THE LITTLE MAIDEN'S BRAVERY.
She pulled her rein, but her eye flashed and she grasped the butt of
her pistol.
"Who dares call upon me to stop? Have I not the right of way on
these prairies?"
"I call you to stop," replied the horseman, riding up close to the
girl, and pushing back his hat. "_I_ do. Look and see if you know me?"
Full well she knew who the interceptor was. The first sound of his voice
had gone with a shiver to her heart. "Ah, you know the Metis chief?"
"But I wish to pass on, monsieur. Even you, le grand Chef, have no
right to stop me without cause; and I now ask you again to let me
pass."
"I will not because I have reason."
"What is it, monsieur?"
"You are a spy. You are an enemy to the cause."
"Even to you, monsieur, I say it is a lie. I will pass;" and she
struck her heels into her horse's flank. The animal bounded forward,
but the rebel chief seized the bridle, as he cried:
"You are an enemy to the cause; and you go now to the enemy. I know
you, mademoiselle Annette." And a terrible light blazed in his eyes,
as he looked the disguised maiden in the face.
"Ay, monsieur! you are quick at penetrating disguises. I am
Mademoiselle Annette; and I go to the enemy. Nor can monsieur hinder
me." As she spoke these words she suddenly drew a pistol, and cocking
it placed the cold, glittering barrel within a foot of the leader's
face.
"Unhand my bridle or by our Holy Lady I fire." The coward hand
quivered, the fingers relaxed, and the bridle was free.
"Now I advise monsieur to meddle with me no more this night. I will
not suffer any bar to my project; I have sworn it." So saying her
horse sprang forward, and she disappeared down the slope, leaving the
baulked chief sitting upon his horse still as a stone. Away, away out
over the soft grassy plain she sped, swiftly and as lightly as a bird
might fly. Three minutes brought her in sight of Hickory Bush, a
grove of trees straggling up from the flat in the moonlight, and
resembling a congregation of witches with draggled hair, suffering
torture. Beyond the trees shone a cluster of white camps; and the
girl's heart gave a great bound as she saw by the order prevailing
there, that the inmates had been so far unmolested. She sprang into
the midst of the camps and shouted,
"Awaken! Arise! Quick! The Crees are bound hither to make you
captives. Allons! Allons!"
A tall supple figure sprang from one of the tents. How readily she
recognised his manly step, his proud head, his bright eye, his
musical voice.
"Who are you? Why this attack?"
"I am you friend. Away, if you value your liberty, and mount your
horse. I await to lead you from the danger." With motion quick and
noiseless as the movements of night birds, the inmates of the tents
armed themselves, strapped their knapsacks, and got into the saddle.
No one questioned the graceful Indian boy further. There was
something so appealing in his voice, so impatient in his gestures as
he waited for their departure, that suspicion could not lurk in any
mind.
"Hark!" cried the unknown. "They come. Hear you not the dull trample
of their hoofs?"
"By the saints in heaven, yes, and I see them too," said one of the
party, looking from his saddle through a night-glass.
"Away, away," cried the Indian boy. "Follow me;" and as the savages
behind surrounded the empty tents with their hellish cries, he led
the rescued ones at full speed down the valley, around the northern
edge of Hickory Ridge, and out toward the Chequered Hills. After half
an hour's ride, he drew bridle and the company gathered about him.
Captain Stephens was the first to speak.
"Brave lad, we owe our liberty to you; yet wherefore, I am sure, I
cannot tell."
But the boy only raised his hand, as if imposing silence upon that
point.
"You are by no means safe from the Indians yet. They will scour the
plains, and on this untrodden prairie you cannot conceal your trail.
My advice is that you make no delay, but push on to Fort Pitt, which
is only about twelve miles distant."
"Of all points this is the one that I should most desire to be at,"
responded Stephens; "but I do not know that I can find Pitt."
One of the number had been at the Fort a few years before; but he
could not make it again from this unknown part of the prairie.
"Follow me, then," answered the unknown. "I shall take you through
the hills by a short route to the river. Then you need but to follow
the bank to find the fort;" and as he spoke he once more dashed his
heels into his horse's flanks and set off towards the center of the
group of hills, that resembled in the distance a row of Dutchwomen in
heavy petticoats.
Several times as the party followed their deliverer, Stephens would
exclaim,
"Where have I heard that voice? The tone is familiar to me, but I
cannot give the slightest guess as to the boys' identity."
"Do you think he is an Indian?" enquired one.
"His voice is certainly finer and sweeter than any Indian's that I
have ever heard. And his French is perfect.
"True, captain, and notice the delicate little hands that he has,
and the proud, dainty poise of his head. He is evidently in disguise;
and what is equally plain, he does not relish our attempts at
penetrating his identity." Upon the crest of a round hill, the guide
stayed his horse and pointed eastward.
"A few minutes ride will take you to the river; half an hour then to
the north and you are at Pitt. Before I leave, just a word. Tall Elk
put on paint to-day, and before the set of to-morrow's sun, there is
not a Cree in all the region who will not be on the war-path. To-morrow
the chief goes to Big Bear, to press him to dig up the hatchet;
so Messieurs, look to your guns in the Fort, as you will have more
than three hundred enemies under the stockades before the
rising of the next moon. Au revoir."
Before any of the group could utter a word of thanks, the mysterious
boy was off again to the north-west with the speed of the wind.
"That voice!" exclaimed Stephen striking his forehead. "I know it
surely; whose _can_ it be?" and bewildered past hope of enlightenment,
he turned his horse down the slope, and dashed towards the Saskatchewan.
His followers and himself were admitted readily enough by Inspector
Dicken, a son of the great novelist, and destined afterwards to be one
of the heroes of the war.
When Annette rode away from Louis Riel to give warning to her lover,
the rebel chief ground his teeth and swore terrible oaths.
"It is as well" he muttered; "I have now justifiable grounds for
depriving her of liberty." Putting a whistle to his mouth he blew a
long blast, which was immediately answered from a clump of
cottonwood, about a quarter of a mile distant. Then came the tramp of
hoofs, and a minute later a horseman drew bridle by his chief.
"The spy has escaped me, Jean, and he was none other than I
supposed, ma belle Demoiselle. She did not deny that she was on a
mission hostile to our interests, and when I remonstrated, she held a
pistol in my face and swore by the Virgin that she would fire. This
is reason enough, Jean, for her apprehension. Let us away."
The chief led along the skirt of the upland, till he entered the
mouth of a wide, darksome valley. Upon either side straggled a growth
of mixed larch and cedar; in the centre was a dismal bog, through
which slowly rolled a black, foul stream. As they passed along the
shoulder of solid ground, troops of birds rose out of the wide sea of
bog, and the noise of their wings made a low, mournful whirring as
they passed in dark troops upwards into the ever-deepening dusk.
Then out of the gloom came a Ding Dong, like the low, solemn beat of
a bell. Jean crossed himself and exclaimed,
"Mon Dieu! What is that Monsieur?"
"What, afraid Jean? That is no toll for a lost soul, but the crying
of the dismal bell bird."
"I never heard it before Mon Chef."
"And may never hear it again. It lives only in the most doleful and
solitary swamps, and I doubt if there is another place in all the
wide territories save here, where you may hear its voice."
It had now grown so dark that the horses could only tread their way
by instinct, and at every noise or cry that came from the swamp,
Jeans' blood shivered in his veins. He had no idea where his master
was leading him, and had refrained from 'asking all along, though the
query hung constantly upon his tongue. Then a pair of noiseless wings
brushed his cheek, paused, and hovered about his head; while two red
eyes glared at him.
"In the name of God what is it?" he screamed, smiting the creature
with the handle of his whip. "Where are you leading me Mon Chef?"
"Peace Jean, I did not believe that you were such an arrant coward.
You shall soon see where I go. It is seldom that man is seen or heard
in this region, and the strange creatures marvel. That was one of the
large night-hawks which so terrified your weak senses. Do you see
yonder light?"
From a point which appeared to be the head of the valley, came a
piercing white light, and its reflection fell upon the wide, black,
shining stream that ran through the valley, like the links of a
golden chain.
"Yonder, Jean, is the abode of Mother Jubal--thither am I bound."
"What, to Madame Jubal, the Snake Charmer, the witch, the woman that
comes to her enemies when they sleep at nights, and thickens their
blood with cold? I thought, Monsieur, that she lived in hell, and
only appeared on earth when she came to do harm to mankind."
"You will find her of the earth, Jean; but she has ever been willing
to do my behests."
By the reflection of the light could be seen a hut standing in a
cup-shaped niche at the head of the valley. It was ringed around with
draggled larch and cedars; and a belt of dark hills encircled it. No
moonlight penetrated here, save toward the dawn, when pale beams fell
slantwise across the ghostly swamp.
As the horses, drew near there was heard to come from the hut a low,
suppressed yelp, half like the bark of a dog, yet resembling the cry
of a wolf. The door was open, and by a low table, upon which burned
the clear, unflickering light which the two had seen so far down the
valley, sat the old woman. Upon hearing the approach of footsteps,
she blew out this light, and through the hideous gloom the Too whit,
Too whoo of an owl came from the cabin. Then several pairs of eyes
began to gleam at the intruders out of the dusk, and all the while
several throats went on repeating in ghostly tones Too whit, Too whoo.
The chief pulled up his horse, while his companion shivered from
head to foot. Then raising his voice, he cried:
"Jubal, relight your lamp; I have come far to see you. You know me,
Jubal. Monsieur le chef?"
"Pardonnez moi," croaked the hag, as she struck the light. Then came
in quavering tones:
"Entrez."
What a brushing of soft wings and gleaming of eyes! The hut was
literally filled with living creatures.
"These are my children," the old woman said, with a horrible quaking
laugh, as she pointed to the perches. Rows of pert ravens stood upon
tip-toe along the bars looking with bright eyes upon the strangers;
while here and there an owl opened his crooked beak and said Too
whit, Too whoo. A strange creature, with wolfish head and limbs,
crouched by the hearth; but after three or four furtive glances at
the intruders, he skulked back into a dark corner of the cabin. From
this retreat he continued to glare with shy, treacherous eyes.
The old woman was short, and stooped; but her eyes were wonderfully
bright. Nay, when she looked from the dark corner, phosphorescent
jets seemed to break from them.
"Come, mother, toss the cup and tell me what Fortune has in store
for me this time," said the chief, who had seated himself upon a low,
creaking stool in the corner.
"I will," she replied; "why should I not when I am honoured so much
as to receive a visit from le grand chef de Metis." And hobbling
away, she took from a nook a large cup without a handle, black on the
outside and white within. Tea was brewed which the Rebel chief drank,
leaving naught but the dregs. Then Jubal muttered some words, which
her visitors could not understand, and threw up the cup. She had no
sooner done this than the crows began to chatter and caw, and the
owls to cry; and each time that the cup ascended, they all raised
themselves upon their feet and elevated their wings. When the cup
came into her hand from the ceiling the third time, she looked toward
the perches and said:
"Peace children." Then turning to the dark, oily chief, she said,
"Listen, O Monsieur, while I read. Here are bands of men hurrying
across the prairie into the gorges, and concealing themselves in the
wood. There is the flash of sabres, and the smoke of cannon.
Everywhere a bloody war is raging; and Indians are tearing away men,
and women, and children from their homes to captivity.
"Ah! what is this I see here? A girl. Monsieur woos her, but she is
turned away. The maiden flies; Monsieur follows, and he overtakes the
maiden. Then he bears her away with guards around her, through a deep
valley, till he reaches a hut. Now he hands her over to an ugly
hag--and the name of that hag is Jubal. Is it not so, Monsieur?" and
the crone, turning from the cup, looked with a hideous grin in the face
of the Rebel chief.
"Oui, Jubal. You have guessed aright. To-morrow or the next day,
Jean will bring hither a young woman. She is to be strictly guarded
in that room where you kept--....
"Jubal remembers; Monsieur need not mention names."
"C'est bon! Well, Jubal, you need not exercise any severity towards
the maiden, save that of a rigid confinement to her room. Me you
shall hear from again."
"Is the maiden a pretty bird?" the crone asked with a chuckle.
"That matters not, Jubal," the chief replied, somewhat haughtily.
"She is a dangerous young person, and has been playing the traitor to
our cause. The only means of proceeding against the girl, is to take
her liberty away. I am in hopes of persuading her to a right frame of
mind, and with this end in view, I shall be obliged to pay some
visits here during her captivity."
"I understand," quavered the hag; and the gleam in her eyes, as she
laid her hand upon the chiefs shoulder, was most diabolical to see.
"My poor simple son is down to the village with the pony for some
provisions for my little cabin. Ma belle I shall be able to use
handsomely, when she comes." Fetching then a black bottle, around
which were many tangles of cob-web, she set it before; her visitors.
The chief took a long draught. Jean swallowed enough to enable him to
stand boldly up and stare at the owls, and the bright-eyed ravens.
"Let us away, Jean," cried the chief now in high spirits as the old
Jamaica began to race through his veins; and flinging himself into
his saddle, he rode of at a fleet pace.
Jean opened not his mouth till he found himself once more upon the
plain, in the light of the honest moon. The Rebel chief now checking
his pony's gait said:
"I suppose you have control enough over your fears now to listen to
me?"
"Oui Monsieur."
"You will be able to-morrow night to find the den that we have left?"
"Without difficulty, Mon Chef."
"Well; to-morrow you ride away to Tall Elk, and give him this
message from me.
"Colonel Marton is abroad, and his daughter, Annette, the enemy of
the Indian and the Half-breed, is at home. She must be secured this
evening before the moon rises. Bring up twenty braves; approach the
house carefully, and fetch the maiden where directed. You will see
that the braves make no noise, for this girl is as wary as the wild
goose, and that little minx, Julie, her maid, is almost as wide-awake."
And as Jean rode away, the villain muttered to himself, "We shall
see my proud bird how long you will gainsay Louis Riel after I get
you under Jubal's bolt and lock. Go with you from Canada as my wife,
and fly the honours with which this revolution will crown my brows?
No, by the Mater purissima. You have been too scornful my pretty
maiden; you have not concealed your preference for this English dog;
you have held your rebellious pistol in my face. Ah, no, ma petite
Annette; but I shall amuse myself, sometimes, after the brunt of the
day's labour, by riding up the dismal valley, and stroking your
broken wings. When I have served my mood, played to the full with the
caged bird, Jubal can let it go to attract some new mate. Holy
virgin, but my triumph will be very sweet! Yea, Annette, to have you
in one's own power is a sweet thing; nothing can be sweeter except
the vengeance which shall feast itself at the same source as my
passion."
He raised his arm in the direction of White Oaks, where lay the
girl's cottage, and cried like a triumphant fiend.
"Bonsoir. Adieu, ma belle Annette. Sweet dreams about your lover
to-night. To-morrow I shall bathe my face in the coils of your silken
hair." And he was away.
When Jean rode away from his master he fell into a train of musing.
"Methinks," he said aloud after a long pause, "that we had better
kill two birds with one stone to-morrow. If the master take the
mistress, I do not see why the man should not have the maid." And as
the fellow reached this conclusion his little weasel eyes brightened
as if each were the point of a glow worm; and he smote the flank of
his horse with his heavy heel. "You one day turned up your sweet,
haughty nose, Julie, when I told you how beautiful you were, and that
I would like to kiss the dew off your red lips. Well, Julie, my plan
for the morrow is to denounce you to Tall Elk as a spy; and after I
have got possession of you, my pretty one, with a brave at one side
of your pony, and myself at the other, we shall march to the
cottonwood where the door of ma mere stands always open to her son,
and that which belongs to him." So, chuckling over the fair prospects
of the morrow, the fellow urged his pony to the full of its speed,
down to the little village of St. Ignace.
Just as the sun went down like a shield of burning brass over the
gray line of the prairie on the morrow, a cringing, stealthy-looking
man might be seen riding a sorrel pony towards the verge of Alka
Swamp, near which were camped the painted warriors of Tall Elk. As he
drew near the squaws began to clap their hands, and the lean, ugly
dogs gave several short yelps. Tall Elk came to the door of his
wigwam, wherein sat several pretty young Cree wives sewing beads and
dainty work upon his war jacket; and going to the horseman he said:
"The messenger from the great chief is welcome. What is his command
for Tall Elk?"
When the savage had heard the orders of the rebel chief, and the
additional instructions of Jean, he grunted: "Ugh; sorry to do this.
The two girls were always kind to the Indians; and our braves will
not like to do this against La Reine. But we must obey the orders of
le grand chef."
"It is well. Let your braves be ready to start when the gopher comes
out of his burrow." Fastening his horse to a cottonwood tree, this
miscreant emissary began to whistle a tune, and walked about among
the lodges, seeking to attract the attention of some pretty Indian
maiden, of which there were many in the tents. The braves were abroad
a little way, some looking for elk and others for muskrat, so that
the impudent Metis might go about seeking to break hearts without any
risk of getting a broken head.
When night had fallen over the prairie, and the bull-frog and the
cricket filled the lower air with a confusing din of small sounds,
thirty dusky warriors, mounted upon their ponies, with Tall Elk and
Jean at their head, crossed over the ridge and struck out for White
Oaks. An hour's ride brought them to an elevation from which they saw
a light twinkling through the grove. Jean's small eyes were gleaming
with foul expectation--he was thinking of his lovely booty, safe
under the lock and key of his hideous little Metis mother.
"Let us spread our force now, chief," he whispered to Tall Elk. And
we leave them drawing their circle of horses, stealthily and swiftly,
around the silent cottage.