A BUSY TIME FOR CAYUSE.
Little Cayuse did not like the white man’s villages. There was
nothing about them that attracted him in the least. While in
Montegordo, whither he had been sent by the scout, he attached
himself to a seat in the railroad-station, spent the night there, and
watched, the next morning, while a man wearing a red vest got off the
west-bound train.
That red vest captured the boy’s fancy, and he decided that some
time, when the chance offered, he would buy one for himself.
With his doting eyes on the vest, he had gone up to the man wearing
it, and asked:
“You De Bray, mebbyso?”
“Why, yes,” answered the stranger, “that’s my name. Who are you, and
what of it?”
“You take um stage for Sun Dance, huh?”
“The first one I can get. But, say! Look here a minute----”
Cayuse did not stop for anything further. Whirling about, he made
off, tearing up the telegram the scout had given to him to send in
case De Bray did not arrive.
Cayuse, a couple of hours later, was in the Sun Dance stage when De
Bray climbed onto the front seat with Pete and Chick Billings.
During the entire journey, up to the point where the first hold-up
had been planned to occur, Cayuse had kept strictly to himself on the
back seat. But he was all eyes and ears, even if he did not use his
tongue, and among the rocks that hemmed in the stage-trail ahead he
had caught a strange glimmer, as of the sun on steel.
That was his signal to drop out at the rear of the mountain-wagon,
and flicker from sight among the rocks like a scared coyote. But
Cayuse wasn’t scared--he was only curious.
He had seen rifles sparkle in the sun before, and he was pretty sure
he had caught a gleam of gun-barrels.
From a safe place among the rocks he witnessed the first hold-up.
When the stage pulled out, and the outlaws grouped together to take
stock of their spoil, Cayuse saw Lawless--whom he knew by sight--open
the locket and stare at the pictures inside.
Then he overheard Lawless plan to cross the arm of the gulch and
overhaul the stage again. Cayuse, much to his disappointment, was
powerless to warn those in the stage. He was afoot, and the driver of
the stage was going fast toward Sun Dance. The boy might have raced
across the arm of the gulch, but he could not have beaten the mounted
thieves. He followed the thieves, however, picking his cautious way
among the rocks and carefully keeping himself out of sight.
By the time he had reached the scene of the second hold-up, the
fighting was over and the stage was once more bounding along toward
Sun Dance.
Hidden safely only a few yards from where the outlaws had left their
horses, Cayuse saw the white woman, and heard her plead for release
as soon as she had recovered from her swoon. He heard, also, a number
of other things which he considered of more importance.
“We’ll go to Medicine Bluff,” said Lawless to one of his men, “and
make sure whether Lawless is going to get well of his wound, or cash
in.”
This remark puzzled the boy. Captain Lawless was speaking, and yet he
was speaking of another Captain Lawless! What did it mean? He cocked
up his ears to hear something more that would throw some light on the
mystery.
“Ye’ll find him deader’n a smelt,” remarked one of the robbers.
“What’s the use o’ botherin’ with him any longer? Rigged out in his
clothes, ye look enough like him ter be twins. Nobody’ll ever know
the difference between the two o’ ye, an’ if the deed is left at the
black rock, ye kin take over the mine without any one ever bein’ the
wiser.”
“Keno,” said the bogus Captain Lawless; “I’ll try it on.”
Thus a light dawned on Cayuse’s brain. The real Lawless was dead,
or dying, and a counterfeit Lawless had taken his clothes and was
playing the rôle in order to get the Forty Thieves Mine!
Some of Buffalo Bill’s pards might have made post-haste for Sun Dance
with this news, but that wasn’t the little Piute’s way. The outfit of
robbers might go to Medicine Bluff, and they might not. Cayuse would
follow them and make sure just where they did go.
Naturally, they outdistanced him, but when they had vanished, he
continued to follow their trail. Close to Pass Dure Cañon luck
struck across the boy’s path, for he met Hawk, the Cheyenne. Hawk
was trailing a cayuse behind him, and the cayuse was burdened with a
couple of white-tail deer.
After making sure that Hawk was a friend, and willing to do a service
for pay, the Piute made a deal with him. For a ten-dollar gold
piece, which Cayuse extracted from his medicine-bag, the Cheyenne
agreed to carry a message to Buffalo Bill, at Sun Dance, and to lend
Cayuse the led horse.
The two deer were unshipped and hung to the limb of a tree where they
would be safe from coyotes, wolves, and other “varmints.” While the
Cheyenne was taking care of the deer, Cayuse was skinning his piece
of bark from a tree and drawing his diagram.
He proceeded fairly well until he got to the point where he wished to
tell the scout that there were two men posing as Captain Lawless. The
communication of this fact seemed beyond the art of picture-writing;
but the boy attempted it by drawing two figures to represent Lawless,
and placing a pair of mule’s ears over one, to signify that there was
something wrong with that particular figure.
When the Cheyenne and the Piute parted, the Cheyenne had the gold
piece and Cayuse had the led horse. They went in different directions.
It was dusk when Cayuse reached Medicine Bluff, hitched his borrowed
horse in the brush, and went scouting to see what he could find.
His principal discovery was a gully running away from the foot of the
Bluff on its western side. The robbers were coming and going at the
mouth of the gully, and the boy made up his mind that there was a
rendezvous somewhere in the defile.
In order to settle his suspicions, he watched his chance and got into
the gully. The place was thickly grown with bushes, and for an Indian
to dodge enemies in such a chaparral was an easy matter.
About a hundred yards from the mouth of the gully Cayuse found an
overhanging ledge of rock where the outlaws had made their camp.
Three of the outlaws sat in front of the dark opening under the
ledge, talking together in low voices. Captain Lawless--that is,
the counterfeit Captain Lawless--was not one of the three. What had
become of him? Cayuse asked himself; and what had become of the
captive white woman who had been taken from the stage?
At first the boy was tempted to think that the supposed Lawless had
taken the white captive away somewhere; and then, a little later, he
began to think those three robbers might be guarding her, and that
she was under the ledge.
He resolved to find out whether the woman was there, and, in order to
do this, began a risky advance upon the three white men.
The bushes ran almost to the edge of the overhanging rock, and Cayuse
was able to creep through them until he was within a few feet of
the nearest of the three men. In order to pass the men, it would be
necessary to cross a narrow open space. Could he do it? Capture was
probable, and capture, in Cayuse’s case, would mean death. However,
that was not the first time the boy had faced death in what he
believed to be the line of duty.
Flinging himself at full length on the ground, he undulated his way
clear of the bushes, like a crawling snake. The backs of the three
men were toward him.
When he was half-way between the edge of the dusky covert and the
pitchy blackness of the opening under the ledge, one of the men
started and turned around.
Cayuse flattened out and, scarcely breathing, lay like a stone.
The shadows of the gully deceived the man, and he turned away again
without seeing Cayuse.
A minute later the boy was under the ledge and safe in the deep
gloom. On hands and knees he crawled about, groping to find a bound
form. If the white woman was there, he reasoned, she would, no doubt,
be bound and gagged, so that she could not move or speak.
In his blind search, his fingers encountered a form, but the
flesh was cold and lifeless, and the boy recoiled. Dead! Had the
scoundrels, then, slain the white squaw? Cayuse believed so, for
palefaces, like the supposed Lawless and his gang have evil hearts
and are equal to anything.
Grievously disappointed, the boy crawled from under the ledge, and
attempted to pass the white men once more. The luck that had been
with him the first time, however, failed him now. In the midst of
his reckless work, one of the men got up and started to go under the
ledge. As fate would have it, the man stumbled over Cayuse, who was
lying squarely in his path.
“A spy!” yelped the man.
The other two bounded to their feet. Revolvers exploded, and one of
the weapons was Cayuse’s. One of the three men dropped to his knees,
and the Piute, with a flying leap, sprang clear over his head and
dropped into the bushes.
Cayuse did not lift himself erect, but flattened along the ground.
Bullets spattered above him, among the bushes, and, while he listened
to them, the echoes were suddenly taken up by a crashing of the
undergrowth toward the mouth of the gully.
“Whoop-ya! This way, fellers, ter ther scene o’ trouble! Ef them
pizen outlaws hev anythin’ ter do with et, we’ll rout ’em out in
reg’lar Buffler Bill style. Straight up ther gully, Hickok! Ef ye see
er bullet comin’ to’ard ye in ther night, jest dodge, an’ keep on
goin’.”
A quiver of excitement ran pulsing through Cayuse’s body. It was the
voice of Nomad!
The next moment there was a change in the situation. The outlaws were
now resisting attack, and the fight was at close quarters.
Cayuse started up to take a part in the fight, rushed out toward the
scene of the scrimmage, and was grabbed by a quick hand and flung to
the ground. A knee dropped on his chest, and a hand with a knife was
lifted above him.
“Wild Bill!” the boy gasped breathlessly.
“Well, what do you think of that!” exclaimed Wild Bill. “Blamed if it
ain’t Cayuse, and I came within a hair of giving him his send-off!
How do you happen to be right in the thick of this gang o’ thieves,
boy?”