COHOON AND HIS ENEMIES.
The band soon reached the main cave, in the center of which a fire
burned brightly.
The scowl of vengeance still rested upon the Modoc’s face, and his
hands were clenched until the nails bruised the palms.
He had been the prey of deep thought during the return; he saw that
successful resistance was not to be expected, and the determination
to fall upon the troops, rifle in hand, then animated his breast.
Arrow-Head, the Klamath, was too cowardly to help him, and it seemed
that the hand of every red-man was against him.
He was the first to enter the cave, and he suddenly paused near the
fire and fastened his eyes upon a figure that lay against a wall.
“What means that?” he asked, turning suddenly upon his chiefs.
Hooker Jim stepped forward.
“The white Modoc is dead,” he said, glancing at the stiffened figure,
clad in the easily recognized garments of Rafe Todd. “He hated the
spies, and so he came to the cave to kill them. But the Warm Spring
chief shot him from the river bank, and he run by Hooker and fell dead.”
“He is really dead, then?”
“Dead! Hooker felt his heart. It can not beat with a bullet-hole
through it.”
A genuine sigh escaped the Modoc’s lips. His best spy was dead.
“Then away with the white Modoc,” he said. “He has done Mouseh much
good; but he was a bad, bad man. Pale girl,” and he turned to ’Reesa
South, “your painted beau is dead.”
The scout’s daughter did not reply, but a look of satisfaction beamed
from her eyes.
“Girl glad?” said Jack.
“Why should I not be?” she asked, quietly looking up into his eyes. “He
sent the Indians to our home. ’Twas his gold that drove the bullet to
mother’s heart, his gold that gave our cabin to the flames. Should I
sorrow for his end?”
“No; if he did all this, Mouseh will not regret his death.”
Then the chief turned from ’Reesa and watched the warriors prepare
Baltimore Bob for burial. He was wrapped in a great blanket, in whose
folds a lot of basaltic stones was placed, and the whole borne to the
river.
A few minutes later the burial party returned, and reported a
fulfillment of their duty.
Nor did they report falsely, for they had flung the corpse into the
stream, beneath the surface of which it disappeared like a cannon-shot.
“Now Mouseh punishes the painted liar,” cried the chief, and the glance
of his dark eye fell upon Cohoon.
“Cohoon is ready,” was the undaunted reply, and with a firm step he
strode into the center of the circle which the chieftain had formed.
“Cohoon has fought the Modocs bravely,” he continued; “he has taken no
prisoners; he would not spare Mouseh were he in his power; therefore,
he expects no mercy at Mouseh’s hands; he will ask none.”
He stood in the light of the fire, with head proudly erect, and arms
pinioned to his side. Once while he spoke he glanced at ’Reesa, and
that glance bade her as affectionate a farewell as his lips could have
framed.
“Thus spies die!” said the chief, stepping toward the Warm Springer
with cocked revolver. “The hunting-ground over our head needs another
hunter and the deer wait by the river for Cohoon’s coming.”
A deadly silence followed the last word, and every breath was suspended.
The revolver crept upward, and just as it rested on a level with the
doomed man’s brain, a bullet knocked it from the Indian’s hand!
Captain Jack uttered an exclamation of rage, and wheeled toward the
spot from whence the shot seemed to come.
A fresh weapon glittered in his right hand--a weapon snatched from the
grip of Scar-faced Charley.
His flashing eyes demanded to know who fired the shot; but he spoke
not, and the warriors gave way as he strode forward.
But, suddenly, a figure leaped from the narrow corridor into which the
chief looked for a solution of the mystery, and halted scarce a foot
from the muzzle of his pistol.
The chiefs recognized the new-comer before the great Modoc, and when
her name rung from every lip, he started back, and gazed from a safer
distance into her face.
“Artena!” he cried, “what does all this mean? Did not the iron shell
blow you to pieces? Chiefs, surely you do not see Artena?”
“Ah, Mouseh, Artena is not with the Manitou,” said the Squaw Spy,
stepping forward quickly, and touching the Modoc’s arm. “The great
shell blew her from the cave; but she has returned to tell Mouseh about
the blue-coats.”
All at once Jack started forward again, and took the girl’s hand.
He never doubted her fidelity to him, and now that Rafe Todd was dead
he could rule his chiefs concerning her retention as a spy, for his
cause.
“But why did Artena shoot Mouseh’s pistol from his hand when he was
about to punish the liar?” queried the Modoc. “Let Artena answer that.”
Seemingly startled by such a question, the girl shrunk from the Indian,
and placed her hand upon her empty belt. She was unarmed; not even a
knife glittered on her person.
“How could Artena shoot without a pistol?” she asked, “and why should
she seek to save the enemies of Mouseh?”
Her reply astonished the Modoc.
“The big ranger has escaped the dark river,” he cried, turning to his
warriors. “He is not far away,” and then he added, in a lower tone:
“trail him, hunt him down this night.”
Almost instantly several Indians deserted the band, and Artena smiled
faintly when they took their departure.
“Artena shall tell Jack about the blue-coats, but not now,” continued
the chief, turning away, and his eyes again fell on Cohoon, toward whom
he walked.
“Cohoon has had time to sing his death song, yet it has not passed his
lips,” he said. “This is not Mouseh’s fault. Donald shot the pistol
from his hands; but he will hit it no more.”
The eyes of the Squaw Spy were riveted upon the Modoc, and, as his
pistol crept up for the second time, she started forward and laid her
hand on his blue-coated arm.
He looked down upon her, his whole frame quivering with smothered rage.
“What Artena want? There is time enough to speak when Mouseh has
settled with the spy,” and with the final word he tore his arm away,
and glanced at a tall chief, who stepped to Artena’s side.
“Artena would tell Mouseh this,” she said, and the words sounded like
icy water dropping upon red-hot steel; “this she would tell Mouseh, the
war-chief of the Modocs. If he takes the life of Cohoon, she will bore
his heart with a bullet, and tear his scalp from his head!”
Instantly the Indian dropped the pistol, and wheeled upon the girl.
He saw the flashing eyes, the pallid lips, and the tightly-clenched
hands.
For several moments he did not speak. The chiefs surged nearer, but he
waved them back with his pistoled hand, never once taking his eyes from
the Squaw Spy.
“Artena is mad,” he said, at length, after looking her in the eye. “She
knows not what she says. Steamboat, take her.”
He looked at the young warrior who had stepped to her side, and his red
hands encircled her arms.
But she wrenched herself loose, displaying in the action a strength
that astonished the spectators, and before Steamboat Dick could secure
her, she stood beyond reach, and his Spencer rifle was clutched in her
hands.
“Artena’s head is not cracked!” she cried, directing her words at
Captain Jack. “She means just what she says. If Mouseh raises his
revolver to Cohoon’s head again, the Modocs shall be chiefless!”
Jack glanced from the girl to his tribe, then back again.
“Artena,” he said, “is a Modoc, Cohoon is a Warm Spring dog. His
forefathers fought ours long years ago. The tree of hatred has thrived
between the two nations, and the river of death has watered its roots.
She can not love the man who-- Ha! what says Artena now?”
The Squaw Spy was a prisoner, for a savage had suddenly leaped through
an opening in the ceiling, and encircled her with his long red arms.
She gritted her teeth and struggled, but all to no purpose; the giant
Modoc was too much for her, and she submitted, while the Indians
clapped their hands in approval of their brother’s deed.
Nor did the captor handle his prize decently. One hand suddenly flew to
her throat, and, strangled until her face assumed a darker color than
its own natural one, she became as limp as a cloth in his hands, and
appeared senseless.
Captain Jack, in the ebullition of his wrath, permitted this, and there
was but one in the whole assemblage who tried to resent the indignity.
This person was Cohoon!
He sprung forward with a cry of horror when he saw Artena’s condition;
but was confronted by Captain Jack, whose right hand hurled him back.
“There’s some infernal treachery between these two,” he cried, glancing
at his braves. “Artena would not strike for Cohoon if he was nothing to
her. Say--girl, what--”
He was flung aside by Cohoon’s clenched hand, and, before he could
recover, Steamboat Dick was hurled upon him, and Artena lay upon the
spy’s arm.
The severing of Cohoon’s bonds was ’Reesa South’s work!
Unable to control the spirit that suddenly swept over her, she had
snatched a knife from the belt of a young savage who stood near,
and liberated Cohoon before the astonished chiefs and braves could
interpose a hand.
And she gained the spy’s side unharmed, and, smiling over her triumph,
faced the array of rifles and knives.
“Back!” yelled Jack, rising and throwing himself before his maddened
braves, who were pressing forward. “Leave all this to me. This night we
will rid ourselves of every enemy that infest this cave!”
Then he wheeled upon Cohoon, whose Spencer was leveled at his breast.
“What is Artena to Cohoon?” he cried.
The answer followed quickly upon the heels of the interrogative, and
startled every one.
“_His wife!_”
The sentence roused Artena, and, starting up, she knocked the rifle
from its level.
Cohoon tried to remedy the accident; but the whiz of an arrow prevented
him.
He groaned; the weapon dropped from his hands, and, with a barbed shaft
sticking in his side, he dropped upon his knees.
A wild yell greeted the result of the shot; but it was broken in twain
by the Squaw Spy, who snatched the rifle from the ground, and, with a
cry of defiance, threw herself before the man who had called her wife!