The Quest of the Four Part 21

Middleton sprang upon a wagon tongue, and, standing very quiet, looked slowly around the circle of defenders, all of whom bent their eyes upon him. They were a motley group, Americans mostly, but with a scattering of a dozen European nationalities among them. The majority of them were bareheaded, with necks and chests uncovered, and all were stained black or brown with a mixture of perspiration, dust, and burnt gunpowder. The majority of them were young, some but little older than Phil himself.

They looked very curiously at Middleton as he stood upon the wagon pole.

Already all knew that he was an officer in the regular army. In the distance hung the dark fringe of Mexicans and Comanches, but, for the moment, only the sentinels paid any attention to them.

"Men," cried Middleton, "you have beaten off the attack of the Mexicans and the Comanches, and you can do it again as often as they come! I know that, and so do you!"

He was stopped for a few seconds by a great cheer, and then he resumed:

"We can beat them off, but the road to Santa Fe has now become impossible. Moreover, the nation with which we are at war holds Santa Fe, and to go there would be merely to march into prison or worse. We can't turn back. You are not willing to go back to New Orleans, are you?"

"Never!" they cried in one voice.

Middleton smiled. He was appealing deftly to the pride of these men, and he had known the response before it came.

"Then if we can neither go on to Santa Fe nor turn back to New Orleans,"

he said, "we must either start to the north or to the south."

He was speaking now with the greatest fervor. His face flushed deeply, and they hung upon his words.

"To the north lies the wilderness," he said, "stretching away for thousands of miles to the Arctic Ocean. To the south there are plains reaching down to a river, broad, shallow, and yellow, and somewhere along that river armies are fighting, armies of our own people and armies of the Mexicans with whom we are now at war. Which way shall we go, north or south?"

"South!" was roared forth in one tremendous voice. Again Middleton smiled. Again he had known before it came the response that would be spoken.

"Then south it is," he said, "and we make for Taylor's army on the Rio Grande. You will find there a better market for what you carry in your wagons than you would have found at Santa Fe, and you're likely to find something else, also, that I know you won't shirk."

"Fighting!" roared forth that tremendous voice once more.

"Yes, fighting," said Middleton, as he sprang down from the pole and rejoined Woodfall.

"That was clever talk," said Bill Breakstone, "but he knew his ground before he sowed the seed. These are just the sort of lads who will be glad to go south to Taylor, breaking their way through any Mexicans or Indians who may get across their path.

"He said north He said south, What's the choice?

We spoke forth, It was south, With one voice.

And now, unless I'm mightily mistaken, we'll fare forth upon our journey, as the knights of old would say. This is a good camp for defense, but not for siege. It lacks water. You just watch, Phil, and you'll see a wrinkle or two in plains work worth knowing."

The men began to hitch the horses to the wagons, but they were interrupted in the task by a horseman who rode forth from the Mexican column, carrying a white handkerchief on the point of a lance. He was joined by two Indian chiefs riding on either side of him. Phil instantly recognized all three. The white man was Pedro de Armijo, and the Indians were Black Panther and Santana.

"They want a big talk," said Bill Breakstone. "I fear the Greeks bearing gifts, and also a lot of other people who smile at you while they hold daggers behind their backs, but I suppose our side will hear what they have to say."

Middleton and Woodfall were already mounting to ride forth, and Middleton beckoned to Phil.

"Come, Phil," he said. "They are three, and we should be three, also.

You can call yourself the secretary of the meeting if you like."

Phil sprang eagerly upon his horse, proud of the privilege and the honor, and rode forth with them. The Mexican and the two Comanches were coming on slowly and gravely. Four hundred yards behind them, Mexicans and Indians, all on horseback, were now gathered in a broad dark line, sitting motionless and watching. Their three envoys sat on their horses midway between the hostile forces, and the three Americans, meeting them there, stopped face to face. De Armijo looked at Middleton and smiled slightly, ironically. His bearing was proud, and was evidently meant to be disdainful. One would have thought that he was a victor, receiving an emba.s.sy about to sue for peace. Middleton returned his gaze steadfastly, but his face expressed nothing. He looked once at Phil, and the boy thought he saw something singular in the glance, as if he impinged somehow upon the mind of the Mexican, but in a moment the look of de Armijo pa.s.sed.

"I have come, Captain Middleton," said the young Mexican, "to save bloodshed, if you are willing to listen to reason. You will observe what forces have come against you. We have here a numerous body of Mexican cavalry, the finest in the world, and we have also the flower of the Comanche nation, the bravest of the Indian warriors. In victory, the Mexicans are humane and merciful, but the Indian nature is different. Excited and impa.s.sioned, it finds vent in terrible deeds.

Therefore, as you are surrounded and cannot escape, we ask you to surrender now, and save the lives of your men."

It was hard for Phil to restrain an exclamation at this piece of presumption, but Middleton received it gravely. His face was still without expression. Nevertheless, his reply was barbed.

"Your demand seems inopportune, Lieutenant de Armijo," he replied. "You can scarcely have forgotten, since it occurred less than an hour ago, the defeat of both your cavalry and your Comanche allies. Perhaps we are unduly confident, but we feel that we can do so again, as often as needed."

De Armijo frowned. He glanced at his Indian comrades. Phil wondered if he had been deceiving them with promises of what the invincible Mexican lancers could and would do. But the two savages made no response.

Their coppery faces did not move.

"Thus, then, is your final answer, Captain Middleton," said de Armijo.

"It is," replied Middleton. "It is not the custom for victors to surrender. So we bid you good day, Lieutenant de Armijo."

As he spoke, he saluted and turned his horse. Woodfall and Phil saluted and turned with him. The Mexican returned the salute with a gloved hand, but the Indians turned stolidly without a sign. Then the two parties rode away in opposite directions, each to its own men. Phil dismounted at the wagons, and was met by Breakstone and Arenberg with eager questions.

"What did that yellow Mex. want, Sir Philip of the Council?" asked Breakstone.

"As he has just given us such a severe thrashing," replied Phil, "he demanded our immediate and unconditional surrender. He said that if we acceded to this demand only one-tenth of us would be shot, but he made it a special condition that a renowned scout, sharpshooter, white warrior, and talker, one William Breakstone, be shot first and at once, as a terrible example, in the presence of both victor and vanquished.

Immediately after him one Hans Arenberg, a very dangerous and blood-thirsty man, was to share the same fate. If we refused this gentle alternative, we were all to be killed, and then scalped by the savages."

"Of course, Sir Philip," said Bill Breakstone, "they've put a just value on me, but I surmise that the jest doth leap from your nimble tongue.

Now the truth!"

"De Armijo and the Indian chiefs did really demand our surrender," said Phil. "They said we could not escape. They talked as if they were the victors and we the beaten."

"Now, by my troth, that is a merry jest!" exclaimed Bill Breakstone.

"When do we lay down our arms? Is it within the next five minutes, or do we even take fifteen?"

"You can surrender if you want to, Bill," said Phil, "but n.o.body else has any notion of doing so. The rest, I think, are going to march southward at once, Mexicans or no Mexicans, Comanches or no Comanches."

"Well spoken," said Bill Breakstone, "and I will even help in the march."

A roar that might easily have been called a shout of defiance came from the men of the train, when the story of the council was told. Then, with increased zeal, they fell to the work of girding up for the march and battle. The insolent demand of de Armijo added new fire to their courage. Cheerful voices arose, the rattle of bridle-bits, the occasional neigh of a horse, men singing s.n.a.t.c.hes of song, generally lines from sentimental ballads, and the clink of bullets as they were counted and dropped into their pouches. Some of these sounds were of war, but Phil found the whole effect buoyant and encouraging. He caught the spirit, and whistled a lilting air as he, too, worked by the side of Bill Breakstone.

The boy soon saw the plan. Gradually the circle of wagons formed itself into two parallel lines, the noses of the horses or mules almost touching the rear of the wagon in front of them. Outside and on either side, but close to the wagons, rode the armed hors.e.m.e.n, two formidable lines, who, if hard pressed, could take refuge and shelter between the parallel rows of wagons. Moreover, the wagons handled by such cool and skillful men could be turned in a crisis, and even under fire, into a circle again, with the animals in the center. Phil understood the arrangement thoroughly, admired it tremendously, and was sure that the master mind of Middleton had directed everything. He glanced at the Mexicans and Comanches. They were still hovering in a great dark ma.s.s about a thousand yards away, and Phil knew that they were watching every movement of the Americans with the most intense curiosity.

Middleton and Woodfall rode to the head of the train. The loud command: "March!" was given. Every driver cracked his whip at the same time, the whole making a report like the sudden crash of many rifles, and the train began to move slowly across the plain, every armed man on either side holding his finger on the trigger of his rifle.

Phil was just behind Bill Breakstone, and both of them looked back at the enemy. Phil wondered what the Mexicans and Comanches would do, but he did not believe they would allow the train to depart unmolested, despite the fact that their face had already been well burned. He saw the hostile columns advance at about an even pace with the train, but he judged that there was uncertainty in their ranks. The Americans bore a certain resemblance to a modern armored train, and such men as de Armijo, Black Panther, and Santana were wary, despite their great excess of numbers.

The train moved forward at a slow but steady pace, but now its head was turned almost due south instead of west. Before them rolled the plains as usual, green with a gra.s.s not yet dried by the summer suns. Here and there appeared strange flowering shrubs, peculiar to the Texas uplands, but no trees broke the view. The plains rolled away until they died under the horizon of reddish gold that seemed an interminable distance away. There was little sound now but that of the turning wheels, the creaking of the axles, and the hoofbeats of many scores of horses and mules. The men were almost completely silent, and this silence, in itself, was strange, because the very atmosphere was impregnated with war. At any moment they might be in deadly conflict; yet they rode on, saying nothing.

Behind them came the Mexicans and Comanches in a double column, preserving the same distance of about a thousand yards, they, too, riding in silence, save for their hoofbeats. The dead evidently had been left as they fell or put in hasty graves, while the wounded were carried on horses in the rear. Phil looked back again and again at this singular pursuit, which, for the present, seemed no pursuit at all--at least, not hostile. It reminded him of the silent but tenacious manner in which wolves followed a great deer. While fearing his antlers and sharp hoofs, they would hang on and hang on, and in the end would drag down the quarry. Would that be the fate of the train?

"It's pretty good country for traveling," said Bill Breakstone cheerily, "and I don't see that anything is interrupting us. Except that we pa.s.s over one swell after another, the road is smooth and easy. What fine gra.s.sy plains these are, Phil, and look! yonder are antelopes grazing to the north of us. They've raised their heads to see, if they can, what we are, and what is that crowd behind us. They're just eaten up with curiosity."

Phil saw the herd of antelope come nearer. They were on a swell, in black silhouette against a red sun, and they were exaggerated to three or four times their real size. Phil was something of a philosopher, and he reflected that they were safe in the presence of so many men, because the men were not seeking game, but one another. The train moved on, and the herd of antelope dropped behind and out of sight. Still there was no demonstration from the enemy, who yet came on, in two columns, at the same distance of about a thousand yards, the sunlight gleaming on the lances of both Mexicans and Comanches. It began to seem to Phil as if they would always continue thus. Nevertheless, it was hard on the nerves, this incessant watching, as if one were guarding against a beast that might spring at any moment. Moreover, their force looked so large.

But Phil glanced at the long-barreled rifles that the men of the train carried. They had proved far more than a match for muskets and lances.

"Will they attack us?" he asked Arenberg.

"Much harm iss meant," replied the German, "but they will not seek to do it until they think they see a chance. It iss time only that will tell."