Lydia of the Pines Part 44

"I don't like this," he muttered.

"What's the matter?" exclaimed Lydia. "Do you think there's going to be trouble?"

"I don't know. It's just something in the air. I think we'd better find the folks and get you and Lizzie out of this."

"I don't believe they mean any harm," said Lydia. "Lots of the whites started home before sunset, anyhow."

"I wish you had," replied Billy. "Gee, here it comes."

The chant suddenly changed to a yell. The drum beat quickened, and the great circle of dancing Indians broke and charged the crowd of whites.

A number of them drew revolvers and began firing them into the air.

Others drew taut the great bows they carried. The whites plunged backward precipitately.

Billy thrust Lydia behind him. "Don't move, Lyd," he cried, pushing aside a threatening buck as he did so.

"Kill 'em whites!" shrieked the squaws.

"Run 'em whites off our reservation!" shouted half a dozen young bucks.

Lydia was trembling but cool. "Good for them! Oh, Billy, good for them!" she exclaimed.

He did not reply. His great body circled about her, with shoulder and elbow buffeting off the surging crowd. Thus far the whites had taken the proceedings as a joke. Then a white woman screamed,--

"Run! It's a ma.s.sacre!"

"Ma.s.sacre" is a horrifying word to use to whites in an Indian country.

Men and women both took up the cry,--

"It's a ma.s.sacre! Run!"

And the great crowd bolted.

Like pursuing wolves, the Indians followed, beating the laggards with their bows, shouting exultantly. Billy caught Lydia round the waist and held her in front of him as well as he could, and for a few moments the rush of the mob carried them on.

Then Lydia heard Billy's voice in her ear. "If this isn't stopped, it _will_ be a ma.s.sacre. We've got to find Charles Jackson."

"We may be killed trying to find him!" Lydia cried.

"We've got to make a try for it, anyhow," replied Billy. "Brace your shoulders back against my chest. I'll try to stop."

They succeeded in holding themselves steadily for a moment against the mob and in that moment, Billy caught a screaming squaw by the arm.

"Susie, where's Charlie Jackson?"

She jerked her thumb back toward the flag pole and twisted away.

"All right! Now we'll make for the pole, Lydia, get behind me and put your arms round my waist. Hang on, for heaven's sake."

Lydia did hang on for a few moments. But the flight was now developing into a free for all fight. And before she knew just how it happened, Lydia had fallen and feet surged over her.

She buried her face in her arms. It seemed an age to her before Billy had s.n.a.t.c.hed her to her feet. In reality she was not down for more than two minutes. Billy swung her against his chest with one arm and swung out with his other, shouting at Indians and whites alike.

"You d.a.m.ned beasts! You dirty d.a.m.ned beasts."

Lydia, bruised and shaken, clung to him breathlessly, then cried, "Go ahead, Billy!"

He glanced down at her and saw a streak of blood on her forehead. His face worked and he began to sob and curse like a madman.

"They've hurt you, the h.e.l.lhounds! I'll kill somebody for this."

Kicking, striking with his free arm, oaths rolling from his lips, he burst through the crowd and rushed Lydia to the free s.p.a.ce about the flagpole where Charlie Jackson stood coolly watching the proceedings.

Billy shook his fist under the Indian's nose.

"Get down there and call the pack off or I'll brain you."

Jackson shrugged his shoulders, calmly. "Let 'em have their fun. It's their last blowout. I hope they do kill Levine and Marshall."

Lydia pulled herself free of Billy. Her voice was trembling, but she had not lost her head.

"Call them off, Charlie. It'll just mean trouble in the end for all of you if you don't."

Charlie looked at Lydia closely and his voice changed as he said, "You got hurt, Lydia? I'm sorry."

"Sorry! You d.a.m.ned brute!" raved Billy. "I tell you, call off this row!"

The two young men glared at each other. Afterglow and firelight revealed a ferocity in Billy's face and a cool hatred in Charlie's that made Lydia gasp. The shouting of the mob, the beating of the drum was receding toward the road. The flag snapped in the night wind.

Billy put his face closer to Charlie's. The muscles of his jaw knotted and his hands clenched and unclenched.

"Call it off!" he growled.

Charlie returned Billy's stare for a long moment. Then sullenly, slowly, he turned and threw out across the night a long, shrill cry.

He gave it again and again. At each repet.i.tion the noise of the mob grew less, and shortly panting, feverish-eyed bucks began to struggle into the light around the pole.

Then, without a word, Billy led Lydia away. The Indians pa.s.sing them shook their bows at them but they were unmolested.

"Can you walk, Lydia? Do you think you're badly hurt?" asked Billy.

"I'm not hurt except for this cut on my head. And I guess I'm scared and bruised from being stepped on. That's all."

"All! To think of me not scratched and you hurt! Your father ought to horsewhip me!"

"You saved me from being trampled to death!" cried Lydia, indignantly.

"Oh there's the auto."

There it was, indeed, with old Lizzie standing in the tonneau, wringing her hands, and Amos and Levine, dust covered and disheveled, guarding the car with clubs.

They all shouted with relief when they saw the two. Lydia by now had wiped the blood from her face.