UNDER THE BRANDING IRON.
"Take that rock off my head," Jesse caught himself mumbling as he
slowly returned to consciousness.
Two factors had served to save the outlaw's life: One that the Indian
behind him had struck him a glancing blow, and the other that Jesse
James' skull was too thick to break by any ordinary means.
But the blow had been a terrific one and the outlaw's head throbbed
like a locomotive under full headway.
He emitted a subdued groan and tried to move. To his surprise he found
he could not.
He was now conscious of shooting pains through his whole body. His arms
were stretched above his head, and when he sought to draw them down by
his side, he found he could not move them.
Jesse cautiously tried to move his feet, but like the arms, these also
refused to respond to his will.
"That's queer," he thought. "I wonder if I'm dead."
He tried to recall the incidents that had preceded his present
condition, but his mind was sluggish and just as he would almost come
upon a solution of his strange condition, memory would elude him again.
He tried to open his eyes, but the eyelids seemed held down by some
irresistible weight.
For a time the desperado sought to gratify the sensation of drowsiness
that seemed to steal over him. Then he would suddenly awake with a
start, the pain in his body more intense than before.
At last with a mighty effort of will he dragged his heavy eyelids open.
At first he could see nothing for the darkness, then little by little
he made out his surroundings.
He was in an Indian tepee.
"How did I get here?" he wondered.
He tried and tried to think.
Suddenly memory returned like a blow.
He remembered it all. The desperate battle on the ground--the club that
finally had laid him low. But beyond that all was dark.
For a moment he could not make up his mind whether it was night or day,
but glancing up he noted that the flap that covered the entrance to the
wigwam showed a tiny ray of light through a fine slit that its owner
had made for secret observations when within. Jesse wished he might be
able to pull himself together sufficiently to get up and peek out.
But the effort to raise only gave him pain.
He sensed that his holsters were still at his sides and by their weight
against his leg he judged that his guns must be in their places.
The thought gave him comfort. The outlaw's guns had become as much a
part of himself as were his hands or his feet.
As his mind by slow process began to clear, he set about finding out
why it was that he could not move--whether he had been seriously
wounded or what mysterious force was holding him down.
The discovery came as a distinct shock and roused all the rage that his
savage nature was capable of.
He was bound hand and foot.
Jesse's inclination was to give voice to his passions--to hurl
invective at his unseen captors, to taunt them, to goad them, but not
to plead. Jesse James had pleaded with no man in his eventful life. It
was not in his nature to do so, nor would he begin now.
Yet he did not quite understand what manner of torture they had
inflicted upon him to put him in such pain. But it was a matter of only
a moment or so before he was made acquainted with his exact situation.
The great desperado had been subjected to the humiliation of being
bound hand and foot. And more than that, his manacled hands had been
triced up to a stake protruding from the ground some eighteen inches,
and the feet had been treated similarly. His position was such that the
weight of his body was a constant strain upon the thongs that bound
him, a strain that extended through his entire body.
Jesse swore a terrible oath.
"I hope I killed the cursed savage," he gritted.
But his fond hopes were dashed almost at the moment of the utterance of
them.
The flap was slowly pulled aside and an evil, ghastly face peered in--a
face so torn and mutilated that Jesse observed nothing familiar in it.
He stared at it without speaking.
All at once he noticed that an ear was missing from the place where it
should have been.
Then Jesse understood.
The face was that of his late antagonist, Great Bear.
The desperado laughed mockingly.
Great Bear jerked aside the flap so viciously that he tore it from its
fastenings, allowing it to drop slowly from his lingering grasp as he
surveyed his captive with malignant eyes.
"Welcome to our home, old scarred-face," jeered Jesse.
Great Bear made no reply, standing with head erect, searching keenly
for some sign of fear or weakening in the face of his captive.
After a time, the redskin squatted on the turf and with chin in hands
sat holding the outlaw with a steady gaze. For an hour he sat thus,
Jesse glaring back at him with menacing, challenging eyes.
"Ugh! Paleface brave man," he grunted.
"Ugh! Big Chief a dirty cutthroat," retorted Jesse.
"Huh!" said Great Bear.
"I can lick you with one arm tied behind my back, old pizen snake,"
leered the desperado. "Let me up and I'll show you."
Great Bear rose, and stepping to the door gave a terse, guttural
command to some one without. Returning to the wigwam, he squatted down
at the great bandit's feet again and resumed his intent gaze into the
other's face.
"Well," questioned Jesse, "Am I so purty that you can't keep your eyes
off'n me? Think you'll know me when you see me again? I'd know you
among a million with that face. I certainly did lam it to you, didn't
I? I ought to have killed you when I had the chance up the tree there,
but I hated to take an unfair advantage, even of such an old murderer
as you are."
While the outlaw was now suffering terrible tortures from his strained
position, he gave no sign to the waiting Indian chief.
A silent-footed savage appeared in the doorway, placing before the
chief an earthen jar from which a thin curl of smoke ascended.
But even then Jesse did not catch the full significance of the chief's
intentions.
From the receptacle the Indian removed a short iron rod. It's end was
at white heat.
Great Bear moistened a finger at his lips and touched it. The rod
hissed angrily.
Jesse understood now.
It was a branding iron. But still he did not quail, though his passions
rose in a perfect storm.
"Paleface like um?" grinned Great Bear once more causing the hot iron
to hiss.
"Never ate any," retorted the desperado with a grin that was even more
expansive than that of the chief. "Going to brand some stock that you
have stolen, eh?"
"Huh! Indian no brand cows. Um brand men. Um burn you."
"Oh, so that's the game is it? You're going to brand me like you would
a critter on the range? Well, what do you think my men will do to you
if I don't get away from here before you do it? Think they will do
anything to you, you black-hearted cur?"
"Paleface no hurt Indian. Paleface all dead."
"That's a lie. One of them is here now watching you. He'll carry the
word to the men and if there is not enough of them left he'll go to the
fort for help. Guess the soldiers wouldn't do much to you."
Great Bear cast a glance that was almost apprehensive, out through the
opening. With an expression that was half snarl, half grunt he drew the
branding iron from the pot and squatted down beside the great outlaw,
leering down into his face, gloating over the joy that was to be his.
Roughly he tore apart his prisoner's shirt and drove the blunt, white
hot iron against his chest.
The iron hissed again. But this time a little thin line of blue smoke
curled upward.
Great Bear inhaled a deep breath of heavenly satisfaction as the odour
of burning flesh permeated his nostrils.
Jesse steeling himself, glared back at his tormentor. He gave no sign
that he sensed the excruciating torture. But the lines of his mouth
drew tense and hard.
The redskin replaced the iron in its heating pot and sat gloating over
his victim as it burned again to a white heat.
Next he bared the left side of the outlaw and carefully selected his
spot with the eyes of an expert, he applied the torture rod, holding it
in place with steady, resistless pressure.
The agony that the victim suffered was almost more than human being
could endure.
But still the man of iron there at the stake made no outcry, gave no
sign, still smiling up at his tormentor. But the eyes were not in
sympathy with the smile on the lips. They were cold and steely--they
were the eyes of the gun-expert at the moment when he is about to take
the life of a human being.
"Great Bear," began Jesse in an even, emotionless voice. "I shall be
going away from here pretty soon. You will be dead then. I shall kill
you. But before I go I am going to cut out your tongue and feed it to
the dogs. Then I shall cut off your other ear and give it to the first
drove of hogs that I meet. You'll be up in the Happy Hunting grounds
then and you can't help yourself."
Once more the fiendish redskin tuned his branding iron to a sizzling
white heat.
Great Bear felt the outlaw's cheek apparently with the intention of
applying the iron there next. But for some reason, he evidently changed
his mind. Carefully slitting the shoulders of Jesse's shirt, he burned
a deep, livid impression on each, holding the iron for what, to the
tortured bandit, seemed ages.
The great desperado was faint and dizzy, and tepee and savage danced
before his eyes in a most outlandish fashion. Jesse wondered vaguely
if all had gone suddenly crazy. But he had borne the ordeal without so
much as a groan.
Great Bear scrutinized the outlaw's face keenly, and what he saw filled
his soul with savage glee.
The Indian grunted a long-drawn grunt of satisfaction and laid aside
his instrument of torture.
"Injun come again," he informed as Jesse opened his eyes once more.
"Come tomorrow sun up. Take eyes out. Jesse Jame no fool Injun this
time. No fool sojer. Byemby Jesse Jame Indian kill um. Injun get heap
money for kill um Jesse Jame. Sojers no get um paleface. No get um
money. Huh!"
"Jesse James will beat you yet," gasped the desperado weakly, mastering
his faintness by a supreme effort. "He'll kill you!"
"Ugh!" breathed the savage, picking up his fire pot and departing from
the wigwam without another word, nor once looking back at his miserable
victim.
His fiendish torture had only just begun, and the anticipation in the
mind of the savage was the keenest of all his inhuman emotions. He
could afford to wait and he would yet see his victim writhe in agony
and scream out as the awful pain was inflicted upon him.
Jesse emitted a long-drawn pent up sigh of relief, and a slight moan of
agony escaped him as he closed his eyes wearily.
Great Bear had been gone but a moment when an Indian whom Jesse had
never seen before, stalked in and made a careful examination of the
tortured captive and his wounds.
From the savage's actions Jesse judged that he must be a medicine man.
The outlaw grinned sardonically.
"Want to find out how much more I can stand, eh?" he jeered. "I'll take
all you blood-thirsty devils can give me, don't you forget that."
His suspicions were confirmed when shortly after the medicine man had
departed, three other Indians accompanied by Great Bear entered the
wigwam, the chief giving them some terse directions in his own tongue
that Jesse could not understand.
He did, however, understand the purport of it when the thongs that
bound him to the stake, were severed by the strike of a keen-edged
knife.
The desperado was roughly turned over on his face, and while two
stalwart savages sat on him to hold him down, his arms were brought
down to their normal position, then securely tied behind his back.
It was not much to be thankful for, but the change brought to Jesse the
most heavenly sensation he ever had known.
His inclination was to draw a deep, long breath, but he resisted and
shut his lips tight.
He would not give them that satisfaction.
The thongs that held his feet were now made doubly secure, so that in
reality he was more helpless than before. But he was not inclined to
complain, though the desperado never had been in such sore straits
before.
His tormentors left him.
Jesse had been left lying on his face, the Indians not taking the
trouble to turn him over. But after satisfying himself that he was
alone, the outlaw cautiously rolled over on his back and rested for a
few minutes. But his new position enabled him to see out through the
opening, only the upper part of the flap having been put back in place
by the savages when they left him.
He discovered that two stolid Indians had been left on guard. They
were squatting on the ground in front of the wigwam. And now the
desperado's mind began to work like a piece of well-oiled machinery,
planning an escape. But just how he expected to accomplish this, was
not clear to himself. Yet to his resourceful mind, no situation was
impossible. Therefore the outlaw took cheer and set about the task in
hand, regardless of the stinging pain from his burns, that he was now
beginning to sense more keenly.
The desperado pricked up his ears at the sound of voices outside. He
recognized the tones of Dew Drop, the Indian maiden. She was speaking
loudly in her broken English, and Jesse understood instantly that she
intended he should hear what she was saying.
Somewhere within her words there lay a message for him.
Dew Drop had launched into a perfect tirade of invective against the
helpless desperado there in the wigwam, and with straining ears he
listened for the words that would give him a clue to her motives. He
observed too, that the shadows of night were falling. Between these two
incidents the desperado believed there was a connection that augured
well for his plans.
Once during her conversation with the Indians, he caught the words,
"fire-water." Then Dew Drop's voice was heard no more, and he
understood that she had gone away.
His heart sank. Perhaps he was wrong in his surmise, after all.
But Jesse's spirits revived a moment later when he heard her returning.
He was at a loss at first to account for her movements. That something
of interest to himself was occurring, Jesse was firmly convinced. But
wriggle about as he would, he could not get a glimpse of the group
outside.
However, the desperado's curiosity was soon rewarded.
"Firewater. That's it," he exclaimed. "By the great humping snakes.
Sure as I am alive, the little savage is filling them up. I wonder what
she's got up her sleeve now? If I only was able to get hold of my guns.
I'd help her clean 'em out."
The sky was heavily overcast and black night had settled down over the
scene, when finally labored breathing and guttural snores from without
told the desperado that little Dew Drop's medicine had done its work
well. Heap big Injun had gone to the happy hunting ground of dreamland.
But the bandit's thoughts were suddenly interrupted by a voice beside
him.
"Jesse Jame," breathed the soft, purring voice of the Indian maid.
"Right you are, my little Dew Drop--"
"S-h-h-h!" cautioned the girl laying a soft, warm palm over his lips.
The sensation was peculiarly pleasant to the great bandit.
"Me cut um lariats. Um Jesse Jame go back by paleface brothers--"
"Where are they?" interrupted Jesse. "Do you know where they are now?"
"Dew Drop know. Dew Drop um know too bad chief kill um Jesse Jame
morning."
"Hurry, little one," he begged, "let me get my guns. I must get out of
here now."
He heard the girl utter a little startled exclamation as if she had
been suddenly surprised by some one from without, then she sped away as
silently as she had come, much to Jesse's surprise.
"Well, that gets me."
He could not understand her peculiar actions.
At least the desperado did not propose to remain quiescent when the way
to freedom had been laid open to him. Dew Drop too, must have ere this,
told the members of his band of his predicament, but by the time they
were able to reach him, it might and probably would be too late.
Seconds were precious.
"I'd be a fool to stay here any longer," muttered Jesse. "The kid
fluttered away like a frightened bird. Guess I'll go to."
Going, for the great desperado, however, was a far different matter. He
could not walk nor could he crawl, and there seemed only one way left
open to him, and this he adopted. He rolled.
It was not a dignified exit that he made from the wigwam, but it was
better than being bound and guarded there with the prospect of further
tortures in the morning.
He found his first difficulty was in getting out of the wigwam without
pulling it down about him. This might attract attention and defeat his
plan of escape. But Jesse finally accomplished it by going out head
first, wriggling along like a clumsy snake on a frosty morning. His
burns tortured him excruciatingly, but the great desperado shut his
teeth together savagely and began to roll.
His two Indian guards lay directly in his path. Jesse with some
misgivings and a greater effort, rolled over them as the quickest way
to get on.
The Indians grunted but did not wake up, which he was positive would be
the case in their condition. But the feel of their bodies against his
had stirred the blood lust within him and suggested a new idea to the
great desperado.
"If my hands only were free," he growled. "Ah, I have it. I'll try it,"
he gritted, with blazing eyes.
Quickly the outlaw rolled back to them. Now he was bent on a terrible
revenge. And he forgot for the moment his own deadly peril in his
ferocious desire to be revenged on Great Bear.
With as much speed as his manacled condition would permit, the great
outlaw worked his head along the body of the Indian nearest to him.
Not finding what he sought at first, he braced his feet with great
difficulty and putting forth an almost superhuman effort, pushed and
pushed against the redskin with his head, until the savage had been
rolled over. The deed, however, had required a supreme effort.
The Indian squirmed and muttered surlily, but to the desperado's
intense relief, did not awake.
Jesse searched at the side he had just turned up, and with a savage
exclamation of delight, bit hard at the Indian's waist.
The desperado's face came away with the redskin's bowie between his
teeth.
The outlaw could have shouted, so great was his joy. After laborious
effort he succeeded in setting the keen-edged blade more firmly between
his teeth, so that only the hilt was held by them.
Cautiously he squirmed and wriggled until his head and shoulders were
over the body of the redskin whom he had again rolled over on his back.
The great desperado, still holding the knife in a vice-like grip
between his teeth, twisted his head at right angles to his body and set
the needle-like point of the blade, on the Indian's abdomen.
The cruel blood-thirstiness of what he was about to do made no
impression on him, for Jesse was bent on a terrible vengeance. And it
was a moment of supreme ecstasy for the bandit-chieftain, bound and
manacled and helpless as he was.
Suddenly throwing the weight of his body on his toes and neck, the
deadly bowie, by the sheer force of the outlaw's own weight, was driven
into the Indian's bowels while the blood in a sudden red sheet, spurted
into his mouth and eyes.
The redskin sprang almost clear of the ground, then settled back with
a heavy groan, his stupor too heavy to resist the work of the vengeful
blade.
With a fiendish light in his eyes the desperado gloated over the death
throes of the unconscious savage, whose writhings, whose agonized
twistings and muscular contractions, sent the outlaw into an ecstasy of
delirious joy.
After a little, the Indian stiffened out and lay still.
"One!" snarled the desperado.
Once more the avenging outlaw crawled laboriously to his victim. And
that despite the fact that every moment's delay placed his own life
more and more in jeopardy.
Now came the most difficult part of his task. The bowie, driven in to
its keen-edged limit, was tightly wedged in the body of the dead savage.
With feverish haste, the world's greatest desperado again buried his
face in the awful pool of blood.
His teeth closed over the slippery hilt of the blade.
But it stubbornly resisted all his efforts.
The knife was too firmly embedded in its human sheath, to come away at
his command.
The cords of the outlaw's neck swelled to enormous proportions from the
fearful strain he was subjecting them to.
He sought to accomplish his ends, in another way. Biting the hilt as if
he would sever it in twain, Jesse pushed against it with all the weight
of his body. The keen edge, under his irresistable pressure, cut its
way into the Indian's flesh at right angles to his body, thus widening
the wound and making its sheath less binding.
Back and forth did the blood-thirsty outlaw work the blade.
He pushed and he pulled like a dog wrestling with a bone. He shook it
like a rat. Then he gave it a long, vicious tug.
The bloody blade came away with a sickening sound.
And the desperado fell backward with a terrible curse. Yet, withal, his
grip on the bloody hilt did not relax.
Now came the most arduous task of all, that of crawling over the body
of his victim and rolling to the remaining savage, without losing the
knife from his teeth. The feat was not so easy as it would seem, and he
could accomplish it only by keeping his head from touching the ground
over every inch of the way.
He struggled desperately.
Minutes elapsed.
But the second redskin died more speedily than had the first, Jesse
having given him a terrible thrust with the deadly blade. And with
eager, fascinated eyes he watched the death agonies of his victim. In a
moment all movement ceased. The man was dead.
Jesse's work of vengeance, for the time, was ended. And now to roll for
safety, if that were possible. Should he be caught, he knew that this
time his punishment would be swift and sure. Great Bear would take no
chances with him after this.
But just as the outlaw was about to start on his unequal journey, he
suddenly espied the figure of an Indian standing a few paces away, in
the gloom, gazing intently in his direction.
The desperado fairly held his breath. He wished now that he had
brought away the bowie from his second victim. But it was too late to
rectify his mistake.
Still, defenceless as he was, the great bandit devoutly hoped the
savage redskin would throw himself upon him. Jesse believed that, with
a well directed kick he could silence the fellow and put an end to him
afterwards, for his thirst for blood had not yet been satisfied.
Though it would be a desperate chance he was willing and anxious to
take it. But he was not given a chance to put his foolhardy plan into
operation. The redskin emitted a sudden grunt, and dropping into a long
lope, sped noiselessly toward the main part of the village, that lay
some twenty rods to the west.
Jesse was off like a flash.
His one supreme object now was to put as much distance as possible
between himself and his savage enemies.
But the laborious rolling process was too slow for him.
He had rolled himself clear of the bodies of his victims, when all at
once, acting upon sudden impulse, he adopted a new and unique method of
facilitating his progress. With a tremendous effort he raised himself
on his manacled feet.
Despite the fact that his hands were tied behind him, the desperate man
threw himself head first to the ground. None but the toughest skull
could have survived the impact when his head struck the hard ground.
Jesse's object was now obvious.
The instant he sensed the feel of the ground under his head, by a
sudden twist of the body, using his head as a pivot, the desperado
threw himself to his feet again, thus finishing as pretty a head spring
as ever a trained performer in a circus had done.
With movements so lightning-like that the eye, in the uncertain light,
would scarcely have been able to follow them, the great bandit hurled
himself into a mad whirl of somersaults that carried him away from the
scene of his recent exploits almost as fast as his legs could have done
had they been free.
He heard a loud commotion in the Indian village behind him. But whether
the savages had learned of the death of the two men or that they simply
had been told by the Indian who came upon him so suddenly, that the
sentinels were asleep, he neither knew nor cared.
Jesse reasoned shrewdly that in any event the Indians would be delayed
a few moments in their surprise at finding their companions murdered,
and then the search for him in the wigwam and its immediate vicinity
following, all of which would give him a fair start.
Still he knew his trail was as plainly marked as if it had been made
by a log-rolling gang, a trail which they would have no difficulty in
following at top speed. Therefore haste was all imperative if he hoped
to keep his scalp fitted in its proper place. And the world's greatest
bandit was not ready to part with that portion of his anatomy just yet.
On dashed the desperado, his movements resembling the evolutions of a
cart wheel down a mountain road. And so rapid was his flight that he
was unable to take note of either direction or location.
The savages were now hot on his trail.
He could hear their shouts as they discovered it. Like the bay of the
hounds when close upon their prey they came rushing down upon him.
Jesse redoubled his efforts. Bending every nerve to the tremendous task
before him, the terrible outlaw sprang far up into the air to increase
the reach of his next leap.
He stiffened his nerves to meet the impact when his feet should next
touch the ground.
But to his intense surprise, the feet did not touch at all. They were
kicking wildly in empty space.
All at once the great desperado realized that he was falling through
space.
Like a rock, hurled with terrific force, he had thrown himself over a
sheer precipice whose rocky bottom lay two hundred feet below him.