The Boy Scouts In The Rockies Part 12

"You don't understand the matter at all," complained the big man, with something like a whine in his gruff voice now, showing that he was pretty nearly cowed.

"How is that?" demanded the other, instantly.

"I'm meaning to be his friend, and the friend, of his folks," Kracker continued.

"Funny way you have of showing your friendly feelings, then, I must say," declared Thad, with scorn in his voice; "making him a prisoner, trying to force him to give up a secret you choose to think he carries; and when he refuses to take you at your word, putting him there on that ledge, to starve, or face a horrible death in perhaps falling down a couple of hundred feet."

Kracker looked a little confused, but it was only a flash in the pan.

Such a thing as shame was foreign to his nature. For years he had been used to browbeating almost every person with whom he had had dealings.

The fact that first of all a mere slip of a woman had dared defy him, and then her boy did the same, nettled him beyond description; and he had arrived at desperate measures at the time Aleck, so unfortunately for the boy, fell into his hands.

And now it galled Kracker to see how he and his two helpers were being actually held up by a parcel of half grown lads. Why, it would seem as though some mockery of fate had taken hold of his fortunes, and was finding keen pleasure in adding to his humiliation.

He would have liked to rush upon these cool boyish customers, and to have trampled them under foot, as he had possibly done many men in times past, when he was less huge in his proportions, and could get around better. But somehow he did not dare attempt it.

Perhaps it was the display of weapons that awed him; and yet Colonel Kracker was accustomed to seeing such things, and knew how to take them at their true value. Then it may have been the manner of the spokesman of the little party that had so depressing an effect upon the bully. Why, what was the world coming to, when mere boys began to hold the whip hand, and shape things as they pleased?

He started to talk, but spluttered so much he could not make intelligible sounds. And his round moon face had taken on a deep red hue again, until it bordered on the purple. Thad, who had some knowledge of medicine, as we have seen on numerous occasions, really began to wonder whether the bulky man might not be getting perilously near the border line, and taking chances with a sudden attack of apoplexy, or else something else along those lines.

Once or twice Thad had seen something move back of the three men. He dared not take his eyes off them long enough to look carefully, and at first could not decide whether it was a prowling wolf, bold enough to come thus near the camp in broad daylight; or a human being.

He even suspected at one moment that possibly the invaders might have been in greater numbers than any of the scouts dreamed; and that some of them were even then creeping around, with the idea of turning the tables on the boys by a sudden coup.

But that idea went glimmering, when he contemplated the utter impossibility of any foe crawling across the bare and open stretch of rock extending between their camp, and the foot of the rise.

It certainly could never be done; and with the Maine boy keeping watch on things from his eyrie amid the piled-up rocks.

Then what?

Why, to be sure, it must be the Fox. The young Crow had vanished, Thad remembered, at the approach of the trio of prospectors. Just where he had gone the patrol leader had neither known, nor cared, at the time.

He seemed to have some reason for fearing either Kracker, or one of the two lesser rascals with him; and appeared desirous of keeping out of their sight.

Thad also remembered that the Indian boy possessed a gun. He only hoped he would not do anything rash; but then he had been present when the scoutmaster spoke to those under him; saying that as members of the great organization that made for peace, they must not use their firearms unless as a very last resort; and then only to cripple their enemies. The Crow had nodded his head with the rest when Thad asked for this a.s.surance; and surely an Indian keeps his word.

There, once again his head poked up into view, and this time so close to the men that Thad saw the Fox had been stealthily creeping nearer all the time.

Did he have some object in his movements, or were they caused simply by curiosity to see how close he could get, un.o.bserved, to the one he seemed to fear?

Seeing that Kracker was too furious to even control his voice, the shorter fellow, whom Thad took to be Waffles, again put in his talk.

"It's plain to be seen you critters don't know the kunnel," he observed, bitterly, just as though he himself had had a long experience, and knew what it meant to stir up that vile temper too far. "He never gives a thing up. He's jest like a bulldog that gits a grip. Ye may chase us off this time; but we'll stick like a plaster; and in the end git what we wants. We allers does."

"Oh! you don't say?" remarked the scoutmaster, with cutting emphasis; "well, the chances are the lot of you will get what you've been richly deserving a long time back, if you keep on meddling with our affairs.

And now, suppose you skip out. We couldn't come to any agreement if we talked an hour. And we have some other things we want to do. Take your fat friend away, Waffles; he's liable to explode before long, unless you do."

Amazed at the cool defiance of the boy, the man called Waffles mechanically started to obey. But before they had taken half a dozen steps backward, Thad heard a strange, hissing sound that he could not understand. The next instant, to his astonishment, he saw Waffles pulled over backwards, his feet sprawling awkwardly. His calls for help were half m.u.f.fled, and for a very good reason; since he was being partly choked by the loop of rope which the young Crow Indian had thrown over his head with so much dexterity, and then jerked tight.

CHAPTER XII.

"JUST TURNED AROUND, AND WENT AWAY!"

It was certainly a time for quick thinking, and speedy action, if the boys expected to avoid a tragedy. Naturally enough, Kracker and his one remaining companion, hearing the cries of the fallen Waffles, would think that they were being actually set upon by their enemies, and that no matter what followed, they must fight.

It was to offset this that Thad first of all turned his attention. A collision must be averted at all hazards. It would be a terrible thing if the scouts became embroiled in a fight with such men, and either received wounds, or were compelled to give them.

And so Thad, acting instantly on impulse, darted forward the very second he saw what was happening. Fortunately for all parties, the big man having been so dazed by his late baiting did not seem able to grasp the situation quickly enough to draw a weapon before Thad was upon him.

The only thing the boy did was to s.n.a.t.c.h the big six-shooter from the hand of Kracker, now trembling with various emotions, in which fear may have had as much s.p.a.ce as anger.

"Surround the other, and don't let him raise a hand, boys!" shouted the scoutmaster to those who had followed close at his heels when he thus rushed forward.

With the words he turned to where Waffles was still sprawling on the ground; but there was now more reason than ever why the fellow could not get up, because some one was sitting astride his body, and threatening him with a knife. Of course it was the Fox; and he seemed to have a storm of pa.s.sion in his dark face.

But while Thad had been prompt to knock the revolver from the hand of Kracker, he was just as quick to leap alongside the young Crow boy, and grasp his wrist.

"Give me that knife, Fox!" he said sternly.

The Indian looked up in his face; for a moment it seemed as though he might be about to mutiny, and positively refuse the order; then his whim changed, and opening his fingers he allowed the shining blade to fall to the ground.

"Ugh! hunt him long time; now find, make give up what snake in the gra.s.s steal away from teepee in reservation!" he grunted, disconsolately.

"Oh! well, if he's got anything that belongs to you, or your people, why you've my full permission to search him, and get it back," Thad went on to say, quickly; "only we want no violence here, if we can help it. We scouts generally manage to reach our ends without that, you know, Fox. Go ahead and see. We'll keep his friends quiet meanwhile, eh, boys?"

"That's what we will, Thad," said Giraffe, who was standing close by, with his gun poking almost into the ribs of the big man with the purple face. "We c'n do it to beat the band, I tell you. And here comes Allan in, to have a hand in the game. Didn't he keep a bead on the colonel here all the while; and if you hadn't jumped in, and s.n.a.t.c.hed that gun away from him, I warrant Allan was just on the point of making him a one-armed man for a while."

But Thad was not paying much attention to what the talkative Giraffe said, his attention being taken up with other matters. The Fox had heard him give permission to search the pockets of the short rascal he was holding down, after having caught him in the loop of b.u.mpus' rope, taken slily from the limb of the tree where the fat scout carefully kept it while in camp. The light that flashed athwart the mahogany colored face of the young Crow told how pleased he was with this chance that was offered.

He immediately started to rummage through the various pockets of Waffles. Quite naturally the lesser bully objected to such liberties being taken with his person; and it must have galled him more than a little to realize that it was an _Indian_, and a boy at that, who was subjecting him to such indignities; for like most men along the border, Waffles undoubtedly held Indians in contempt.

But when he raised his voice in stormy protest Thad told him to hush up; besides, the Fox leaned over and glared in his eyes with such a suggestive look that Waffles, being a coward at heart, gradually subsided, his protests taking the safer form of groans, and grunts, and wriggles, all of which were alike unavailing.

Presently the Crow uttered a cry of joy.

"Found what you were looking for?" asked Thad.

"Ugh! it is well!" and as he said this the Fox held something up.

Thad may have thought that the Indian boy was making a mountain out of a mole-hill, for if it had been left to him, he did not know that he would have willingly paid more than a dollar, at the most, for the object the Fox now gripped with such evident delight. But then, at the same time Thad realized that a.s.sociations often have a great deal to do with the value of things. That peculiar strip of deerskin, decorated with colored beads that formed all sorts of designs, must have come down from some of the Fox's ancestors. Perhaps it was a species of wampum similar to that in use as currency during the earlier days, when men like Daniel Boone were trying to settle along the Ohio River. And then again, it might be that the fore-fathers of the Fox always wore this strip of beaded leather when they were invested with the office of chief to the tribe.

At any rate, Waffles had apparently known of its value, and had stolen it, possibly hoping at some time to receive a rich reward for its safe return; for surely he could not have fancied it because he had any love for beauty, or meant to start a collection of Indian relics.

"Are you satisfied, Fox, now that you've recovered your property--if that is all he took from your home?" Thad asked.

"Huh! much like mark thief on him cheek, so know where belong!"

grunted the Crow boy, longingly.