A BULL AND A BEAR
Wonota had known nothing of what was supposed to have been a deliberate
attempt to injure Ruth Fielding until some hours after the occurrence.
She had not much to say about it, but, like the three white girls, she
was sure the guilty man was Dakota Joe.
As William had said, Fenbrook was a "mighty mean man," and the Osage
maid knew that to be a fact. She nodded her head gravely as she
commented upon the incident that might have ended so seriously.
"That Dakota Joe is bad. Chief Totantora would have sent him to the
spirit land long since, had he been here. There are white men, Miss
Fielding, who are much worse than any redman."
"I will grant you that," sighed Ruth. "Badness is not a matter of blood,
I guess. This Fenbrook has no feeling or decency. He is dangerous."
"I should have shot him," declared the Osage girl confidently. "I am
afraid I have done wrong in not doing so before."
"How can you talk so recklessly!" exclaimed Ruth, and she was really
troubled. "Shooting Dakota Joe would make you quite as bad as he is. No,
no! That is not the way to feel about it."
But Wonota could not understand this logic.
And yet, Wonota in other ways was not at all reckless or ferocious. She
possessed a fund of sympathy, and was kindly disposed toward everybody
When one of the cook's helpers cut his foot with an ax, she aided in the
rough surgery furnished by the camp boss, and afterwards nursed the
invalid while he was confined to his bunk and could not even hop about.
All the men liked her, and after a time they did not speak carelessly of
her as "that Injun gal." She seemed to be of a different caliber from
the other Indians engaged in making the picture. At least, she was more
intelligent.
The girls from the East did not lose their personal interest in Wonota
in the least degree. But of course while the various scenes were being
made even Ruth did not give all her attention to either the Indian
maiden or to the shooting of the picture.
The great freshet scene, when developed and tried out in the projection
room at Clearwater, proved to be a very striking film indeed. If
"Brighteyes" was to rise to the level of that one scene, every reel of
the picture must be photographed with great care.
While the director and Mr. Hammond and the company in general worked
over some of the lumber-camp scenes, retaking or arranging for the shots
over and over again, Ruth rode with her two chums on many a picturesque
trail around Benbow Camp, Hubbell Ranch and the Clearwater station of
the railroad.
They were quite sure that Dakota Joe Fenbrook had left this part of the
country--and left in a hurry. If he learned that his attempt on Ruth
Fielding's life was not successful, he must have learned it some time
after the occurrence. Just where the "bad man" had gone after leaving
Benbow on the run, nobody seemed to know.
Ruth and Helen and Jennie were in the saddle almost every day. They
found much to interest them on the various trails they followed. They
even discovered and visited several pioneer families--"nesters" in the
language of the cowpunchers and stockmen--who welcomed the Eastern girls
with vast curiosity.
"And how some of these folks can live in such Wild places, and in such
perfectly barren cabins, I do not see," groaned Helen Cameron after a
visit to one settler's family near a wild canyon to the west of Benbow
Camp. "That woman and those girls! Not a decent garment to their backs,
and the men so rough and uncouth. I would not stay there on a bet--not
for the best man who ever breathed."
"That woman's husband isn't the best man who ever breathed," said
Jennie, grimly. "But perhaps he is the best man she ever knew. And,
anyway, having as the boys say 'got stuck on him,' now she is plainly
'stuck with him.' In other words she has made her own bed and must lie
in it."
"Why should people be punished for their ignorance?" complained Helen.
"Nature's way," said Ruth confidently. "Civilization is slowly changing
that--or trying to. But nature's law is, after all, rather harsh to us."
"If I was one of those girls we saw back there," Helen continued, "I
would run away."
"Run where?" asked Ruth slyly. "With a movie company? Or a Wild West
Show?"
"Either. Anything would be better than that hut and the savagery of
their present lives."
"They don't mind it so much," admitted Jennie. "I asked one of them. She
was looking forward to a dance next week. She said they had three of
four through the year--and they seemed to be reckoned as great treats,
but all a girl could expect."
"And think how much we demand," said Ruth thoughtfully. "Welladay! Maybe
we have too much--too much of the good things of the earth."
"Bah!" exclaimed Helen, with disgust. "One can't get too much of the
good things. No, ma'am! Take all you can----"
"And give nothing?" suggested Ruth, shaking her head.
"Nobody can say with truth that you are selfish, Ruthie Fielding," put
in Jennie. "In fact, you are always giving, and never taking."
Ruth laughed at this. "You are wrong," she said. "The more you give the
more you get. At least, I find it so. And we are getting right now, on
this trip to the great Northwest, much more than we are giving. I feel
as though I would be condemned if I did not do something for these
hard-working people who are doing their part in developing this
country--the settlers, and even the timbermen."
"You want to be a lady Santa Claus to that bunch of roughnecks at Benbow
Camp, do you?" laughed Jennie.
"Well, I would like to help somebody besides Wonota. What do you hear
from your New York dressmaker about Wonota's new outfit, Jennie?"
"It will be shipped right out here to Clearwater before long," announced
the plump girl, with new satisfaction. "Won't Wonota be surprised?"
"And delighted!" added Helen, showing satisfaction too.
At that very moment they rode out of a patch of wood which had hidden
from the girls' eyes a piece of lowland fringed by a grove of northern
cottonwood trees. On the air was borne a deep bellow--a sound that none
of the three had noted before.
"What is that?" demanded Helen, startled and half drawing in her
snorting pony.
"Oh, listen!" cried Jennie. "Hear the poor cow."
Ruth was inclined to doubt. "When you hear a 'cow' bellowing in this
country, look out. It may be a wild steer or a very ugly bull. Let us go
on cautiously."
All three of the ponies showed signs of trepidation, and this fact added
to Ruth's easily aroused anxiety.
"Have a care," she said to Helen and Jennie. "I believe something is
going on here that spells danger--for us at least."
"It's down in the swamp. See the way the ponies look," agreed Jennie.
They quickly came to a break in the cottonwood grove on the edge of the
morass. Instantly the ponies halted, snorting again. Ruth's tried to
rear and turn, but she was a good horsewoman.
"Oh, look!" squealed Helen. "A bear!"
"Oh, look!" echoed Jennie, quite as excited. "A bull!"
"Well, I declare!" exclaimed Ruth, her hands full for the moment with
the actions of her mount. "One would think you were looking at a picture
of Wall Street--with your bulls and your bears I Let me see--do!"