The Keepers of the Trail Part 26

Evidently they had not been daunted by their repulse of the night before, as they were broiling venison on the ends of sharpened sticks and eating heartily. The two white men finishing their food lay down on the gra.s.s and rested lazily. By and by the red members of the band did likewise.

"It's just as we thought last night," said Henry, "They will not try to carry us by a.s.sault again, but will undertake to starve us out with a long siege. Even if they've guessed the meaning of our smoke they don't know that we have in here running water that runs on forever."

"Would they care to carry on a long siege?" asked Paul.

"Maybe not, if Wyatt were not there. You know how he hates us all, and he will be continually urging them to attack us. Perhaps Red Eagle and Blackstaffe will now go on and join the main army, leaving Wyatt with a chosen band to take us by siege."

"'Pears likely to me," said Long Jim, who was listening. "It's easy enough for them to set thar out uv range an' hold us in here, but they forget one mighty important thing."

"What's that, Jim?"

"Shif'less Sol. He's in the bush, an' he kin stalk 'em when he pleases.

They don't know that the warrior killed at the door last night fell afore his bullet, an' he kin bring down one uv 'em any time he feels like it. Thar's a panther in the bushes right by the side uv 'em an'

they don't know it. An' it's a panther that will bite 'em, too, an' git away ev'ry time. Hark to that, will you?"

They heard the distant sound of a rifle shot and saw one of the Indians around the campfire sink over in the gra.s.s. The others uttered a terrific yell of rage, and a half-dozen darted away in the bushes.

"I ain't no prophet, nor the son uv a prophet," said Long Jim, "but I'll bet my scalp that in an hour or two they'll come back without Shif'less Sol."

"I won't take your bet," said Paul. "Six warriors started away in pursuit, and now we'll see how many return."

"The first will be back in an hour," said Long Jim, "'cause Sol won't leave no trail a-tall, a-tall. He made sh.o.r.e uv that afore shootin'."

"I believe you are a prophet, Jim," said Paul. "Let's watch together."

Within the appointed hour two warriors returned, bringing with them nothing that they had not taken away, and sat down in the opening, their att.i.tude that of dejection.

"They never struck no sign of no trail, nowhere, nohow," said Long Jim, exultantly.

"Too many negatives, Jim," said Paul, reprovingly.

"Too many what?" exclaimed Long Jim, staring. "I never heard of them things afore!"

"It's all right anyhow. There comes another warrior, and he too bears no bright blonde scalp, such as adorns the head of our faithful and esteemed comrade, Solomon Hyde."

"That's three 'counted fur, an' three to come. I know, Paul, that Sol will git away, that they can't foller him nohow, but I'd like fur them three to come back empty handed right now. It would be awful to lose good old Sol. Uv course he's always wrong when he argys with me, but I'm still hopin' some day to teach him somethin', an' I don't want to lose him."

Paul saw deep anxiety on the face of Long Jim. These two were always in controversy, but they were bound together by all the ties of the border, and the loss of either would be a crushing blow to the other.

Long minutes dragged by and became an hour, and the face of Jim Hart expressed apprehension.

"It's time fur at least one more to come back," he said.

"Well, there he is," said Paul. "Don't you see him stepping out of those bushes on the east?"

"Has he anything at his belt?" asked Long Jim eagerly.

"Nothing that he doesn't usually carry. He has no yellow scalp, nor any scalp of any kind. Empty he went away and empty he has returned."

"So fur, so good. Two more are left out, an' it'll now be time fur them to come trampin' back."

"Be patient, Jim, be patient."

"I am, but you must rec'lect, Paul, that thar comin' back soon means the life uv a man, a man that's one uv us five, an' that we could never furgit ef so be the Injuns took him."

"I'm not forgetting it, Jim, but I've every confidence in Shif'less Sol.

I don't believe those warriors could possibly get him."

Another half-hour dragged away, and Long Jim became more uneasy. He scanned the woods everywhere for the two missing warriors, and, at last, he drew a mighty sigh of relief when a tufted head appeared over the bushes, and a warrior returned to the opening.

"He's a Shawnee," said Long Jim. "I marked him when he went away. I kin see that he's tired an' I could tell by the bend in his shoulders that he wuz comin' back with nothin'. He's set down now, an' ez he 'pears to be talkin' I guess he's tellin' the others, to 'scuse his failure, that it wuzn't really a man that he wuz follerin', but jest a ghost or a phantom, or suthin' uv that kind. Thar ain't but one left an' he ought to be in in a few minutes."

But the few minutes and many more with them slid into the past, without bringing back the last warrior, and once more that look of deep apprehension appeared on the face of Long Jim Hart. The man should have returned long before, and Jim held him to personal accountability for it.

"I didn't like his looks when he went away," he complained to Paul. "He wuz a big feller, darker than most uv the others, an' he wuz painted somethin' horrible. I guessed by his looks that he wuz the best scout an' trailer in the band an' that he would hang on like a wolf. Ugly ez he is his face would look nice to me now, 'pearin' in that openin'. He's done outstayed his leave."

"I wouldn't be worried, Jim," said Paul. "We know what a man Sol is in the woods. No single warrior could bring him down."

"That's so. Sol's terrible smart, but then anybody might be ambushed. I tell you, Paul, that wuz the wickedest lookin' warrior I ever saw. His eyes wuz plum' full uv old Satan."

"Why, Jim, we are too far away for you to have seen anything of that kind."

"I know that's so at usual times, but them eyes uv his wuz shinin' so terrible bright with meanness that I caught thar look like the gleam uv a burnin' gla.s.s. I reckon he wuz the wust savage in all these woods. All but him hev come back more 'n a half-hour ago, an' I'm beginnin' to hev a sort uv creepy feelin'."

"Hark!" exclaimed Henry, who had been standing almost in the mouth of the opening.

"What is it, Henry? What is it?" exclaimed Long Jim eagerly.

"That strong wind brought the sound of a rifle shot. It was so faint and far away that it was no more than the snapping of a little twig, but it was a rifle shot and no mistake. Sol and that warrior have met."

"And who fired the bullet? And who received it? That's what we'd like to know!" said Paul.

Complete silence succeeded the shot. Evidently the Indians around the campfire had not heard it, as they showed no signs of interest, but the four in the mouth of the cavern waited in painful anxiety, their eyes turned toward the point from which the report had come. At last the scalp lock appeared above the bushes and four hearts sank. Then the figure of the warrior came completely into view and four hearts sprang up again. The man's left arm was held stiffly by his side and he was walking with weakness. Nor did any bright blonde scalp hang from his waist or any other part of his body.

"I knowed it! I knowed it!" exclaimed Long Jim, triumphantly. "He come too close to Sol, an' got a bullet in his arm. It must hev been a long shot or he must hev been nearly hid, else he would now be layin' dead in the bushes. But ez it is he's sh.o.r.ely got enough to last him fur a long time."

Paul was less vocal, but like the others he shared in the triumph of the shiftless one.

"I'll admit I was worried for a while," he said, "but Sol has given us one more proof that he can take care of himself any time and anywhere."

"And he has also proved to our besiegers," said Henry, "that every hour they spend there they're in peril of a bullet from the bush. I think it will give them a most disturbing feeling."

Henry was right, and he was also right in some of his earlier surmises.

Red Eagle and Blackstaffe departed to join the main army, leaving Braxton Wyatt in command of the besieging band which had been reinforced by a half-dozen warriors. Wyatt, animated by wicked pa.s.sion, was resolved not to leave until he could kill or take those in the little fortress, but he was upset by the certainty that one of the terrible five was outside. He had believed from the first that it was Henry Ware, and, when their best warrior came in shot through the arm, he was sure of it.

The warriors shared his state of mind. Their losses had inflamed them tremendously and all of them were willing to stay and risk everything for eventual triumph. Yet a terror soon fell upon them. The single marksman who roamed the woods sent a bullet singing directly through the camp, and the search for him failed as before. An hour later another who went down to the brook for water was shot through the shoulder.

Wyatt saw that in spite of their desire for revenge superst.i.tious fears were developing, and in order to prevent their spread he organized a camp, surrounded by sentinels whom nothing could escape. Then he awaited the night.

Henry and his comrades had heard the second shot and they had seen the man whose shoulder had been pierced by the bullet, run toward the others leaving a red trail behind him, but they were not alarmed this time, as n.o.body left the camp. Evidently the warriors, stout-hearted though they were, did not care to trail the shiftless one once more, and in the growing dusk, too, when they would be at the mercy of his rifle.