THE SILENT WITNESS.
Meanwhile Dick Lewis and those of the Club who remained at the Fort,
were awaiting the return of the wanderers with no little impatience.
Dick, who knew almost to an hour how long they ought to be gone,
exhibited no anxiety until the sixth day, and then he began to be
uneasy. He made frequent trips to the summit of a high swell near the
Fort, gazed long and earnestly in the direction the boys had gone,
looked dubiously at the clouds, and was always moody and silent when he
returned to the camp. On one occasion, when he had been on the lookout
nearly all day, he was met by George Le Dell, who seemed to be greatly
excited about something.
“What is it, youngster?” exclaimed the trapper. “Your face says you’ve
got news of some sort for me.”
“Come with me and see for yourself,” replied George. “I may be
mistaken, and certainly hope I am. I haven’t said a word about it, for
I didn’t want to excite any unnecessary alarm.”
George, followed by the trapper, made a wide circuit around the camp,
and entering the grove from the opposite side, walked into it a short
distance, and then stopped and pointed to a horse which was hitched to
one of the trees.
“I found him feeding with my horse, and brought him in here to keep him
until you came” said George. “I hope I have made a mistake.”
“Wal, you hain’t,” said the trapper, bluntly. “That’s leetle Fred’s hoss,
if I ever seed him. Something’s happened to them keerless fellers.”
“That’s what I was afraid of,” said George, an expression of anxiety
settling on his face. “You see he has a piece of rawhide rope around
his neck. He never broke that.”
“In course he didn’t,” said the trapper. “I’ve a notion to tell ole
Bob to give me a good wallopin’ fur lettin’ ’em go. The snow’ll be four
foot deep afore this time to-morrow, an’ something’s got to be done,
right quick.”
As the trapper spoke he untied the horse and led him through the grove
to the camp. Uncle Dick and all the boys were there, and, as may be
imagined, the trapper’s appearance created no little commotion among
them. They recognised Fred’s horse at once.
“Thar hain’t no need of wastin’ time an’ words over it,” said Dick,
hurriedly. “This hoss’s lariat has been cut with a knife, an’ he’s come
home. Fred didn’t cut it himself, in course; so something’s happened to
them boys, an’ me an’ Bob’s got to see about it, to onct. We’d oughter
gone two days ago. I kinder felt it in my bones.”
The Club and Uncle Dick said plainly enough by their actions that if
the trappers were going to look for the missing boys, they were not
going alone. A general rush was made for bridles, saddles and weapons,
and confusion reigned supreme until Uncle Dick took the management of
affairs into his own hands. Two of the boys were directed to hitch the
mules to the wagon, drive them up to the Fort and request permission
of the colonel to leave them there until they should be called for;
another was instructed to strike the tent and pack it away in the
wagon; another to get out a supply of bacon, hard-tack and coffee
sufficient to last them a week; and the two trappers to saddle the
horses. Uncle Dick himself bundled up the blankets; and order being
thus established, and each one having a certain duty to perform,
everything was done in a very short space of time.
Colonel Gaylord readily promised to take charge of such of the Club’s
property as they wished to leave behind, and took the trouble to come
down to camp to see what the matter was. When he had heard Uncle Dick’s
story, he generously offered him a squad of cavalry to assist in
hunting up the boys, but the trappers said they didn’t need it.
In half an hour the whole party were in the saddle and the Fort was
out of sight. Frank Nelson, of course, led the way. He went at such
a rate of speed that the foot-hills were reached a little after
midnight, and there Dick Lewis ordered a halt. The storm was by this
time fairly under way, and a terrible one it was, too. Walter and the
rest of the boys from Louisiana, who had never experienced anything of
the kind before, were amazed at its violence, and even Uncle Dick and
the two trappers, who had “roughed it” all their lives, said it was
something rather out of the ordinary. It continued all night, and the
next morning the little hollows between the swells were filled with
snow. The wind seemed to blow with redoubled force as the day advanced,
but it was at their backs, and by keeping close along the edge of the
hills, Uncle Dick and his party were in some measure protected from
its fury. They were all warmly clad and suffered but little from the
cold. They did not stop again until near the middle of the afternoon,
and then a circumstance happened which gave the Club an opportunity to
gain some idea of the wonderful skill in woodcraft possessed by their
two backwoods companions. Dick Lewis, who was riding by Frank’s side,
suddenly drew rein, turned his horse’s head toward the willows which
lined the base of the hills, and after snuffing the air a few times,
looked inquiringly at old Bob. The latter nodded his head and Dick
exclaimed: “It hain’t fur off. We must go back.”
“What isn’t far off, and why must we go back?” asked George.
“I smell smoke,” replied Dick.
The boys looked at one another a moment, but none of them could
understand the matter.
“Now I’ll tell you what’s a fact,” said Perk. “Suppose you do smell
smoke; what of it?”
“Why thar’s a fire around here somewhere,” answered the trapper; “an’
whar thar’s a fire thar must have been somebody to set it agoin’.”
The boys understood it now, and exhibited no little surprise. They
snuffed the air repeatedly, but their senses were not as keen as those
of the trappers, and they could detect no smell of smoke. But Dick and
old Bob could, and they followed it up with all the sagacity of a brace
of hounds. They skirted the hills for a quarter of a mile or more,
breasting the fierce wind which almost took their breath away, and
then Dick suddenly reined his horse into the willows. He kept straight
ahead, turning neither to the right nor left, and presently brought his
companions within sight of the fire.
The boys were greatly disappointed. They had confidently expected
to find Archie and his friends there, but they saw no one except a
solitary stranger, who was doubled up over a small bed of coals,
rubbing his palms together and shaking violently in every limb. His
hands and face were blue with cold. He glanced up as they approached,
and then looked down into the fire again.
“Hallo, stranger!” cried Dick. “Whar mought you be a travellin’ to?”
“I’m lost,” was the faint reply, “an’ starvin’ an’ freezin’.”
“Sho!” exclaimed the trapper; “freezin’ with a fire in front of you an’
all this timber around you!”
“Boys,” said Uncle Dick, “unpack the provisions, a couple of you, and
the rest of us cut some wood. This poor fellow is so nearly benumbed
that he can’t keep his fire going.”
A few minutes’ work made a great change in the appearance of the
stranger’s camp. Three or four small trees had been cut down for the
horses to browse upon; the fire was roaring cheerfully; a coffee-pot
and several slices of bacon were spattering on the coals; and the
bushes and saplings had been cleared away for a space of twenty feet
or more, and piled on one side of the camp to protect it from the fury
of the wind. The kind-hearted and thoughtful George, noticing that the
stranger’s well-worn clothing was but a poor protection against the
wintry blasts, had thrown a pair of heavy blankets over his shoulders;
but he was so cold that he hugged the fire long after all the rest had
begun to back away from it. The boys were eager to hear how he came
there, but old Bob restrained their impatience. “A man that’s hungry
an’ half froze can’t talk,” said he. “Wait till he gets warmed up with
a pot or two of hot coffee, an’ stows away a few pounds of them bacon
an’ crackers, an’ his tongue will run lively enough, I tell you.”
The old trapper was mistaken for once, however. The stranger emptied
his cup as fast as it was filled for him, and disposed of three men’s
share of the bacon and biscuits, but they seemed to have no effect on
his tongue. He was as dumb as a wooden man, and seemed uneasy in the
presence of those who had fed and warmed him.
At length Uncle Dick began questioning him, telling him also that if he
would let them know where he wanted to go the trappers would put him
on his course; and furthermore, they would give him provisions enough
to last him until he reached his destination. He finally succeeded in
getting the stranger started on his story, which he told in such a
way that none of his auditors believed a word of it. He said he had
belonged to a wagon-train which had been attacked by the Indians. The
most of the emigrants had been massacred, all the stock driven off and
he had barely escaped with his life. It happened a week ago, and he
had had nothing to eat since.
Uncle Dick and his party heard him through, and then settled back and
looked their disbelief. If there had been any Indian depredations
during the week that had just passed, Colonel Gaylord would not have
been ignorant of the fact, and they would have been certain to have
heard of it through him. The impression at once became general that
the man had been doing something that would not bear investigation,
else why had he trumped up such a story? They made no remark, however,
and it is probable that the stranger would have been permitted to go
his way without any further questioning or offers of assistance from
them, had it not been for one little circumstance. There was a witness
against him which he had not thought of, and Frank was the one who
discovered it. The latter, who was sitting on the opposite side of
the fire with his hands clasping his knees, suddenly straightened up
and looked closely at something lying on the ground by the stranger’s
side. Presently he arose and walking over to him, laid hold of
the object, which was concealed from the view of the others by the
blankets that George Le Dell had thrown over the man’s shoulders. As
he made an effort to lift it, the stranger seized it and held it fast.
The expression on Frank’s face brought the Club to their feet in a
twinkling.
“Let go,” said Frank, earnestly. “I want to see what you’ve got here.”
“It’s mine,” said the stranger.
“Well, I must see it and know how you came by it. Let go.”
The man still held fast to the object, whatever it was, and Frank,
seizing it with both hands wrenched it out of his grasp, jerking
off the blankets at the same time, and bringing to light a Maynard
rifle—the mate to his own. It was so much like it, in fact, that when
the rifles were first purchased by the cousins, they could never tell
them apart until they had had their names engraved on them. Frank was
so well acquainted with the weapon that he would have known it had he
seen it in Asia. He turned it up, and there was Archie’s name on the
butt-plate. He read the name aloud, and the boys flocked about him with
exclamations of wonder, each one taking the rifle into his own hands
and giving it a good looking over. It was so unexpected, this finding
of Archie’s property in the possession of a stranger, that they wanted
the evidence of their own eyes before they could believe it.
“Now I’ll just tell you what’s a fact,” said Perk, who was the first to
speak, “you’ve been up to something. Where did you get it?”
“Hand out the cartridges,” said Frank, finding that there was an empty
shell in the chamber of the rifle.
“What’s that thar stickin’ out thar?” exclaimed old Bob, suddenly.
Bob pushed away the stranger’s leg and snatched up a belt containing
two revolvers. They were Eugene’s, and every one about the fire
recognised them.
“You’ve been up to something, I tell you,” said Perk.
“Hand out the cartridges,” repeated Frank.
“I hain’t got none,” replied Simon Cool, for it was he. “I didn’t have
but one load for the rifle, and I tried to get something to eat with
that.”
“When did you last see the boys who own these things?” asked Uncle Dick.
“Two days ago.”
“How many of them were they, and were they all right?”
Simon replied that there were three of them, and that the last time he
saw them they were safe and sound, and in no danger of suffering from
cold or hunger; and then, in obedience to Uncle Dick’s command, went
on to tell his story—the true story this time—to which his auditors
listened with much more attention than they had given when he related
his first one. He told everything just as we have told it, and when his
story was ended, Dick Lewis declared that they had rested long enough,
and ordered an immediate start.
The sorrow which Simon Cool pretended to feel for the wrong he had
done, did not secure his release, as he had hoped it would. Uncle Dick
did not know how much faith to put in him. They might not find the
boys where Simon said he had left them; or if they did find them, they
might not be all right after all. Then, too, they might have more to
tell than Simon had seen fit to disclose; and taking all these things
into consideration, Uncle Dick decided that the man should be detained
until they had opportunity to satisfy themselves of the truth of his
statements.
Frank’s horse, being the largest and strongest animal in the party, was
given over to Dick Lewis, who took Simon up behind him and carried him
during the rest of the journey. So impatient were they all to find the
missing boys, that their halts were few and far between, and they made
such good headway, in spite of the snow-drifts, that they reached the
mouth of the gully on the afternoon of the second day after the finding
of Simon Cool. The gully was filled with snow, and as it had not been
recently disturbed, they knew that the boys were still finding shelter
under the cliffs.
While Dick and Bob were breaking a road for the horses, the former,
whose eyes were everywhere, called Frank’s attention to something.
It was a smooth, bare spot on a beech tree, from which the bark had
been cleared by a knife or hatchet. Frank became excited at once. He
floundered through a deep drift, brushed the snow off the tree, and
calling the attention of his companions, read aloud the following,
which had been written with a lead-pencil:
“Nov. 12th.—All well and hearty, but don’t like being weather-bound.
If we must be snowed up again, should rather have it done in summer.
Take the first right-hand gully, then the _next_ right-hand one, and
you will find us before you have gone a quarter of a mile.”
“Well, the boys are in good heart,” said Uncle Dick, and the long
breath that came up from his broad chest showed the relief he felt.
“I knowed we’d find them keerless fellers all right,” said Dick Lewis.
“And here’s something else that I can’t quite make out,” said Frank,
still studying the writing on the tree. “Archie always writes a
horrible hand when he’s in a hurry.”
“Perhaps his fingers were cold,” said Walter.
“It is dated November 16,” continued Frank.
“That was yesterday,” said Uncle Dick, with some uneasiness. “No bad
news, I hope. Try and make it out if you can.”
Frank lightly brushed off the snow, taking care not to erase the
pencil-marks, and then slowly read, spelling out each word, a sentence
that created as great a commotion as a thunderbolt would have done, had
it suddenly fallen into the midst of the party:
“We have found Chase, and he is well.”
“_What!_” cried Uncle Dick.
“That’s what I make it,” said Frank, breaking away from the tree to
make room for Perk and the rest of the boys, who came plunging through
the drift. “I shouldn’t wonder if your missing friend had turned up at
last.”
[Illustration: “WE HAVE FOUND CHASE.”]
“Yes, sir, he has!” exclaimed Bob, after he had closely examined the
writing; “hasn’t he, Perk?”
Perk took a look, then Walter and George, and each declared that
Frank’s rendering of the obscure sentence was the correct one. The boys
were so surprised and delighted that they could scarcely speak.
“Well! well! I never will be surprised at anything again,” said Uncle
Dick. “There are some people away off in Louisiana who would give
something to know what we know now. Push ahead, Lewis. You can’t go any
too fast for us.”
“Look a yer,” said Simon Cool, suddenly. “Seein’ you’ve found your
friends, mightn’t you as well turn me loose?”
“Why, man, you would freeze or starve,” said Bob.
“I kin take keer of myself,” replied Simon, who, it was plain, would
much rather have taken his chances on the prairie than face those whom
he had wronged.
“We have another story to listen to before we take leave of you,” said
Uncle Dick. “Climb up, boys, and we’ll be off.”
The whole party were in their saddles in two minutes more, and riding
down the gully as fast as the deep snow-drifts would permit.