Nick of the Woods Part 14

"If I'm the crittur that holped her into the fix, I'm the crittur to holp her out of it. 'Tarnal death to me, whar's the Injuns? H'yar goes to eat 'em!"

With that, he uttered a yell,--the first human cry that had been uttered for some time, for the a.s.sailants were still resting on their arms,--and rushing up the ravine, as if well acquainted with the localities of the Station, he ran to the ruin, repeating his cries at every step, with a loudness and vigour of tone that soon drew a response from the lurking enemy.

"H'yar you 'tarnal-temporal, long-legged, 'tater-headed paint-faces!"

he roared, leaping from the pa.s.sage floor to the pile of ruins before the door of the hovel (where Emperor yet lay ensconced, and whither Roland followed him), as if in utter defiance of the foemen whom he hailed with such opprobrious epithets,--"h'yar you bald head, smoke-dried, punkin-eating red-skins! you half-niggurs! you 'c.o.o.n-whelps!

you snakes! you varmints! you raggam.u.f.fins what goes about licking women and children, and scar'ring-anngelliferous madam! git up and show your scalp-locks; for 'tarnal death to me, I'm the man to take 'em--c.o.c.k-a-doodle-doo!"

And the valiant horse-thief concluded his warlike defiance with such a crow as might have struck consternation to the heart not merely of the best game-c.o.c.k in Kentucky, but of the bird of Jove itself. Great was the excitement it produced among the warriors. A furious hubbub was heard to arise among them, followed by many wrathful voices exclaiming in broken English, with eager haste, "Know him dah! cuss' rascal! Cappin Stackpole!--steal Injun hoss!" And the' "steal Injun hoss!" iterated and reiterated by a dozen voices, and always with the most iracund emphasis, enabled Roland to form a proper conception of the sense in which his enemies held that offence, as well as of the great merits and wide-spread fame of his new ally, whose mere voice had thrown the red-men into such a ferment.

But it was not with words alone they vented their displeasure.

Rifle-shots and execrations were discharged together against the notorious enemy of their pinfolds; who nothing daunted, and nothing loath, let fly his own "speechifier," as he denominated his rifle, in return, accompanying the salute with divers yells and maledictions, in which latter he showed himself, to say the truth, infinitely superior to his antagonists. He would even, so great and fervent was his desire to fight the battles of his benefactress to advantage, have retained his exposed stand on the pile of ruins, daring every bullet, had not Roland dragged him down by main force, and compelled him to seek a shelter like the rest, from which, however, he carried on the war, loading and firing his piece with wonderful rapidity, and yelling and roaring all the time with triumphant fury, as if reckoning upon every shot to bring down an enemy.

It was not many minutes, however, before Roland began to fear that the fatality which had marked all his relations with the intrepid horse-thief, had not yet lost its influence, and that Stackpole's present a.s.sistance was anything but advantageous to his cause. It seemed, indeed, as if the savages had been driven to increased rage by the discovery of his presence; and that the hope of capturing _him_, the most daring and inveterate of all the hungerers after Indian horseflesh, and requiting his manifold transgressions on the spot, had infused into them new spirit and fiercer determination. Their fire became more vigorous, their shouts more wild and ferocious: those who had effected a lodgment among the ruins crept higher, while others appeared dealing their shots from other quarters close at hand; and in fine, the situation of his little party became so precarious, that Roland, apprehending every moment a general a.s.sault, and despairing of being again able to repel it, drew them secretly off from the ruin, which he abandoned entirely, and took refuge among the rocks at the head of the ravine.

It was then,--while unconscious of the sudden evacuation of the hovel, but not doubting they had driven the defenders into its interior, tho enemy poured in half a dozen or more volleys, as preliminaries to the a.s.sault which the soldier apprehended,--that he turned to the unlucky Ralph; and arresting him as he was about to fire upon the foe from his new cover, demanded, with much agitation, if it were not possible to transport the hapless females in the little canoe, which his mind had often reverted to as a probable means of escape, to a place of safety.

"'Tarnal death to me," said Ralph, "thar's a boiling-pot above and a boiling pot below; but ar'n't I the crittur to shake old Salt by the fo'-paw? Can take anngelliferous down 'ar a shoot that war ever seed!"

"And why, in Heaven's name," cried the Virginian, "did you not say so before, and relieve her from this horrible situation?"

"'Tarnal death to me, ar'nt I to do her fighting first?" demanded the honest Ralph. "Jist let's have another crack at the villians, jist for madam's satisfaction; and then, sodger, if you're for taking the shoot, I'm jist the salmon to show you the way. But I say, sodger, I won't lie,"

he continued, finding Roland was bent upon instant escape, while the savages were yet unaware of their flight from the hovel,--"I wont lie, sodger;--thar's rather a small trough to hold madam and the gal, and me and you and the n.i.g.g.e.r and the white man" (for Stackpole was already acquainted with the number of the party); "and as for the hosses, 'twill be all crucifixion to get 'em through old Salt's fingers."

"Think not of horses, nor of us," said Roland. "Save but the women, and it will be enough. For the rest of us, we will do our best. We can keep the hollow till we are relieved; for, if Nathan be alive, relief must be now on the way." And in a few hurried words, he acquainted Stackpole with his having despatched the man of peace to seek a.s.sistance.

"Thar's no trusting the crittur, Tiger Nathan," said Ralph; "though at a close hug, a squeeze on the small ribs, or a kick up of heels, he's all splendiferous. Afore you see his ugly pictur' ag'in, 'tarnal death to me, strannger, you'll be devoured; the red niggurs thar won't make two bites at you. No, sodger,--if we run, we run,--thar's the principle; we takes the water, the whole herd together, niggurs, hosses, and all, particularly the hosses; for, 'tarnal death to me, it's ag'in my conscience to leave so much as a hoof. And so, sodger, if you conscientiously thinks thar has been walloping enough done on both sides, I'm jist the man to help you all out of the bobbery;--though, cuss me, you might as well have cut me out of the beech without so much hard axing!"

These words of the worthy horse-thief, uttered as hurriedly as his own, but far more coolly, animated the spirits of the young soldier with double hope; and taking advantage of the busy intentness with which the enemy still poured their fire into the ruin, he despatched Ralph down the ravine, to prepare the canoe for the women, while he himself summoned Dodge and Emperor to make an effort for their own deliverance.

CHAPTER XVII.

The roar of the river, alternating with peals of thunder, which were now loud and frequent, awake many an anxious pang in Roland's bosom, as he lifted his half-unconscious kinswoman from the earth, and bore her to the canoe; but his anxiety was much more increased when he came to survey the little vessel itself, which was scarce twelve feet in length, and seemed ill-fitted to sustain the weight of even half the party. It was, besides, of the clumsiest and worst possible figure, a mere log, in fact, roughly hollowed out, without any attempt having been made to point its extremities; so that it looked less like a canoe than an ox-trough; which latter purpose it was perhaps designed chiefly to serve, and intended to be used for the former only when an occasional rise of the waters might make a canoe necessary to the convenience of the maker. Such a vessel, managed by a skilful hand, might indeed bear the two females, with honest Ralph, through the foaming rapids below; but Roland felt, that to burden it with others would be to insure the destruction of all. He resolved, therefore, that no other should enter it; and, having deposited Telie Doe in it by the side of Edith, he directed Dodge and Emperor to mount their horses, and trust to their strength and courage for a safe escape. To Emperor, whatever distaste he might have for the adventure, this was an order, like all others, to be obeyed without murmuring; and, fortunately, Pardon Dodge's humanity, or his discretion, was so strongly fortified by his confidence in the swimming virtues of his steed, that he very readily agreed to try his fortune on horseback.

"Anything to git round them everlasting varmint,--though it a'n't no sich great circ.u.mstance to fight 'em neither, where one's a kinder got one's hand in," he cried, with quite a joyous voice; and added, as if to encourage the others,--"it's my idea, that, if such an old crazy boat can swim the river, a hoss can do it a mortal heap better."

"'Tarnal death to me," said Ralph Stackpole, "them's got the grit that'll go down old Salt on horseback! But it's all for the good of anngelliferous madam: and so, if thar's any hard rubbing, or drowning, or anything-of that synommous natur', to happen, it ar'n't a thing to be holped no how. But hand in the guns and speechifiers, and make ready for a go; for, 'tarnal death to me, the abbrygynes ar' making a rush for the cabin!"

There was indeed little time left for deliberation. While Ralph was yet speaking, a dozen or more flaming brands were suddenly seen flung into the air, as if against the broken roof of the cabin, through which they fell into the interior; and, with a tremendous whoop, the savages, thus lighting the way to the a.s.sault, rushed against their fancied prey. The next moment, there was heard a yell of disappointed rage and wonder, followed by a rush of men into the ravine.

"Now, sodger," cried Ralph, "stick close to the trough; and if you ever seed etarnity at midnight, you'll see a small sample now!"

With that, he pushed the canoe into the stream, and Roland, urging his terrified steed with voice and spur, and leading his cousin's equally alarmed palfrey, leaped in after him, calling to Dodge and Emperor to follow. But how they followed, or whether they followed at all, it was not easy at that moment to determine; for a bright flash of lightning, glaring over the river, vanished suddenly, leaving all in double darkness, and the impetuous rush of the current whirled him he knew not whither; while the crash of the thunder that followed, prevented his hearing any other noise, save the increasing and never absent roar of the waters. Another flash illuminated the scene, and during its short-lived radiance he perceived himself flying, as it almost seemed, through the water, borne along by a furious current betwixt what appeared to him two lofty walls of crag and forest, towards those obstructions in the channel, which, in times of flood, converted the whole river into a boiling caldron. They were ma.s.ses of rock, among which had lodged rafts of drift timber, forming a dam or barrier on either side of the river, from which the descending floods were whirled into a central channel, ample enough in the dry season to discharge the waters in quiet, but through which they were now driven with all the hurry and rage of a torrent. The scene, viewed in the momentary glare of the lightning, was indeed terrific: the dark and rugged walls on either side, the ramparts of timber of every shape and size, from the little willow sapling to the full-grown sycamore piled high above the rocks, and the rushing gulf betwixt them, made up a spectacle sufficient to appal the stoutest heart; and Roland gasped for breath, as he beheld the little canoe whirl into the narrow chasm, and then vanish, even before the light was over, as if swallowed up in its boiling vortex.

But there was little time for fear or conjecture. He cast the rein of the palfrey from his hand, directed Briareus's head towards the abyss, and the next moment, sweeping in darkness and with the speed of an arrow, betwixt the barriers, he felt his charger swimming beneath him in comparatively tranquil waters. Another flash illumined hill and river, and he beheld the little canoe dancing along in safety, scarce fifty yards in advance, with Stackpole waving the tattered fragments of his hat aloft, and yelling out a note of triumph. But the l.u.s.ty hurrah was unheard by the soldier. A more dreadful sound came to his ears from behind, in a shriek that seemed uttered by the combined voices of men and horses, and was heard even above the din of the torrent. But it was as momentary as dreadful, and if a cry of agony, it was of agony that was soon over. Its fatal cause was soon exhibited, when Roland, awakened by the sound from the trance, which, during the brief moment of his pa.s.sage through the abyss, had chained his faculties, turned, by a violent jerk, the head of his charger up the stream, in the instinctive effort to render a.s.sistance to his less fortunate followers. A fainter flash than before played upon the waters, and he beheld two or three dark ma.s.ses, like the bodies of horses, hurried by among the waves, whilst another, of lesser bulk and human form, suddenly rose from the depth of the stream at his side. This he instantly grasped in his hand, and dragged half across his saddle-bow, when a broken, strangling exclamation, "Lorra-g-g-gor!"

made him aware that he had saved the life of the faithful Emperor.

"Clutch fast to the saddle," he cried; and the negro obeying with another e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n, the soldier turned Briareus again down the stream, to look for the canoe. But almost immediately his charger struck the ground; and Roland, to his inexpressible joy, found himself landed upon a projecting bank, on which the current had already swept the canoe, with its precious freight, unharmed.

"If that ar'n't equal to coming down a strick of lightning," cried Roaring Ralph, as he helped the soldier from the water, "thar's no legs to a jumping bull-frog! Smash away, old bait!" he continued, apostrophising with great exultation and self-admiration the river whose terrors he had thus so successfully defied; "ar'n't I the gentleman for you? Roar as much as you please;--when it comes to fighting for anngelliferous madam, I can lick you, old Salt, 'tarnal death to me! And so, anngelliferous madam, don't you car' a copper for the old crittur; for thar's more in his bark than his bite. And as for the abbregynes, if I've fout 'em enough for your satisfaction, we'll just say good-bye to 'em, and leave 'em to take the scalp off old Salt."

The consolation thus offered by the worthy captain of horse-thieves was lost upon Edith, who, locked in the arms of her kinsman, and sensible of her escape from the horrid danger that had so long surrounded her, sensible also of the peril from which he had just been released, wept her terrors away upon his breast, and for a moment almost forgot that her sufferings were not yet over.

It was only for an instant that the young soldier indulged his joy. He breathed a few words of comfort and encouragement, and then turned to inquire after Dodge, whose gallant hearing in the hour of danger had conquered the disgust he at first felt at his cowardice, and won upon his grat.i.tude and respect. But the Yankee appeared not, and the loud calls Roland made for him were echoed only by the hoa.r.s.e roar from the barriers, now left far behind, and the thunder that yet pealed through the sky. Nor could Emperor, when restored a little to his wits, which had been greatly disturbed by his own perils in the river, give any satisfactory account of his fate. He could only remember that the current had borne himself against the logs, under which he had been swept, and whirled he knew not whither until he found himself in the arms of his master; and Dodge, who had rushed before him into the flood, he supposed, had met a similar fate, but without the happy termination that marked his own.

That the Yankee had indeed found his death among the roaring waters, Roland could well believe, the wonder only being how the rest had escaped in safety. Of the five horses, three only had reached the bank, Briareus and the palfrey, which had fortunately followed Roland down the middle of the chasm, and the horse of the unlucky Pardon. The others had been either drowned among the logs, or swept down the stream.

A few moments sufficed to acquaint Roland with several losses; but he took little time to lament them. The deliverance of his party was not yet wholly effected, and every moment was to be improved, to put it, before daylight, beyond the reach of pursuit. The captain of horse-thieves avouched himself able to lead the way from the wilderness, to conduct the travellers to a safe ford below, and thence through the woods, to the rendezvous of the emigrants.

"Let it be anywhere," said Roland, "where there is safety; and let us not delay a moment longer. Our remaining here can avail nothing to poor Dodge."

With these words, he a.s.sisted his kinswoman upon her palfrey, placed Telie Doe upon the horse of the unfortunate Yankee, and giving up his own Briareus to the exhausted negro, prepared to resume his ill-starred journey on foot. Then, taking post on the rear, he gave the signal to his new guide; and once more the travellers were buried in the intricacies of the forest.

CHAPTER XVIII.

It was at a critical period when the travellers effected their escape from the scene of their late sufferings. The morning was already drawing nigh, and might, but for the heavy clouds that prolonged the night of terror, have been seen shooting its first streaks through the eastern skies. Another half hour, if for that half hour they could have maintained their position in the ravine, would have seen them exposed in all their helplessness to the gaze, and to the fire of the determined foe. It became them to improve the few remaining moments of darkness, and to make such exertions as might get them, before dawn, beyond the reach of discovery or pursuit.

Exertions were, accordingly, made; and, although man and horse were alike exhausted, and the thick brakes and oozy swamps through which Roaring Ralph led the way, opposed a thousand obstructions to rapid motion, they had left the fatal ruin at least two miles behind them, or so honest Stackpole averred, when the day at last broke over the forest. To add to the satisfaction of the fugitives, it broke in unexpected splendour. The clouds parted, and, as the floating ma.s.ses rolled lazily away before a pleasant morning breeze, they were seen lighted up and tinted with a thousand glorious dyes of sunshine.

The appearance of the great luminary was hailed with joy, as the omen of a happier fate than had been heralded by the clouds and storms of evening. Smiles began to beam from the haggard and care-worn visages of the travellers; the very horses seemed to feel the inspiring influence of the change; and as for Roaring Ralph, the sight of his beautiful benefactress recovering her good looks, and the exulting consciousness that it was _his_ hand which had s.n.a.t.c.hed her from misery and death, produced such a fever of delight in his brain as was only to be allayed by the most extravagant expressions and actions. He a.s.sured her a dozen times over, "he was her dog and her slave, and vowed he would hunt her so many Injun scalps, and steal her such a 'tarnal chance of Shawnee hosses, thar shorld'nt be a gal in all Kentucky should come up to her for stock and glory:" and, finally, not content with making a thousand other promises of an equally extravagant character, and swearing, that, "if she axed it, he would go down on his knees and say his prayers to her," he offered, as soon as he had carried her safely across the river, to "take the backtrack, and lick, single-handed, all the Injun abbregynes that might be following." Indeed, to such a pitch did his enthusiasm run, that, not knowing how otherwise to give vent to his over-charged feelings, he suddenly turned upon his heel, and shaking his fist in the direction whence he had come, as if against the enemy who had caused his benefactress so much distress, he p.r.o.nounced a formal and emphatic curse upon their whole race, "from the head-chief to the commoner, from the whisky-soaking warrior down to the pan-licking squall-a-baby," all of whom he anathematised with as much originality as fervour of expression; after which, he proceeded, with more sedateness, to resume his post at the head of the travellers, and conduct them onwards on their way.

Another hour was now consumed in diving amid cane-brakes and swamps, to which Roaring Ralph evinced a decidedly greater partiality than to the open forest, in which the travellers had found themselves at the dawn; and in this he seemed to show somewhat more of judgment and discretion than would have been argued from his hair-brained conversation; for the danger of stumbling upon scouting Indians, of which the country now seemed so full, was manifestly greater in the open woods than in the dark and almost unfrequented cane-brakes: and the worthy horse-thief, with all his apparent love of fight, was not at all anxious that the angel of his worship should be alarmed or endangered, while entrusted to his zealous safe-keeping.

But it happened in this case, as it has happened with better and wiser men, that Stackpole's cunning over-reached itself, as was fully shown in the event; and it would have been happier for himself and all if his discretion, instead of plunging him among difficult and almost impa.s.sable bogs, where a precious hour was wasted in effecting a mere temporary security and concealment from observation, had taught him the necessity of pushing onwards with all possible speed, so as to leave pursuers, if pursuit should be attempted, far behind. At the expiration of that hour, so injudiciously wasted, the fugitives issued from the brake, and stepping into a narrow path worn by the feet of bisons, among stunted shrubs and parched gra.s.ses, along the face of a lime-stone bed, sparingly scattered over with a similar barren growth, began to wind their way downward into a hollow vale, in which they could hear the murmurs, and perceive the glimmering waters of the river over which they seemed never destined to pa.s.s.

"_Thar_', 'tarnal death to me!" roared Ralph, pointing downwards with triumph, "arn't that old Salt now, looking as sweet and liquorish as a whole trough-full of sugar-tree? We'll just take a dip at him, anngelliferous madam, jist to wash the mud off our shoes; and then, 'tarnal death to me, farewell to old Salt, and the abbregynes together--c.o.c.k-a-doodle-doo!"

With this comfortable a.s.surance, and such encouragement as he could convey in the l.u.s.tiest gallicantation ever fetched from lungs of man or fowl, the worthy Stackpole, who had slackened his steps, but without stopping while he spoke, turned his face again to the descent; when--as if that war-cry had conjured up enemies from the very air,--a rifle bullet, shot from a bush not six yards off, suddenly whizzed through his hair, scattering a handful of it to the winds; and while a dozen or more were, at the same instant, poured upon other members of the unfortunate party, fourteen or fifteen savages rushed out from their concealment among the gra.s.s and bushes, three of whom seized upon the rein of the unhappy Edith, while twice as many sprang upon Captain Forrester, and, before he could raise an arm in defence, bore him to the earth, a victim or a prisoner.

So much the astounded horse-thief saw with his own eyes; but before he could make good any of the numberless promises he had volunteered, during the morning journey, of killing and eating the whole family of North American Indians, or exemplify the unutterable grat.i.tude and devotion he had as often professed to the fair Virginian, four brawny barbarians, one of them rising at his side and from the very bush whence the bullet had been discharged at his head, rushed against him, flourishing their guns and knives, and yelling with transport, "Got you _now_, Cappin Stackpole, steal-hoss! No go steal no hoss no more! roast on great big fire!"

"'Tarnal death to me!" roared Stackpole, forgetting everything else in the instinct of self-preservation; and firing his piece at the nearest enemy, he suddenly leaped from the path into the bushes on its lower side, where was a precipitous descent, down which he went rolling and crashing with a velocity almost equal to that of the bullets that were sent after him. Three of the four a.s.sailants immediately darted after in pursuit, and their shouts growing fainter and fainter as they descended, were mingled with the loud yell of victory, now uttered by a dozen savage voices from the hill-side.

It was a victory, indeed, in every sense, complete, almost bloodless, as it seemed, to the a.s.sailants, and effected at a moment when the hopes of the travellers were at the highest: and so sudden was the attack, so instantaneous the change from freedom to captivity, so like the juggling transition of a dream the whole catastrophe, that Forrester, although overthrown and bleeding from two several wounds received at the first fire, and wholly in the power of his enemies, who flourished their knives and axes in his face, yelling with exultation, could scarce appreciate his situation, or understand what dreadful misadventure had happened, until his eye, wandering among the dusky arms that grappled him, fell first upon the body of the negro Emperor, hard by, gored by numberless wounds, and trampled by the feet of his slayers, and then upon the apparition, a thousand times more dismal to his eyes, of his kinswoman s.n.a.t.c.hed from her horse and struggling in the arms of her savage captors.

The frenzy with which he was seized at this lamentable sight endowed him with a giant's strength; but it was exerted in vain to free himself from his enemies, all of whom seemed to experience a barbarous delight at his struggles, some encouraging him, with loud laughter and in broken English, to continue them, while others taunted and scolded at him more like shrewish squaws than valiant warriors, a.s.suring him that they were great Shawnee fighting-men, and he a little Long-knife dog, entirely beneath their notice: which expressions, though at variance with all his preconceived notions of the stern gravity of the Indian character, and rather indicative of a roughly jocose than a darkly ferocious spirit, did not prevent their taking the surest means to quiet his exertions and secure their prize, by tying his hands behind him with a thong of buffalo hide, drawn so tight as to inflict the most excruciating pain. But pain of body was then, and for many moments after, lost in agony of mind, which could he conceived only by him who, like the young soldier, has been doomed, once in his life, to see a tender female, the nearest and dearest object of his affections, in the hands of enemies, the most heartless, merciless, and brutal of all the races of men. He saw her pale visage convulsed with terror and despair,--he beheld her arms stretched towards him, as if beseeching the help he no longer had the power to render,--and expected every instant the fall of the hatchet, or the flash of the knife, that was to pour her blood upon the earth before him.

He would have called upon the wretches around for pity, but his tongue clove to his mouth, his brain spun round; and such became the intensity of his feelings, that he was suddenly bereft of sense, and fell like a dead man to the earth, where he lay for a time, ignorant of all events pa.s.sing around, ignorant also of the duration of his insensibility.

CHAPTER XIX.