ONE OF MAD ANTHONY’S SPIES.
Mitre St. Pierre reached the shade of the cottonwood in time to hear
the story of the tragedy at the fort from Major Runnion’s lips.
The old man was thunder-struck.
During the narration of the bloody deed he narrowly noted the manner
of the speaker, clearly perceived in the bright moonlight, and he felt
that the officer was grossly misrepresenting the affair. If he struck
Firman Campbell, as he said, in self-defense, why should he fear the
trial that was approaching? Ah! the old man feared it was an unprovoked
murder, and, as the officer proceeded, the trader cocked his rifle as
though he had divined the finale of the moonlight meeting.
Now, for the first time, he knew that Effie did not love the Briton,
and then it rushed upon his mind that she had not forgotten one whom he
had driven from his Post, telling him to remain away upon the pain of
death.
Almost with bated breath, he watched the twain under the tree, and
when Effie flashed the pistol into the major’s face, an inaudible
ejaculation of admiration welled from his heart.
“Shoot the white dog, Effie!” he murmured, now thoroughly disgusted at
the conduct of one whom he had long respected. “Shoot him down, an’
I’ll carry him back to the fort an’ say: ‘Hyar’s the dog that slew the
lamb.’ What!” when the weapon was knocked from Effie’s hand. “This’ll
never do. I’ve a say in this muss, Ru’ Runnion, an’ hyar it goes.”
The infuriated major had seized the young girl in his arms, and was
hissing his devilish intentions in her ears, when the trader’s gun
struck his shoulder, and sent forth the ball with a result already
witnessed by the reader.
Mitre St. Pierre had started from his concealment with a cry of horror,
for he thought the bullet had accomplished a double work of death, when
he saw a dark form drop from the branches of the cottonwood.
Mechanically he executed an abrupt halt, and crouched in the tall grass
unperceived by the new-comer.
The Indian--for such the figure that dropped from the tree proclaimed
itself--alighted beside the motionless form of Effie St. Pierre, which
he quickly held in his arms, and was gazing down into her white face,
with eyes aflame with triumph.
“It’s Wacomet!” ejaculated Mitre, springing up from the grass, and
bounding to the side of the brave.
“Chief--”
The trader’s touch sent an electric thrill to the Indian’s heart, and
the brawny fellow, still holding Effie from the earth, turned upon him
with an exclamation of astonishment.
St. Pierre held a clubbed rifle over his feather-protected head.
“Wacomet!”
“Mitre St. Pierre!”
The trader started back at the sound of that voice, and a light laugh
broke from the speaker’s lips.
“Ha! you thought me Wacomet,” he continued, in unbroken English. “Well,
perhaps my dress does make me resemble that treacherous red-skin. I
never thought of that when I painted up, and it’s not too late to mend.
You know it wouldn’t do to have two Wacomets in the tribe at once.”
Mitre St. Pierre was silent; but the hate of a lifetime flashed from
his dark eyes, and his frame shook with the passion of anger.
“I’m the last man you expected to meet to-night,” continued the
disguised white, calmly glancing down upon Effie’s face, with a mingled
expression of love and pity. “I was an unwilling spectator to the
meeting but lately concluded. I watched him narrowly, and, sir, before
he should have harmed this fair girl, I would have sent a bullet to his
brain.”
In the silence that followed, the French trader found his tongue.
“Yes, you are the last devil I expected to see to-night,” he hissed,
taking a step forward; “and the sooner you leave this spot the better
it will be for you, Mark Morgan. Here! give me the girl--my child--and
seek your mad--your crazy General!”
“I am the disposer in this instance, St. Pierre,” said the scout, with
unruffled temper; “and I might as well tell you first as last that,
when I leave this spot, the girl, Effie, goes along. I was following my
legitimate business when I came here, and, sir, your arm, clothed as I
know it to be with bone and sinew, is not strong enough to hinder my
departure with whatever I choose to take away.”
A bitter oath parted St. Pierre’s lips.
“Mark Morgan--Wayne’s accursed spy,” he hissed, “not two months since
I drove you from my Post, and warned you, for your own sake, to stay
away. You have disregarded that warning; now I should inflict the
penalty.”
The ranger laughed, and with uplifted rifle the Frenchman darted
forward.
Suddenly, but with gentleness, the scout permitted Effie to slide from
his grasp, and St. Pierre’s rifle met a tomahawk in mid-air.
The next moment, the weapon was wrenched from his grasp; he saw it
describe a parabola over his head, and a dull plash told him that it
had sunk in the waters of the Maumee.
While his hand, shaking with the rage that filled his heart, glided
to his tomahawk, his eyes looked into the muzzle of a pistol,
uncomfortably near his forehead.
“I do not mean to kill you, Mitre St. Pierre,” said the spy; “but when
you have listened to me, you will be at liberty to return to your Post.”
The trader said nothing, but continued to glare upon the young
vanquisher with the ferocity of a tiger.
“It is useless to tell you that I love your _protege_,” began the young
man, “though perhaps the information that her hand has been promised me
may be new to you.”
An oath declared that the information was new to St. Pierre.
“Ere this, Wayne has marched from Greenville, to punish the red
dwellers in these forests, and perhaps their white aiders and abettors.
Sir, unless you change your tactics, the simoom of vengeance that is to
sweep these parts will not leave a vestige of your Post. I’m speaking
for your own good now. You have furnished the Indians with munitions
of war to fight us, and, unless you soon swear fealty to Wayne, I say
you’ll reap the harvest of justice. It is for the safety of the girl
that I remove her from you to-night.”
“Safety!” sneered St. Pierre, pointing toward the British fort. “Those
walls are strong, and then who seeks _her_? _He_ is dead?”
“Yes; undoubtedly your bullet finished him,” responded the young spy,
glancing at the river; “but Effie has another lover--one who has sworn
in secret and before his sub-chiefs to possess her. To-night he stands
before the assembled tribes, spitting his venom at Wayne; to-morrow
night he may burst in your doors and bear away, over your corpse,
perhaps, the prize he covets.”
A sneer escaped St. Pierre’s lips.
“Ah! you may sneer when he is far away. You know him not as I do.
_I_ have heard him swear--in spite of the friendship his people bear
you--to possess this fair girl--the woman whom I love--whom you have
raised from childhood. This woman goes with me.”
“Where would you take her?”
“To Greenville.”
“Through the woods would you guide her alone?”
“Yes.”
“The route is a death-trail now!”
“I have accomplished the journey already,” replied Mark Morgan; “I know
every dangerous spot betwixt this place and Greenville, and when Mad
Anthony has chastised the Indians, I will bring the girl back.”
“Why would the wolf return the lamb to the fold?”
“Perhaps she would want to see you, and have the ceremony performed at
the Post, associated with many sweet memories, to her.”
“Oh, if I had the weapons, Mark Morgan!” hissed St. Pierre, his hand
moving mechanically toward his knife. “Oh, if I had the weapons, I’d
stretch you dead upon this sod, and then I’d toss you to the fishes
that swim in yonder stream. You have the advantage now; but you will
not keep it long. You’ve made a devil out of me, Mark Morgan--the
bitterest enemy the Americans can own. I return to my Post, seize my
arms and join the allied tribes. In days long gone, I trod the war-path
with Turkey-foot, Leather-lips, and such chiefs. I have not forgotten
the lessons learned from them. This old frame still possesses the
elasticity of youth; these eyes have not lost their penetrating powers;
this mind still owns the subtlety that baffled the king of France,
and when I bring all my powers to bear against you, sir spying dog,
you have the same chances for escape that a wood-tick has under the
grinding heel of an Indian.
“We’ll meet again,” St. Pierre continued, before the spy could utter a
word, “and that girl,” and he pointed to Effie, who had recovered and
was clinging to her lover’s arm, “and that girl,” he repeated, “shall
listen to the groans I shall wring from your heart, powerless to help
you. I shall hunt you with a vindictiveness to which the work of the
bitterest vendetta of the Old World can not be compared. Mark my words,
Mark Morgan; take the girl and go.”
As Mitre St. Pierre finished he stepped aside and waved his hand toward
the slumbering river.
“Come, Effie,” said the spy, taking the young girl’s hand. “If it
needed but an effort for your preservation to transform that man into a
fiend, then it were best that his roof shelters you no longer.”
St. Pierre scowled at this, and as the spy darted past with his pale
flower, the sound of quick footsteps fell upon his ears.
“Mark, listen,” whispered Effie.
“I hear them, girl,” he said, without pausing. “They are British
soldiers who have discovered the major’s escape. They must not find me.”
He sprung to the water’s edge, where he suddenly paused, and, with a
startling exclamation, gazed bewilderingly around.
“Where’s my boat?”
The interrogative bubbled unsummoned to his lips.
His canoe was gone--gone from the tufts of grass to which he had
securely moored it!
In his dilemma the spy turned toward the cottonwood.
He saw several British soldiers and Indians gain St. Pierre’s side.
“There! there!” cried the trader, excitedly, pointing to the twain
relieved against the silvery surface of the Maumee. “See! see! Mark
Morgan, Wayne’s accursed spy!”
With hideous yells, the Indians espied the brave scout, and darted
forward.
A pistol flashed from Morgan’s girdle, and before the foremost savage
could throw himself to the earth, he sprung into the air with a bullet
in his heart.
The following moment the scout sprung from the bank, and with Effie
at his side was swimming toward the conical island covered with young
cottonwood and poplar that lay a short distance below in mid-stream.
“Don’t shoot!” shouted the trader, as his tomahawk knocked several
directed guns from the Indians’ hands. “You might hit the girl, an’
she’s mine. He will land on the Cone, and there, as certain as death!
we’ll bag our game.”
The braves set up a shout at this, and the party on shore watched the
twain in the water.
The “Cone,” as the island was called, lay a short distance below the
foot of the rapids, and in comparatively placid water. The scout had
often visited it, and made himself acquainted with every foot of ground
it contained. Its area embraced but eight acres, one-fourth of which
composed a hollow, often irrigated by the Maumee.
At length Morgan’s feet touched the bottom of the stream, and, holding
Effie above the water, he waded to the Cone.
“Safe!” ejaculated the girl, as she looked up into the eyes of her
lover.
“Not yet, Effie--look yonder!” and the spy’s finger directed her to an
unwelcome sight up the river.
The Indians were springing into the water, and swimming toward the
island!
Effie turned to Mark with pallid cheek.
“I left my rifle here,” he said, “and with it we’ll keep the red-skins
from landing.”
It was evident that his last words were uttered to reassure the girl,
when he believed the odds terribly against him.
He led her from the bank, and from the hollow of a decayed log drew a
long-barreled rifle.
Bidding Effie remain in the shadow of some poplars, the spy stepped
toward the water with ready weapon.
A second later a hand touched his arm.
“Ef--”
“Hist!” admonished the girl, with finger on lip.
“What?” he ventured to whisper.
“Some one’s down in the hollow, Mark. I just heard a human voice. My
God! can it be Indians?”
Mark Morgan uttered an ejaculation of horror. Were savages on the
island, and others swiftly approaching?
It was a terrible moment!