am frank to your face as you were behind my back when you told
Many Horses that my man and I do our conjuring for the presents we
get, the ponies."
"I saw a couple of hundred."
"We have three hundred. Take them, all of them. Four ponies will
break back here when my love calls them. They are mine. The rest
you shall take to the head chief as a gift to the poor of your
village."
"Why didn't you do this before?"
"Why should we? Nobody before has doubted us. As you told my
brother here, all other men except yourself are horse thieves. Any
Indian, as he told you, caught with the sacred herd, would be burned
by my people. But, as you are not a horse thief, you are safe.
What! surely you are not frightened? You? who are so brave!"
"Because I'm your enemy," said Rising Wolf, "you've set a trap to get
me burned!"
"My brother Heap-of-dogs shall ride ahead with my message for the
Chief Many Horses. The head chief himself shall send herders to help
you. Then you will be praised for the gift you bring to the poor.
And you like praise."
"Damned clever," said Rising Wolf, "perfectly convincing, and
devilish subtle. And why do you want to win me over?"
"Is this the moment for telling?" asked Rain. "Should we not win you
first?"
"A common woman," the man was thinking, "would have bargained with
her horses. She is at least a lady. And she claims that father is
dying. Suppose it were true! After all, I don't think she means any
harm, or that I'm frightened."
"Please," he said, "will you take me to my father?"
"Not while your heart is bad."
"Why not?"
"Because your coming would spoil your father's peace while he is
dying. So I will take you in your dream to see other people until
your heart is good. Who would you like to see?"
"Adventurers, fellows like me. I understand them best."
The French-Canadian mother side of Rising Wolf was very
superstitious, had to be bitted severely, and reined hard lest it run
away with the pawky Monroe strain in his character. Now, both his
womanly intuition and his Scots intellect were leagued together
against the noble pig-headed tenacity of his Indian training.
"I won't be fooled," he said all through that afternoon, while he
held himself proudly aloof from Rain and haunted Storm like a peevish
ghost to show his independence. Storm would tell him nothing, but
went fishing with Rain's brother Heap-of-dogs. Like all good
Blackfeet, Heap-of-dogs despised fish as unclean, but being a
sportsman found that rainbow trouts were rather good fun. Neither
Heap-of-dogs nor Storm took heed of Rising Wolf and his worries;
indeed the Indian's mind was set upon his fond ambition to get
Storm's golden scalp as a trophy of war. But Rain objected.
At sundown, fagged in mind and body, Rising Wolf lay down in the
guest lodge bidding the squaws keep quiet while he had a nap.
Afterwards he swore that he went down to the bathing pool, where Rain
came behind him, placing her forefinger just between his eyes, and
bidding him look at the light on the still water. "We never moved an
inch." So he told the woman. "And all the time I could hear the
roar of the falls. Only the sound through the pines was more like
the sough of wind. It was lifting the snow as it drove across the
rocks, a sort of whirling blizzard, so it was only between the gusts
that I saw the old fellow up on top of the crag. The young chap was
close by, small, frail, with the fringes of his buckskin shirt
snapping like whip crackers. He was blown off his feet once or
twice, but he scrambled up at last with a little bundle which he
reached out to the man on top. It blew out on the wind, a flag, the
Yankee flag, and the man waved it, shouting. Both of 'em were
cheering like mad."
"Who are they?" asked Rising Wolf.
"The boy," said Rain, "is called Kit, Kit Carson, I think. The man's
name is Fremont. They're sent by the Big Father to find a trail to
the Oregon; but they've climbed up a peak of the World Spine to
plant--they call it Old Glory! Say a prayer with me, Rising Wolf,
for these men and for their flag."
"Why should I?"
"It helps them."
"To steal Oregon, eh? I'll see 'em damned first."
"Oregon," said Rain, "is here."
The snow had vanished, and they looked down at the Columbia, all
flame red, snaking through lava fields. Up beyond the broken brown
hills loomed blue forest, and high above that was a volcano blazing,
whose immense eruption filled the sky with light, as of a burning
world.
"Storm likes that," said the priestess. "So I thought it might
please you. He calls the mountain Saint Helens. I don't like it at
all. I think it's dreadful. The tribes on the coast are packing up
smoked salmon, for a move to the next world, poor things. My man
says that even the Stonehearts at Fort Vancouver are getting
frightened. They call it 'Day-of-judgment.'"
"Ah! That's it," the white man was thinking; "she's got a
professional manner, just like a medicine man or a war chief
teaching. I wonder if the angels have a professional manner."
"If you only saw one!" said Rain's mind. "The dogs and the ponies
can see. Why is this poor thing blinded by his conceit!"
"Humph!" said Rising Wolf. "Am I so bad as all that?"
"Your spirit-power," Rain answered, "is like a spent torch, which
flickers, then smokes and then flares, nearly dead. Sun Spirit, help
him!"
They were flashing southward, the sunset glow abreast upon their
right, where violet cumuli, like mountain ranges, broke to reveal
cirrii of molten ruby against clear orange sky. As they came down
into the lower earth mist, that radiance glowed warmly upon the face
of an adobe wall upon their left, with prickly pear bush on the
parapet dark green against the upward sweep of the advancing night.
"We are in Mexico," said Rain.
In front of this wall facing the afterglow stood a long line of men
on parade, at open intervals three feet apart. Ragged, unshaven,
famished, they were gay with a forced cheerfulness, passing jokes one
to another in derision of a group of officers, Mexicans.
"That general," said Rain, "is the wicked President Santa Ana. Years
ago, in a dream like this, Storm saw him at the siege of Alamo, when
Bowie, Travis, and so many heroes fell, and dear Davy Crockett."
The Mexican General Staff was attended by a squad of half-clad
soldiers, who shuffled their dusty sandals, halting to order in front
of each in turn of the American prisoners. To each of these captured
filibusters, when his turn came, there was tendered a sack from which
he was required to take one bean, and hold it up for inspection. If
it proved to be a white bean, he lived. If it was a black bean, the
firing party, moving in drill time, got ready, presented, loaded,
fired, then left the quivering body in its blood, to shoulder arms,
and march one full pace right in readiness for the next murder. The
Americans were jeering at their uncouth movements.
"My man is here," said Rain. "Of course, they cannot see him. Look."
Amid the disheveled company Storm stood out clean. His golden mane
and tawny dress looked crisp, fresh, strangely luminous, his face,
from which the beard hairs had been plucked in the Indian manner, was
that of a mighty chief, commanding, sternly beautiful as he stood
wrapped in prayer. In his arms he held the prisoner next for death,
supporting him. The fusillade rang out, and as the smoke cleared
Rising Wolf saw the crumpled body sag down with that queer empty look
he had noticed so often in men newly dead.
But the prisoner released, the man, the spirit himself, stood as
before, supported in Storm's arms, rather bewildered than hurt. "It
wasn't so very bad?" Storm whispered to him.
"Why," answered the American, "you don't say I'm dead?"
"There is no death," said Storm, "except for your poor body. Come
away; here is your mother waiting to take you home."
Rain pointed out the prisoner next for trial, young Crittenden. "He
isn't old enough to go on the war trail," she said. "A boy, and such
a dear lad! O Rising Wolf, this will awaken your soul--or your soul
is dead. My man and I pray for him. Oh, can't you say one little
prayer?"
Crittenden drew a white bean, so Rain's prayer was answered.
"I am glad of that," said Rising Wolf. "He seems a decent lad."
Crittenden gave his white bean to the middle-aged man who stood next
upon his left. "You have a wife and children," he was saying, his
tongue so dried by fear that he could scarcely speak. "I haven't. I
can afford to risk another chance."
"O Mighty Power," Rain cried, "O Morning Star, Son of the All-Father,
help him! Help him!"
Storm came behind Crittenden, trying to guide his hand. "Rain," he
shouted, "help me to guide his hand! Quick!"
Crittenden put his hand into the bag.
"Help him!" cried Rising Wolf. "Oh, I do wish I could help!"
"Your first prayer, answered!" said Rain, as Crittenden held up a
white bean.
For some time after that Rising Wolf joined his wishes to the prayers
of Rain and Storm for those who were murdered or for those who lived.
Then Storm was left to the duty, while the priestess led the white
adventurer upon another quest.
"How do you find your way?" asked Rising Wolf, as they went southward
into deepening twilight, guided now for vast distances by the heights
upon their left, of the white Andes.
"My secret helper," answered the priestess, "tells me the names and
the places. Then I just wish, and I am there. Pray now for those in
peril." The southern ocean lay beneath, lashed by an icy hurricane.
Through the gray dusk loomed icebergs spectral and enormous above the
black white-capped ranges of seas mountainous. There, like poor
ghosts half seen amid the level driving snow, two ice-clad ships fled
under bare poles eastward.
"What ships?" asked Rising Wolf.
"The _Erebus_ and the _Terror_," answered Rain, "and they are so
frightened!"
The ships passed into the night, and Rain's prayer went with them.
"I always help them a little at evening prayer," she said.
But Rising Wolf was troubled. "You do a hard day's work; then travel
ten thousand miles to pray for people in danger, and that when you're
dead tired."
"Dead tired? Oh dear, no. Are you?"
"Well, fact is, I'm not."
"How you get things mixed up! Of course our animals are tired, which
we washed, fed, watered, rode to a finish, then washed, fed, and
watered all over again before we put them to rest. But we left our
animals asleep. We are not the horses, but the riders, the mounted
Spirits of the Heavens. We are free, we use the free will which
white men talk so much about, and know so little."
"Free will? What do you mean?"
"I'm free, dear man. I will to be in a country called Tahiti, at the
hut of the Queen Pomare. Look!"
The dusk was taking form within a large grass hut, where there seemed
to be many persons, women, asleep on the floor. The sudden flinging
open of a door filled the place with the hot splendor of a tropic
day. Outside, the cocoa palms were streaming in the breeze above the
coral reefs and the leaping diamond-glittering surf.
A man stood in the doorway, seen darkly against the blaze, his white
uniform heavily laced, braided and hung with cords of gold across the
shoulders. His gestures and his speech were French and full of
studied deliberate insult, addressed to a woman who sat up on the
mats, while she suckled a new-born baby at her breast. She was
lithe, tawny, fierce, tigerishly regal, and in a royal rage as she
stood up to confront this bully.
"Admiral," she answered him, holding out her baby that he might see,
"this is the prince you have robbed of his kingdom, this is my son,
the king who shall avenge me against your people. Now"--with a
sweeping gesture of her arm, Pomare pointed away through the door to
the sun and the leap of the crested seas--"get out!" she hissed, "or
I'll have you thrown to the sharks. They love a cur. I don't."
"Poor thing!" Rain muttered. "So she has lost her kingdom after all,
to the cruel Stonehearts. What do you think of that man who could
bully a woman in labor?"
From Tahiti westward Rain showed her pupil the wide immensity of the
Coral Sea which, like the sky at night, glitters with far-flung
constellations, though these are of ring-shaped palm groves and white
beach, set in a riot of surf. Beyond that gleamed the Indies; and,
crossing a forest continent, they came to a bay in Sarawak where a
white schooner yacht rolled in the anchorage. The white man was
puzzled by Rain's Blackfoot accent, which gave a funny twist to
"Rajah Brooke."
"He is the new king of all this land," said Rain. "He is ever so
busy shooting robbers, saving English sailors who are war slaves of
the chiefs, opening old mines of stuff called diamonds and gold,
which is not to eat, or to wear, or to keep the tipi warm."
Under the poop awnings Brooke of Sarawak sat at a table writing.
"He makes the power-message every day for his old mother. Peep over
his shoulder and tell me. No? Of course--you say you are a chief.
But what is the use of being a chief, a gent-le-man, when nobody can
see you. Oh, do look!"
Gentleman though he was, being greatly tempted, Rising Wolf took one
step, and read the words to Rain. "'I breathe peace,' he writes,
'and comfort to all who obey; and wrath and fury to the evil-doer.'"
"His medicine," said Rain, "is very strong this day; but sometimes my
man or I must nurse him through the fever. Now he thinks about his
friend whose name is so hard to say--Captainharry Keppel. We will
go, see."
In Malacca Strait they found Harry Keppel's ship, H.M.S. _Dido_,
having a fight with a number of pirate junks, one being afire and
sinking. "I like fights best," said Rain, "don't you?"
"But I thought you set up as a holy woman!"
"That's to help my man, and other people, but I'm really and truly
bad most of the time. Storm likes you, for instance, but I've always
thought you hateful."
"We never met until yesterday!"
Rain chuckled. "Why, we've looked after you for years. My Secret
Helper told me I must train myself by praying for some one I hated,
so I took you. Then of course I had to help that other Stoneheart,
No-man, who is poison. I loathe you both--like fruits and
vegetables."
They had crossed a broad haze of the midday heat, but now above the
mist descried a broken sea of mountains, a storm of rock, which was
called Afghanistan. Far to the left, fain in the distance rose a
rock platform, old Herat. Beyond lay Persia whose king, the
Shah-in-Shah, had lately laid siege with seventy thousand men, to the
rock fortress. "The Afghans there," said Rain, "were yelping coyotes
until the young spy came. He made them mountain lions."
"Who is the young spy?"
Eldred Pottinger was his name, but in Rain's telling the words were
not much like that. While Pottinger was busy saving Herat from the
Persians, a British field force had conquered Afghanistan. But there
arose an Afghan chief named Akbar, who brought about a revolt against
the British. It burst like a volcano, and the British leaders lost
their heads. Their army was caught in the Khyber, and only one man
escaped, a Doctor Brydon. Rain had held him steady on his dying
horse until he crossed the Indian boundary to Fort Jellalabad. She
told the story next of General Sale, and his young warriors cut off
in Afghanistan, corralled by Akbar's army. During three whole moons
under fire they built the walls of their stronghold; then on the
ninetieth day an earthquake knocked their fortress flat, and left
them at Akbar's mercy. "That," said Rain, "is when I learned what
prayers can do. Oh, if you had seen the chief Havelock with his
young men charge, stampeding Akbar's tribes--like dust before a
cyclone!
"See, Stoneheart, yonder, far in the north, is Kohistan. There was
the young spy with his regiment of the Ghoorka tribe, fighting his
way southward. He was wounded and nearly dead. He had five warriors
left when he came to the gates of Cabul."
"Five men!"
"Then," answered Rain, "but now! See, all along this roadside, the
regiments of his Afghan army camped, asleep through the heat of the
day, until his trumpets call at sundown. See here, outside this
little wayside fort, are forty great chiefs and medicine men of his
Council.
"Where is the young spy?"
"That shabby Afghan sitting half asleep in the shadow of the gate."
"You say he raised and leads an army?"
"Yes, these Afghan tribesmen think that he is a sort of god. He
leads them against Akbar, their own king."
"This is a man indeed!"
Rain showed him the courtyard of the fort, full of poor ragged women
and children, Lady Sale, the British General's wife, Lady McNaughten,
the wives of many soldiers. The women of the fallen government and
the dead army were all rescued, they and their children, by the spy
who sat asleep there in the gateway.
"Listen!" said Rain, as they stood on the wall of the fort.
Somewhere, far away in the heat haze, there was a tiny broken thread
of music. First one and then another, the women and the children
stirred in their sleep, awakened in sudden terror, then sat up,
wondering, to listen, straining to catch the distant sound again, for
an old, old Scottish melody rang softly in the cañons, "Oh, but ye've
been lang a-comin'!"
Now they were all afoot, swarming across the courtyard to the gate.
Lady McNaughten, rousing the spy, cried, "Major Pottinger, don't you
hear? Oh, can't you hear? A band is playing somewhere!"
Pottinger rose to his feet, swaying with weariness as he stared down
the pass, intent to catch the sound; and then he also heard.
"Oh, but ye've been lang a-comin'!"
Pottinger called his General Staff about him, giving brisk orders.
His bugler was sounding the "Alert," then the "Assembly," and trumpet
after trumpet took the echo far off into the haze.
Then the head of the British relief column came swinging round a
shoulder of the cliffs, and Lady Sale ran, shouting, to join her
husband.
Rain cried a little, then brushed her eyes with her sleeve.
"Finished," she said. "I have worked for our dear spy three snows
now, and he needs no more help." She turned upon her pupil.
"And you?" Rising Wolf felt as though Rain's eyes were burning him.
"Your soul," she said, "has come alive so quickly."
They were crossing the evening westward into the night and Rain drove
her lesson home to the white man's heart:
"Faith in all that is good is the soul's life, like sunshine to a
plant, but doubt is the bleak wind which stops its growth, denial the
frost which nips and withers it."
"I believe in you."
"The messenger is bad," she answered, "but the message is true, and
He who sends it expects you to obey. Now, if I take you to your
father, what sort of comfort do you bring to his bedside? Ah, you
still dread death!"
"I do."
"A sore thing, parting with one's horse, eh?"
"It is all that."
"--with the animal one has ridden so hard, and loved so dearly."
"Aye, Rain. You love a horse as much as I do."
"Did it break your heart to leave your tired animal there in the
guest lodge when you came with me?"
"You mean my body? No."
"See. There below us is the Atlantic, lit by the moonrise."
"So it is. Then we've been nearly round the earth. What an immense
adventure!"
"And yet you grudge your father this adventure?"
"Oh, but he's dying."
"Dying into a bigger adventure than ours, in bigger and more splendid
worlds. Do you grudge him that? Shame on you!"
He saw America lift above the sky line, and presently the Gulf of St.
Lawrence narrowed to the river. There was the citadel of Quebec,
yonder his native Montreal, the familiar maple trees, the garden, the
old house with its green shutters, the open windows. "See," said
Rain, "I leave you now. My dear man, Storm, is waiting, to take you
to your father."
The night was hot and the windows thrown wide open, the moonlight
falling through the maples cast the shadows of their delicately
pointed leaves, like dark stars, on the floor and on the white bed
where old Monroe lay dying.
"'For this my son,'" he said in his dream, "was dead, and is alive
again, was lost, and is found. It's been such a long time, Doggie.
I'm frightened, too, although you needn't tell my brother officers."
"What is it makes you frightened, sir?" asked Rising Wolf.
"To lie in the earth while the worms crawl and bite me. I can't say
I like the idea, Doggie. And when they've finished, I won't be
exactly nice for the Last Parade."
"I've a friend outside, sir, waiting, sort of angel, knows all about
it. Will you see him?"
"Three days, Doggie, since I shaved my chin, or brushed my whiskers.
I've had men flogged for less, much less."
"Draw the sheet up to your mouth, sir. There, you look fine. Storm!"
Storm knelt beside him.
"Oh, it's you!" said the old man. "But, Doggie, this is the fellow I
sent to fetch you. He doesn't know a platoon from a quarter guard."
"I don't," said Storm cheerily, "but I use worm for bait."
"Hoo! What a despicable way of fishing."
"No flies," the Colonel's son explained.
"If a worm wanted," said Storm, "to eat me, and if he was old
Boneyparte himself, he'd need to run like a jack rabbit, or fly like
a bird before he got a bite."
The colonel nodded.
"I'm not frightened of worms, and you're no more scared of 'em than
you was of Boney. They're welcome to my animal body, after I've
finished with it."
"Finished with it?"
"Well, there's a natural body, and there's a spiritual body, isn't
there?"
"That's quoting Authority. That's as good as Queen's Regulations."
"Better," said Storm. "Won't be monkeyed with by the War Office.
I've heard soldiers growsing before now."
"Bravo! Excellent!"
"Well, the worms get the natural body, and the angels get the
spiritual body."
"We shall rise in our bodies at the Last Day. That's Authority too."
"Yes, if it says 'in our animal bodies.' I've seen some I'd hate to
repair if I was the carpenter."
The colonel chuckled. "Well," he said, "there's sense in that. Go
on."
"Soldiers tell me," said Storm, "that each regiment has a battalion
at home feeding one oversea."
"With drafts, yes."
"Yours, Colonel, if I've got it correct, sent out a lot of drafts,
one time and another."
"That's true."
"Drafts from Torres Vedras, Fuentes d'Onoro, Talavera, Toulouse,
Quatre Bras, Waterloo----"
"Hold on. We lost men, a lot of men in those engagements, but----"
"Drafts," said Storm. "I've met the Other Battalion, and they say
they'll be jolly glad to welcome good old--well, they called you 'Old
Cat's Whiskers.'"
"They did, eh? Beastly cheek!"
"They say you'll have seniority, whatever that means."
"It means taking command, I say, young Angel, or whatever you call
yourself--are they on active service?"
"Yes."
"Who's the enemy?"
"Devils."
"Is it like that, Angel?" answered the colonel, radiant. "Doggie,"
he turned to his son, "seem's you've found a new master. Follow him,
my son, when I am gone."
"I will," said Rising Wolf.
For hours he kept vigil at his father's bedside, each in his dream
comforted by the other's presence, although the old man did not speak
again.
Hugh Monroe thought of this night's great journey round the planet,
made at a speed he reckoned of about four thousand miles an hour, by
sheer will power of the woman he had slandered. He had dared to call
Rain a charlatan!
He who called himself adventurer had met Kit Carson, Fremont, and
Crittenden, Brooke the King of Sarawak, Harry Keppel, and greatest of
them all young Eldred Pottinger the spy. Their very names were new
to him. "And what am I?" he moaned, "compared with the least of
these!"
His world had seemed enormous, limitless, his influence powerful, yet
his own father had told him, Rising Wolf, white leader of the
Blackfeet, to be Storm's dog!
Then Rising Wolf awakened from his dream, to find himself in the
guest lodge, and through the open doorway saw the rose flush of the
sunrise lighting the pinnacles of the Apse of Ice. Rain sat beside
him, her hand upon his forehead. "Remember!" she was
whispering--"remember!"
"He called me Doggie," answered Rising Wolf. "Storm's dog. I shall
remember. While I live, I shall remember."