Two days Silvia had passed in the ranger’s home. Two days the ranger
had spent in fruitless search of her father among the wilds of the
Black Hills. But the kind-hearted man had every reason to believe that
he would yet find him, and encouraged the maiden’s impatient spirits by
the tenderest words of hope.
With his eagle he had left the cavern in the morning, and after a hard
day’s ride returned at night.
The third day Rainbolt set out upon his mission, in which he had begun
to feel a strange interest.
It was toward noon, that, while ascending a steep hill, he came
suddenly face to face with a strange-looking individual who had come
from the other side of the ridge.
The stranger stopped directly in front of the ranger as if he were
going to dispute his passage. Rainbolt drew rein and scanned the fellow
from head to foot.
He was tall, standing fully six feet in his moccasins, with an ungainly
form, and eyes whose color could not be defined in the shadow of their
scraggy, beetling brows. The complexion of his face was a dirty sallow,
though it was almost hidden beneath its growth of grizzly gray whiskers
that reached to the man’s waist.
Altogether he was a wretched specimen of humanity, and Rainbolt could
not suppress a smile as he took in his doleful figure.
The strange creature carried a huge knotted club, with which he menaced
the ranger.
“What is your name?” asked the fierce-looking man, abruptly.
“My name is Rodger Rainbolt--who are you?”
“Solomon Strange, my lord,” the man replied, boastfully. “I am just
from ‘Merry England’ across the water, the water.”
“A foreigner,” replied the ranger; “and what brings you here, Mr.
Strange?”
“Ho! ho! ho! my lord,” he laughed, with an imbecile leer; “a love for
the chase brings me here. In Merry England across the water, I was
game-keeper to Oliver Cromwell. Do you know you look so much like my
lord Oliver, that I can’t help calling you my lord? Surely, you are
some relation to him, to him, my lord.”
“None at all,” replied the ranger, much amused; “but you are an aged
man to have lived in Cromwell’s time.”
“So I am, so I am, my lord; but the swiftest that ever came from the
land of the Orient--the swiftest of all save your half-brother the
Lightning’s bolt.”
“Crazy,” muttered the scout, to himself, “crazy as a loon.” Then he
said aloud:
“You are a wonderful man, Solomon Strange.”
“So I am, so I am, my lord Oliver--Thunderbolt, I mean; and I can read
the past and future to you, my lord, like an open book, an open book.”
“Then perhaps you can tell me where those are I seek?” said the ranger,
humoring his crazy whims.
“_Those_ are I seek,” the man repeated; “yes, yes, yes; there are five
of them, but you need not hunt, my lord. One of them lies dead and
buried where you last saw him, and the others are scattered through the
mountains.”
The ranger would have been surprised had he known how truthfully the
man had spoken, whether gifted with the power of second sight or not.
Solomon Strange was silent for a moment, then he continued:
“I see you doubt my words, my lord, for you do not know whether I speak
the truth or not; but, try me--ask me other questions--such as you will
know whether I answer truthfully, truthfully, my lord.”
“Then tell me for what I seek those persons, or something touching my
past.”
“I can tell you something of both, of both, my lord,” said the man,
closing his sunken eyes and grasping the knotted staff in both hands.
“In the first question I see a beautiful girl, with golden ringlets
and soft blue eyes. Ay, do I not, my lord, do I not?”
The ranger started with surprise. Before he could speak, Strange
continued:
“Yes, yes, it is so, my lord; I see the answer upon your flushed face;
and now your past, your past, my lord. Ay, it is gloomy, gloomy. I see
trouble and sorrow in the ‘crow’s feet’ about your eyes, your eyes, do
I not?”
“Never mind; go on, go on,” replied the ranger, with a strange
curiosity.
Strange continued:
“Yes, trouble and sorrow in the crow’s feet, and what beyond? Ay, a
group of men, a military tribunal, a cashiered captain, and who is
that wending his way through the hills, the hills? Now, now I see, my
lord; it is the captain, the cashiered captain; and now, what do I see,
see emerge from the woods and seize the captain. Ay, it’s a legion of
dusky fiends, fiends, and then, oh, then, what beyond that, my lord? A
canoe, a canoe drifting, drifting down a wild mountain stream, and in
it lies the cashiered captain bound hand and foot, and the canoe with
the captain is drifting, drifting toward what? Ay, toward _death_--the
falls, the falls--Oh, God! he has gone over, and all beyond is black,
black as----”
The man’s words were here cut short by a bullet whizzing in close
proximity to his head, closely followed by the report of a rifle.
Throwing up his hands, he exclaimed:
“Away, Rainbolt! away! the fiends, the fiends are after you again. Save
yourself for the girl’s sake!” and turning, the man glided away into
the forest.
At this instant, Echo, the eagle, appeared over his master’s head,
and uttered a wild scream which the ranger knew to be his signal of
approaching danger, and speaking to his animal, he dashed away down the
stony hill with a score of mounted Cheyennes thundering after him.
The ranger shaped his course back toward his hidden home, for the
language of the madman, Solomon Strange, had so fearfully impressed his
mind that he could not pursue the search for Silvia’s father until he
had had time for reflection.
After an hour’s hard riding he entered a level, wooded valley, through
which wound the waters of Lodge Pole creek.
He now reined his noble animal to a walk, inasmuch as he had distanced
his pursuers, but, suddenly, his eagle again came swooping down with
the warning cry of danger, and again he rode on at the top of his
animal’s speed.
He had gone thus some two miles, when he suddenly dashed from the thick
timbers into an open plain, and what was his surprise to find himself
in the outskirt of an Indian village.
It required but a single glance to see that the Indians were Cheyennes,
and great was his surprise to see Black Bear among them.
The ranger’s situation was precarious. He could not turn back without
running into the power of those he was fleeing from; nor could he turn
to the right nor the left on account of the, almost, perpendicular
hills on one side and the creek on the other. So there was no
alternative but to ride directly through the heart of the village, and
drawing his saber and giving his animal the reins, he dashed on.
He was half-way through the village ere the savages discovered the
daring ranger in their midst, and was gone like the wind, before they
had recovered sufficiently to pursue.