THE INDIAN GIRL.
“Whatever d’ye think Wild Bill wants us fur, Buffler?”
“I haven’t any idea, Nick, but he’ll think we’re a long time getting
to Sun Dance.”
“That paper-tork o’ his had a hard time reachin’ us, an’ we’ve had er
hard time gittin’ through ter Sun Dance--leastways, you an’ Dell hev
had. But we kain’t be so pizen fur from ther camp now.”
“This short cut we’re taking through the hills will bring us into the
cañon above the camp. Dell and Cayuse will come in below. We ought to
get to the place we’re going a good two hours ahead of them.”
The king of scouts, and his old trapper pard, Nick Nomad, were riding
through the rough country on their way to Sun Dance.
It was early morning, and the trapper and his pards had been in the
saddle all night.
A number of things had conspired to delay them in taking the trail in
answer to Wild Bill’s “paper-talk.” Among other things, Crawling Bear
had been slain by hostile Cheyennes, and Hickok’s note had come into
the scout’s hands by another messenger.
Some distance back on the Sun Dance trail, the scout and Nomad had
separated from Dell Dauntless, Buffalo Bill’s girl pard, and the
Piute boy, Little Cayuse, the scout and the trapper to travel “’cross
lots,” and Dell and Cayuse to follow the regular trail.
This would bring Buffalo Bill and Nomad into Sun Dance a little
earlier than if they had kept to the trail, and they were already so
late that they were anxious to save even an hour or two.
The course they took was a rugged one, and they had to climb steep
hills and ridges, and urge their mounts over ground that would have
tried the strongest nerves.
But it was all for Pard Hickok, and no loyal pard ever called on
Buffalo Bill in vain.
The scout, however, was vastly puzzled to account for the business
that had led to the call. In his note, Wild Bill had not written a
word about that.
“Wild Bill must hev tangled up with somethin’ purty fierce,” remarked
Nomad, “or he’d never hev sent in a hurry-up call like thet.”
“It may not be anything that concerns Wild Bill, Nick, but something
that concerns _us_,” the scout returned. “Hickok may not be in
trouble; on the contrary, he may know something we’ve got to know in
order to avoid trouble ourselves.”
“Kerect, Buffler. I hadn’t thort o’ ther thing in thet light afore.
We ain’t neither of us very much in ther habit o’ side-steppin’ when
trouble hits ther pike an’ p’ints fer us. This hyar trouble is er
quare thing, pard; plumb quare. Some o’ the people has trouble all
ther time, an’ all ther people has trouble some o’ the time, but all
ther people kain’t hev trouble all ther time.”
The scout laughed.
“What of it, anyhow, Nick?” he asked.
“Nothin’. I was jest torkin’ ter give my bazoo exercise. No man
knows jest when trouble is goin’ ter hit him. Sometimes he kin see
et a good ways off, like er choo-choo train. He kin hyer ther bell
an’ ther whistle, an’ ef he’s a-walkin’ on ther track, he’s er ijut
ef he don’t step off, an’ let et go by. An’ then, ag’in, trouble
comes on ye around a sharp curve. The despatcher mixes orders,
er somethin’, an’ afore ye know et ye’re tangled up in a head-on
collision. Now, thet’s what I call----”
Nomad was interrupted. As if to illustrate his rambling remarks, the
crack of a rifle was heard in the distance, followed by a shrill
scream.
The two pards, at that moment, were on the crest of a rocky ridge.
Instinctively they stopped their horses and shot their glances in the
direction from which the report and the scream reached them. What
they saw set their pulses to a swifter beat.
Speeding toward them along the foot of the ridge was an Indian girl.
She was mounted on a sorrel cayuse, and the pony was getting over
the ground like a streak. The girl was bending forward, her blanket
flying in the wind behind, and her quirt was dropping on the pony’s
withers with lightninglike rapidity.
She was being pursued by an Indian buck, armed with a rifle. The buck
seemed savagely determined to overtake the girl. He was mounted on a
larger, and evidently a fleeter, horse, for at every stride he came a
shade closer.
“Is thet ther ceremony o’ ther fastest hoss, Buffler?” queried the
startled Nomad. “Ef ther buck ketches ther gal, will she marry him?
Hey?”
“That isn’t the ceremony of the fastest horse, Nick,” answered the
scout. “The buck wouldn’t be shooting at the girl if it was.”
“Mebbyso he was jest shootin’ ter skeer her.”
“It’s not the right way to win a bride--or a Cheyenne bride. As near
as I can make out, those two are Cheyennes.”
“Ther gal’s a Cheyenne, but at this distance I take ther buck fer a
Ponca.”
“I reckon you’re right, Nick. The buck is a Ponca and the girl a
Cheyenne. There’s a good deal of bad blood between the Cheyennes and
the Poncas just now, and we can’t overlook the fact that the under
dog, in this case, is a squaw. We’ll save her.”
“Shore we’ll save her!” averred Nomad. “I knowed ye’d be fer doin’
thet all along. We’re jest fixed right ter slide down this hill and
sashay in between ther two.”
“That Ponca is getting ready to shoot again!” exclaimed Buffalo Bill,
as he started his horse, Bear Paw, down the descent. “The next bullet
may not go as wide as the first, and I reckon we’d better give the
buck something to think about, so he’ll let the girl alone.”
As he charged down the slope, Buffalo Bill pulled his forty-five out
of his belt and shook a load in the Ponca’s direction.
The range was too great for pistol-work, but the scout succeeded in
his design of giving the buck “something to think about.”
The crack of the revolver and the “sing” of the bullet caused the
buck to lower the rifle he had half-raised, and to turn his eyes in
the direction of the white men. The girl also, for the first time,
saw that help was near. She flung up one hand in a mute appeal.
“Don’t ye fret none, gal!” roared Nomad. “We’ll look out fer _you_!”
The girl, apparently taking courage from the shot fired in the buck’s
direction, and from the reassuring tone of Nomad’s voice, slowed down
her pony.
A few moments later the pards reached the foot of the ridge and laid
their horses across the Ponca’s path. The Ponca, without speaking,
tried to go around them. This was the girl’s signal to turn her pony
and circle back until she was under the lee of Bear Paw.
“No, ye don’t, Injun!” cried the trapper, kicking in with his spurred
heels and getting in front of the Ponca at a jump. “Mebbyso ye kin
git eround me, but ye kain’t git eround _this_!” and Nomad leveled a
revolver.
The Indian sat back on his horse and glared angrily at Nomad, at the
scout, and at the girl.
“Me take um squaw,” grunted the Ponca. “Her b’long to Ponca.”
“She’s a Cheyenne,” said the scout. “How can a Cheyenne belong to a
Ponca?”
“Me buy um squaw with ponies,” asserted the Indian. “Me take her from
Cheyenne village, and she make um run. Ugh! Give Big Thunder squaw.”
“You bought this girl of the Cheyennes?” demanded the scout.
“Wuh! Pay um all same so many ponies.”
The Ponca held up five fingers.
Buffalo Bill looked at the girl attentively. He had never seen a
prettier Indian girl. Her features were regular, and her large,
liquid-black eyes gave her countenance almost a Spanish cast. Her
garments were of buckskin, beaded and fringed, and her blanket was
of a subdued color, clean and new. Broad silver bands encircled
her forearms and her shapely wrists, and her hands were small and
delicately formed.
The buck, on the other hand, was a rough-looking specimen of a Ponca.
“Speakin’ free an’ free, as between men an’ feller sports,” observed
Nomad, “I kain’t blame ther gal none fer runnin’ erway.”
“Me know um Pa-c-has-ka,” said Big Thunder calmly. “Him friend of
Poncas, and him got good heart. Him no let squaw get away from Ponca
brave.”
“What is your name?” asked the scout of the girl.
“Wah-coo-tah,” was the answer.
“That’s a Sioux name.”
“Me Cheyenne, no Sioux. Name Wah-coo-tah.”
The girl had a rippling, musical voice, very different from the
usually hard, strident voices of Indian women.
“Very well, Wah-coo-tah,” said the scout, “I’ll take your word for
it. Why was the Ponca chasing you?”
“Me no like um.”
“Did your father sell you to the Ponca?”
“Ai. Me no like um, me run ’way. Him ketch Wah-coo-tah, then
Wah-coo-tah kill herself.”
Here was a knotty point for the scout. Having bought the girl, by the
girl’s own admission, the Ponca certainly had a right to take her for
his squaw. But the scout could not justify himself in his own mind if
he allowed the vicious-looking Ponca to take the fair Cheyenne.
“Where will you go, Wah-coo-tah, if you get away from the Ponca?”
“Me go where me be safe,” she said.
“How much time do you want to get away?”
The girl turned on her pony’s back and pointed to the top of a
distant hill.
“So far,” she answered.
“All right. We’ll hang onto the Ponca until you get there.”
Before the scout could stop her, Wah-coo-tah caught his hand and
pressed it to her lips. Then she turned her pony and galloped off.
Big Thunder sat silently on his horse for a space, his eyes
glittering fiendishly. Suddenly he jerked his rifle to his shoulder.
Nomad, watching him like a cat, struck up the barrel, and the bullet
plunged skyward.
Quick as a catamount the Ponca dropped the weapon and hurled himself
from his horse’s back--not at Nomad, but at Buffalo Bill. He had a
drawn knife in his hand, and, as he landed on the scout’s horse, he
made a venomous, whole-arm stab with it.
But if the Ponca was quick, the scout was a shade quicker. Twisting
about in his saddle, Buffalo Bill clutched the Ponca’s knife-wrist
with his right hand, and, with his left, took a firm grip of the
Ponca’s throat.
A second later and the struggle carried them both to the ground.
Big Thunder was a powerful Indian, and the nude, upper-half of his
wiry body was liberally besmeared with bear’s grease. The grease made
him as slippery as an eel. Nevertheless, the scout knew how to deal
with him.
A crushing pressure at the wrist caused the knife to drop. With the
Ponca practically disarmed, the fight became one of mere wrestling
and fisticuffs.
Big Thunder slipped his oily throat clear of the scout’s fingers, but
the scout’s hand, leaping upward from the throat, took a firm grip of
the scalp-lock. Holding the Ponca’s head to the ground, Buffalo Bill
released his wrist, and got his right hand about the throat in such a
manner that it could not slip; then, kneeling on the ground, he held
the Ponca in that position until he was half-throttled.
“Waugh!” jubilated Nomad. “Jest see how Pard Buffler tames ther red
savage. I’m darned ef et ain’t as good as a show. Goin’ ter strangle
him, Buffler? Better do et. Ef ye don’t, he’ll camp on yore trail
an’, sooner er later, ye’ll hev ter kill him ter prevent his takin’
yer scalp.”
The scout saw that the Indian had been punished enough for his
attack, and suddenly sprang away from him.
“Don’t worry, pard,” sang out Nomad; “I’ve got him kivered.”
For a second or two the Ponca lay on the ground, gasping for breath;
then, as he struggled to his feet, the point of the trapper’s
revolver lifted with him, the trapper’s menacing eye gleaming along
the barrel.
“Easy, thar, Ponk!” warned Nomad; “make er single hosstyle move, an’
ye’ll be er good Injun afore ye kin say Jack Robinson.”
Big Thunder, seeing how he was corralled, grunted savagely, drew
himself to his full height, and folded his arms.
“Injun thought Pa-e-has-ka friend of Poncas!” he exclaimed scathingly.
“I’m the friend of the Poncas, all right, Big Thunder,” answered the
scout, “but the girl did not want to go with you.”
“Ponca buy her, make um go!”
“Not while I’m around. Keep your hands off that girl, understand?”
“Ponca no keep hands off Pa-e-has-ka. Bymby, Pa-e-has-ka’s scalp dry
in Big Thunder’s lodge; Big Thunder make um Cheyenne girl tie um
scalp on hoop, hang um up.”
“Hyer ther pizen red!” snarled the trapper. “Hadn’t I better rattle
this hyar pepper-box o’ mine at ther threatenin’ varmint?”
“No.” The scout looked in the direction taken by the girl. She had
got far beyond the point to which she had drawn his attention, and
had vanished. “I reckon Wah-coo-tah’s all right, Nick. Put up your
gun and we’ll ride on to Sun Dance.”
Unconcernedly, the scout walked to Bear Paw and mounted.
Big Thunder, still erect and with his arms folded, followed the
scout’s movements with eyes of hate.
“Come on, pard,” said the scout, starting for the next “rise.”
“Mebbyso he’ll open up on ye with thet rifle o’ his, Buffler,”
demurred Nomad.
“He’ll not do that,” was Buffalo Bill’s confident reply, as he
spurred on.
Nomad lowered his revolver, but kept his vigilant gaze on the Ponca
as he followed his pard. When they crossed the next hill, the last
they saw of Big Thunder he was still glaring after them.
“Ye’ve made er enemy out o’ thet red, Buffler,” observed the trapper,
pushing his revolver back into its holster.
“I suppose so,” said the scout thoughtfully. “The worst of it is,
Nick, I can’t blame the Indian. According to the laws and customs of
the red man he is in the right. I had no business interfering between
him and Wah-coo-tah.”
“Any white man would hev done et!” asserted the trapper.
“Any white man who had the right kind of a heart,” qualified the
scout.
“Wah-coo-tah ain’t er common Injun squaw.”
“That’s why I helped her.”
“All this hyar,” commented Nomad, “on’y illustrates what I was er
sayin’ erbout trouble. This excitement come around ther curve,
full-tilt, an’ hit us squar’ in ther face. Thar wasn’t no dodgin’ et.”
Half an hour later the pards descended into Sun Dance Cañon, and an
hour’s ride down the cañon brought them to the foot of the slope
leading to the “flat,” and the mining-camp.
“We’re a good two hours ahead o’ Dell an’ Cayuse,” asserted Nomad,
while they were climbing the slope.
“I hope we’re in time for Hickok’s business, whatever it is,”
answered the scout.
Bije Spangler, as usual, was occupying a couple of chairs in front of
the Lucky Strike. The ragged, palm-leaf fan was working slowly, and
he watched the pards approach with a speculative eye. Spangler had no
difficulty in detecting that they were persons of consequence.
“‘Lucky Strike Hotel,’” said the scout, reading from the sign. “Are
you the proprietor?” he went on, dropping his eyes to the huge bulk
of humanity in the two chairs.
“I run this joint,” wheezed Spangler, “but I ain’t high-toned enough
ter call myself a proprietor.”
“Can we stop here?”
“Can if ye got the price.”
“We want a room by ourselves.”
“Only got one private room, an’ that was took by a feller that
vamosed last night without settlin’ up. Reckon ye kin hev that,
seein’ as I don’t know whether the feller’s ever comin’ back er not.
J. Algernon Smith sorter opined he’d like a room by hisself, too, so
I reckon he’d think he had fust claim on the room, on’y he vamosed as
myster’ously as Wild Bill.”
“What’s that?” demanded the scout, pulling himself together with a
jerk, and peering sharply into the flabby face of Spangler. “Was Wild
Bill Hickok staying here?”
“He was.”
“And you say he left last night?”
“Him an’ J. Algernon went away tergether. That was right after supper
last night, an’ neither of ’em has come back yet.”
“How long has Wild Bill been here?”
“He come day before yesterday, on hossback, with er Injun. J.
Algernon come yesterday arternoon, on the Montegordo stage. Both of
’em’s skedaddled. Who might you be, neighbor?”
“Cody’s my name----”
Spangler tried to express his surprise and delight, but only
succeeded in emitting a throaty gurgle; he likewise tried to get up
and grab the scout’s hand, but his sudden flop displaced one of the
chairs, and he slumped to the ground in a quivering heap.
Nomad got behind him and boosted him up.
“This hyar camp must be er healthy place,” remarked Nomad, “ef et
grows many ombrays o’ yore size.”
“It ain’t as healthy as it looks,” said Spangler. “Buffalo Bill, I’m
glad ter meet ye. Ye kin have this hull hotel if ye want it. I’ll
call a man ter take keer o’ yer hosses.”
“I take care of my horse myself,” replied Buffalo Bill. “Show me the
stable, Spangler.”
Spangler waddled to the corner of the house and pointed to a brush
shelter in the rear.
“What d’ye think o’ this, Buffler?” asked the trapper perplexedly, as
he and his pard led their mounts to the stable.
“I don’t know what to think of it _yet_,” answered the scout, with a
troubled frown.
“Wild Bill was hyar, an’ vanished last night.”
“He vanished with a man called J. Algernon Smith. If we’re to believe
Spangler, both Smith and Hickok departed unexpectedly. It looks bad,
on the face of it, but----”
The rear of the stable was open. As the scout looked in, he saw and
recognized Wild Bill’s horse.
“Et’s Wild Bill’s animile, shore enough,” muttered Nomad, following
the scout’s eyes with his own. “Hickok wouldn’t pull out ter go any
great distance without his hoss.”
“It wouldn’t seem so,” the scout answered, leading Bear Paw into an
empty stall.
Removing the saddle, he rubbed Bear Paw down carefully with the
saddle-blanket, then tore off a layer of hay from a bale, and
loosened it out in the manger.
Nomad, deeply thoughtful, had been caring for his own horse in the
same way.
Presently the pards left the stable and walked back to the front of
the hotel.
Spangler was again seated on his chairs, plying the fan. He was
talking with a man in a long linen duster.
“Buffalo Bill,” called Spangler, “shake hands with J. Algernon Smith,
of Chicago. Smith,” went on Spangler, blowing like a porpoise, “this
here is the Buffalo Bill ye read so much about.”
The scout’s eyes instantly engaged the face of J. Algernon Smith.
Smith, after a moment’s hesitation, stretched out his hand.
The scout was an expert in character-reading, and, inasmuch as Smith
was the last man seen with Wild Bill, he gave him keen attention.
“Well!” exclaimed Smith, “you’re the gentleman Wild Bill has been
expecting. He told me about you.”