"I have been here before," said Joe to Whispering Winds. "I remember
that vine-covered stone. We crawled over it to get at Girty and
Silvertip. There's the little knoll; here's the very spot where I
was hit by a flying tomahawk. Yes, and there's the spring. Let me
see, what did Wetzel call this spot?"
"Beautiful Spring," answered the Indian girl.
"That's it, and it's well named. What a lovely place!"
Nature had been lavish in the beautifying of this inclosed dell. It
was about fifty yards wide, and nestled among little, wooded knolls
and walls of gray, lichen-covered stone. Though the sun shone
brightly into the opening, and the rain had free access to the mossy
ground, no stormy winds ever entered this well protected glade.
Joe reveled in the beauty of the scene, even while he was too weak
to stand erect. He suffered no pain from his wound, although he had
gradually grown dizzy, and felt as if the ground was rising before
him. He was glad to lie upon the mossy ground in the little cavern
under the cliff.
Upon examination his wound was found to have opened, and was
bleeding. His hunting coat was saturated with blood. Whispering
Winds washed the cut, and dressed it with cooling leaves. Then she
rebandaged it tightly with Joe's linsey handkerchiefs, and while he
rested comfortable she gathered bundles of ferns, carrying them to
the little cavern. When she had a large quantity of these she sat
down near Joe, and began to weave the long stems into a kind of
screen. The fern stalks were four feet long and half a foot wide;
these she deftly laced together, making broad screens which would
serve to ward off the night dews. This done, she next built a
fireplace with flat stones. She found wild apples, plums and turnips
on the knoll above the glade. Then she cooked strips of meat which
had been brought with them. Lance grazed on the long grass just
without the glade, and Mose caught two rabbits. When darkness
settled down Whispering Winds called the dog within the cavern, and
hung the screens before the opening.
Several days passed. Joe rested quietly, and began to recover
strength. Besides the work of preparing their meals, Whispering
Winds had nothing to do save sit near the invalid and amuse or
interest him so that he would not fret or grow impatient, while his
wound was healing.
They talked about their future prospects. After visiting the Village
of Peace, they would go to Fort Henry, where Joe could find
employment. They dwelt upon the cabin they would build, and passed
many happy moments planning a new home. Joe's love of the wilderness
had in no wise diminished; but a blow on his head from a heavy
tomahawk, and a vicious stab in the back, had lessened his zeal so
far that he understood it was not wise to sacrifice life for the
pleasures of the pathless woods. He could have the last without the
danger of being shot at from behind every tree. He reasoned that it
would be best for him to take his wife to Fort Henry, there find
employment, and devote his leisure time to roaming in the forest.
"Will the palefaces be kind to an Indian who has learned to love
them?" Whispering Winds asked wistfully of Joe.
"Indeed they will," answered Joe, and he told her the story of Isaac
Zane; how he took his Indian bride home; how her beauty and
sweetness soon won all the white people's love. "It will be so with
you, my wife."
"Whispering Winds knows so little," she murmured.
"Why, you are learning every day, and even if such was not the case,
you know enough for me."
"Whispering Winds will be afraid; she fears a little to go."
"I'll be glad when we can be on the move," said Joe, with his old
impatient desire for action. "How soon, Winds, can we set off?"
"As many days," answered the Indian girl, holding up five fingers.
"So long? I want to leave this place."
"Leave Beautiful Spring?"
"Yes, even this sweet place. It has a horror for me. I'll never
forget the night I first saw that spring shining in the moonlight.
It was right above the rock that I looked into the glade. The moon
was reflected in the dark pool, and as I gazed into the shadowy
depths of the dark water I suddenly felt an unaccountable terror;
but I oughtn't to have the same feeling now. We are safe, are we
not?"
"We are safe," murmured Whispering Winds.
"Yet I have the same chill of fear whenever I look at the beautiful
spring, and at night as I awake to hear the soft babble of running
water, I freeze until my heart feels like cold lead. Winds, I'm not
a coward; but I can't help this feeling. Perhaps, it's only the
memory of that awful night with Wetzel."
"An Indian feels so when he passes to his unmarked grave," answered
Winds, gazing solemnly at him. "Whispering Winds does not like this
fancy of yours. Let us leave Beautiful Spring. You are almost well.
Ah! if Whispering Winds should lose you! I love you!"
"And I love you, my beautiful wild flower," answered Joe, stroking
the dark head so near his own.
A tender smile shone on his face. He heard a slight noise without
the cave, and, looking up, saw that which caused the smile to fade
quickly.
"Mose!" he called, sharply. The dog was away chasing rabbits.
Whispering Winds glanced over her shoulder with a startled cry,
which ended in a scream.
Not two yards behind her stood Jim Girty.
Hideous was his face in its triumphant ferocity. He held a long
knife in his hand, and, snarling like a mad wolf, he made a forward
lunge.
Joe raised himself quickly; but almost before he could lift his hand
in defense, the long blade was sheathed in his breast.
Slowly he sank back, his gray eyes contracting with the old steely
flash. The will to do was there, but the power was gone forever.
"Remember, Girty, murderer! I am Wetzel's friend," he cried, gazing
at his slayer with unutterable scorn.
Then the gray eyes softened, and sought the blanched face of the
stricken maiden.
"Winds," he whispered faintly.
She was as one frozen with horror.
The gray eyes gazed into hers with lingering tenderness; then the
film of death came upon them.
The renegade raised his bloody knife, and bent over the prostrate
form.
Whispering Winds threw herself upon Girty with the blind fury of a
maddened lioness. Cursing fiercely, he stabbed her once, twice,
three times. She fell across the body of her lover, and clasped it
convulsively.
Girty gave one glance at his victims; deliberately wiped the gory
knife on Winds' leggins, and, with another glance, hurried and
fearful, around the glade, he plunged into the thicket.
An hour passed. A dark stream crept from the quiet figures toward
the spring. It dyed the moss and the green violet leaves. Slowly it
wound its way to the clear water, dripping between the pale blue
flowers. The little fall below the spring was no longer snowy white;
blood had tinged it red.
A dog came bounding into the glade. He leaped the brook, hesitated
on the bank, and lowered his nose to sniff at the water. He bounded
up the bank to the cavern.
A long, mournful howl broke the wilderness's quiet.
Another hour passed. The birds were silent; the insects still. The
sun sank behind the trees, and the shades of evening gathered.
The ferns on the other side of the glade trembled. A slight rustle
of dead leaves disturbed the stillness. The dog whined, then barked.
The tall form of a hunter rose out of the thicket, and stepped into
the glade with his eyes bent upon moccasin tracks in the soft moss.
The trail he had been following led him to this bloody spring.
"I might hev knowed it," he muttered.
Wetzel, for it was he, leaned upon his long rifle while his keen
eyes took in the details of the tragedy. The whining dog, the bloody
water, the motionless figures lying in a last embrace, told the sad
story.
"Joe an' Winds," he muttered.
Only a moment did he remain lost in sad reflection. A familiar
moccasin-print in the sand on the bank pointed westward. He examined
it carefully.
"Two hours gone," he muttered. "I might overtake him."
Then his motions became swift. With two blows of his tomahawk he
secured a long piece of grapevine. He took a heavy stone from the
bed of the brook. He carried Joe to the spring, and, returning for
Winds, placed her beside her lover. This done, he tied one end of
the grapevine around the stone, and wound the other about the dead
bodies.
He pushed them off the bank into the spring. As the lovers sank into
the deep pool they turned, exposing first Winds' sad face, and then
Joe's. Then they sank out of sight. Little waves splashed on the
shore of the pool; the ripple disappeared, and the surface of the
spring became tranquil.
Wetzel stood one moment over the watery grave of the maiden who had
saved him, and the boy who had loved him. In the gathering gloom his
stalwart form assumed gigantic proportions, and when he raised his
long arm and shook his clenched fist toward the west, he resembled a
magnificent statue of dark menace.
With a single bound he cleared the pool, and then sped out of the
glade. He urged the dog on Girty's trail, and followed the eager
beast toward the west. As he disappeared, a long, low sound like the
sigh of the night wind swelled and moaned through the gloom.