A LAST ADVENTURE
It was not without a guilty feeling that Rosebud rode out of the stockade.
She knew that she was deceiving Seth. She knew that she had lied to him
deliberately. Worse, she had played upon his feelings with intent to
deceive him. But her motive was good, and she tried to draw consolation
from the knowledge.
Her argument was worthy of her. It was impulsive, and would not stand the
test of logical inspection. She had thought long before putting her plan
into execution; at least, long for her. She told herself that no deceit
was unpardonable which had an honest, sound motive. In fact it was not
deceit at all, only subterfuge.
Her argument was something after this fashion. She had been the chief
source of trouble. Therefore she owed something to the general welfare.
Seth was harassed with his responsibilities, and the chances were terribly
against him and those under his charge. There was something she could do,
something which might turn the tide in their favor, might save the
situation. What if to carry it out she must act a lie? Who would blame her
if she were successful? If it failed it would not matter to her who
blamed.
She was a child no longer, but a strong woman whose devotion to those she
loved rose boundless over every other feeling. It was this very devotion
that urged her and shut out every scruple, every qualm of conscience, at
the manner in which she had gained her ends.
Thus she passed out into the dark, starlit world, with its strange glare
of fire.
Once clear of the farm she heaved a deep sigh. The tension had relaxed now
that she felt herself to be doing at last. Cooped within the stockade, her
plans still waiting to be set in motion, she had felt nigh to choking with
nervousness. Her anxiety to be gone had been overwhelming. Perhaps none
knew better than she what the task of cajoling Seth meant, for he was not
an easy man when duty was uppermost in his mind. But that was all done
with now; she was out at last.
The freedom of her horse's gait felt good under her. There was confidence,
exhilaration to be drawn from each springing stride. And, too, there was a
new and delightful sense of responsibility in the heavy lolling of the
revolver holsters upon her hips. But above all there was the supreme
feeling that she was endeavoring to help those she had left behind.
Her tears had dried before she mounted to the back of the animal to which
she was now pinning her faith. The parting kiss she had imprinted upon the
man's thin cheek had inspired her. Life meant nothing to her without him.
Her fortune was nothing to her, no one was anything to her compared with
him. He stood out over everything else in her thoughts.
She heard the rumbling of the wheels of Joe Smith's wagons, but gave no
heed to them. Instead, she rode straight on to the south, purposely
avoiding the newcomers she was ostensibly going to meet. In a few minutes
she drew rein at Wanaha's log hut.
She was not without some doubts when she saw that the place was in
darkness. But her apprehensions were quickly dissipated. Her first summons
brought the squaw to the door, where her tall, dark figure stood out in
the gentle starlight.
As was her custom Rosebud handed the woman the reins to hook upon the
wall. She was constrained to do without her usual greeting, for she knew
that, here too, she must deceive to gain her ends. It would be madness to
tell the half-tamed savage her real intentions. Wanaha's love for her was
great, but well she knew that blood is thicker than water, and a savage's
blood more particularly so than anybody's else.
Once inside the hut Wanaha was the first to speak.
"You come? On this night?" she questioned, choosing her English words with
her usual care.
The girl permitted no unnecessary delay in plunging into the object of her
visit.
"Yes, yes, my Wana," she replied, drawing the tall woman to her, so that,
in the dim starlight, they sat together on the edge of the bed. Her action
was one of tender affection. Wanaha submitted, well pleased that her
white friend had allowed nothing of the doings of her people to come
between them. "Yes, I come to you for help. I come to you because I want
to remove the cause of all the trouble between your people and mine. Do
you know the source of the trouble? I'll tell you. I am!"
Rosebud looked fixedly in the great dark eyes, so soft yet so radiant in
the starlight.
"I know. It is--my brother. He want you. He fight for you. Kill, slay. It
matter not so he have you."
The woman nodded gravely. The girl's heart bounded, for she saw that her
task was to be an easy one.
"Yes, so it is. I have thought much about this thing. I should never have
come back to the farm. It was bad."
Again Wanaha nodded.
"And that is why I come to you. I love my friends. There is some one I
love, like you love your Nevil, and I want to save him. They will all be
killed if I stay, for your brother is mighty--a great warrior. So I am
going away."
Rosebud's allusion to the squaw's love for her husband was tactful. She
was completely won. The girl, who was clasping one of Wanaha's hands, felt
a warm, responsive pressure of sympathy, and she knew.
"Yes, now I want you to help me," she hurried on. "To go as I am now, a
white girl in white girl's clothing, would be madness. I know your people.
I should never escape their all-seeing eyes. I must go like one of your
people."
"You would be--a squaw?" A wonderful smile was in the great black eyes as
Wanaha put the question.
"Yes."
"Yes, I see. Wana sees." A rising excitement seemed to stir the squaw. She
came closer to her white friend and spoke quickly, stumbling over her
English in a manner she would never have permitted in cooler moments. "An'
in these way you mak' yourself go. You fly, you run; so my brother, the
great chief, no more you find. Yes? Then him say, 'him gone.' We no more
use him fight. We go by tepee quick. An' there is great peace. Is that
how?"
"That is it," cried Rosebud, in her eagerness flinging her arms about the
squaw's neck. "We must be quick. Seth will miss me from the farm, and then
there'll be a to-do, and he will come hunting for me. Lend me your
clothes, a blanket, and an Indian saddle. Quick, my Wana! you'll help me,
won't you? Oh, make haste and say, and set my doubts at rest!"
The tide of the girl's appeal had its effect. The squaw rose swiftly,
silently. She moved off and presently came back with a bundle of beaded
buckskin clothing.
"You wear these, they my own. I get him for you. See. You put on, I go get
saddle. The blanket here. So. Nevil, my Nevil, from home. Wana not know
where. But maybe he come quick an' find you an' then----"
Wana did not finish expressing her fears. She seemed suddenly to remember
of whom she was speaking, and that there was disloyalty in what she was
saying.
But Rosebud was paying little heed. She was already changing her clothes.
She knew the value of time just then, and she had been forced to waste
much already. While she was completing the transformation, the squaw went
out and changed her saddle and bridle for an Indian blanket and surcingle
with stirrups attached to it, and a plaited, gaudy rope bridle and spade
bit.
When she came back the white girl had completed her toilet, even to the
moccasins and buckskin chapps. Even the undemonstrative Wanaha exclaimed
at the metamorphosis.
She saw before her in the dim starlight the most delightful picture of a
squaw. Rosebud's wealth of golden hair was hidden beneath the folds of the
colored blanket, and only her fair white face with its dazzling eyes,
bright now with excitement, shone out and destroyed the illusion.
"You are much beautiful," the Indian declared in amazement. Then she stood
gazing until Rosebud's practical voice roused her.
"Food, my Wana."
"I give bread and meat. It in bags on the horse. So. Now you go?"
"Yes, dear Wana. I must go."
Rosebud reached her arms up to the tall woman's neck, and drawing her dark
face down to her own, kissed her. Though she loved this dark princess she
knew that her kiss was the kiss of Judas. Then she passed out, and,
mounting her horse, rode away.
Within five minutes of her going, and while Wanaha was still standing in
the doorway looking after her, a party of warriors, headed by Little Black
Fox himself, rode up to the house. The chief had come in search of Nevil
Steyne. He angrily demanded the white man's whereabouts of the woman who
was his sister.
The ensuing scene was one of ferocious rage on the part of the headstrong
man, and fear, hidden under an exterior of calm debate, on the part of
Wanaha. She knew her brother, and in her mind tried to account for her
husband's absence. After the warriors had departed she passed a night of
gloomy foreboding.
All unconscious of her narrow escape, Rosebud headed away to the
northeast. She had no elaborate scheme of route. With the instinct of her
prairie training she knew her direction. She would make her destination as
the crow flies, chancing everything, every danger, so that she could make
the best time; no personal considerations entered into her calculations.
She could see the reflections of the camp-fires in the sky in every
direction, but, with a reckless courage, she cared nothing for this. A
more calculating mind might well have shrunk from the dangers they
suggested. To her they meant no more than obstacles which must be
confronted and overcome. She knew nothing of strategy in warfare; of cover
there was none in the direction she was taking.
Like the line of great soldiers from whom she was descended she understood
riding straight only. Let the fences and pitfalls come, let them be what
they might, she would not swerve. Whatever the emergency, she was prepared
to confront it, and, like a thorough sportswoman but a bad general, to
take her chance, relying only on her good horse and the darkness, and the
proverbial luck of the reckless.
Though this was her general idea she did all she could to help. A
featherweight, she still strove to ride lighter. Then she had her
firearms, and she steeled her heart to their use. After all she came from
splendid fighting stock.
She allowed herself no thought of failure. She must not fail, she told
herself. They were waiting for help in the stockade behind her; patient,
strong, a man of lion heart, who knew defeat only when the last shot was
fired, the last blow struck, and he was left helpless to defend himself
and those others, he was waiting. Her thoughts inspired her with the
courage of a brave woman whose lover is in grave peril, than which there
is no greater courage in the world.
Now the moment of her peril drew near. Every raking stride of her willing
horse cut the brief seconds shorter and shorter. The lurid reflections of
the camp-fires in the sky had given place to the starlike glow of the
fires themselves, and every yard of the distance covered showed them
larger and plainer against the sky-line.
She was riding straight for the middle course of the black space dividing
two of the fires ahead. There was little to choose in any direction, so
complete was the circle around the farm, but she had been quick to see
that that little lay here.
She measured the distance she had to go with her eye. It was not far, and
instinctively she reined her horse up to give him breathing for the great
effort to come; an effort which she knew was to be very real indeed.
Approaching steadily she made her preparations. Freeing her right arm from
her blanket she drew one of her revolvers and saw that it was fully
loaded. Then she closely scrutinized the fires. She could make out the
general outline of two vast camps away to the right and left of her. The
fires were in the midst, and right to the limits of the lurid light, she
could see the dim outlines of innumerable tepees, and crowds of moving
figures. It was a sight to put fear into the heart of a daring man, then
how much more so into the heart of a frail woman?
The black stretch before her seemed devoid of tepees, but she was not
sure. Of one thing she felt convinced, even if the camps were confined to
the fires there was no likelihood of these wide intervals being left
unguarded.
Her horse refreshed, she put him into a strong gallop, and in a few
minutes had entered the danger zone. Almost on the instant her surmise
proved correct. The air directly ahead of her split with a fierce yell.
She knew it. It was the Sioux war-cry. The supreme moment had come. It
must be now or never. Clinching her moccasined heels into her horse's
barrel she sent him racing headlong. And as he rushed forward she gripped
her revolver ready for immediate use.
An Indian mounted on a pony suddenly loomed ahead of her. Such was her
pace that he seemed to rush out of the darkness upon her. Yet his pony had
not moved. There was a clatter of speeding hoofs on either side, and she
knew that the alarm had been taken up, and the bloodthirsty warriors from
the camps were in pursuit.
The man ahead appeared only for an instant. Her revolver was covering him,
the terrific speed of her horse helped her aim. She saw the sights of her
weapon; she saw the man. The hammer fell. There was a cry, and the biting
report of the revolver died away in the darkness. She had passed the spot
where the man had been. Horse and rider had vanished. She had no thought
for anything now. She was conscious of only one thing, the din of
pursuit.
Thrusting the revolver back into its holster she offered up a silent
prayer to heaven. Then she leaned over her horse's neck to relieve him of
her weight, and, with the yelling horde hard upon her heels, gave herself
up to the race.