FOR nearly a month Jack Telfair, with black Cato at his heels, had
been riding northward through a country recently reclaimed from the
wilderness and reduced to civilization. Day after day he passed over
broad well-beaten roads from village to village and from farmstead to
farmstead, where clucking hens and lowing cattle had taken the place
of Indian, bear, and wildcat. Between, he rode through long stretches
of wilderness, where the settlements lay farther and farther apart and
the ill-kept way grew more and more rugged and silver-frosted boulders
glistened underfoot in the dawn.
The route lay wholly west of the Alleghenies and the travellers had
to climb no such mighty barrier as that which stretched between the
Atlantic and the west. But the land steadily rose, and day by day the
sunset burned across increasing hills. The two passed Nashville--a
thriving town growing like a weed--and came at last to the Kentucky
border and the crest of the watershed between the Cumberland and the
Green river. Here, cutting across the headwaters of a deep, narrow
creek, ice cold and crystal clear, filled with the dusky shadows of
darting trout, they stumbled into the deep-cut trail travelled for
centuries by Indian warriors bound south from beyond the Ohio to wage
war on tribes living along the Atlantic and the Gulf. This trail was
nearly a thousand miles long; one branch started from the mouth of the
Mississippi and the other from the Virginia seaboard, and the two met
in southern Kentucky, crossed the Ohio, and followed the Miami toward
the western end of Lake Erie. Jack had only to follow it to reach his
destination.
Like all Indian pathways, the trail clung to the highest ground,
following the route that was driest in rain, clearest of snow in
winter and of brush and leaves in summer, and least subject to forest
fires. Much of it was originally lined out by buffalo, which found
the way of least resistance as instinctively as the red men, but long
stretches of it had been made by the Indians alone. The buffalo trail
was broad and deep and was worn five or six feet into the soil; the
Indian trail was in few places more than a foot deep and was so narrow
that it was impossible to see more than a rod along it. No one could
traverse it without breaking the twigs and branches of the dense bushes
that overhung it on either side, leaving a record that to the keen
eye of the savage and of the woodsman was eloquent to the number who
had passed and the time of their passage. No one who once travelled
its vistaless stretches could fail to understand the ease with which
ambushes and surprises could be effected.
Though the trail clung to high ground the exigencies of destination
compelled it in places to go down into the valleys. It had to descend
to cross the Kentucky river and to descend again into the valley of
the Licking as it approached the Ohio at Cincinnati. In such places
it had often been overflowed and obliterated and its route was far
less definite. However, this no longer mattered, for in all such parts
it had long been incorporated into the white man’s road. Much of it,
however, still endured and was to endure for more than a hundred years.
Beyond the Ohio it climbed once more and followed the crest of the
divide between Great and Little Miami rivers to Dayton, Piqua, and
Wapakoneta.
Thirty years before men had fought their way over every inch of that
trail, dying by scores along it from the arrow, the tomahawk, and the
bullet. But that had been thirty years before. For twenty years the
trail had been safe as far as the Ohio; for ten it had been measurably
safe halfway up the state, to the edge of the Indian country.
Throughout the journey Jack tried hard to be mournful. Every dawn as
he opened his eyes on a world new created, vivid, baptized with the
consecration of the dew, he reminded himself that life could hold no
happiness for him--since Sally Habersham had given her hand to another.
Every noontide as he saw the fields swelling with the growing grain,
the apples shaping themselves out of the air, the vagrant butterflies
seeking their painted mates above the deep, moist, clover-carpeted
meadows, he told himself that for him alone all the vast processes of
nature had ceased. Every evening, when the landscape smouldered in the
setting sun, when the red lights burned across the tips of the waving
grasses, when the burnished pines pointed aspiringly higher, when the
rushing rapids on the chance streams glittered in sparkling points of
multi-colored fire, he assured himself that to himself there remained
only the hard, straight path of duty.
Yet, in spite of himself, the edge of his grief grew slowly but surely
dull. The bourgeoning forests, the swelling mountains, the vast
stretches of solitude were all so many veils stretched between him and
the past. His love for Sally Habersham did not lessen, perhaps, but
it became unreal, like the memory of a dear, dead dream that held no
bitterness. It was hard to brood on the life of gallant and lady, of
silver and damask, of polished floors and stately minuets, when his
every waking minute had to be spent in meeting the intensely practical
problems that beset the pioneers. It was hard to assure himself that he
would live and die virgin and that his house should die with him, when,
as often as not, he dropped off to sleep in the same house, if not the
same room, with a dozen or more sturdy boys and girls that were being
raised by one of those same pioneers and his no less vigorous wife.
Besides, Cato would not let him brood. Cato had feminine problems of
his own which he insisted on submitting to his master’s judgment. When
rebuffed, he preserved an injured silence till he judged that Jack’s
mood had softened and then returned blandly to the charge. Very early
on the trip Jack gave up in despair all attempts to check his menial’s
tongue; he realized that nothing short of death would do this, and he
could not afford to murder his only companion, though he often felt as
if he would like to do it.
“There ain’t no use a-talkin’, Marse Jack,” Cato observed one day. “The
onliest way to git along with a woman is to keep her a-guessin’. Jes’
so long as she don’ know whar you is or what you’s a-thinkin’, you’s
all right. But the minute she finds out whar you is, then whar is you?
Dat’s what I ax you, Marse Jack?”
Jack shook his head abstractedly. “I’m sure I don’t know, Cato,” he
said. “Where are you?”
“You ain’ nowhar, that’s what you is. Dar was Colonel Jackson’s gal
Sue. Mumumph! Couldn’t dat gal make de beatenest waffles! An’
didn’t she make ’em foh me for most fo’ months till I done ax her to
marry me! An’ didn’t she stop makin’ ’em right spang off? An’ didn’t
she keep on stoppin’ till I tuk up with Sophy? An’ then didn’t she
begin again? Yes, suh; it’s jes’ like I’m tellin’ you. Jes’ as long
as a woman thinks she’s got you, you ain’t nobody; and the minute she
thinks some other gal’s got you, then you’s everything. Talk to me
about love! Gals don’t know what love is. All they wants is to spite
the other gals.”
“Well! How did you make out, Cato. Did you fix on Sue or Sophy?”
“Now, Marse Jack, you know I ain’t a-goin’ to throw myself away on none
of them black nigger gals. I’se too light complected to do that, suh.
Besides, Sue and Sophy done disappointed me. They pointedly did, suh.
Jes’ as I was a-makin’ up my mind to marry Mandy--Mandy is dat yaller
gal of Major Habersham’s; I done met her when you was co’ting Miss
Sally--Sue and Sophy got together and went to Massa Telfair and tole
him about it and Massa Telfair say I done got to marry one of them two
inside a week, an’ if you hadn’t done start off so sudden I reckon’s
I’d a been married and done foh befo’ now, suh. Massa Telfair’s plumb
sot in his ways, suh.”
Jack was tired of the talk. “Oh! Well! I reckon Mandy’ll be waiting for
you when you get back,” he answered, idly.
Cato smiled broadly. “Ain’t dat de trufe?” he chuckled, delightedly. “I
ain’t ax Mandy yit, but she ’spec’s me to. I tell you, Marse Jack, you
got to keep ’em guessin’, yes, you is, suh. Jes’ as long as you does
you got ’em.”
Cato rung the changes on his tale with infinite variations. Jack
heard about Sue and Sophonia and Mandy from Alabama to Ohio, from the
Tallapoosa to the Miami. It was only when he reached Dayton that the
loves of his henchman were pushed into the background by more urgent
affairs.
Dayton was alive with the war fever. Governor Hull, of Michigan, who
had been appointed a brigadier general, had started north from there
nearly a month before with thirty-five hundred volunteers and regulars
and was now one hundred miles to the north, cutting his way laboriously
through the vast forest of the Black Swamp. At last reports he had
reached Blanchard River, and had built a fort which he called Fort
Findlay. So far as Ohio knew war had not yet been declared, but news
that it had been was expected daily. The whole state awaited it in
apprehension, not from fear of the British, but from terror of their
ruthless red allies.
Not a man or woman in all Ohio but knew what Indian warfare meant.
Not one but could remember the silent midnight attack on the sleeping
farmhouse, the blazing rooftree, the stark, gashed forms that had once
been men and women and little children, the wiping out of the labor of
years in a single hour.
Every sight and sound of forest and of prairie mimicked the clash. The
hammering of the woodpecker was the pattering of bullets, the thump of
the beaver was the thud of the tomahawk, the scream of the fishhawk the
shriek of dying women, the scolding of the chipmunks in the long grass
the chatter of the squaws around the torture post, the red reflection
of the setting sun the gleam of blazing rooftrees.
Ah! Yes! Ohio knew what Indian war meant.
And Cato, for the first time, realized whither he was going. He ceased
to talk of his sweethearts and began to pray for his soul.
At last Jack came to Piqua. Piqua stood close to the boundary of the
Indian country, which then spread over the whole northwestern quarter
of Ohio. North of it lay the great Black Swamp, through which roved
thousands of Indians, nominally peaceful, but potentially dangerous. At
Piqua, too, dwelt Colonel John Johnson, the United States Indian agent,
whose business it was to keep them quiet.
As Jack rode into the outskirts of the tiny scattered village, a
middle-aged man with long, gray whiskers, skull cap, and buckskin
trousers came up to him.
“Hello, stranger!” he bawled. “What’s the news?”
Jack reined in. “Sorry, but I haven’t any,” he replied.
“Whar you from?”
“From Dayton and the south.”
“Sho! Ain’t Congress declared war yet?”
“Not that I know of. The last news from Washington was that they were
still debating.”
“Debatin’? Well! I just reckon they are debatin’. Lord sakes, stranger,
don’t it make you sick and tired to hear a lot of full grown men
a-talkin’ and a-talkin’ like a pack of women. Just say what you got
to say and stop; that’s my motto. And here’s Congress a-talkin’ and
a-talkin’ and a-wastin’ time while the Injuns are fillin’ up with
fire-water and sharpenin’ their tomahawks and the country’s going to
the devil. Strike first, and talk afterwards, say I. But then I never
was much of one to talk. I guess livin’ in the woods makes you kinder
silent, and----”
“What’s the news from the north?” Hopeless of a pause in the old man’s
garrulity Jack broke in.
The old man accepted the interruption with entire good humor if not
with pleasure, and straightway started on a new discourse. “Bad, bad,
mighty bad, stranger,” he declared. “That red devil, Tecumseh, has been
a-traveling about the country but he’s back now and the Injuns are
getting ready to play thunder with everybody. Colonel Johnson says you
ought to treat ’em kind and honeyswoggle ’em all the time, but that
ain’t my way, and it ain’t the way of nobody that knows Injuns. How far
north is you aimin’ to go, stranger?”
“To Wapakoneta, I think.”
“Then I reckon you’ll have to see Colonel Johnson. What did you say
your name was? Mine’s Rogers--Tom Rogers.”
Jack grinned. “I didn’t say,” he answered. “But it’s Jack Telfair.”
“Telfair! Telfair! Seems to me I kinder remember hearin’ of somebody of
that name. But it’s mighty long ago. Let’s see, now, I wonder could it
ha’ been that fellow that we whipped for stealin’--Pshaw, no, that was
a fellow named Helden. He was----”
“Where’ll I find Colonel Johnson,” demanded Jack, in despair.
“Well, now, that’s mighty hard to tell. Colonel Johnson sloshes round a
whole lot. Maybe you’ll find him at John Manning’s mill up at the bend
here or maybe you’ll have to go to his place at Upper Piqua or maybe
you’ll have to go further. I reckon you didn’t stop at Stanton as you
come along, did you? Colonel Johnson’s mighty thick with Levy Martin
down there, and he’s liable to be at his house, or at Peter Felix’s
store.”
Jack shook his head. “No, I didn’t come by Stanton.”
By this time a number of other white men had come up. The old hunter
insisted on making Jack known to all of them. Jack heard the names of
Sam Hilliard, Job Garrard, Andrew Dye, Joshua Robbins, Daniel Cox, and
several others. All of them were anxious for news in regard to the
coming war, and all shook their heads dubiously when they heard that
Jack proposed to go further north.
“It’s taking your life in your hands these days, youngster,” remarked
Andrew Dye, a patriarchal-looking old man. “There’s ten thousand
Injuns pretendin’ to be tame between here and Wapakoneta and the devil
only knows how many more there are north of it. Tecumseh’s sort of
civilized, but his Shawnees ain’t Tecumseh by a long shot. And them d--
British are stirrin’ ’em up. Course you may get there all right, but
when you go trampin’ in where angels are ’fraid to, you’re mighty apt
to get turned into an angel yourself.”
“I guess I’ve got to go,” said Jack. “I want to get somebody who knows
the country to go along with me.”
“What’s the matter with me?” broke in Rogers. “I ain’t a-pining to lose
my scalp, but I reckon if I won’t go nobody will. And I don’t want no
big pay neither. You and me’ll agree on terms mighty easy. I can take
you anywhere. I know all the Injuns. Why! Lord! They call me----”
Job Garrard laughed. “Yes,” he said. “Tom can take you anywhere. Tom’s
always willing to stick in. He stuck in on Judge Blank’s court down in
Dayton the other day, didn’t you, Tom? Haw! Haw! Haw!”
A burst of laughter ran round the group. Everybody laughed indeed,
except Tom himself. “You boys think you’re blamed funny,” he tried to
interpose.
But the others would not hear him.
“Maybe you heard something about it as you come through Dayton,
stranger!” said Dye. “Tom tromped right into court and he heard the
judge dressin’ down two young lawyers that had got to fussin’. I reckon
Tom had been a-practicin’ at another bar, for he yells out: ‘Give it to
’em, old gimlet eyes.’ The judge stops short. ‘Who’s that?’ he asked.
Tom thinks he’s going to ask him upon the bench or something and he
steps out an’ says: ‘It’s this yer old hoss!’ The judge he looks at him
for a minute an’ then he calls the sheriff and says, ‘Sheriff, take
this old hoss out and put him in a stall and lock the stable up and see
that he don’t get stole before tomorrow mornin’.’ And the sheriff done
it, too. Haw! Haw! Haw!”
The laughter was interrupted by the appearance of a wagon drawn by
mules and driven by a man who looked neither to the right nor to the
left.
Rogers, glad of any change of subject, jumped forward. “Hey!” he
yelled. “What’s the news?”
The driver paid no attention to the call. His companion on the box,
however, leaned out. “Go to h--l, you old grand-daddy long legs,” he
yelled.
The old hunter’s leathery cheek reddened. But before he could retort a
horseman appeared in the road in front of the wagon and threw up his
hand.
“Hold on, boys,” he called. “Hold on! I want to speak to you.”
The driver hesitated; then, compelled by something in the eyes of the
man, he sulkily reined in. As he did so Jack and the little crowd about
him moved over to the wagon.
“I’m Tom Rich, deputy of Colonel Johnson, the Indian agent up here,”
the horseman was explaining, peaceably. “Colonel Johnson’s away just
now and I’ve got to see everybody that goes north to trade with the
Injuns.”
“We ain’t going to trade with no Injuns,” said the man who appeared to
be the leader. “We’re taking supplies to Fort Wayne for the Government.
I reckon you ain’t got no call to stop us.”
“Not a bit of it, boys. Not a bit of it. Just let me see your papers
and you can go right along.”
The man sought in his pockets and finally extracted a paper which he
passed to Rich, who scanned it carefully. “Your name’s David Wolf, is
it?” he questioned, “and your friend’s name is Henry Williams?”
“That’s right and we ain’t got no time to waste. There ain’t no tellin’
when war’ll be declared an’----”
“No! There’s no telling. You can go along if you want to, but I’ve got
to warn you--warn all of you.” Rich’s eye swept the group. “We got
news this morning that there was a big council at Wapakoneta last
night. There was a British officer there in uniform and he and Tecumseh
tried to get the Shawnees to go north. Black Hoof (Catahecasa) stood
out against them, and our news is that less than two hundred braves
went. Still, there’s no telling, and the country’s dangerous. Colonel
Johnson’s at Wapakoneta now. Better wait till he gets back.”
“Wait nothin’.” Wolf spat loudly into the road. “General Hull rushed
us here with supplies for Fort Wayne and we’re going through. If any
darned Injun gets in our way he won’t stay in it long. My pluck is to
shoot first and question after.”
The deputy’s brow grew stern. “You’ll be very careful who you shoot and
when,” he ordered, sternly. “A single Indian murdered by a white man
might set the border in flames and turn thousands of friendly Indians
against us. I’ll let you go through, but I warn you that if you shoot
any Indians without due cause Colonel Johnson will see that you hang
for it. We’ve got the safety of hundreds of white people to consider
and we’re not going to have them endangered by any recklessness of
yours. You understand?”
Wolf shrugged his shoulders. “I reckon so,” he muttered.
“All right, see that you heed.” Rich turned away from the men and
greeted Jack. “And where are you bound, sir?” he asked smilingly.
“I’m looking for Colonel Johnson,” returned Jack. “I’m looking for
a young lady who was to have been left in his care. Have you heard
anything about her.”
“A young lady?” The deputy stared; then he laughed. “No! I’m not young
enough,” he remarked, cryptically.
“Then, with your permission I’ll just tag along after our crusty
friends in the wagon.”
The deputy hesitated. “I have no power to stop you,” he said. “But
you’d better wait here for Colonel Johnson.”
“I can’t. The matter is urgent. Come, Cato! So long, boys!” Jack nodded
to the group around him, shook his bridle and cantered off after the
wagon, which had just vanished among the trees.