TOM'S RIDE CONTINUED.—THE CHIEF'S DAUGHTER.—SINGULAR ADVENTURE.
FORTY miles north-east of the landing, where Tom parted from the
Willards, was a wide belt of woods, through which, down in its dim
depths, ran a foaming river. The irregular limestone bluffs forming its
banks were wild and picturesque in the extreme. Few, save the Indian,
and the hunter, and trapper, ever entered these labyrinths.
On the stream, farther down, where the woods ended in rolling prairie,
a young town had started, and using the water power, furnished lumber
to villages less favored; for the settlers deemed themselves fortunate,
if by going a score of miles, they could procure a load of boards to be
used in building their cabins.
At this place, the stage deposited Tom—the route continuing no farther.
The young Scotch-American also stopped there, who, on learning Tom's
destination, stated that his father's cabin was twelve miles distant
on Tom's path, and, as he would return next day with horse and wagon,
offered to take Tom and his trunk along for company.
"I shall get here by two in the afternoon, to-morrow," he said.
Next morning, to "stretch his limbs," Tom started alone, on a short
exploring walk up the river, amusing himself on the way gathering
botanical and entomological specimens, and noting the varieties of
birds that flitted on the wing, or floated on the water.
Absorbed in thoughts of the dear ones he was going to visit, and in
what he saw, he had gone some distance into the woods, when, coming
to a widening of the trail, he saw, quietly preceding him, an Indian
girl, of from sixteen to eighteen years of age. She was walking slowly,
apparently unaware that any one was near. Rumors of Indian hostilities
were afloat, and this evidence that he was in the vicinity of an Indian
encampment was anything but welcome.
His first impulse was to turn about, and noiselessly retrace his steps.
A second thought showed the folly of this, for he had been shouting to
awaken the echoes, and singing, to express his enjoyment, and crashing
the dry twigs, up to the very instant of the appearance of the tawny
maiden. So, despite her seeming ignorance of his presence, he felt
assured she was aware of it.
Making, therefore, the best of his uncomfortable situation, he hurried
to overtake the stranger. Approaching, he was struck with her exceeding
beauty, while the ornaments upon her person proclaimed her a chief's
daughter.
Her form was symmetry itself; her jet black hair, elaborately dressed
and braided, was long, silken, and glossy; her carriage was graceful
and dignified; while row after row of many-hued beads encircled her
neck and shoulders, and embroidered her moccasons. And such face and
eyes! The former, delicately tinged, perfectly regular, interesting;
the latter, soft, lustrous, shaded by long, dark lashes.
In his boyhood, Tom had read, in some high-wrought romance he chanced
to meet, an ideal sketch of an Indian maid; this prodigy of nature
fully realized that glowing portraiture.
Scarcely, however, had he reached her side, when a short, dry cough,
the insidious "coffin cough," so often heard in civilized dwellings,
fell on his ear.
"Indian girl sick?" he inquired, awkwardly striving to make himself
understood.
No answer was returned, nor did the movement of a muscle of the
features, or a turn of the head, give token that she saw or heard him.
Again she involuntarily coughed.
Taking out a well-stocked medicine case, he drew forth a vial, and,
displaying it to view, said,—
"Indian girl sick; medicine, perhaps, make well!"
Without a responsive glance or word, a little yellow hand was stretched
out, the slender fingers glistening with rings. Pouring some medicated
globules into the open palm, she gravely swallowed them, and continued
her silent walk. Soon the cough softened a little, the irritation of
the respiratory organs was soothed, and feeling that, possibly, on her
favor his very life might depend, he sought, fruitlessly, to engage her
in conversation.
Suddenly, however, she disappeared down the side of the bluff. A
profound silence, broken only by the rush of the stream and twitter of
birds succeeded, yet that ambushed eyes watching every motion he could
not doubt.
Retracing his way with assumed carelessness, he had not gone far, when
from the thickets leaped a band of yelling savages, naked to the waist,
their hair flowing in wild disorder over their brawny shoulders. It
was a startling onset; but understanding Indian character too well
to manifest fear, he scrutinized his captors with a coolness that
astonished himself.
"Money! Money!" they shouted in rude English, thrusting their grimy
paws from every side into his face.
"No money!" he replied, shaking his head.
Dancing, grinning, jeering, for a few exciting moments, they at length
vanished in the woods.
Feeling uneasy, and uncertain as to what the discovery he had made
might forebode, he thought he would see if he could find their
encampment. So, pushing his way through the bushes, and down the
declivity, he discovered, hidden under the overhanging ledge, several
Indian tents.
Before one, tightly stretched from two stakes driven into the ground,
was a deer's hide, the pelt of which an old hag was rubbing soft and
smooth with a sharp-edged stone—a slow and laborious process.
Just shooting into view from the other side of the river, and propelled
by a squaw, was a canoe, laden with the limbs of trees for the fire;
while in a lodge squatted the lazy "lords of the soil," playing games
of chance, the paint on their faces showing that, if not on the
war-path, they perhaps intended mischief to somebody.
Feeling that in view of the Indians having recently left him
unmolested, he might enter the camp without special danger, and as he
wished, if possible, to ascertain their designs, he at once descended
the ledge, and entered the tent. Seating himself, he watched their
play. No notice was taken of him. One of the players, whose cruel leer,
and the contortions of whose supple body, made him think of a human
snake, struck into a savage song, swaying back and forth to keep time.
Tom found it difficult to conceal his apprehensions, and the better
to do so, in a frank, "at home" manner, he had just taken his turn in
drinking from the dubious-looking pail of water that stood near, when
the chief appeared, accompanied by his daughter.
"Medicine for pappoose!" he said.
"Yes," Tom gladly replied, and, carefully taking out the powder, showed
him what was a dose, making him comprehend that the remedy was to be
taken three times daily, saying,—
"Make pappoose better!"
"Good, good," answered the Indian, adding, "Good, white man, go home
bimeby, quick! Indian no hurtee him."
Taking the hint, Tom departed, reaching the little settlement, thankful
at his easy escape. Did the gratitude of the Indian maid, operating
through the love of the old chief for his strangely beautiful child,
give him a safe return? Long did he ponder his strange adventure.
It is an old adage, "All knowledge will come into use at some time."
Tom's splendid constitution, thanks to the tug and toil of his varied
experiences as a squatter's son, permitted him to study more and
faster in a day than if he had been tenderly reared. Long deprivation
of school privileges had also made him brain-hungry. As an inmate of
an eminent physician's family, he had a taste awakened for anatomy,
physiology, and the knowledge of diseases and their treatment.
"Christ was physician of both soul and body; why should not I be?" he
argued.
Little did he think, however, as he waded through Diagnosis and the
Materia Medica, and rode and talked with the knowledge-imparting
doctor, that the first use he would have for the medicine case the
physician had presented him at parting, would be to relieve an Indian
girl, and thereby, perhaps, save his own life.
He was aware that a frontier missionary must needs prescribe for
the sick, or stand idly by and see them suffer; and from benevolent
considerations, he had informed himself in medicine. He had begun to
receive the reward, sure to accrue, sooner or later, to those who seek
the good of others.