While the black buzzards are quarrelling over the carcase, not far off
there is another carcase stretched upon the sward, also of a bear.
But the grouping around it is different; six hunters on horseback and
double the number of dogs.
They are the boy hunters late bivouacking in the glade, and the bear is
the same that had strayed unwittingly into their camp.
The animal has just succumbed under the trenchant teeth of their dogs,
and a bullet or two from their rifles. Nor have the hounds come off
unscathed. Two or three of them, the young and rash, lie dead beside
the quarry they assisted in dragging down.
The hunters have just ridden up and halted over the black, bleeding
mass. The chase, short and hurried, is at an end, and now for the first
time since leaving the glade do they seem to have stayed for reflection.
That which strikes them is, or should be, fearful.
"My God!" cries young Randall, "the Indian! We've left him hanging."
"We have, by the Lord!" seconds Spence, all six turning pale, and
exchanging glances of consternation.
"If he have let go his hold--"
"If! He must have let go; and long before this. It's full twenty
minutes since we left the glade. It isn't possible for him to have hung
on so long--not possible."
"And if he's let go?"
"If he has done that, why, then, he's dead."
"But are you sure the noose would close upon his neck? You, Bill Buck,
and Alf Brandon, it was you two that arranged it."
"Bah!" rejoins Buck; "you seed that same as we. It's bound to tighten
when he drops. Of course we didn't mean that; and who'd a thought o' a
bar runnin' straight into us in that way? Darn it, if the nigger has
dropped, he's dead by this time, and there's an end of it. There's no
help for it now."
"What's to be done, boys?" asks Grubbs. "There'll be an ugly account to
settle, I reckon."
There is no answer to this question or remark.
In the faces of all there is an expression of strange significance. It
is less repentance for the act than fear for the consequences. Some of
the younger and less reckless of the party show some slight signs of
sorrow, but among all fear is the predominant feeling.
"What's to be done, boys?" again asks Grubbs.
"We must do something. It won't do to leave things as they are."
"Hadn't we better ride back?" suggests Spence.
"Thar's no use goin' now," answers the son of the horse-dealer. "That
is, for the savin' of him. If nobody else has been thar since we left,
why then the nigger's dead--dead as pale Caesar."
"Do you think any one might have come along in time to save him?"
This question is asked with an eagerness in which all are sharers. They
would be rejoiced to think it could be answered in the affirmative.
"There might," replies Randall, catching at the slight straw of hope.
"The trace runs through the glade, right past the spot. A good many
people go that way. Some one might have come along in time. At all
events, we should go back and see. It can't make things any worse."
"Yes; we had better go back," assents the son of the planter; and then
to strengthen the purpose, "we'd better go for _another purpose_."
"What, Alf?" ask several.
"That's easily answered. If the Indian's hung himself, we can't help
it."
"You'll make it appear suicide? You forget that we tied his left arm.
It would never look like it. He couldn't have done that himself!"
"I don't mean that," continues Brandon.
"What, then?"
"If he's hanged, he's hanged and dead before this. We didn't hang him,
or didn't intend it. That's clear."
"I don't think the law can touch us," suggests the son of the judge.
"But it may give us _trouble_, and that must be avoided."
"How do you propose to do, Alf?"
"It's an old story that dead men tell no tales, and buried ones less."
"Thar's a good grist o' truth in that," interpolates Buck.
"The suicide wouldn't stand. Not likely to. The cord might be cut away
from the wrist; but then there's Rook's daughter. She saw him stop with
us, and to find him swinging by the neck only half-an-hour after would
be but poor proof of his having committed self-murder. No, boys, he
must be put clean out of sight."
"That's right; that's the only safe way," cried all the others.
"Come on, then. We musn't lose a minute about it. The girl may come
back to see what's keeping him, or old Rook, himself, may be straying
that way, or somebody else travelling along the trace. Come on."
"Stay," exclaimed Randall. "There's something yet--something that
should be done before any chance separates us."
"What is it?"
"We're all alike in this ugly business--in the same boat. It don't
matter who contrived it, or who fixed the rope. We all agreed to it.
Is that not so?"
"Yes, all. I for one acknowledge it."
"And I!"
"And I!"
All six give their assent, showing at least loyalty to one another.
"Well, then," continues Randall, "we must be true to each other. We
must swear it, and now, before going further. I propose we all take an
oath."
"We'll do that. You, Randall, you repeat it over, and we'll follow
you."
"Head your horses round, then, face to face."
The horses are drawn into a circle, their heads together, with muzzles
almost touching.
Randall proceeds, the rest repeating after him.
"We swear, each and every one of us, never to make known by act, word,
or deed, the way in which the half-breed Indian, called Choc, came by
his death, and we mutually promise never to divulge the circumstances
connected with that affair, even if called upon in a court of law; and,
finally, we swear to be true to each other in keeping this promise until
death."
"Now," says Brandon, as soon as the six young scoundrels have shaken
hands over their abominable compact, "let us on, and put the Indian out
of sight. I know a pool close by, deep enough to drown him. If he do
get discovered, that will look better than hanging."
There is no reply to this astute proposal; and though it helps to allay
their apprehensions, they advance in solemn silence towards the scene of
their deserted bivouac.
There is not one of them who does not dread to go back in that glade, so
lately gay with their rude roystering; not one who would not give the
horse he is riding and the gun he carries in his hand, never to have
entered it.
But the dark deed has been done, and another must needs be accomplished
to conceal it.