The Plow-Woman Part 17

"There's Soggy, that Phil Kearney fellow----"

The colonel gave a grunt of disgust. "In jail at Omaha," he said.

"Played cards with a galoot who had some aces in his boot-tops. Plugged him."

"What's the matter with your Rees?"

"That's just it! You see, that bunch of Sioux out there"--he jerked his head toward the stockade--"helped in a bit of treachery two summers ago.

Rounded up some friendly Rees at a dance and scalped 'em. So--there's poison for you! In this business on hand I couldn't trust even my head scout." He began pacing the floor. "Anyway, sign language, when there are terms to be made and kept, isn't worth a hang!"

"I wish I could suggest a man," said Lounsbury. "Fact is, Colonel, I'm terribly worried myself. I came to ask you for help in some trouble----"

The old soldier threw up his hands. "Trouble!" he cried. "Why I'm simply daft with it! Look at that!" He pointed to the farthest side of the room.

It was dimly lighted there. Lounsbury stepped forward and peered down--then recoiled, as startled as if he had happened upon something dead. On the floor was a man--a man whose back was bent rounding, and whose arms and legs were hugged up against his abdomen and chest. Torso and limbs were alike, frightfully shrunken; the hands, mere claws.

Lounsbury could not see the face. But the hair was uncovered, and it was the hair that made him "goose-flesh" from head to heel. It was white--not the white of old age, with glancing tints of silver or yellow--but the dead white of an agony that had withered it to the roots. Circling it, and separating the scalp from the face and neck, ran a narrow fringe that was still brown, as if, changing in a night, it had lacked full time for completion.

Lounsbury could not take his eyes from the huddled shape. Colonel c.u.mmings paused beside him. "This morning," he said, speaking in an undertone, "a sentry signalled from beyond the barracks. Two or three men took guns and ran out. They found this. His clothes were stiff with ice. He was almost frozen, though he had been travelling steadily. He was utterly worn out, and was crawling forward on his hands and knees."

The ragged sleeves and trousers, stained darker from the wounds on elbows and knees, were mute testimony. "He couldn't see," continued the colonel. "He was snow-blind. They laid him out on a drift and rubbed him. The surgeon did the rest. He begged to see me. They brought him in, and he told his story. It's an old one--you've heard it. But it's always new, too. This is Frank Jamieson, a young----"

As he heard his name, the man stirred, straightened his legs and let fall his arms. He looked up.

"Young!" gasped Lounsbury. "Good G.o.d!" The face was aged like the hair!

Jamieson struggled weakly to his feet, using the wall to brace him.

Colonel c.u.mmings hastened across and lent the support of an arm. "No, no," he protested. "You mustn't talk. You're too weak."

But Jamieson did not heed. "You an interpreter?" he asked in a rasping whisper.

"You're too weak----"

"No, I ain't; no, I ain't. If he'll go with us, I'm strong enough--why, I shovelled snow on the special to Bismarck--that's how they let me ride--and skating home I didn't stop to rest----"

"Yes, yes, my boy, we know."

"I walked and walked--straps broke--I forgot to tell you--that's why I had to. But it didn't do any good--it didn't do any good! When I got there----" As if to shut out some terrible sight, he screened his eyes with one palsied hand, and sank back limply into Colonel c.u.mmings' arms.

Lounsbury swept the cot clean of maps, and they laid him there.

"His father was dead," said the commanding officer; "dead--and naked, scalped, mutilated, full of arrows and rifle b.a.l.l.s. The house and barns were burned."

"Any women?"

"Two--gone."

Jamieson put out his arms. "My mother!" he cried imploringly. "My poor little mother!"

Lounsbury knelt beside him, feeling shaken and half sick.

"If I could only 'a' been there! But I was 'way off at St. Paul. I knew something was wrong when the letters stopped."

"But you must buck up, Jamieson," said the colonel, "so you can help us."

"I will, oh, I will."

"How'd you get down here?" asked Lounsbury.

"I didn't eat for a long time. I was crazy. The snow blinded me, and I was hungry. But I didn't leave the river--I knew enough for that--they found me."

"You think the women are alive, Colonel?" asked the storekeeper.

"Undoubtedly, and with the other half of the very band we've got here--somewhere up in the Big Horn country." He took a turn up and down the room.

"May I ask your plan?"

"We are in fine shape to talk terms to the captors. I'll send a command to them, demanding the women. If they are not surrendered, I'll hang four of the redskins I've got here, Lame Foot, the medicine-man, and Chiefs Standing Buffalo, Canada John, and Shoot-at-the-Tree--all ringleaders. Then the rest of the band will be put on a reservation. If the Jamieson women are alive, and they send 'em in, I won't hang the chiefs."

"When'll the command start?"

"Three hours after we get an interpreter. I've sent word up to Custer at Lincoln. But the delay! Think what it means to those women!"

"It was about two women that I wished to speak," said Lounsbury. He felt apologetic, however, the one danger was so trifling beside the other.

Colonel c.u.mmings listened. "Those girls had better come here," he said, as the storekeeper finished. "Then they'd be safe enough. I remember seeing one of 'em the day we got back. She was a fine-looking young woman."

"There are two arguments against their coming, sir. For legal reasons, it's best they should not vacate the shack or leave the claim."

"I see."

"And, again, the father is--well, he's rather sore about the war."

"You don't say!"

"So, if you could give me a couple of men to take my place now and then during the night--the situation is temporary, you see, the father'll be back in a few days."

"There are very strong reasons against my acting in the matter. I'm here to keep an eye on Indians. The settlers are expected to go to the civil authorities when they have quarrels. Now, I'd like to mix up with Shanty Town, for instance. Our guard-room is jammed with men who've been drugged over there with vile whisky. Yet I can't. I can only punish my men."

"I know that's so."

"Of course, I shan't see defenceless women suffer----"

Lounsbury was piqued. "Not altogether defenceless, Colonel. But I can't stay at the shack----"

"True, true. Why not ask Mrs. Martin, Major Appleton's sister, to go over. Then you might guard from the barn, if they have one."

"That's a splendid suggestion, sir. It would solve the difficulty."

"I'd be glad to speak to Mrs. Martin about it." He thought a moment, pa.s.sing a hand over his clean-shaven face. "You'd have to be relieved even then, John, I should think."