THE DEBT IS PAID
A strange sight awaited Johnny and the Basque. Thunder Bird’s braves
had surprised Gallup and captured him. Roddy, his deputy—Sol
Ahrens—and Kent had bolted. So, without a shot having been fired,
old Aaron had been marched to the camp at the top of the mountain.
The rock formation looked very much as if it was of volcanic origin,
a huge crater or bowl having been carved out where the peak of the
mountain must once have risen. In this bowl was the Piute camp.
Johnny and Madeiras, from the point they had gained above the
Indians, were able to see what went on. Gallup was tied to a stake.
Thunder Bird sat facing him, and squatting in a circle about the
doomed man were at least fifty Indians. Two or three squaws moved
around in back of the circle, gathering rocks and depositing them in
piles within reach of their lords.
“They’re goin’ to stone him,” Johnny told the Basque. “It’s a good
old Piute trick.”
Gallup’s voice rose above the throbbing of the drum, but what he
said was not intelligible to the two men watching him. Thunder Bird
sat unmoved, gloating over the man before him, Aaron’s torrent of
words only adding to his enjoyment.
At a signal from one of the chief’s sons the squaws left their
gathering of rocks and approached the single lodge which had been
erected. A brief wrangling, and Johnny saw Molly step forth from the
tent’s folds. Ten seconds later the chief’s lodge fell in the dust.
A brief moment of labor and the Indian women had it strapped on a
pony.
Johnny saw Thunder Bird raise his hand as Molly approached him.
Plainly he was exhibiting her to Gallup. The Indian’s sense of the
dramatic was superb. He intended that Aaron should think that he had
stolen her.
Gallup turned his entreaties to Molly, but she seemed deaf to them.
Johnny saw her pick up a rock from the piles which the squaws had
made. She held it out questioningly toward old Thunder Bird. Rapid
words followed, the chief continuing to shake his head negatively.
Molly’s actions became vehement. The chief held up his hand to his
women. It ended the argument, for the next second Molly was being
led toward the distant crest of the large bowl.
“He wouldn’t listen to her,” thought the boy. “She savvied those
piles of rock.” Aloud, then, he added:
“They’re sendin’ her away. It’s pretty refined of the old chief not
to make her witness what’s comin’ off.”
“Well, what we do now?” Tony asked. “You t’ink she’s any good for go
down there?”
“I’m goin’ to try it,” Johnny answered. “You stay here. Maybe they
won’t let me come in to camp. If they do I’ll palaver and stall as
long as I can. Kelsey and the others will be showin’ up before long.
They can’t be asleep at the Agency to what is goin’ on. Ames is
Injunwise. If these braves git started the top is likely to blow off
before they’re calmed down again.”
“Bes’, I t’ink, to stay right here,” Tony stated firmly.
“And fail—after all my talkin’? Not on your life. I’m goin’ to git
Gallup, as I said I would. My luck ain’t so bad. Say, where’d you
get that trinket on the hat? That’s Traynor’s, ain’t it?”
“_Sí_. I get heem out of Gallup’s purse when he geeve eet to me for
keel you. That’s why I mak’ so much excitement. Maybe you tak’ eet.”
Tony offered the gold snake to Johnny, but the boy waved it back.
“No—I’ll play my own stuff. You watch me when I git down there. If I
hold up my hand, you shoot—fire two or three times. I’ll be tellin’
’em how many men I got around the rim. If the others arrive in time,
maybe they’ll understand, too.”
They shook hands, and Johnny moved away, Madeiras’s eyes following
him. When the boy was within two hundred yards of the camp the
Basque saw him raise his right hand, palm flat, above his head, his
left hand, palm pointing downward, dropping until it hung below his
waist. It was the Piute sign for a parley.
Johnny avoided any cover, lest it be thought that he stole up on
them. A few seconds later he was seen.
Contrary to the white man’s nice little laws, these Indians were
armed. Johnny caught the flash of the sun’s rays on the polished
barrels, but he continued to walk toward them. Thunder Bird turned
his head in the boy’s direction as he advanced.
Gallup had recognized Johnny, and he cursed him. Johnny ignored
Aaron. When he reached the chief’s side, the boy’s hands moved until
the tips of his fingers rested against his forehead. It was the sign
of friendship. The chief answered and motioned to Johnny to sit
down.
Instead of complying, Johnny took the drum from the player’s hands,
and, holding it before Thunder Bird, dropped a handful of dust upon
it. It was symbolic—the omen of disaster. A murmur passed around the
circle of squatting Indians.
The old chief caught the boy’s meaning. “Nah!” he grunted angrily.
“My tongue speaks no lie,” Johnny answered flatly. “It is the drum
of death! Many men are in the hills. They are near. They no ask
question—just shoot.”
Thunder Bird’s head moved back and forth assuredly. A sarcastic,
mocking grunt broke from his lips. “White men run,” he announced.
“All gone.”
He referred to the other members of Gallup’s party. Not knowing
this, Johnny wondered if his play was doomed.
“Some go, many more come, chief,” he went on without a sign of
wavering. “Piute women rub ashes in their hair tonight. Me good
friend with you, Thunder Bird. Me tell um you, no take Gallup—white
man want him. Man Gale, he is dead; man Kent, he dead, too. Make
talk—plenty talk. Big Jim come. Many guns come with him. Mebbe so
you remember Mormon fight? Plenty Injun die; no fires in the lodges.
Now come so happen again.”
And Johnny stooped and threw a handful of dust into his own face;
from his lips came the doleful notes of the chant for the dead.
Thunder Bird stirred uneasily. The boy, wisely, had made no demands.
What he had said had been only the airing of his sadness over the
calamity facing the tribe. His talk held truths as Thunder Bird
knew—the Mormon raid, for instance. Doubts for the safety of his
band began to assail the chief. He saw his braves staring at Johnny.
That individual was keenly alive to the fact that the issue hung in
the balance right now. If his bluff were called he would be in for
it.
Bluff was one of Thunder Bird’s weapons also. He availed himself of
it now. “We keep Gallup,” he said. “No take away him. Men not come.
If men come, where they be?”
Johnny’s hand was being called. He did not flinch. With a look that
said a thousand men surrounded them he lifted his hand and began
sweeping it around the edge of the bowl. “They are there,” he said.
His hand pointed toward the spot where Madeiras lay. _Bang, bang,
bang_, came the sound of the Basque’s gun.
“There are many,” Johnny paused to say cautiously before his hand
moved onward. Was there any one else up there to answer him—Scanlon,
Doc, Kelsey? God help him if there was not. An eternity passed for
the boy as his hand started again and moved a foot without receiving
an answer. Johnny knew that he was taking the supreme gamble of his
life. Another few inches his hand moved, and then _bang, bang, bang_
came the report of a gun.
“Good old Doc Ritter,” Johnny murmured to himself, thinking he
recognized the sound of Doc’s heavy calibered weapon.
Johnny’s hand was sweeping along. Another series of shots rang out.
A pause then until his hand pointed in the very direction in which
Molly had gone. The next instant a fusillade of shots echoed in the
basin. Over the crest came a band of men—twenty-five or thirty of
them.
“It is Ames and the agent!” Johnny cried aloud. “Thank God!” The boy
had no need to fear that his words had been overheard. The Indians
were in a panic. Only old Thunder Bird sat unmoved.
Johnny ran toward the oncoming men, his hands raised as he shouted
to them to put down their guns. By the time they met, Kelsey and
Scanlon were running down to them. A minute more and Ritter and
Madeiras appeared.
Ames had organized the party.
“What’s it all about, Johnny?” Ames asked. “I shore thought they wuz
out to raise ha’r.”
“They just wanted Gallup. He’s treated the chief as though he was a
water boy. When you hurt his dignity you’re hurtin’ somethin’.”
“Wal, you’d better untie Gallup,” Ames suggested. “He don’t look
happy.”
“I’ll take care of him,” Kelsey announced. “I want him for murder.”
This statement caused some excitement among the trader’s party.
Kelsey explained briefly. “We’ll take him back to town,” he went on.
“Maybe you can find a horse for the old chief. Patch it up with him.
I’ll want him for a witness when this case comes to trial.”
Gallup had a tirade ready for Kelsey and the others as they
approached him. “’Bout time some one came,” he growled. “Injuns do
about as they please on the Reservation nowadays.”
“Aaron Gallup,” Kelsey interrupted, “I’ve got a warrant for your
arrest. You’re wanted for the murder of Crosbie Traynor.”
Gallup winced as if he had been shot. “Like hell I am,” he roared
when he recovered his breath. “That whipper-snapper there is at the
bottom of this!” And he hurled an oath at Johnny.
“That’s enough out of you, Gallup,” Kelsey snapped. “The boy got
you, all right. We’ve had Gale’s story also.”
“And Kent’s,” Johnny added. “He’s dead,” he continued in answer to
Jim’s question. “He tried to plug me; Tony stopped him. It was just
as we had it figured. Gallup shot Traynor from the top of a box
car.”
“That’s goin’ to be right hard on the girl,” the trader exclaimed.
“Losin’ her paw thata-way. I took her and sent her down to my house
just a while back. The Injuns had her.”
“You’ll get her now,” Gallup sneered at Johnny, “You’re welcome to
her. What is she, anyhow? You think she’s——”
Madeiras had plucked a glowing faggot from a little “squaw” fire
which the Indians had made. He pressed it against Gallup’s mouth.
“Wan more word, Gallup,” he dared, “and I shove thees down your
dam’, no-good t’roat!”
Thunder Bird broke his silence long enough to grunt his approval of
this proposed action.
“You and Tony will be going with Ames,” Kelsey stated. “Our party
will go back the way you came, Johnny. Guess we’d better take Kent’s
body with us. Where’ll we find it?”
“In that little park of cedars soon after you start downhill.”
“Wal, we’ll git goin’ out of hyar,” Ames announced. “What about you,
chief? Better trail along.”
Thunder Bird shook his head.
“Suit yoreself. So-long, boys.”
Gallup, gloomy and sullen, got to his feet; the parties separated
and soon lost sight of each other.
“Never seen trouble come yit when the agent wuz home,” the trader
grumbled as they mounted their horses. “Reckon this is about Thunder
Bird’s last good time.”