IN THE QUICKSANDS.
"There," said Hugh, one afternoon as they rode over a low ridge, and
down toward a stream flowing through a wide valley, "that's the
Mussellshell!"
"Well," said Jack, "it don't look to me like much of a river."
"Well, no," said Hugh, "it ain't; there's a heap of valley and mighty
little river. There ain't but one other river, that I know of, that's
long like this one, that carries as little water."
"What one is that, Hugh?" said Jack.
"That's Milk River," was the reply. "We cross that, or at least, the
heads of it after we get into the Piegan country. That stream don't rise
in the mountains, but comes up out of a lot of springs and swamps on the
prairie; so all the water it gets is what little melting snow drains
into it in spring; and besides that, it flows through a gumbo country,
and lots of the water soaks into the soil, so that by the middle of
summer down near its mouth it is often plumb dry, or what water there is
in it just stands in water holes; it don't run at all. Then, in spring,
when the snow is melting and the rains are on, it often gets over its
banks and floods the whole country."
"There don't seem to be much wood here, Hugh; where are you going to
camp?"
"Well," said Hugh, "we'll have to camp by some patch of sage-brush, and
use that and buffalo chips to cook with. There's plenty of wood up
nearer to the mountains, but none down here."
Camp was made early in the afternoon, but after they had taken off the
packs, and Jack had unsaddled, he noticed that Hugh's horse still had
his saddle on, and was feeding about the camp, dragging his rope and
bridle.
"Why don't you unsaddle, Hugh?" he asked.
"Well," said Hugh, "I'm going to ride along the river apiece, and try to
pick a good place to cross; this here creek is mighty bad in
spots--quicksands in the river and soap-holes along the bank, that you
can't see until you get right to 'em. It may take me half an hour to
look out a crossing to-night, and that may save us a horse, and anyhow,
a whole lot of trouble in the morning."
After they had eaten and washed up the dishes, Hugh mounted and rode off
up the stream. The horses were feeding close to the camp, and Jack took
his rifle, and walking up to a little rise of ground, sat there,
overlooking the camp and the wide valley. He had not been there very
long when something moving down the stream caught his eye, and as he
watched it, and it came nearer, he could see that it was a bird flying,
and when still closer, he saw that the bird was big, and that there
seemed to be something long streaming out behind it. Just below the camp
it came down nearly to the water's surface, and suddenly threw out a
long neck, checked its flight, and let its long slender legs drop,
alighting on a sand-bar. Jack saw then that it was a great heron or
crane, but larger than any that he had ever seen. He thought he would
shoot it, and get Hugh to tell him just what it was; so after the bird
had stopped looking about, and had lowered its head and was walking
along the bar, Jack quickly crept out of sight, and running down between
two ridges which hid him, got near enough to the bank to take a shot at
the bird. It was not easy to estimate how far off it was; it looked like
less than a hundred yards, but over the flat bottom and the water there
was nothing to measure the distance by except the bird's size. However,
he took a careful shot at it with level sights, and was delighted to see
it spread its wings and fall forward on the sand. He walked to the edge
of the stream, wondering how he could get the bird. The distance across
to the sand-bar was not great, but the water was muddy and whirling, and
it was impossible to see bottom, or to guess whether if he stepped in he
would go over his shoes or his head. He looked about for a stick with
which he might feel for the bottom, but of course there were no sticks
there. He put the butt of his gun into the water, but could not feel the
bottom. Then he sat down, took off his shoes and stockings, and rolled
up his trousers, and let himself down over the bank, feeling in the
water for bottom, but he could not touch it. The water felt thick, and
he could feel the little particles of soil striking against his legs.
Getting up on the bank again he took his shoes in one hand and his rifle
in the other, and walked up the stream a little way, and there he again
tried for bottom, but found none. He looked at the bird, so near to him,
and did not feel like giving it up. It was hardly thirty feet away. He
felt sure that he could throw a rope across to it.
This gave him an idea. Putting on his shoes, and thrusting his socks
into his pocket, he walked up to the camp and took a sling-rope off a
pack saddle, and then, with the axe and a picket-pin in his hand walked
down to the stream. He now had in his mind two ways of getting the bird;
one was to tie the picket-pin to the end of the rope, and try to throw
it over the bird, and drag it into the water, and so, across. If he
could not do that, he made up his mind that he would drive the
picket-pin into the bank, tie the rope to it, strip off all his clothes,
and, holding the rope, try to wade across the channel.
It was not hard to throw the picket-pin and rope over to where the bird
lay, but it proved very hard to throw it so that the line could lie
across the bird. Once he did so, and began to pull in very gradually,
but before the bird had been moved at all toward the water's edge the
pin slipped up over it and came away.
Meantime, Hugh had ridden quite a long way up the stream, looking for a
crossing, but finding none. Two or three places seemed inviting, but his
horse was afraid of them, and on investigating, Hugh found that bad
quicksands lay close to the bank. At length, however, he reached a point
where a deep buffalo trail came down to the water's edge, and where
buffalo had crossed later. There were some stones in the bottom here,
and Hugh, riding in, and crossing the stream so as to come out where the
buffalo trail appeared on the other side, found that he had a good
crossing. Then he turned about and rode back to camp.
After Jack had thrown the picket-pin until he was thoroughly
discouraged, he decided to try to cross, himself. He drove the
picket-pin firmly in the bank, and tied the sling-rope to it, undressed,
took the coil of rope in his hand, and then let himself down from the
bank into the water, very slowly. Before the water was up to his
shoulders his feet struck the bottom of coarse gravel, and he turned his
face toward the other bank, and holding the rope tightly, with the coil
in his left hand, he began to go slowly out into the stream. The water
flowed with great violence, and two or three times nearly took him off
his feet. Soon, however, it shoaled a little, and he turned up the
stream to reach the point of the sand-bar behind which there was an
eddy. In a moment the water was only up to his knees, and he was just
about to spring forward to the bar when suddenly the bottom seemed to
give out beneath his feet, and the water was up to his waist, while,
piled around his legs, up to his knees, was a mass of heavy sand. He
tried to lift his feet out of it, but the sand clung like great weights
about his legs and he could not move them. In a moment it flashed across
his mind that these must be the quicksands about which he had heard so
often, but of which he had known nothing. Stories told by Hugh and
others, of men and animals caught in this terrible, unyielding sand
flashed across his mind as he struggled to free his feet. One pull
seemed to loosen his right foot, and he lifted it a little way, but this
left him with his knee bent, and made that leg useless. The sand seemed
to be piling up higher around his legs, and now it was half way up to
his thighs. He was frightened.
All this had taken a very few moments and luckily he still held the
sling-rope. He drew this tight, and throwing himself forward, so that
his body was almost horizontal, he pulled on the rope with all his
might, and at the same time tried to kick with his legs. In vain; he
could move neither of them, but his thighs, which before had been erect,
bent forward, and now he could not get them back again; to keep his body
erect he was obliged to lean backward. Every minute he could feel that
the sand was higher on his legs, and he could also feel that the water
was creeping up his body. It seemed but a few moments since his knees
were out of the water, and now the water rippled against his chest. What
was going to happen? It could not be that he should drown here; and yet
Hugh had told him of men who had been drowned in just this way. He must
try again to get out. He must do something; he could not stand this.
Suddenly, he remembered something that Hugh was always saying; something
that he had said to him only two or three days before; the sense of it
was, that a man should always keep his wits about him; and as these oft
repeated words came into his mind he seemed suddenly to cool off, and to
lose the excitement that he had been feeling. His mind worked fast, and
he said to himself, "Now, what would Hugh do if he were stuck here?" He
tried to think; then suddenly he bent down, and with his face close to
the water began to scrap away the sands from the sides of his thighs. He
had been doing that only for a moment when he noticed something; the
sand scraped away on the down-stream side of his body seemed to come
back at once; that scraped from the up-stream side did not come back,
but left a hole. In a moment he comprehended what this meant; that on
the up-stream side of his legs the water was helping carry away the
disturbed sand, while on the down-stream side it was packing in that
sand all the time. In a moment he was working with both hands on the
up-stream leg, and it took a very short time to clear this almost down
to the knee, but below that he could not get. Suddenly, he threw himself
down stream as hard as he could, wrenched his body to one side, and with
a mighty pull dragged his left leg from its fetter, falling down in the
water so that its muddy flood covered him. He righted himself at once,
and kept kicking with his left leg, for fear that it should again become
fast, and soon he had trodden a hard place, where for a little while he
could rest his foot, but the whirling sands soon covered it, and he was
obliged to keep it moving. Now the water had carried away the sand from
the upper part of his right thigh, but he could not free it, nor even
move it. Again despair seized him, and he did not know what to do. He
looked at the clear blue sky, at the brown prairie, and back at the
horses, quietly feeding near the camp, just as if no one anywhere about
was suffering and fearing, perhaps dying. Oh, if Pawnee were only here,
and he could take hold of his tail.
Once more he tried to free his foot, struggling, jerking, pulling and
wrenching the leg, until it was strained and sore, but the unyielding
sand held it as in a vise, and at length he stood still, almost
exhausted. All the time he felt that the water was creeping up a little
higher on his body. Now for a little while Jack entirely lost his self
control. "What does it mean?" he asked himself in despair. "What is
going to happen? Can it be that I am not going to get out? Have I got to
drown here in sight of camp? Shan't I ever get back home, and see father
and mother again, or uncle Will or Hugh? Was mother thinking about this
when she cried and kissed me at the train, and asked me to be careful? I
haven't been careful, but it seems kind o' hard that she should have to
suffer because I am a fool. How badly father'll feel, too, and Uncle
Will and Hugh. They'll all think that they were to blame. Oh! I must get
out, I can't die here;" and the poor boy again struggled until he was
exhausted. The water was now nearly up to his arm-pits, and he was
almost worn out.
All at once, as he looked at the camp, he saw Hugh ride in among the
horses, stop and look about, as if trying to see where his companion
was. Jack's heart gave a great bound, and he called loudly, but Hugh did
not hear him, and began to swing himself out of the saddle. In despair,
Jack yelled again, sending out a shrill, high-pitched scream which
reached the rider and made him throw his leg back over the saddle and
turn in the direction of the river. Again Jack screamed, and Hugh
galloped rapidly toward the bank, and in a moment saw the boy's white
skin shining above the muddy water.
"Help, Hugh! help! I'm stuck," called Jack.
"All right, son," came Hugh's deep voice, "hold on a minute, we'll have
you out." He galloped up to the very edge of the bank, sprang from the
saddle, and quickly freed his rope from the horse's neck, at the same
time throwing down the bridle rein. Then stepping a little to one side;
he coiled the rope, made a careful cast, and the loop fell over Jack's
head. Jack caught it, drew up the loop under his arm-pits, and Hugh
quickly took in the slack; then he walked to his horse, drew the rope
tight, and took a double turn of it about the saddle horn.
"Now, son," said Hugh, "we've got to pull you out, and if you're badly
stuck, it's liable to stretch you considerable."
"No matter, Hugh; only get me out as quick as you can," said Jack. "I've
got one leg free, there's only one to be pulled loose."
"Well," said Hugh, "we'll go as easy as we can, but it's liable to hurt
you considerable. What's this rope running into the water from this
pin?"
"That's around my body, too," said Jack.
"Is it tied?" said Hugh.
"No," said Jack, "it's just wrapped around."
"Well, make it fast around your body, and then let me have what slack
you can. I'll pull on that rope, and have the horse pull on the other,
and maybe that'll make it easier for you."
Jack tied the end of the rope about his body, and Hugh took in the
slack; then he loosened the lariat, turned his horse so that his head
was away from the stream, again fastened the lariat to the saddle horn,
and put the sling-rope over his own shoulder; then he called to Jack,
"See if you can dig away the sand at all from around the leg that's
fast." Jack bent down until his face was under water, and worked hard,
scraping away the sand, and again succeeded in getting it down to his
knee; then he raised his head again, and called to Hugh, "I've done the
best I can, the sand is down to my knee, but it's filling up again."
"Well," said Hugh, "we'll start. You must yell if you feel anything
breaking." He bent forward, throwing his weight very slowly against the
sling rope, and starting the horse very slowly at the same time. The
ropes tightened, Jack was pulled forward until his face was under water,
he felt as if he were being cut in two below his arms, as if his legs
were being pulled out of their sockets, when suddenly, with a jerk, he
flew forward, was buried under the muddy water, and then whirled over
and over in it, and a moment later was dragged out on the bank by Hugh,
who bent over him with an anxious face. Without a word Hugh lifted him
in his arms and put him on the horse, which he led toward the camp.
Before they had reached there, Jack had recovered his breath, and said,
"Oh, Hugh, I don't think I ever was so glad to see anybody in my life as
I was to see you ride in among the horses."
"Well," said Hugh, "I'm glad I got there just when I did. You must have
had a pretty bad time while you were stuck there."
"Yes," said Jack, "I don't think I will ever be so near drowning, and
yet live."
"You're some cut by them ropes, I see," said Hugh. And Jack, looking
down, saw about his body two red, bleeding marks, where the ropes had
rubbed his skin off. "Are your legs all right?" continued the old man.
"I think so," said Jack. "One of 'em feels longer than the other, but I
can move them both."
"Well," said Hugh, "I ought to have told you not to try to cross this
creek; everybody knows it's bad for quicksands, but I ought to have
remembered that you didn't know nothing about this country, anyhow."
Hugh lifted Jack out of the saddle and laid him down on one of the
mantas, and then unrolled his bed and put him on that.
"Now," said Hugh, "I'm going to look you over and see if you're much
hurted." A quick, rough examination showed Hugh that, except for marks
around Jack's body where the ropes had pulled, and a long, deep scratch
on his leg and foot, he was quite sound. Hugh took some sheep tallow,
and melting it in the frying-pan, applied it warm to these scars; and
then, telling Jack to lie still, went down to the stream again and
brought back his rifle and clothes. Then he sat by him and talked to
him, telling stories of the Musselshell country, and the Indian fights
that had taken place there, until darkness fell, and the boy dropped
asleep.