"Snakes! if that ain't the war-whoop, why then old Smokestack Bill never
had to keep a bright lookout after his hair."
Both inmates of the log cabin exchanged a meaning glance. Other
movement made they none, save that each man extended an arm and reached
down his Winchester rifle, which lay all ready to his hand on the heap
of skins against which they were leaning. Within, the firelight glowed
luridly on the burnished barrels of the weapons, hardly penetrating the
gloomy corners of the hut. Without, the wild shrieking of the wind and
the swish and sough of pine branches furiously tossing to the eddying
gusts.
"Surely not," was the reply, after a moment of attentive listening.
"None of the reds would be abroad on such a night as this, let alone a
war-party. Why they are no fonder of the cold than we, and to-night we
are in for something tall in the way of blizzards."
"Well, it's a sight far down that I heard it," went on the scout,
shaking his head. "Whatever the night is up here, it may be as mild as
milk-punch down on the plain. There's scalping going forward
somewhere--mind me."
"If so, it's far enough away. I must own to having heard nothing at
all."
For all answer the scout rose to his feet, placed a rough screen of
antelope hide in front of the fire, and, cautiously opening the door,
peered forth into the night. A whirl of keen, biting wind, fraught with
particles of frozen snow which stung the face like quail-shot, swept
round the hut, filling it with smoke from the smouldering pine-logs;
then both men stepped outside, closing the door behind them.
No, assuredly no man, red or white, would willingly be abroad that
night. The icy blast, to which exposure--benighted on the open plain--
meant, to the inexperienced, certain death, was increasing in violence,
and even in the sheltered spot where the two men stood it was hardly
bearable for many minutes at a time. The night, though tempestuous, was
not blackly dark, and now and again as the snow-scud scattered wildly
before the wind, the mountain side opposite would stand unveiled; each
tall crag towering up, a threatening fantastic shape, its rocky front
dark against the driven whiteness of its base. And mingling with the
roaring of the great pines and the occasional thunder of masses of snow
dislodged from their boughs would be borne to the listeners' ears, in
eerie chorus, the weird dismal howling of wolves. It was a scene of
indescribable wildness and desolation, that upon which these two looked
forth from their winter cabin in the lonely heart of the Black Hills.
But, beyond the gruesome cry of ravening beasts and the shriek of the
gale, there came no sound, nothing to tell of the presence or movements
of man more savage, more merciless than they.
"Snakes! but I can't be out of it!" muttered the scout, as once more
within their warm and cosy shanty they secured the door behind them.
"Smokestack Bill ain't the boy to be out of it over a matter of an
Indian yelp. And he can tell a Sioux yelp from a Cheyenne yelp, and a
Kiowa yelp from a Rapaho yelp, with a store-full of Government
corn-sacks over his head, and the whole lot from a blasted wolfs yelp,
he can. And at any distance, too."
"I think you _are_ out of it, Bill, all the same;" answered his
companion. "If only that, on the face of things, no consideration of
scalps or plunder, or even she-captives, would tempt the reds to face
this little blow to-night."
"Well, well! I don't say you're wrong, Vipan. You've served your
Plainscraft to some purpose, you have. But if what I heard wasn't the
war-whoop somewhere--I don't care how far--why then I shall begin to
believe in what the Sioux say about these here mountains."
"What do they say?"
"Why, they say these mountains are chock full of ghosts--spirits of
their chiefs and warriors who have been scalped after death, and are
kept snoopin' around here because they can't get into the Happy
Hunting-Grounds. However, we're all right here, and 'live or dead, the
Sioux buck 'd have to reckon with a couple of Winchester rifles, who
tried to make us otherwise."
He who had been addressed as Vipan laughed good-humouredly, as he tossed
an armful of fat pine knots among the glowing logs, whence arose a blaze
that lit up the hut as though for some festivity. And its glare affords
us an admirable opportunity for a closer inspection of these two. The
scout was a specimen of the best type of Western man. His rugged,
weather-tanned face was far from unhandsome--frankness, self-reliance,
staunchness to his friends, intrepidity toward foes, might all be read
there. His thick russet beard was becoming shot with grey, but though
considerably on the wrong side of fifty, an observer would have credited
him with ten years to the good, for his broad, muscular frame was as
upright and elastic as if he were twenty-five. His companion, who might
have been fifteen years his junior, was about as fine a type of
Anglo-Saxon manhood as could be met with in many a day's journey. Of
tall, almost herculean, stature, he was without a suspicion of
clumsiness; quick, active, straight as a dart. His features, regular as
those of a Greek-sculpture, were not, however, of a confidence-inspiring
nature, for their expression was cold and reticent, and the lower half
of his face was hidden in a magnificent golden beard, sweeping to his
belt. The dress of both men was the regulation tunic and leggings of
dressed deerskin, of Indian manufacture, and profusely ornamented with
beadwork and fringes; that of Vipan being adorned with scalp-locks in
addition.
These two were bound together by the closest friendship, but there was
this difference between them. Whereas everyone knew Smokestack Bill,
whether as friend or foe, from Monterey to the British line, who he was
and all about him, not a soul knew exactly who Rupert Vipan was, nor did
Rupert Vipan himself, by word or hint, evince the smallest disposition
to enlighten them. That he was an Englishman was clear, his nationality
he could not conceal. Not that he ever tried to, but on the other hand,
he made no sort of attempt at airing it.
This winter cabin was a substantial log affair, run up by the two men
with some degree of trouble and with an eye to comfort. Built in a
hollow on the mountain face, it hung perched as an eyrie over a ravine
some thousands of feet in depth, in such wise that its occupants could
command every approach, and descry the advent of strangers, friendly or
equivocal, long before the latter could reach them. Behind rose the
jagged, almost precipitous mountain in a serrated ridge, and
inaccessible from the other side; so that upon the whole the position
was about as safe as any position could be in that insecure region,
where every man took his rifle to bed with him, and slept with one eye
open even then. The cabin was reared almost against the great trunk of
a stately pine, whose spreading boughs contributed in no slight degree
to its shelter. Not many yards distant stood another log-hut, similar
in design and dimensions; this had been the habitation of a French
Canadian and his two Sioux squaws, but now stood deserted by its former
owners.
Vipan flung himself on a soft thick bearskin, took a glowing stick from
the fire, and pressed it against the bowl of a long Indian pipe.
"By Jove, Bill," he said, blowing out a great cloud. "If this isn't the
true philosophy of life it's first cousin to it. A tight, snug shanty,
the wind roaring like a legion of devils outside, a blazing fire,
abundance of rations and tobacco, any amount of good furs, and--no
bother in the world. Nothing to worry our soul-cases about until it
becomes time to go in and trade our pelts, which, thank Heaven, won't be
for two or three months."
"That's so," was the answer. "But--don't you feel it kinder dull like?
A chap like you, who's knocked about the world. Seems to me a few
months of a log cabin located away in the mountains, Can't make it out
at all." And the scout broke off with a puzzled shake of the head.
"Look here, you unbelieving Jew," said the other, with a laugh. "Even
now you can't get rid of the notion that I've left my country for my
country's good. Take my word for it, you're wrong. There isn't a
corner of the habitable globe I couldn't tumble up in every bit as
safely as here."
"I know that, old pard. Not that I'd care the tail of a yaller dog if
it was t'other way about. We've hunted, and trapped, and `stood off'
the reds, quite years enough to know each other. And now I take it,
when we've lit upon a barrelful of this gold stuff, you'll be cantering
off to Europe again by the first steamboat."
"No, I think not. Except--" and a curious look came into Vipan's face.
"Well, I don't know. I've an old score to pay off. I want to be even
with a certain person or two."
"You do? Well now don't you undertake anything foolish. You know
better than I do that in your country you've got to wait until your
throat's already cut before drawing upon a man, and even then like
enough you'll be hung if you recover. Say, now, couldn't you get the
party or parties out here, and have a fair and square stand up? You'd
make undertaker's goods of 'em right enough, never fear."
"No, no, my friend. That sort of reptile doesn't face you in any such
simple fashion. It strikes you through the lawyers--those beneficent
products of our Christian civilisation," replied the other, with a
bitter laugh. "However, time enough to talk about that when we get to
our prospecting again."
"If we ever do get to it again. Custer's expedition in the fall of last
year didn't go through here for fun, nor yet to look after the Sioux,
though that was given as the colour of it. Why, they were prospectin'
all the time, and not for nothin' neither. No, `Uncle Sam' wants to
have all the plums himself, and, likely enough, the hills'll be full of
cavalrymen soon as the snow melts. Then I reckon we shall have to git."
"Well, the reds'll be hoist with their own petard. It's the old fable
again. They call in `Uncle Sam' to clear out the miners, and `Uncle
Sam' hustles them out as well. But we may not have to clear, after all,
for it's my belief that the moment the grass begins to sprout the whole
Sioux nation will go upon the war-path."
"Then we'd have to git all the slicker."
"Not necessarily," replied Vipan, coolly. "I've a notion we could stop
here more snugly than ever."
"Not unless we helped 'em," said the scout, decidedly. "And that's not
to be done."
"I don't know that. Speaking for myself, I get on very well with the
reds. They've got their faults, but then so have other people. Wait, I
know what you're going to say--they're cruel and treacherous devils, and
so forth. Well, cruelty is in their nature, and, by the way, is not
unknown in civilisation. As for treachery, it strikes me, old chum,
that we've got to keep about as brisk a look-out for a shot in the back
in any of our Western townships as we have for our scalps in an Indian
village."
The scout nodded assent; puffing away vigorously at his pipe as he
stared into the glowing embers.
"For instance," went on the other, "when that chap `grazed' me in the
street at Denver while I wasn't looking, and would have put his next
ball clean through me if you hadn't dropped him in his tracks so
neatly--that was a nice example for a white man and a Christian to set,
say, to our friends Mountain Cat, or Three Bears, or Hole-in-a-Tree,
down yonder, wasn't it? But to come to the point--which is this:
Supposing some fellow had rushed us while we were prospecting that place
down on the Big Cheyenne in the summer and invited us to clear, I guess
we should briskly have let him see a brace of muzzles. Eh?"
"Guess we should."
"Well, then, it amounts to the same thing here. We are bound to strike
a good vein or two in the summer--in fact, we have as good as struck it.
All right. After all the risk and trouble we've stood to find it,
Uncle Sam lopes in and serves us with a notice to quit. It isn't in
reason that we should stand that."
"Well, you see, Vipan, we've no sort of title here. This is an Indian
reservation, and Uncle Sam's bound by treaty to keep white men out.
There are others here besides us, and I reckon in the summer the
Hills'll be a bit crowded up with them. So we shall just have to chance
it with the rest, and if we're moved, light out somewhere else."
"Well, I don't know that _I_ shall. It's no part of good sense to chuck
away the wealth lying at our very feet." And the speaker's splendid
face wore a strangely reckless and excited look. "The scheme is for the
Government to chouse the Indians out of this section of country by hook
or by crook--then mining concessions will be granted to the wire-pullers
and their friends. And we shall see a series of miscellaneous frauds
blossoming into millionaires on the strength of _our_ discoveries."
"And are you so keen on this gold, Vipan? Ah I reckon you're hankering
after Europe again, but I judge you'll be no happier when you get
there."
The scout's tone was quiet, regretful, almost upbraiding. The other's
philosophy was to end in this, then?
"It isn't exactly that," was the answer, moodily, and after a pause.
"But I don't see the force of being `done.' I never did see it; perhaps
that's why I'm out here now. However, the Sioux won't stand any more
`treaties.' They'll fight for certain. Red Cloud isn't the man to
forget the ignominious thrashing he gave Uncle Sam in '66 and '67, and,
by God, if it comes to ousting us I'll be shot if I won't cut in on his
side."
"I reckon that blunder won't be repeated. If the cavalrymen had been
properly armed; armed as they are now, with Spencer's and Henry's
instead of with the sickest old muzzle-loading fire-sticks and a round
and a half of ammunition per man, Red Cloud would have been soundly
whipped at Fort Phil Kearney 'stead of t'other way about."
"Possibly. As things are, however, he carried his point. And there's
Sitting Bull, for instance; he's been holding the Powder River country
these years. Why don't they interfere with him? No, you may depend
upon it, a war with the whole Sioux nation backed by the Indian
Department, won't suit the Govermental book. `Uncle Sam' will cave in--
all the other prospectors will be cleared out of the Hills, except--
except ourselves."
"Why except ourselves?" said the scout, quietly, though he was not a
little astonished and dismayed at his friend and comrade's
hardly-suppressed excitement.
"We stand well with the chiefs. Look here, old man: I'd wager my scalp
against a pipe of Richmond plug--if I wasn't as bald as a billiard ball,
that is--that I make myself so necessary to them that they'll be only
too glad to let us `mine' as long as we choose to stay here. Just
think--the stuff is all there and only waiting to be picked up--just
think if we were to go in on the quiet, loaded up with solid nuggets and
dust instead of a few wretched pelts. Why, man, we are made for life.
The reds could put us in the way of becoming millionaires, merely in
exchange for our advice--not necessarily our rifles, mind." And the
speaker's eyes flashed excitedly over the idea.