THE RISING
"All parts resound with tumults, plaints and fears;
And grisly death in sundry shapes appears."
--_Dryden_.
There was great excitement in Burgtown. The old tavern keeper had found
three horses without his door, standing there jaded, tired, in the early
dawn. He recognised them as the animals of the pilot and the two
prospectors. Around the tavern's long porch were assembled Professor
Bill Banks, the town citizens, and several outside squatters, a motley
assemblage, listening to old Burke's recital. The tavern keeper was
filled with importance, for once he was the centre of attraction and
seemed like a Fourth of July orator, so breathless did all seem to hang
upon his words. His round body was swelled to greater proportions as he
proceeded, in a roundabout way, to narrate what he knew of the affair.
"It war this way. The pilot, Hugh Lark, he kem a-riding up about dark
last night and asked fer the strangers, whether they was to home in the
tavern. He seemed powerful anxious to have them right away. 'Going
rafting, Hugh?' sez I, social-like. 'No,' sez he; 'air Mr. Ande and Mr.
Dick in?' 'Been rafting?' sez I. Then he fired up, mad-like, and talked
about the grey mare of hisn being able to pull a oar as good as any
raftsman. I had my doubts of that, though the mare has a heap of sense.
But I thought he war joking, and I guess he war. About that time I up
and asked whether he war a-going a-hunting for the mine. You see the
strangers air pros--whatever it is--I mean they war miners, and we uns
had the idee that they were a-searching for something of that kind. He
up and sez, short-like, that he warn't and that they war just going
hunting. 'Bout this time Mr. Ande and Mr. Dick come out, and their
hosses were brought around, and they jumped on, and then I thought I
would ask Mr. Ande, being as he war allers social-like. 'Air ye going to
find thet mine, Mr. Ande?' sez I. Then he up, and in high larndt
langwidge, told we uns about their going after some kind of fishes, but
I ne'er hearn tell of a man going fishin' without hooks and with a gun
and----"
"Come, cut it short," said Professor Bill, impatiently. "At what hour
did they go?"
"'Bout seven o'clock last night, and----"
"And when did the horses return?"
"Well, if I do hev to say it----"
"Come," said Bill, with the authority of a leader, "when did they
return?"
"Well--I kalkilate 'bout five o'clock in the morning, leastways they
were here when we uns got up."
"And which way did they go?"
"Well, ye see, Mr. Ande, who is a great scholard and high larndt,
he----"
"Egregious dolt! Vociferous driveller!" exclaimed Bill, in exasperation,
"can't you say which way they went."
"Gosh, what langwidge!" murmured the tavern keeper in excessive
admiration of Bill's explosion, but seeing that Bill was getting angry
he answered quickly: "As I live, Bill, I think they went down creek to
old Hunter Tom's, seein' as Hugh war fond of Tom. Leastways they went
that way and----"
Old Burke's words were drowned in the commands of Bill.
"Every man get his horse and gun and we'll start in five minutes. Others
can follow. We go to Hunter Tom's place. Perhaps some accident has
happened. Fetch me some brandy, Burke; if they are hurt they may need
it."
Rapidly the men collected, and under the able generalship of Professor
Bill Banks forth they sallied. The tavern keeper watched them gallop
down the town road and thunder over the lower bridge, and when they had
disappeared among the trees of the farther shore he entered the tavern.
"Wot a scholard Bill is," he murmured as he endeavoured to write down
his learned words. "Egg--egg--" he murmured, and then he slowly allowed
his tongue to follow the twisting, uncertain movements of his quill pen.
"It's no use," he said, as he flung down the quill; "Bill will hev to
write her down fer me. Wot a scholard! He'll be a Congressman yit."
Bill and his men in a short time reached the hunter's cabin in the
Loop. Tom, hearing the shout of familiar voices, flung open the door,
and in a few, brief words narrated the adventures of the night. They had
been up the creek, he said, and had been attacked by Shawnese. About the
object of their night expedition he was silent.
The news of the presence of Indians in the neighbourhood was new to all
but two of the party, who had seen them as the pilot had seen them on
the former day. Bill, with the skill of a general, divided his forces.
Two he told to remain with Ande in the cabin; some were sent down the
river in search of the pilot and Dick; the remainder and greater number,
with the hunter in their midst, were to take the trail up stream to
avenge themselves on the remaining Shawnese. According to the hunter's
account but half a dozen at the most remained. Tom was in little hopes
of finding them, as by this time they had made good their escape; but
Professor Bill was inflexible, and forth up the creek trail they
started. Part of the expedition went in Tom's canoe and the rest,
leaving their horses in Tom's clearing, started forth on foot. The place
of the battle was reached after an hour or so, but little was to be
learned. At the landing, with the exception of trampled ground and a few
pools of blood, nothing could be seen. The bodies of the slain Shawnese
were either buried or consigned to the flood. The neighbourhood was
thoroughly searched, the woods and hills beaten by the scattering
settlers, but Shawnese, living and dead, and even Dick's broken rifle,
had disappeared. Expecting the rising of the settlers they had decamped
in haste. Disappointed in their quest they returned to the Loop.
There they waited the return of the party down stream while they
listened to Hunter Tom's cursory narrative of the battle and the chief
events. He told how they were surprised, but not for what purpose they
had journeyed to that locality; how the pilot fought and slew a couple
of the foe and afterward, rushing into the flood to reach the canoe, was
shot down by an Indian bullet; how Dick, "the giant," as he was
sometimes called by the settlers, towered a head and shoulders o'er the
enemy.
"I'll wager he knocked them down like nine-pins," said Professor Bill
Banks.
"Aye," said the hunter, "he did that; he handled his rifle like a
farmer's flail, and every time he struck he threshed their top-knots
out. Then, when I caught up the lad in yonder and took him back to the
canoe, he cleared a wider circle for himself and leaped like a kangaroo
toward shore."
"And they didn't dare stop him?" asked one.
"Not they? They couldn't. Aye, there were two fellows, one a stout one,
good-sized, that did hedge in to cut him off, but one was shot down and
the other----" The old man allowed his weather-beaten face to relax into
a grim smile of humour as the scene arose before him in mind.
"And the other?"
"Well, the other come too nigh to Mr. Dick's big fist, and he went down
in a heap with the most astonishing look on his countenance that I ever
saw on the face of any one. It makes me smile now when I think of it.
Then Mr. Dick came leaping and pushing through the water. I had pushed
out a little from shore and had my knife ready to cut the rope as soon
as he could reach the canoe, when a hailstorm of bullets skipped across
the water and Dick plunged under and I saw him no more. The rest of the
tale you know."
The narrative was finished, but it was noticed by several that the old
hunter spoke very little of his own achievements in that battle. And yet
they knew that he had not been idle.
"And did Mr. Ande do much fighting?" asked Professor Bill.
"Fighting? Aye, he fought like an old Indian fighter. In all my
experience with Indians, I have come across none who put up a braver
battle than the young lion cub in yonder; aye, and fighting wounded at
that, for he carries a wound in the chest that would have killed an
ordinary man, and a wound in the leg, and another in the arm that would
have made many a stout heart give in, but he fought on until he received
that blow on the head that rendered him unconscious. Brave--very brave."
"And how about yourself, Tom?" asked one of the settlers.
"Oh, I killed a few," said the old hunter, simply.
There was a shout from down the creek trail, and the sound of horses'
hoofs, and proceeding as rapidly as possible over the uncertain trail
the band from down stream entered the clearing.
"What news?" asked Professor Bill, rising from his recumbent position.
"We found the pilot and he's living, but pretty badly hurt. He was
pulled on a raft by the Pegleg pilot, and they put him off at a tavern
further down stream."
A cheer went up from all the assembled settlers, and the wildwood rang
with their voices again and again, and then when silence had come there
were various comments.
"I thought the pilot was too tough to be put out by a single bullet,"
said one.
"I knew that ye couldn't drown an old water dog like him," said another.
"Did they get a doctor," said Professor Bill.
"Yaas," drawled one of the returned expedition, "they got a doctor and
he fixed him up, but he can't be moved yet for some time, but he'll pull
through, he said. We didn't have much time fer to talk with Hugh, for we
uns wanted to see about the tother fellow and the Shawnese. We went all
the way to the mouth of the creek, and there we learned thet five
Indians were seen crossing the river in a canoe some hours before. Now,
I remembers it, some of the fellows at the mouth said they seemed in a
powerful hurry, and passed over the river in the early dawn, and were
making their way toward Michigan."
"And Mr. Dick?" asked the Professor.
"Nawthing was seen of him at all. He must be drowned by this time."
There was a little conference between Professor Bill and the hunter
about moving Ande to Burgtown, but the old man strenuously opposed it,
and Bill acquiesced in his plan of leaving him at the Loop until he
should recover. The setting sun saw all of the expedition trotting
homeward to Burgtown, where the events of the day were gone over again
and again for the benefit of Peter Burke, tavern keeper. In the mind of
that worthy they were tabulated and placed on the same shelf in his
memory as the records of Reverend Burg.