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RED BELTS
[Illustration: “_On the ground lay Elsie Tonpit, hurled there by a
bandit, a huge brute of a man, bending over her._”]
RED BELTS
by
HUGH PENDEXTER
[Illustration: Printer decoration]
Frontispiece by Ralph Pallen Coleman
Garden City New York
Doubleday, Page & Company
1920
Copyright, 1920, by
Doubleday, Page & Company
All rights reserved, including that of
translation into foreign languages,
including the Scandinavian
Copyright, 1919, by The Ridgway Company
FOREWORD
In 1784 North Carolina’s share of the national debt was a ninth, or
about five millions of dollars—a prodigious sum for a commonwealth just
emerging from a colonial chrysalis to raise. Yet North Carolina was
more fortunate than some of her sister débutantes into Statehood, in
that she possessed some twenty-nine million acres of virgin country
beyond the Alleghanies. This noble realm, from which the State of
Tennessee was to be fashioned, had been won by confiscation and the
rifles of the over-mountain settlers and had cost North Carolina
neither blood nor money.
The republic was too young to have developed coalescence. A man might
be a New Yorker, a New Englander, a Virginian and so on, but as yet
seldom an American. The majority of the Northern representatives to the
national Congress believed the Union was full grown, geographically;
that it covered too much territory already. To all such narrow visions
the Alleghanies appealed as being the natural western boundary. These
conservatives insisted the future of the country was to be found on the
seaboard.
Charles III of Spain heartily approved of this policy of restriction
and set in motion his mighty machinery to prevent further expansion of
the United States. He knew the stimuli for restoring his kingdom to a
world plane could be found only in his American possessions.
As a result of those sturdy adventurers, crossing the mountains to
plunge into the unknown, carried with them scant encouragement from
their home States or the central Government. In truth, the national
Congress was quite powerless to protect its citizens. And this,
perhaps, because the new States had not yet fully evolved above the
plan of Colonial kinship. It was to be many years before the rights of
States gave way to the rights of the nation. The States were often at
odds with one another and would stand shoulder to shoulder only in face
of a general and overwhelming peril.
Spain, powerful, rapacious and cunning, stalked its prey beyond the
mountains. She dreamed of a new world empire, with the capital at New
Orleans, and her ambitions formed a sombre back-curtain before which
Creek and Cherokee warriors—some twenty thousand fighting men—manœuvred
to stop the white settlers straggling over the Alleghanies. These
logical enemies of the newcomers were augmented by white renegades, a
general miscellany of outlaws, who took toll in blood and treasure with
a ferocity that had nothing to learn from the red men.
So the over-mountain men had at their backs the indifference of the
seaboard.
Confronting them were ambuscades and torture. But there was one factor
which all the onslaughts of insidious intrigue and bloody violence
could not eliminate from the equation—the spirit of the people. The
soul of the freeman could not be bought with foreign gold or consumed
at the stake. Men died back on the seaboard, and their deaths had only
a biological significance, but men were dying over the mountains whose
deaths will exert an influence for human betterment so long as these
United States of America shall exist.
The fires of suffering, kindled on the western slopes of the
Alleghanies to sweep after the sun, contained the alchemy of the
spiritual and were to burn out the dross. From their clean ashes a
national spirit was to spring up, the harbinger of a mighty people
following a flag of many stars, another incontestable proof that
materiality can never satisfy the soul of man.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. FROM OVER THE MOUNTAINS 3
II. THE DEAD ARE DANGEROUS 27
III. THE PRICE OF A JUG OF WHISKY 43
IV. FOR WATAUGA AND AMERICA 68
V. THE ANCIENT LAW 86
VI. ON THE WHITE PATH 106
VII. IN THE MAW OF THE FOREST 125
VIII. THE EMPEROR OF THE CREEKS 142
IX. POLCHER’S LITTLE RUSE 174
X. THROUGH THE NECK OF THE BOTTLE 197
XI. SEVIER OFFERS THE RED AX 210
XII. TONPIT CHANGES HIS PLANS 226
XIII. THE SENTENCE OF THE WILDERNESS 237
------------------------------------------------------------------------
RED BELTS
CHAPTER I
FROM OVER THE MOUNTAINS
With its sixty cabins and new log court-house Jonesboro was the
metropolis of the Watauga country. The settlers on the Holston and
Nolichucky as a rule lived on isolated farms, often entirely surrounded
by the mighty forest. Outside the tiny communities along these three
rivers the Western country was held by red men, wild beasts and beastly
white renegades. There were no printing-presses, and it required thirty
days for a backwoods horseman, familiar with the difficult mountain
trails, to make the State capital five hundred miles away.
The Watauga region contained reckless and lawless men, and anarchy
would have reigned if not for the summary justice occasionally worked
by the backwoods tribunals. North Carolina did not seem vitally
concerned about her children over the mountains. Perhaps
“step-children” would more nearly describe the relationship, with the
mother State playing the rôle of an indifferent dame.
On a July morning in 1784 the usual bustle and indolence of Jonesboro
were in evidence. Men came and went in their linsey trousers and
buckskin hunting-shirts, some for the fields, some for the chase. A
group of idlers, scorning toil, lounged before the long log tavern kept
by Polcher, quarter-blood Cherokee and whispered to be an agent of the
great Creek chief, McGillivray.
The loungers were orderly enough, as a rule, almost secretive in their
bearing. Plotting mischief to be carried out under the protection of
night, honest men said. Polcher seemed to have complete control of this
class, and more than one seriously minded settler in passing scowled
blackly at the silent group.
On this particular morning, however, Lon Hester was disturbing the
sinister quiet of the tavern with his boisterous manners and veiled
prophecies. He held an unsavoury reputation for being strangely welcome
among hostile Cherokees, even free to come and go among the
“Chickamaugas”—renegade Cherokees, who under Dragging Canoe had
withdrawn to the lower Tennessee to wage implacable war against the
whites.
Polcher followed him anxiously from bar to door and back again,
endeavouring to confine his loose tongue to eulogies on the rye whisky
and the peach and apple brandy. The other habitues saw the
tavern-keeper was deeply worried at Hester’s babblings, yet he seemed
to lack the courage to exert any radical restraint.
“Got Polcher all fussed up,” whispered one with a broad grin.
“He carries it too far,” growled another.
Hester, reckless from drink, sensed his host’s uneasiness and took
malicious delight in increasing it. Each time he came to the door and
Polcher followed at his heels, his hands twisting nervously in the
folds of his soiled apron, he would wink knowingly at his mates and say
enough to cause the tavern-keeper to tremble with apprehension.
This baiting of the publican continued for nearly an hour, and then
Hester’s drunken humour took a new slant. Reaching the door, he wheeled
on Polcher and viciously demanded:
“What ye trailin’ me for? Think I’m only seven years old? Or be ye
’fraid ye won’t git yer pay?”
“Now, now, Lon! Is that the way to talk to your old friend?” soothed
Polcher, fluttering a hand down the other’s sleeve. “There’s some fried
chicken and some bear meat inside, all steaming hot and waiting for
you.” Then, dropping his voice and attempting to placate the perverse
temper of the man by adopting a confidential tone, he whispered, “And
there’s things only you and me ought to talk about. You haven’t
reported a word yet of all that Red Hajason must have said.”
With a raucous laugh Hester openly jeered him, crying:
“It’s ye’n me, eh? When I quit here, it was ‘Ye do this’ an’ ‘Ye do
that.’ Now we must keep things away from the boys, eh? ——! When I git
ready to talk to ye, I’ll let ye know. An’, when I bring my talk to ye,
mebbe it won’t be me that’ll be takin’ the orders.”
“I’ve got some old apple brandy you never tasted,” murmured Polcher,
trying to decoy him inside.
“Ye’re a master hand to keep things to yerself,” retorted Hester,
readjusting a long feather in his hat. “But mebbe, now I’ve made this
last trip, the brandy will be ’bout the only thing ye can hoot ’bout as
bein’ all yer own.”
Several of the group grinned broadly, finding only enjoyment in the
scene.
The majority, however, eyed the reckless speaker askance. They knew his
runaway tongue might easily involve them all in a most unwholesome
fashion. Polcher’s saturnine face suddenly became all Indian in its
malevolent expression, but by a mighty effort he controlled himself and
turned back into the tavern.
Hester glanced after him and laughed sneeringly. As he missed the
expected applause from his mates, his mirth vanished, and dull rage
filled his bloodshot eyes as he stared at the silent men and saw by
their downcast gaze that he was rebuked. Standing with hands on his
hips, he wagged his head until the feather in his hat fell over one
ear. In the heraldry of the border the cock’s feather advertised his
prowess as a man-beater, insignia he would retain until a better man
bested him in the rough-and-tumble style of fighting that had left him
cock-of-the-walk.
“What’s the matter with ye all?” he growled, thrusting out his under
lip. “Don’t like my talk, eh? Ye’re lowin’ I oughter be takin’ orders
from that sand-hiller in there? Well, I reckon I’m ’bout done takin’
any lip from him. Ye’ll find it’s me what will be givin’ orders along
the Watauga mighty soon if—”
“For Gawd’s sake, Lonny, stop!” gasped a white-bearded man.
“Who’ll stop me?” roared Hester, leaping from the doorway and catching
the speaker by the throat. “Mebbe ye ’low it’s ye who’ll do the
stoppin’, Amos Thatch, with yer sly tricks at forest-runnin’. Who ye
workin’ for, anyhow? Who gives ye orders? —— yer old hide, I reckon
ye’re tryin’ to carry watter on both shoulders.”
“Don’t, Lonny!” gasped Thatch, but making no effort to escape or resent
the cruel clutch on his throat. “Ye’re funnin’, I know. Ye know I’m
workin’ same’s ye be.”
“Workin’ same as ye be, eh? Ye old rip! Fiddlin’ round in the same
class that ye be, eh?”
“Don’t choke me! Let’s go inside an’ have a drink. Too many ears round
here. Too near the court-house.”
With a wild laugh Hester threw him aside and derisively mocked:
“Too near the court-house, is it? Who cares for the court-house?”
And he grimaced mockingly at the figure of a man busily writing at a
rough table by the open window. Then, believing he must justify his
display of independence, he turned to the group and with drunken
gravity declared:
“The time’s past, boys, when we have to hide an’ snoop round. There’s a
big change comin’, an’ them that’s got the nerve will come out on top.
The time’s past when court-houses can skeer us into walkin’ light when
we feel like walkin’ heavy. I know. I’ve got news that’ll—”
“Now, shut up!” gritted Polcher, darting out the door and whipping a
butcher-knife from under his apron. “Another word and I’ll slit your
throat and be thanked by our masters.”
As Hester felt the knife prick the skin over his Adam’s apple, his jaw
sagged in terror. Sobered by the assault, he realized he had gone too
far. Instantly the loungers crowded about him to prevent outsiders from
witnessing the tableau. Old Thatch whispered:
“He’s dirty drunk. ‘Nolichucky Jack’ must ’a’ heard some of it. I seen
him stop writing and cock his ear.”
“To —— with Chucky Jack!” Hester feebly defied. “I ain’t said nothin’.”
“If you had finished what you’d begun, you’d never said anything more,”
hissed Polcher. “You can drink your skin full every hour in the day,
and that’s all right. But you’ve got to keep your trap closed. I’ve
tried soft means, and now I’m going to rip your insides out if you
don’t keep shut.”
Hester glanced down at his own bony hands and the long finger-nails,
pared to points for the express purpose of scooping out an opponent’s
eyes, then shifted his gaze to the grim faces of his companions. He
read nothing but indorsement for Polcher.
“I can’t fight a whole crowd,” he jerkily admitted.
“You don’t have to fight none of us,” warned Polcher, lowering the
knife and hiding it under his apron. “All you’ve got to do is to fight
yourself, to keep your tongue from wagging. You say you’ve brought
something. Is it for me?”
“No, it ain’t for ye,” sullenly retorted Hester, his small eyes glowing
murderously.
“Then keep it for the right man. Don’t go to peddling it to Chucky Jack
and all his friends,” said Polcher.
Glimpsing a stranger swinging down the brown trail that answered for
the settlement’s one street, he motioned with his head for the men to
pass inside. To mollify the bully he added—
“You understand, Lon, it’s yourself as much as it’s us you’ll be
hurting by too much talk.”
“It’s that last drink of that——peach brandy,” mumbled Hester. “I’ll
stick to rye after this. I can carry that.”
“Now you’re talking like a man of sense,” warmly approved Polcher,
clapping him heartily on the shoulder. “Lord, what fools we all be at
times when we git too much licker in. The boss combed me once till I
thought he was going to kill me just because I got to speaking too
free. Now let’s join the boys and try that rye.”
Outwardly amiable again, Hester followed him indoors; deep in his heart
murder was sprouting. He knew Polcher wished to pacify him, and this
knowledge only fanned his fury higher. And he knew Polcher had lied in
confessing to babbling, for the tavern-keeper’s taciturnity, even when
he drank, was that of his Indian ancestors.
The whisky was passed, Polcher jovially proclaiming it was his treat in
honour of Hester’s return from somewhere after a month’s absence.
Hester tossed off his portion without a word, now determined not to
open his lips again except in monosyllables. Old Thatch sought to
arouse him to a playful mood with a chuckling reminder of some deviltry
he had played on a new settler over on the Holston. But even pride in
his evil exploits could not induce Hester to emerge from his brooding
meditations.
For the first time since he had won the right to wear the cock’s
feather he had been backed down—and, at that, in the presence of the
rough men he had domineered by his brutality. Of course it was the
knife that had done it, he told himself, and yet he knew it was
something besides the knife. If Old Thatch had held a knife at his
throat, he would have laughed at him. No, it wasn’t that; it was the
discovery that there dwelt in Polcher’s obsequious form a man he had
never suspected. The knowledge enraged while subduing him. He recalled
former insolences to the tavern-keeper, his treatment of him as if he
were a humble servitor.
It was humiliating to know that, while he was sincere in his behaviour,
Polcher had played a part, had tricked him. He knew that Polcher would
gladly have him resume the rôle of bully, swear at him and treat him
with disdain. He had no doubt but that Polcher would meekly submit to
such browbeating. But never again could he play the bully with Polcher,
and all this just because he understood how Polcher had fooled him by
submitting in the past. This was gall to his little soul. The man he
had looked down upon with contempt had been his master all along.
His smouldering rage was all the more acute because he had believed he
had been the selected agent in mighty affairs; whereas, he had acted
simply as a messenger. On entering the settlement early that morning he
had smiled derisively at beholding the tavern and the usual group
before the door. He had supposed himself miles above them in the
secrets of the great game about to be played. Now his self-sufficiency
was pricked and had deflated like a punctured bladder.
Being of cheap fibre, Hester had but one mental resource to fall back
upon: the burning lust to re-establish himself in his own self-respect
by killing Polcher. He had been grossly deceived. He had been permitted
to believe—nay, even encouraged to believe—the breed was only the
vintner to the elect. It was while wallowing in the depths of this
black mood that the sunlight was blocked from the doorway by the
arrival of the stranger Polcher had glimpsed up the trail.
The newcomer paused and waited for the sunshine to leave his eyes
before entering the long and dimly lighted room. His hunting-shirt was
fringed and tasseled and encircled by a bead-embroidered belt. From
this hung a war-ax, severe in design and bespeaking English make. His
long dark hair was topped with a cap of mink-skin. In his hand he
carried the small-bore rifle of the Kentuckians. The loungers drew
aside to both ends of the bar, leaving an open space for him. He took
in the room and its occupants with one wide, sweeping glance;
hesitated, then advanced.
It maddened Hester to observe how servilely Polcher leaned forward to
take the stranger’s order. The other men, seemingly intent on their
drink, quickly summed up the newcomer. A forest-ranger fresh from
Kentucky. He stood nearly six feet in his moccasins and carried his
head high as his grey eyes ranged deliberately over the two groups
before returning to meet the bland gaze of Polcher.
In a drawling voice he informed—
“A little whisky.”
“You’ve travelled far, sir,” genially observed Polcher, his Indian
blood prompting him to deduce a long, hard trail from the stained and
worn garments. “That beadwork is Shawnee, I take it.”
“It was once worn by a Shawnee,” grimly replied the stranger. “Lost my
horse a few miles back and had to hoof it afoot.”
“Virginy-born,” murmured Polcher.
“Yes, I’m from old Virginy,” proudly retorted the stranger, tossing up
his head. “A mighty fine State.”
“Quite a number of ye Virginians seem keen to git clear of her mighty
fine State an’ come down here to squat on North Car’lina land,” spoke
up Hester, his insolent half-closed eyes advertising mischief.
The newcomer slowly turned and eyed him curiously and smiled faintly as
he noted the cock’s feather. And he quietly reminded:
“The first settlers on the Watauga were Virginians. When they came here
fourteen years ago, they reckoned they was on soil owned by Virginy. I
don’t reckon North Car’lina lost anything by their mistake.” He threw
off his drink and proceeded to deliver himself of the sting he had held
in reserve. “From what I hear, the Sand-hillers didn’t care to come
over the mountains and face the Indians till after the Virginians had
made the country safe.”
The two groups of men shifted nervously. Hester’s eyes flew open in
amazement, then half-closed in satisfaction.
“The——they had to wait for Virginy to blaze a trail!” he growled,
slowly straightening up his long form and tipping his hat and its
belligerent feather down over one eye. “An’ where was ye, mister, when
the first brave Virginians kindly come over here to make things safe
for North Car’lina?”
“I was eleven years old, shooting squirrels in Virginy,” chuckled the
stranger.
“An’ wearin’ a Shawnee belt! Who give it to ye?”
“The warrior who was through with it when I got through with him. It
happened up on the Ohio,” was the smiling response. “Anything else
you’d like to ask?”
“Killed a Injun, eh?” jeered Hester. “That’s easy to tell. Sure ye
ain’t the feller that licked the Iroquois all to thunder? No one here
to prove ye didn’t, ye know.”
Toying with his empty glass, the stranger again surveyed Hester, much
as if the bully were some strange kind of insect. He grimaced in
disgust as he observed the long, pointed finger-nails. “One thing’s
certain,” he drawled, “you never fought no Iroquois, or they’d have
them talons and that hair of yours made into a necklace for some squaw
to wear. Just what is your fighting record, anyway?”
“I ain’t never been licked yet by anything on two kickers atween here
an’ the French Broad,” bellowed Hester, slouching forward, his hands
held half open before him. Then he flapped his arms and gave the sharp
challenge of a gamecock. “I’m Lon Hester, what trims ’em down when
they’re too big an’ pulls ’em out when they’re too short.” And again he
sounded his chanticleer’s note.
“I’m Kirk Jackson, from the Shawnee country, and I reckon it’s high
time your comb was out,” was the even retort.
“Just a minute, gentlemen,” purred Polcher, with a wink at Hester.
“Fun’s fun, but, when you’re armed with deadly weapons, you might carry
a joke too far. Before you start fooling, let’s put all weapons one
side.”
Jackson’s brows contracted, but, as Hester promptly threw a knife and
pistol on the bar, the Virginian reluctantly stood his rifle against
the wall and hung his belt on it. It was obvious he was regretting the
situation. Hester read in it a sign of cowardice and crowed exultingly.
For a moment Jackson stood with his gaze directed through the open
door. Hester believed he contemplated bolting and edged forward to
intercept him. What had attracted Jackson’s gaze, however, was the slim
figure of a girl on horseback, and, as he stared, she turned and
glanced toward the tavern, and his grey eyes lighted up with delighted
recognition.
“Take yer last peep on natur’, ’cause I’m goin’ to have both of ’em,”
warned Hester, hitching forward stiff-legged, his hands held wide for a
blinding gouge.
“You dirty dog!” gritted Jackson, his soul boiling with fury at the
brutality of the threat.
With a spring Hester leaped forward, his right hand hooking murderously
close to the grey eyes. Jackson gave ground and found himself with his
back dangerously close to the group at the end of the room. He could
feel the men stiffening behind him, and he believed they would play
foul if Hester needed assistance. As Hester made his second rush,
Jackson worked with both elbows and knocked two men away from his back,
sending one reeling against the wall, the other against the bar.
Then he leaped high, his legs working like scissors, feinting with his
left foot and planting the right under the bully’s chin, smashing the
long teeth through the protruding tongue and hurling him an inert mass
against the base of the bar.
“No kickin’!” yelled Old Thatch, pulling a knife.
“You played foul!” roared Polcher, his suave mask dropping and leaving
his dark face openly hideous. “Shut that door, boys!”
The men at the upper end of the bar rushed to the door and not only
closed it but appropriated Jackson’s rifle and belt. There was a stir
behind him, and Jackson leaped to the end of the bar just vacated by
the men. Here he wheeled and snatched a five-gallon jug of brandy from
the bar and swung it high above his head. Then planting a foot on
Hester’s chest he warned:
“The first move made means I’ll brain this dog at my feet and then
damage the rest of you as much as I can.”
Polcher and his henchmen stood motionless, wrathfully regarding the man
at bay.
“You broke the rules by kicking,” said Polcher.
“Rules, you miserable liar and scoundrel!” hissed Jackson. Then in a
loud voice, “Open that door and stand clear, or I’ll smash this punkin
at my feet and rush you.”
“One minute!” softly said Polcher. And he whipped a long pistol from
under the bar and levelled it at Jackson. “You set that jug on the bar
and do it soft-like. You’ve played foul with my friend. He’s going to
have a fair shake at you.”
“Just let me git at him!” sobbed Hester from the floor. “That’s all I
ask, boys.”
“Before you can move that jug an inch, I’ll shoot your head off,”
warned Polcher. “Put the jug down and step to the middle of the floor.
No one will meddle while Mr. Hester has a fair chance.”
“Fair chance? You low-down murderers! Shoot and be——!”
“I’ll count three—then I’ll shoot. There’s witnesses here to say you
come in drunk and hellin’ for a row and got it. One—two—”
“Drop that pistol, Polcher!” called a voice at the window.
The tavern-keeper glanced about and paled as he beheld the muzzle of a
long rifle creep in over the sill and bear upon him.
“If you’d said three, it would have been your last word on earth.”
Polcher lowered his weapon but protested:
“Look here, Sevier, this stranger has assaulted one of my patrons. I
propose to see they fight it out man-fashion.”
“A man-fashion fight is a bit beyond your imagination,” was the grim
reply. “Have that door opened and see the stranger’s rifle is stood
outside. Be quick!”
Polcher nodded to Old Thatch, who threw back the door and passed the
rifle and the belt. Jackson tingled with a fresh shock as he glimpsed a
slim brown hand receiving the weapons. Then Sevier commanded:
“Now, young man, come out. If you want to be murdered, there’s a rare
chance for you anywhere along the border without entering this
hell-hole. Remember, Polcher, you’re a dead man if a hand is raised
against this guest of yours.”
Jackson sprang through the door and closed it after him. The girl he
had seen passing the tavern at the inception of the brawl was waiting
for him.
“Elsie!” he whispered, relieving her of his weapons. “I’ve just come
from Charlotte, where I went to find you.”
She was as fair as he was dark, and her blue eyes glistened as he
addressed her. Then she sighed, and an expression of sadness
overclouded her small face.
“I saw you for a second,” she faltered. “It seemed impossible it could
be you. I knew you would have trouble when I saw them close the door. I
left my horse and called Mr. Sevier. Kirk, I’m glad to see you—and I’m
sorry you came.”
John Sevier, or Chucky Jack, as he was commonly called after the
Nolichucky River he lived on, stepped round the corner of the tavern
before Jackson could reply to the girl’s contradictory statement and
brusquely called out:
“Come along, Miss Tonpit. And you, sir; this is no place for an honest
man to linger in.”
“I owe you thanks. I’ll try to thank you later,” said Jackson. “I find
Miss Tonpit is an old acquaintance—an old friend—I’ll walk home with
her.”
The girl cast a swift glance at Sevier and faintly shook her head.
Sevier tucked his arm through Jackson’s and quietly insisted:
“You must come with me now; Miss Tonpit is perfectly safe—perfectly
safe.”
To Jackson’s amazement the girl flushed, then turned pale and ran to
where her horse was tied to a tree.
“—— it, man! Virginians don’t leave such matters to chance,” cried
Jackson, tugging to release his arm. “The young lady should be escorted
home. This seems to be a desperate community.”
“I, too, am a Virginian,” Sevier calmly reminded, tightening his hold
en the other’s arm. “And I know the community better than you do.”
There was a peculiar hardness in his voice as he added, “Miss Tonpit is
perfectly safe in any part of the Watauga settlements at any time of
day or night, providing her identity is known.”
Jackson stared savagely into Sevier’s face and hoarsely demanded—
“Just what do you mean by that?”
“Nothing to her hurt, God bless her!” was the ready response. “But this
is no place to talk. If there was an ounce of courage to go with the
ton of hate back in the tavern, we’d both be riddled with bullets
before this. Step over to the court-house where we can talk.”
“But, Miss Tonpit? She lives near here? I shall have a chance to see
her again?”
And Jackson held back and gazed after the girl, who was now cantering
up the trail towards the foot-hills.
“Every opportunity, I should say,” assured Sevier, leading the way into
the court-house. “Now suppose you give an account of yourself. I’m sort
of a justice of the peace here. We’re hungry for honest men, God knows.
I believe you’ll fit in with the court-house crowd rather than with the
tavern crowd.”
“But Elsie? Miss Tonpit?”
“Your story first,” Sevier insisted, seating himself at the table and
motioning Jackson to a stool fashioned from a solid block of cedar.
Jackson surrendered and rapidly narrated:
“I’m Kirk Jackson, Virginian. I met the Tonpits in Charlotte a little
over a year ago and fell in love with Miss Elsie. I must confess my
suit didn’t progress as I had hoped. I think her father was opposed. I
can’t blame him. Major Tonpit’s daughter can look higher than a
forest-ranger. Anyway, I went back to the Ohio country, where I had
served under George Rogers Clark. I’m just back from there. Absence had
renewed my courage.
“I hurried back to Charlotte and learned the major had moved over the
mountains. My informant didn’t know whether he had made his new home in
the Watauga district or on the Holston. I saw and recognized her just
as that brute in the tavern was preparing to tear my eyes out. Now tell
me what you meant by saying she is safe anywhere hereabouts, providing
her identity is known.”
Sevier drummed the table and frowned. Then he explained:
“John Tonpit, according to all indications, holds the whip-hand over
these scoundrels here. They serve him, I believe.”
“Good heavens!” Jackson weakly exclaimed. “Major Tonpit, proud to
arrogance—having truck with those scoundrels?”
And he wondered if this were the girl’s reason for pronouncing his
quest of her as hopeless. Then he rallied with the buoyancy of youth.
If the only barrier between them was some sinister business of her
father’s, he would overcome it, although great be her pride.
“Can’t you tell me something more definite?”
Sevier tapped a document on the table and replied:
“This is a petition I’m about to send to Governor Martin. North
Carolina is dumping criminals and trash upon us, and we’re asking for a
superior court to handle their cases. The Creeks, under Alexander
McGillivray, are working day and night to get the Cherokees to join
them in a decisive war against all settlers on the Watauga, the Holston
and the French Broad. The petition asks for power to raise militia and
for officers to lead the men.”
“But how does Major Tonpit come into this?” broke in Jackson. “Tavern
brawlers and hostile red men!”
“I’m coming to that, if there is any that. The Creeks have made a
secret treaty with Spain. McGillivray pledges twenty thousand warriors
towards exterminating the Western settlements.”
“But you can’t know that for a fact.”
“You’ve been away the last year. You’re out of touch with affairs. The
treaty was signed at Pensacola, June first, by McGillivray on behalf of
the Creek Nation and by Don Estephan Miro, Governor of West Florida and
Louisiana, on behalf of Spain.”
Jackson was nonplussed by this intelligence. He gazed in silence at the
man across the table, whose words were building a mighty barrier
between him and the girl. Sevier’s handsome face softened in sympathy.
He was a tall, fair-skinned man with an erect carriage, and his slender
figure well set off the hunting-shirt he invariably wore. Eager and
impulsive by nature, he was now holding himself in restraint because he
knew his revelations were so many blows at the young ranger’s happiness.
“The major fits into all this. Spain and the Creeks?” Jackson faintly
asked.
“So I firmly believe. There is one flaw in the chain—the Cherokees.
For, while McGillivray has pledged twenty thousand braves, his Creeks
can’t furnish any such a number of fighting men. There are a few
thousand Seminoles he can get, but unless he lines up the Cherokee
Nation he has promised more warriors than he can call to the war-path.
One of the principal chiefs of the Cherokees, Old Tassel, is holding
off. He controls three thousand warriors. He wants his lands back, but
he wants to get them by peaceful measures.
“Major Tonpit has great influence with Old Tassel. Could he swing him
for a war against us, not only would his three thousand fighting men be
added to McGillivray’s total, but the rest of the Cherokee Nation, now
hesitating, would gladly rush in. Major Tonpit may supply the link to
complete the chain. It will be the weakest link in the chain, yet
absolutely necessary for McGillivray’s success.”
“Tonpit a schemer for Spain!” gasped Jackson.
Sevier frowned, then shrugged his shoulders and corrected:
“Scarcely a schemer. He isn’t cold-blooded enough for that. For a
schemer you need a man of Polcher’s cool mind. Tonpit is flattered by
attentions from royalty. He loves royalty. His head is in the clouds of
personal ambition. He sees himself a dictator of a mighty province
reaching from the Alleghanies to the Mississippi. If put in as royal
governor he would rule supreme, he believes.
“I became suspicious when he gave up his comfortable home in Charlotte
and went to the State capital and then came out here and made his home.
Since being here, he has informed Governor Martin that the Indians are
friendly and desire peace but that our settlers persist in stealing
their lands and abusing them. This has won him the friendship of Old
Tassel. Every talk Tassel has sent to the governor has been carried by
Tonpit.”
“That’s bad!” cried Jackson. “But I can’t make myself believe he
deliberately plots for Spain. Even in the national Congress men are
expressing different views as to what shall be done with the region
west of the mountains.”
“True. And Major Tonpit takes the views of Charles III.”
“But he may be friendly with Old Tassel and yet not be working with the
Creeks,” persisted Jackson, trying to find something favourable to say
in behalf of Elsie’s father.
“I know he is hand in glove with McGillivray,” solemnly declared
Sevier. “I know McGillivray looks on him as a man of insane ambitions
but lacking balance. I know McGillivray even now is holding back from
war only because he is not quite satisfied that Tonpit will live up to
his agreements. It isn’t the major’s heart or courage he doubts, but
his lack of balance. Once he gets what he believes to be a firm hold on
Tonpit, you’ll see things begin to hum along the Holston and the
Watauga.”
Jackson shifted the trend of conversation, seeking to find a weak spot
in Sevier’s hypothesis.
“After all, McGillivray’s probably over-rated. I never saw an Indian
yet who could plan a campaign and stick to it,” he hopefully said.
Sevier smiled ruefully.
“You don’t know Alexander McGillivray, who calls himself ‘Emperor’ of
the Creek Nation. His father was Lachlan McGillivray, a Scotch trader.
His half-breed mother was of a powerful family of the Hutalgalgi, or
Wind clan. Her father was a French officer. McGillivray was educated at
Charleston and studied Latin and Greek as well as the usual branches.
He’s a partner in the firm of Panton, Forbes and Leslie in Pensacola.
Naturally that firm has a monopoly of the Creek trade. He’s shrewd as a
Scotchman, has the polish of a Frenchman and is more cunning than any
of his Indians. He is an educated gentleman according to English
standards. He lives up to his title of ‘Emperor.’ I must say this for
him: he’s kind to captives and honestly tries to do away with the usual
Indian cruelties.
“Now to return to my petition to show where we fit in. It’s Old
Tassel’s deadly fear of the Watauga riflemen as much as his desire for
peace that is holding him back. And, if he should die, his three
thousand warriors would flock to McGillivray at once. The renegade
Cherokees, who call themselves Chickamaugas, are impatient to take the
path. As things are turning out, my riflemen aren’t enough. They’ve
served without pay. The new settlers demand pay. We must have power to
raise and equip militia.”
“I begin to understand,” Jackson sadly admitted. “This Polcher? He must
be active in anything evil.”
“He’s cunning. His tavern is where messages are brought and relayed on.
If word comes to Tonpit, it is left at the tavern and sent secretly.
Look here, young man! Perhaps I’ve talked more freely than I should.
You’re in love with Miss Elsie, and you’d be a fool if you weren’t. But
that naturally makes you wish to see things that exonerate the major.
Wander round and see and hear for yourself. In a few days, maybe, I’ll
feel like telling you something else. Only remember this: Elsie Tonpit
hasn’t a better friend west of the Alleghanies than John Sevier. By
heavens! I’m a better friend to her than her father is!”
He clamped his lips together and began rereading the petition.
Jackson studied the strong visage with new interest. Sevier’s face
reminded him strongly of Washington’s in its Anglo-Saxon lines of
determination. But there was also a certain mobility of expression, a
mirroring of emotions, which came from his French blood. He was a
Virginian, and the young ranger had heard his fame echoing up and down
the lonely Ohio. As Nolichucky Jack—usually clipped to Chucky Jack—his
name was reputed to be worth a thousand rifles when he took the field
against the red men.
But it puzzled Jackson to understand how this man, a gentleman born and
bred, could have left the solid comforts of his home at Newmarket in
the beautiful valley of the Shenandoah, thrust behind him positive
assurances of great political advancement, cast off the social
prominence he so naturally graced and bring his Bonnie Kate to the
lonely country of the Nolichucky.
Jackson’s material mind had taught him that one fought Indians because
one must, not from choice. A beautiful and devoted wife and ample
fortune appealed to the young ranger as being the goal in life. It
never entered his process of reasoning that Destiny transplants men to
obtain results, just as Nature supplies seeds with methods of
locomotion so that new regions may be fructified. The vital incentive
for Jackson’s admiration for the man was not his sacrifices but rather
his knowledge that Chucky Jack had invented a new style of
forest-fighting.
He could not know that in his lifetime a certain Corsican would utilize
the same tactics in overrunning Europe: namely, the hurling of a small
force with irresistible momentum and the achieving of greater results
thereby than by the leisurely employment of large bodies of soldiery.
The border already rang with the victories of Chucky Jack, who was to
fight thirty-odd battles with the red men and never suffer a defeat;
whose coming to the Watauga country marked the passing of defensive
warfare and instituted the offensive.
“Yes, it’s natural that you should try to think leniently of Major
Tonpit,” murmured Sevier without raising his eyes from the petition.
Jackson flushed and coldly replied:
“I am a Virginian, first and last. I have nothing to do with the
Spanish King.”
“We soon must begin to call ourselves Americans—if we wouldn’t bend the
knee to Spain,” gently corrected Sevier with a whimsical smile.
“Of course,” agreed Jackson. “We’re all Americans now. But first we are
Virginians, I take it.”
Sevier rose and stood at the window and stared thoughtfully across the
valley and spoke as one repeating articles of faith in the privacy of
his chamber:
“Virginians when we were colonials, but now Americans first and last—if
this republic is to endure. If this union of States is to last, we must
forget our former identity; we must be merged in one compact body and
be known as Americans. Well, well. It will all come some day, please
God!”
He broke off and leaned from the window and called out:
“Ho, Major Hubbard! Step here a minute.”
Jackson saw a tall figure in forest dress turn in the trail leading to
the woods. As the man came toward the court-house, he beheld a dark,
gloomy face, a countenance he could never imagine as being lighted with
a smile. Hubbard came up to the window, and Sevier said:
“Mr. Jackson, step here, please. Meet Major James Hubbard. Major, this
is Kirk Jackson, fresh from the Shawnee country and come to live with
us.”
Hubbard’s face glowed with passion, and he clutched Jackson’s hand
fiercely and cried:
“The Shawnees! I envy you your chance, sir.”
Sevier gently nudged Jackson to stand aside and, leaning from the
window, muttered:
“Major, times are ticklish. Any little break will mean ruin to many
cabins. Remember!”
Hubbard made some reply inaudible to Jackson. In a freer tone Sevier
asked—
“What is the latest news?”
“That —— mixed-blood, John Watts, and his Chickamaugas have gone to
water. They’ll be raiding the French Broad and Holston next.”
Sevier pursed his lips musingly and said:
“We must have more men, more arms and money. North Carolina must act on
my petition.”
Hubbard laughed harshly and sneered:
“Why should they give money when you’ve always been ready to foot the
bills? Ask them for money, and they’ll tell you that the Indians—curse
them, curse them—are friendly and much abused. And they’ll leave you to
pay the shot.”
“I can’t pay again. I’ve spent my all,” Sevier quietly answered. “But
I’m hopeful the State will show common sense. North Carolina must
realize we’re no longer able to handle the criminals pouring over the
mountains without courts; that we’re unable to stand off the Creek
Nation once the Cherokees join it. Old Tassel can’t always hold his
three thousand in check.”
“His chiefs rebel. Many of his young warriors are stealing away to go
to water and follow Watts,” was the gloomy response.
A few words more and Hubbard returned to the trail and struck off for
the forest. Sevier stood and looked after him uneasily. Wheeling about,
his face betrayed his anxiety and prompted Jackson to ask:
“What’s the matter with him? Any relation to Hubbard, the Injun-killer,
we heard about up on the Ohio?”
“He is the killer. He’s killed more Cherokees than any other three men
on the border. His family was wiped out by Shawnees back in Virginia.
You can’t make him believe any Indian should be allowed to live. And he
worries me. Now he’s off to scout the forest. It only needs the killing
of an Indian or so to explode the powder under our feet. Huh! I wish he
had not gone.”
“He had news?”
“Nothing more than we’ve suspected for a year. John Watts is always
ready to take the path. He’s the shrewdest of the Cherokee leaders. If
Old Tassel loses his grip or should decide that peace doesn’t pay—”
His French blood found expression in an outward gesture of the hands as
he dropped down at the table.
Toying with the petition and speaking his thoughts aloud, he ran on:
“But Major Hubbard wants war. He’s inclined to look on the dark side of
things. Tush! The State by this time realizes what we’ve won for her
without an ounce of help. Pure selfishness will compel the Legislature
to send us the necessary aid. Ha! There’s news, by heavens! The
Cherokees must have struck!”
It was the distant clatter of flying hoofs. Sevier dropped through the
window with Jackson at his heels. Polcher and his henchmen were piling
from the tavern and staring toward the mountains. Some one was riding
at top speed from the east.
Although the rider might be bringing the fate of a continent, Jackson’s
first interest was in a man and woman cantering up the trail from the
opposite direction. Instead of watching for the furious rider, he had
eyes only for the two. The man was tall and gaunt and of haughty
bearing, his sharp, cold face swinging from side to side as if he were
the master riding among slaves. The girl was his daughter, Elsie
Tonpit. The young Virginian forgot the approaching messenger and ran
toward the couple, his heart beating tumultuously.
To his glad surprise Tonpit greeted him with a shadowy smile and
stretched out a hand in welcome. The girl, however, betrayed symptoms
of alarm instead of being pleased by her father’s attempt at
cordiality. She even sought to evade the fond gaze of her lover and
glanced apprehensively toward the court-house. Jackson knew in a moment
that she felt shame for what she believed Sevier had told him.
“When Elsie informed me you were in Jonesboro, Mr. Jackson, I set out
to find you,” Tonpit now delighted the young man by saying.
“I have to thank her and Sevier for rescuing me from a ridiculous
position,” he blurted out and then bit his tongue for having uttered
the words.
“Ha! How is that?” coldly demanded Tonpit, but with his gaze seeking a
glimpse of the rider, now well among the cabins.
“The men in the tavern were taking advantage of their numbers,” quickly
spoke up the girl. “The man called Hester was the ringleader, I should
say.”
“This is the first time you’ve said anything about it,” murmured her
father, his eyes now lighting as they focussed on the bobbing figure of
the horseman.
“It only needed Mr. Sevier’s command to relieve Mr. Jackson of any
embarrassment,” she awkwardly explained.
Tonpit’s thin visage grew cold with hate.
“I and my friends refuse to be beholden to this man Sevier,” he harshly
warned.
And, touching spur to his mount, he beckoned the girl to follow him and
darted toward the tavern. With one backward glance she rode after him.
Jackson ran forward, as did Sevier, as the rider reined in before the
tavern door and wearily dismounted. From all quarters came the settlers
and their families. Polcher brought out a pitcher of brandy, and the
messenger drank deeply. Then jumping on a horse-block he waved a paper
in his hand and cried out—
“For Chucky Jack!”
“Here!” called Sevier from the edge of the crowd.
The missive was tossed into his outstretched hand. As he was breaking
the seal, the messenger drew a deep breath, waved his arms for silence
and shouted—
“North Carolina has ceded us to the central Government to pay for her
part of the war debt!”
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