The Westerners Part 4

They surrounded him in a voluble and indignant group, and listened to him with sympathy, casting glances of scorn toward their pa.s.sive lords and masters in the background. In their way they became as excited as Lafond. One or two wept. Most employed the variety of their vocabularies in giving the world what is known as a "piece of their minds."

In the still air of a prairie morning their hysterical cackle rose like the crying of an indignant band of brant. Lafond told, dramatically, what should have been done. The women, in turn, told how effectively they would have done it. The men were taking stock of the situation.

The mountaineers wasted little discussion on what might have been done.

The question before them was that of the most practical method of returning over the long miles of prairie they had traversed in their pursuit of Alfred and his outfit. They entertained not a moment's doubt as to the necessity of the return. Their equipment consisted now of ten horses and six wagons. By humoring the animals they might be able to get through with a pair to each schooner. This meant the abandonment of one of the wagons, and the lightening of the others. It was decided. One of the men strode to the group of women.

Lafond was in the midst of a tirade, but when he saw the mountaineer approach, he prepared to pay eager attention to the plan of action.

"H'yar," announced the latter, with a little the heavier shading on his accustomed drawl, "that's enough of this h'yar jaw, I reckon. You-all come along and pack up."

"And when is it that we do pursue them?" asked Lafond eagerly.

"Pursue nothin'," replied the man. "We're goin' back."

There was a moment's silence.

"And you intend not to get that revenge?" the half-breed inquired.

"Revenge!" snorted the man. "You d.a.m.n fool--with _that_ outfit?" He swept a descriptive gesture toward the women. "Besides, what's the good now?" Lafond fell silent, and withdrew from the group.

The man of mixed blood is not like other men, and cannot be judged by the standards of either race. From his ancestors he takes qualities haphazard, without balance or proportion, so that the defects of virtues may often occur without the a.s.sistance of the virtues themselves. And, besides, he develops traits native to neither of the parent races, traits which perhaps can never be comprehended by us who call ourselves the saner people. He is superst.i.tious, given to strange impulses, which may unexpectedly, and without reason, harden into convictions; obscure in his ends; unscrupulous in his means. No man lives who can predict what may or may not suffice to set into motion the machinery of his pa.s.sions. A triviality is enough to-day.

To-morrow the stroke of a sledge may not even jar the cogs. But, once started, the results may be tremendous, and quite out of proportion to the first careless touch on the lever. Such pa.s.sions are dangerous, both to their possessor and to those who stand in their way.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A SIOUX COUNCIL]

Now, from the gainsaying of his lesser revenge--the proving to Billy Knapp the futility of his objections--Lafond conceived the desire for a greater. There entered into his life one of those absorbing pa.s.sions which are to be encountered in all their intensity only in such men as he--pa.s.sions which come to be ruling motives in the lives of those who harbor them; gathering to themselves all lesser forces which are spread more evenly over saner existences; losing their first burning intensity, perhaps, but becoming thereby only the more sustained, cool, and deadly; so that at the last they lie unnoticed in the background of the man's ordinary life, coloring, influencing every act--a religion to which, without anger, but without relenting, he bends every long-planned effort of even his trivial and daily deeds. You may not understand this, unless you have known a half-breed; but it is true.

Interrupted in the midst of his flow of anger, and deprived of the immediate solace of shooting things at his enemies, Lafond fell into a sulking fit. During the rest of the day he brooded. After dark that night he wound his way silently through the gra.s.ses, crept up behind the solitary sentinel considered necessary in this peaceful country, stabbed the man in the back, and returned to camp. Thus his way was clear. Then he took from the wagons three slabs of bacon, a small sack of coffee, a large supply of powder, lead, and caps, a blanket, and a frying-pan and cup. With these he mounted the hill, past the dead sentinel, to the ponies. Two of the latter he drew apart from the herd. One of them he saddled; the other he packed with his supplies.

Then the half-breed led them silently westward for a good half-mile.

Then he mounted and rode away.

VI

THE WOMAN AND THE MAN

The wagon-train under the command of Billy Knapp, and Alfred, and Jim Buckley had a very hard trip before they were done with it. The only difficulty they did not encounter was lack of water. There was too much of that. Several times the party had to camp in one spot for days while the wagons were laboriously warped across rivers of mud and quicksand, with steep, slippery clay banks. How little Prue stood the journey so well, neither her father, her mother, nor the men of the party were able to divine; but she did, and, what is more, she seemed to think it great fun. So cheerful was she, and so sunny, that the men came to grudge each other her company. And as for Mrs. Prue and the doctor, who could help loving the patient sweetness of the one, or the pathetic, gentle, impracticable kindness of the other?

Yes, it was a hard journey; but somehow the feeling was not entirely of joy and relief when the stockade of Frenchman's Creek shimmered across the broad, flat foot-hills. There they separated. The dangers were over.

Then, to the surprise of everyone, the doctor waked up and knew just where he wanted to go. He displayed an unexpected familiarity with the general topography of the hills. It puzzled Billy. And, to the vaster astonishment of both his _confreres_, Jim suddenly announced, with quite unwonted volubility, that he had been intending all along to start in prospecting at the end of this trip, and that here he meant to quit scouting and leave the society of his brothers in arms--unless, of course, he added, as a doubtful afterthought, they wanted to join him.

They profanely replied that they did not.

Most of the men pushed on immediately to Rockerville, whither a majority of the former inhabitants of Frenchman's Creek had already emigrated. Alfred and Billy decided to get over in the Limestone for a "big hunt" before returning East. Prue said good-by to them with real feeling, and most of them threw out their chests and were very gruff and rude because they were sorry to leave. Prue understood. They were kind-hearted men, after all, these rough pioneers. Billy remembered for almost two years how she looked when she said that, which was extraordinary for Billy. He had led so varied a life as pony-express rider, stage-driver, scout, Indian, bronco-buster, hunter, and trapper, that he had little room in his memory for anything short of bloodshed or a triumph for himself.

Finally, after all the rest had gone, Jim and the doctor made the mutually delightful discovery that they had selected the same locality, the one for his prospecting, the other for his scientific investigations. So the doctor simply left his outfit in Jim's wagon, and they all went up together.

The little scientist was as excited as a child. To him the country was as a doc.u.ment--a doc.u.ment which he had studied thoroughly in the pocket editions. He now had it before him in the original ma.n.u.script, open and unabridged.

And indeed, even to an ordinary observer, the Black Hills are a strange series of formations.

They run north and south at the westernmost edge of the northern prairie, and are, altogether, about as large as the State of Vermont.

Unlike other ranges, they possess no one ridge that serves as a backbone to the system. The separate peaks rise tumultuously, like the rip of seas in a tideway, without connection, solitary, sombre.

Between them lie deep gorges, or broad stretches of gra.s.s-park, which dip away and away, until one catches the breath at the grand free sweep of them. Huge castellated dikes crop up from the ridge-tops like ramparts. Others rise parallel in the softest verdure, guarding between their perpendicular sides streets as narrow and clean-cut as the alleys of a city of skysc.r.a.pers.

Through it all, back and forth, like the walls of a labyrinth, run the broken, twisted, faintly defined geological systems, which cross each other so frequently and so vigorously that all semblance of order is lost in the tumultuous upheaval. Here are strata deposited by the miocene tertiary; here are breakings forth of metamorphic rocks of many periods; here are the complex results of diverse influences and forces.

Down in the south is a great cavern--of which ninety-seven miles and twenty-five hundred rooms have, at this writing, been explored--which was once the interior of a geyser. For ages it spouted; for ages more its fluids crystallized and petrified into varied and beautiful forms; and then, finally, many layers of stratified rock were slowly overlaid to seal forever this dried-out, beautiful, lifeless mummy of a cave.

It lies there now, as it has lain through the centuries, with a single, tiny opening by which it can be entered--a palace of vast re-echoing halls, hung with jewels, a horror-haunted honeycomb of unsounded depths, a solemn abode wherein not the faintest drip of water, not the gentlest sigh of air through the corridors, breaks the eternal silence.

Only its mouth roars continually as the winds rush in or out. The Indians a.s.sign to it the spirits of their dead warriors, and cannot be induced to approach it. Geologists rave over it, and cannot be persuaded to come away.

But this is in the latter day of railroads and tenderfeet. At the time of which this story treats, little was known of the country. It was simply a great second-hand shop, of a little of everything in the geological line.

When the party arrived at Spanish Gulch, the doctor was so eager to get into the wonderful hills that only with the greatest difficulty did he constrain himself to help Jim erect a log cabin for the accommodation of his family. Even then he was not of much use, although he could at least help to lift timbers. Jim practically did it alone, and it took him almost a month; but when it was done, it was very nice. The doctor accepted the free gift of the scout's labor and skill quite as a matter of course, just as he had taken the free gift of an ordinarily expensive pilotage across the plains; but the woman appreciated, and perhaps she understood, for she suddenly became very shy in Jim's presence. And then, sometimes, she would gaze at him, when he was not looking, with an adoration of grat.i.tude filling her eyes.

After the doctor's home was finished, Jim betook himself into another gulch, where he constructed a less elaborate shelter for his own occupation. Thenceforward he spent much of his time in mysterious prospecting operations; but two or three times a week he liked to sit perfectly silent under the tree which overshadowed the doctor's cabin, watching Prue, if she happened to be near, playing with Miss Prue, or trying to talk with the doctor. He never went inside the house, even in the winter; and he never seemed to try to know Prue any more intimately. It would have been difficult for him to say just what pleasure he discovered in these visits.

After a little, the routine of life became fixed. The doctor took up his work systematically. Each morning he plunged into the hills. His little bent form moved from ridge to ridge, following his own especial leads as earnestly as the most eager gold prospector of them all.

Sometimes he got lost, but generally he managed to reach home at sunset. He was entirely preoccupied. He ate his meals as they were set before him without question, he pulled on his well-mended clothes without noticing the new patches, he warmed himself before his fire without a thought of whence came the wood, blazing up the mud-chimney.

Prue at first wondered a little at this, for even in his intensest absorption the doctor's home-life had been much to him; but in time she came to appreciate his mood, and to rely on herself even more than usual. She had such an exalted opinion of his work that she easily fell into the habit of sacrificing herself to it. She watched for the things that pleased him, or, rather, did not bother him, for his pleasures were negative; she carefully excluded all disturbing influences, and came to look on this lonely time as only a probation, sooner or later to be over, after which, in the fulness of his success, he would turn to her with his old love. To hasten this she would have cut off her right hand.

So, much to the disgust of Jim Buckley, the brave little woman took the management of things upon herself. During the long days, while the doctor was away, she schemed to make both ends meet. She raised a few vegetables in a plot of open ground on the sunny side of the creek, working in it daily with an old spade. Her face was hidden in the depths of a sunbonnet, and her hands were covered with a pair of deerskin gauntlets, for she could not forget, poor woman! that she was gently bred, and she hated to see her skin reddening in the dry air of the hills.

Items of necessity she bought scantily, sparingly, of travelling pedlars, for prices were high. Candles for the winter, corn-meal, occasionally flour, coffee, sugar--all these counted. Things cost so much more here than she had antic.i.p.ated. Prue saw the end coming, distant though it might be. She sometimes did little bits of mending for pa.s.sing miners, and was paid for it. Oftener she skimped on the daily meals, pretending that she was tired and did not care to eat.

The doctor never noticed, nor did she mean that he should.

In the presence of his work, he could think of nothing else. Once, when they ran out of wood, she told him of it. It worried him for a week. Material necessities drew his mind away from the att.i.tude of calm scientific investigation. The pile of fuel that goes with every new shack lasted the first winter through. After that was gone, Prue used the chips made when the house was built, as long as they held out.

Then she tried to chop down a tree herself. Jim Buckley found her sitting on a stone, the axe between her knees, her face buried in her hands. Beside her was a pine scarred at random with weak, ill-directed blows. He made a few profane remarks into his thick beard concerning the doctor, then took the axe from her, and started to work. In a week enough firewood was piled over against the house to last the winter.

During that week he ate his noon meals in the little cabin. The woman did her best, and used up a fortnight's provisions in the attempt to make a respectable showing before the hungry man. But in spite of that he saw through her pitiful efforts, and offered to let her have money.

She drew herself up and showed him the door. When he had gone, bewildered, she went out and looked at the white shining wood-pile and wept bitterly.

But in spite of economy the closest, and the sacrifice of absolutely every non-essential, the time came when the last cent had gone. The woman stood face to face with want. And, as ill-luck would have it, at this period the doctor was especially br.i.m.m.i.n.g with enthusiasm, for he had almost achieved the one result he needed to fill out his scheme.

He worked feverishly to forestall the snow. He was full of his system, alternating between glowing enthusiasm and a haunting fear that the winter would set in too early. He must have uninterrupted time for work until then, he said. On this depended his professional reputation, their fortune.

She set her lips firmly and looked about her. The flour and meal were gone; there were no candles, and without candles how could the doctor put the last touches to his book when winter fell? Little light filtered through the oiled paper of the windows. She sold her ring to some pa.s.sing gamblers. The money soon slipped away. For a few days she fought hard with her pride. Then she put on her sunbonnet, and, kissing the child tenderly, went, with heightened color, down the gulch to Jim Buckley's.

She found him sitting on a stump in front of his dirt-roofed shack, pounding into sand some quartz in an iron mortar. He did not hear her until she stood beside him. Then he arose, drawing his gaunt form up quickly, taking off his broad hat, and wiping his grimy hands on his jeans.

"Mr. Buckley," she said hurriedly, before he could speak, "I have come to tell you how sorry I am that I was so rude to you. You have been very kind to me, and I had no right to speak to you as I did. No, no!"

she implored, as Jim opened his mouth to expostulate. "I must tell you that, and _please_ don't interrupt me.

"My husband is doing some very valuable work," Prue continued, "very valuable, and when he gets it done he will be very famous and very rich. But just now it takes all his time and attention, so that he doesn't realize--how--poor--we--are." The little woman's cheeks burned, and she lowered her head until the sunbonnet hid her face. "Of course, if I should tell him," she went on proudly, "he would attend to it at once. But I mustn't do that. He needs _such_ a little time to finish his work, and I mustn't--must I?" And she suddenly looked up into Jim's honest eyes with an imploring gesture.

Jim was standing, his broad hat against his knee, looking at her fixedly. No doubt he was thinking how, when he had first seen her, her cheeks were as full and ripe as the apples of his old home in New England; and was wondering if the dip of strata were worth this.

Seeing that he intended no reply, she looked down again and went on.

"I came here to see you about that. Once, Mr. Buckley, you offered to lend me some money, and I--I--am afraid I was very rude. And now--oh, dear!" And suddenly the poor little figure in faded and patched calico sank to the ground, and began to sob as if her heart would break.