THE MEDICINE MAN.
SUNRISE found the boys well on their way to Indiantown. By nine o'clock
they were entering the jungle where Charley had been fired at on his
previous trip. Before entering it, however, the lads stopped and cut
two long slender poles with which to kill the moccasins basking on the
road.
This time no rifle bullets halted their progress, but the snakes were
there, and, by the time they had passed out of the jungle they had
slaughtered over fifty of the loathsome creatures.
"Whew!" exclaimed Walter, as they broke out of the darkness of the
jungle, "that's the most awful place I was ever in. It fairly reeks
with rottenness and fever."
"Yes," Charley assented. "I dread putting the machine into it, but
it's got to be done. I am going to set fire to it before the machine
gets there; that may help some. Once we get through it, we are over
the worst. There's Indiantown, about two miles from here. Now, I
figure that the motive for the attacks on us lies somewhere between
the machine and Indiantown, for the strange white men never go beyond
the trading-post, but, for the life of me, I can see nothing in this
country that would supply the motive, can you?"
"No," Walter admitted. "The land seems fertile enough, but there is
plenty of good cheap land along the coast, right close to the railroad,
so no one would want to come way out here for land. There is not
enough timber here to offer any temptation, and we know that Florida
contains no iron, coal, or precious minerals. I can see no motive for
any striving out here. I guess we are just dreaming when we talk of a
powerful motive out here."
"It's no dream," said Charley decidedly, "unless that fire was a dream,
those convicts a dream, that dynamite a dream, the assault on McCarty
a dream, those rifle-bullets a dream, and the whole one disagreeable
nightmare."
"Well, let's forget it all," urged Walter. "Remember, this is a
pleasure trip, and we want to make the most of it."
This conversation brought the two lads to the first Indian dwelling,
but they found it empty, as was the next and the next. Near the middle
of the little settlement, however, they came upon the whole tribe,
gathered around a large wigwam. Unlike the other buildings, this one
was not only thatched on top, but was also inclosed on sides and
ends with bark and palmetto leaves. In one end was a small opening,
just large enough for a man to enter by lying flat on the ground and
wriggling through.
The two lads approached the silent group with their interest thoroughly
aroused.
"What's the matter, Willie John?" Charley asked of an Indian he knew.
"Chief plenty sick," said the Indian sadly. "Indians go get paleface
doctor, but paleface doctor say medicine no good, chief must die, but
medicine man say he cure chief for two ponies. All right, we give
two ponies. Medicine man come pretty soon to cure chief. No cure, no
ponies. Understand?"
Charley nodded comprehensively. "Can we go in and see the chief?" he
asked.
"I guess so," said the Indian indifferently. "It no matter, I guess.
Chief be dead, maybe, before medicine man comes. He have to come all
the way from Big Cypress."
Charley did not wait for other permission. Lying flat on his stomach,
he wriggled into the wigwam, followed by his chum. Once inside the lads
found themselves in pitch darkness, save that in a distant corner a
feeble rushlight, set in an earthen saucer of oil, glowed faintly. For
a moment, the lads were sorry that they had been so rash in entering,
for the close air of the wigwam was heavy with the sickening smell of
fever. A low moaning from one corner, however, drew them on.
On a bed of boughs and skins near the rushlight lay what had been once
a magnificent figure of a warrior. The rushlight was too dim to be of
much use, so Walter lit match after match, while Charley bent over and
examined the stricken man. The warrior was hardly more than a skeleton.
The skin was drawn tightly over protruding cheek bones, and the black,
beady eyes glowed with unearthly brightness in their deep sockets.
Charley felt of the Indian's cheek. It was almost hot enough to burn
his hand. "We can do nothing for him," he said to his chum. "He is
just skin and bones, and he cannot live long with such a fever. We had
better get out of here. He may have something contagious. We were fools
to come in here."
But, before the boys could reach the opening, the Indians outside began
to wriggle in, each bearing a rushlight in its earthen saucer of oil.
"Medicine man come," whispered Willie John, as he passed them. "Better
sit down and keep still. Indians no like you go now. They get plenty
angry if you go."
The boys' curiosity overcame their prudence. They were both anxious to
witness the rites of the medicine man and they seated themselves among
the Indians, who, after lighting their rushlights, set them together in
the middle of the wigwam and sat down Turk fashion on either side of
the wigwam and folded their arms across their breasts. It was a curious
scene, with the dim glow of the rushlights falling on their impassive
faces and black, beady eyes.
For perhaps ten minutes the silence was unbroken save by the restless
tossing and moaning of the sick man. Then, from outside the tent came a
shrill, wailing sound, gradually getting nearer and nearer, until the
skin that covered the entrance was pushed to one side and through the
opening wriggled a figure that made the boys' flesh creep. Once inside
the figure rose erect, and the lads could see in the rushlights' glow
that it was an old Indian, naked save for a loin cloth. So old was he
that his face was a mass of wrinkles, and he tottered as he walked.
Around his withered neck was a string of alligators' teeth, and from
his arms and waist and ankles hung strings of human bones. His withered
body was painted a vivid red, slashed with streaks of bright yellow. In
his right hand he carried a wand, from which hung dozens of rattlesnake
rattles, which made a noise like the song of a locust whenever he moved
his skinny arm. In his left hand was clutched a bag made of snake skin.
As this grewsome object passed by them the boys shrank back in dread,
but the old savage did not notice them. He tottered on, and sank to
the ground beside the sick man. Then followed a scene which the boys
never forgot. Rolling on the ground beside the sick man the old Indian
began to beat the air with his hands, uttering a low, wailing cry,
that was taken up and repeated by the circle of Seminoles. Faster and
faster the old man beat the air, flecks of foam gathered on his lips,
and his withered face grew horribly contorted. With his talon-like
hands he began clawing at the sick man, who was twisting and tossing
on his couch, as though with convulsions. The medicine man paused for
a moment in his wild exertions, and, taking from his snakeskin bag a
packet of reddish powder, he scattered it over the burning rushlights.
Immediately there rose a sweet, sickening, pungent vapor, that made the
boys gasp for breath. They would have given a good deal to have got out
in the fresh air, but they were afraid the Indians would resent any
move on their part, and, besides, they were curious to see the end of
this weird ceremony. They had not long to wait. The medicine man, with
a sudden yell, snatched a knife from his loin cloth and plunged it into
the sick man's arm. Into the long, shallow cut he had made he rubbed
more of the reddish powder; then, with a long-drawn-out wail, he sank
back to the ground and his limbs and body stiffened out as rigid as
stone. Evidently this was the end of the incantations, for a couple of
Indians advanced, and, picking up the stiff figure, bore it outside of
the wigwam. The two lads started to follow, but Willie John put forth a
detaining hand.
"Go look at chief first," he said, and they silently obeyed.
The change in the sick man was amazing. They could hardly believe their
eyes. The haggard look of pain had disappeared from his face, his skin
was moist and cool, his tossing had ceased, and he had fallen into a
deep sleep.
"Pale face doctor no cure chief like medicine man," proudly said Willie
John, and the wondering lads had to admit the truth of his assertion.
Outside the two lads found the Indians dashing water in the medicine
man's face and trying to bring him out of his cataleptic state.
"He be all right, pretty soon," Willie John assured them. "Alway he get
stiff like this when he wrestles with the evil spirits of sickness.
Now I will go and get two ponies for you." He soon returned, leading
two ponies already saddled and bridled. The boys mounted, and, with
farewell waves of the hand, rode out of the camp and turned into the
road leading to the great lake.
"What did you think of that business back there?" Walter asked, as soon
as they were out of hearing of the little settlement.
"I give it up," Charley said frankly. "It's a mystery beyond me. Of
course, I don't take much stock in all that wriggling, clawing, and
wailing, but there must certainly be some wonderful curative agent in
that powder. I agree with the doctor that the chief was dying when the
medicine man came."
"Well, it is not so very wonderful, after all, when one stops to
consider the matter," said Walter reflectively. "The Seminoles are an
old, old race, so old that nobody knows how old they are. For ages and
ages they have lived in these great swamps, and it would be strange,
indeed, if the more intelligent of them had not by this time found some
remedy for the fevers of the country."
"It's interesting, anyway," Charley declared. "I'd give something
to know what that powder was made of. It would be a blessing to the
fever-stricken world."