THE TRAIL.
The dawn was just commencing to overshadow the horizon with transient
opaline tints; a few stars were still glistening in the dark blue sky.
The wild beasts were leaving their watering places, and slowly retiring
to their dens, disturbing at intervals the solemn silence of the desert
with their sinister howling.
Valentine opened his eyes, looked around him anxiously, and after
employing a few seconds in shaking off his drowsiness, he rose slowly
and awoke his comrades, who were still sleeping, rolled up in their
blankets.
Soon, the whole little party were collected round the fire, on which the
hunter had thrown a few armfuls of dry wood, and in whose brilliant
flames the breakfast was now preparing.
The Mexicans, with their eyes fixed Valentine, silently awaited his
explanation, for they guessed that he had important communications to
make to them. But their expectations were foiled, at least for the
present, and the Frenchman remained quite silent.
When the meal was ready, Valentine made his comrades a signal to eat;
and for some twenty minutes no other sound could be heard save that
caused by the formidable appetites of the hunters. When they had
finished, Valentine quietly lit his Indian pipe, and indicated to his
companions that he wished to speak. All turned toward him.
"My friends," he said, in his sympathetic voice, "what I feared has
happened. Red Cedar has left his island camp; he has, if I am not
mistaken, several days' start of us, and in vain did I try last night to
take up his trail: it was impossible. Red Cedar is a villain, endowed
with a fortunately far from common ferocity, whose destruction we have
sworn, and I hope we shall keep our word. But I am compelled to do him
the justice of saying, that he is one of the most experienced hunters in
the Far West; and no one, when he pleases, can more cleverly hide his
own trail, and discover that of others. We are, therefore, about to have
a trial of patience with him, for he has learned all the stratagems of
the redskins, of whom, I am not ashamed to say, he is the superior in
roguery."
"Alas!" Don Miguel muttered.
"I have sworn to restore your daughter to you, my friend," Valentine
continued, "with the help of heaven. I shall keep my oath, but I am
about to undertake a gigantic task: hence I ask of you all the most
perfect obedience. Your ignorance of the desert might, under certain
circumstances, cause us serious injury, and make us lose in a few
minutes the fruit of lengthened researches: hence I ask of your
friendship that you will let yourselves be entirely guided by my
experience."
"My friend," Don Miguel replied, with an accent full of majesty,
"whatever you may order, we will do; for you alone can successfully
carry out the difficult enterprise in which we are engaged."
"Good! I thank you for the obedience you promise me, my friend: without
it, it would be impossible to succeed. Now leave me to arrange with the
Indian chiefs."
Valentine rose, made a sign to Curumilla and Eagle-wing, and the three
sat down a short distance off. Valentine passed his calumet to the
Araucano, who took a few whiffs and then handed it to Eagle-wing, and
he, after smoking also, returned it to the hunter.
"My brothers know why I have convened them in council," Valentine said
presently.
The two chiefs bowed in reply.
"Very good," he continued; "now what is the advice of my brother? Let
the Sachem of the Coras speak first. He is a wise chief, whose counsels
can only be good for us."
"Why does Koutonepi ask the advice of his red brothers?" he said.
"Koutonepi is a great warrior: he has the eye of the eagle, the scent of
the dog, the courage of the lion, and the prudence of the serpent. No
one can discover better than him a trail lost in the sand: what
Koutonepi does is well done: his brothers will follow him."
"Thanks, chief," Valentine continued; "but in what direction should we
proceed?"
"Red Cedar is the friend of Stanapat: after his defeat the scalp hunter
will have sought a refuge with his friend."
"That is also my opinion," the hunter remarked. "What do you think,
chief?" he said, turning to Curumilla.
The Araucano shook his head.
"No," he said, "Red Cedar loves gold."
"That is true," said Valentine: "besides, the Apaches are too near us.
You are right, chief: we must therefore proceed northward?"
Curumilla nodded an assent.
"No horses," he said, "they destroy a trail."
"We will go on foot. Have you Red Cedar's measure?"
Curumilla fumbled in his medicine bag, and produced an old worn
moccasin.
"Oh!" Valentine said eagerly; "that is better still: let us be off at
once."
They broke up the conference.
"My friends," the hunter said to the Mexicans, "this is what we have
resolved on: you three, alone, will be mounted. Each of you will lead
one of our horses, so that we may mount at the first signal. The two
chiefs and myself will march on foot, in order to let no sign escape us.
You will keep two hundred yards, behind us: and as I noticed that there
are at this moment a great many trumpeter swans in the river, that will
be our rallying cry. All this is arranged?"
"Yes," the three gentlemen answered unanimously.
"Good! now to set out, and try never to let us out of sight."
"Be at your ease, my friend, about that," the general said; "we have too
great an interest in not quitting you. _Canarios!_ what would become of
us alone, lost in this confounded desert?"
"Come, come, something tells me that we shall succeed," Valentine said
gaily, "so we will have courage."
"May heaven grant you are not mistaken, my friend," Don Miguel said
sadly. "My poor child!"
"We will deliver her. I have followed a more difficult trail before
now."
With these consolatory words, the two Indians and the hunter set out.
Instead of taking Indian file, as ordinarily adopted on the prairie, and
marching one after the other, they spread like a fan, in order to have a
greater space to explore, and not lose the slightest indication. So soon
as the scouts were at the arranged distance, the Mexicans mounted and
followed them, being careful not to let them out of sight, as far as was
possible.
When Valentine told Don Miguel that he had followed more difficult
trails, he was either boasting, or, as is more probable, judging from
his frank character, he wished to restore hope to his friend.
In order to follow a trail, it must exist. Red Cedar was too old a wood
ranger to neglect the slightest precaution, for he knew too well that,
however large the desert may be, a man habituated to cross it always
Succeeds in finding the man he is pursuing.
He knew, too, that he was followed by the most experienced hunter of the
Far West, whom, by common accord, white and half-breed trappers, and the
redskins themselves, had surnamed "The Trail-hunter." Hence he surpassed
himself, and nothing was to be seen.
Although Valentine and his two comrades might interrogate the desert, it
remained dumb and indecipherable as a closed book. For five hours they
had been walking, and nothing had given an embodiment to their
suspicions, or proved to them that they were on the right track.
Still, with that patience which characterises men accustomed to prairie
life, and whose tenacity no word can express, the three men marched on,
advancing, step by step, with their bodies bent, their eyes fixed on the
ground, never yielding to the insurmountable difficulties that opposed
them, but, on the contrary, excited by these very difficulties, which
proved that they had an adversary worthy of them.
Valentine walked in the centre, with Curumilla on his right and
Eagle-wing on his left. They were crossing at this moment a level plain,
where a considerable view could be enjoyed; on one side stood the
outposts of the virgin forest, on the other was the Gila, running over a
sand bed. On reaching the bank of a small stream, obstructed with
shrubs, Valentine noticed all at once that two or three small branches
were broken a few inches from the ground.
The hunter stopped, and in order to examine more closely, lay down on
the ground, carefully regarding the fracture of the wood, as he thrust
his head into the copse. Suddenly he started up on his knees, uttering a
cry of joy: his comrades ran up to him.
"Ah, by Heaven," Valentine exclaimed; "now I have him. Look, look!"
And he showed the Indians a few horse's hairs he held in his hand.
Curumilla examined them attentively, while Eagle-wing, without saying a
word, formed with earth and stones a dyke across the bed of the stream,
which was only a few yards in width.
"Well, what do you say to that, chief?" Valentine asked. "Have I guessed
it?"
"Wah," the Indian replied, "Koutonepi has good eyes; these hairs come
from Red Cedar's horse."
"I noticed that the horse he rode was iron grey."
"Yes; but it halts."
"I know it, with the off foreleg."
At this moment the Coras summoned them: he had turned the course of the
stream, and the traces of a horse's hoofs could be distinctly traced in
the sand.
"Do you see?" said Valentine.
"Yes," Curumilla remarked; "but he is alone."
"Hang it, so he is."
The two warriors looked at him in amazement.
"Listen," Valentine said, after a moment's reflection, "this is a false
trail. On reaching this stream, where it was impossible for him not to
leave signs, Red Cedar, supposing that we should look for them in the
water, crossed the stream alone, although it would be easy for men less
accustomed to the desert than ourselves to suppose that a party had
crossed here. Look down there on the other side, at a horse's marks. Red
Cedar wanted to be too clever; showing us a trail at all has ruined him.
The rest of the band, which he joined again presently, instead of
crossing, descended the bed of the stream to the Gila, where they
embarked and passed to the other side of the river."
The two Indians, on hearing this clear explanation, could not repress a
cry of admiration. Valentine burst the dyke, and with their help formed
another one hundred yards below, a short distance from the Gila. The bed
of the stream was hardly dry, ere the two Indians clapped their hands,
while uttering exclamations of delight.
Valentine had guessed aright: this time they had discovered the real
trail, for the bed of the stream had been trampled by a large band of
horses.
"Oh, oh," Valentine said; "I fancy we are on the right road."
He then imitated the cry of a swan, and the Mexicans, who had been
puzzled by the movements of the hunters, and were anxious to hear the
news, galloped up.
"Well?" Don Miguel shouted.
"Good news," said Valentine.
"You have the trail?" the general asked, hurriedly.
"I think so," the hunter modestly replied.
"Oh!" said Don Pablo, joyously; "In that case we shall soon catch the
villain."
"I hope so. We must now cross the river; but let us three go first."
The three hunters leaped on their horses and crossed the river, followed
at a distance by the others. On reaching the other side of the Gila,
instead of ascending the bank, they followed the current for some
distance, carefully examining the ground.
"Ah!" Valentine suddenly exclaimed, as he stopped his horse. "I think
the men we are pursuing landed here."
"That is the place," said Curumilla, with a nod.
"Yes," Moukapec confirmed him; "it is easy to see."
In fact, the spot was admirably adapted for landing without leaving any
signs. The bank was bordered for nearly one hundred yards with large
flat rocks, shaped like tombstones, where the horses could rest their
hoofs without any fear of leaving a mark. These atones extended for a
considerable distance into the plain, and thus formed a species of
natural highway, nearly half a mile in width.
Still, a thing had happened which no one could have foreseen, and which
would have passed unnoticed, save for Valentine's watchful eye. One of
the horses, in climbing on to the rock, had miscalculated its distance
and slipped, so that an almost imperceptible graze, left by its hoof on
the stone, showed the quick-sighted hunter where the party struck the
bank.
The hunters followed the same road; but, so soon as they had landed, the
trail disappeared anew. Although the scouts looked around with the most
minute attention, they found nothing that would indicate to them the
road followed by the enemy on leaving the water.
Valentine, with his hands resting on the muzzle of his rifle, was
thinking deeply, at one moment looking on the ground, at another raising
his eyes to the sky, like a man busied with the solution of a problem
which seems to him impossible, when suddenly he perceived a white headed
eagle soaring in long circles over a mass of rocks, situated a little to
the right of the spot where he was standing.
"Hum," the hunter said to himself, as he watched the eagle, whose
circles were growing gradually smaller, "what is the matter with that
bird? I am curious to know."
Summoning his two comrades, he threw his rifle on his back, and hurried
toward the spot above which the bird of prey still continued to hover.
Valentine imparted to the Indians the suspicions that had sprung up in
his mind, and the three men began painfully climbing up the mass of
rocks strangely piled up one on the other, and which rose like a small
hill in the middle of the prairie.
On reaching the top the hunters stopped to pant; the eagle, startled by
their unexpected appearance, had flown reluctantly away. They found
themselves on a species of platform, which must infallibly have once
served as a sepulchre to some renowned Indian warrior, for several
shapeless fragments lay here and there, near a rather wide cavity, some
ten yards in width.
Valentine bent over the edge of this hole, but the obscurity was so
dense, owing to the shape of the cavity, that he could perceive nothing,
though his sense of smell was most disagreeably assailed by a fetid odour
of decaying flesh.
"Hilloah! what is this?" he asked.
Without speaking, Curumilla had lit a candle wood torch which he handed
the hunter. Valentine bent over again and looked in.
"Ah!" he exclaimed, "Red Cedar's horse--I have you now, my fine fellow!
but how the deuce did he manage to get the animal up here without
leaving any trail?" After a moment he added: "Oh, what a goose I am! The
horse was not dead, he led it up here, and then forced it into the hole.
By Jove! It is a good trick: I must confess that Red Cedar is a very
remarkable rogue, and had it not been for the eagle, I should not have
discovered the road he took--but now I have him! Were he ten times as
cunning he would not escape me."
And, all delighted, Valentine rejoined the Mexicans, who were anxiously
awaiting the result of his researches.