CHAPTER III.
BIRDS OF PREY.
Once clear of the buffalo-hunters' camp, MacRae and I paired off andspeedily began to compare notes, where we had been, what we had done,how the world had used us in the five years since we had seen each otherlast. And although we gabbled freely enough, MacRae avoided all mentionof the persons of whom I most wished to hear. I didn't press him, for Iknew that something out of the common must have happened, else he wouldnot have been wearing the Queen's scarlet, and I didn't care to bring upa subject that might prove a sore one with him. But men we had known andtrails we had followed furnished us plenty of grist for theconversational mill. Our talk ranged from the Panhandle to the Canadaline, while our horses jogged steadily southward.
Dark came down on the four of us as we topped Manyberries Ridge, andseven or eight miles of rolling prairie still lay between us andPend d' Oreille. If Mac had been alone he would have made the post bysundown, for the Mounted Police rode picked horses, the best money couldbuy. But it was a long jaunt to Benton, and the rest of us were inclinedto an easier pace, that we might husband the full strength of ourgrass-fed mounts for any emergency that should arise on the way.
With the coming of night a pall of clouds blew out of the west,blanketing the stars and shutting off their hazy light completely, andwhen the sky was banked full from horizon to horizon, the dark envelopedus like a black sea-mist. Once or twice we startled a little bunch ofbuffalo, and listened to the thud of their hoofs as they fled throughthe sultry, velvet gloom; but for the most our ride was attended by nosounds save the night song of frogs in the upland sloughs and the hollowclank of steel bits keeping time to the creak of saddle-leather.
Halfway down the long slope MacRae and I, riding in the lead, pulled upto make a cigarette on the brink of a straight-walled coulee that wecould sense but not see. As I waited for Mac to strike a match my eyesroved about, seeking to pierce the unnatural blackness that wrappeditself about us, and while my gaze was for an instant fixed on thenight-enshrouded canyon, a red tongue of flame flashed out for a momentin the inky shadow below. MacRae saw it also, and held the matchunstruck.
"Must be somebody camped down there," I hazarded.
"A camp-fire would hardly flash and die out like that, Sarge," heanswered thoughtfully. "At least, not an ordinary one. There are somefolk in this country, you know, who manifest a very retiring dispositionat times. That looks to me like a blind fire or a signal. Let's wait aminute."
We sat there on our horses, grouped close together, a minute thatlengthened to five; then MacRae broke off in the middle of a sentence asthe flare leaped up, flickered an instant, and was blotted out again. Icould have sworn I heard a cry, and one of my men spoke in a tone thatassured me my imagination had not been playing a trick.
"Hear that?" he asked eagerly. "Somebody hollered down there."
"I don't much like that," MacRae said, in a low tone. "I have a hunchthat something crooked is going on, and I reckon I'll go down and seewhat that fire means. You fellows better go a little farther and waitfor me."
"Not on your life," I protested. "You might run into most any kind offormation. We'll go in a bunch, if we go at all."
"Might be Injuns," Bruce Haggin put in. "An', anyhow, whatever playcomes up, four men's a heap better'n one. If you're bound t' mix in,why, lead the way. I'm kinda curious about what's down there m'self."
So near to the post it was that MacRae almost knew the feel of theground underfoot. He led us a hundred yards along the rim of the bankand stopped again.
"This is as good a place as any, but you'll have to get down and leadyour horses," he warned. "It's a devil of a scramble from here to thebottom."
We dismounted, and speedily found that MacRae hadn't exaggerated theevil qualities of that descent. If there had been boulders on thathillside the noise of our coming would have alarmed a deaf man; but thesoft dirt and slippery grass gave out no sound, though we slid andtumbled and dug in our heels for a foothold till the sweat streamed downour cheeks.
At the bottom we mounted again and followed MacRae in a cautious filearound clumps of willow and rustling quaking-asp to the place where theblaze should have shown. But no glint of fire appeared in any direction;the coulee-bottom lay more dark and silent, if that were possible, thanthe gloomy hills above. Perplexed, MacRae halted, and we bunchedtogether, whispering, each of us straining his eyes and ears to catchsome sight or sound of life in that black, ghostly quiet. We might haveconcluded that our senses had been playing pranks at our expense, thatthe flame we had seen from the ridge was purely an imaginary thing, butfor the rank, unmistakable odor of burning wood--a smell no man bred ina land of camp-fires can mistake. We were near it, wherever it was, buthow near we had no means of knowing.
After a bit of waiting, Mac decided that the smoke was floating from acertain direction, and we began to edge carefully that way. Presently wecircled a clump of brush, to come near riding right into a banked fire,barely visible, even at short range, under its covering of earth. Adimly outlined bulk lay beside it, and leaning over in our saddles, thefaint glow of the coals revealed a man's body, half stripped of itsclothing, and--oh, well, such things are so utterly devilish youwouldn't credit it. It's bad enough to kill, even when it's necessary;but I never could understand how a white man could take a leaf out ofthe Indian's torture-book.
The fire had been heaped over with earth--to screen it from prying eyes,I suppose, while the good work went on. We got off our horses andstooped over the man, forgetting for the moment that danger might lurkin the surrounding thicket. Mac swore under his breath when he bent andpeered keenly at the man's face; then he straightened up and kicked apart of the clay covering from the smoldering embers. As the bright glowof a little cascade of sparks pierced the darkness, a voice in our rearcalled sharply: "Hands up!" and we swung round to behold two maskedfaces regarding us from behind steadily held Winchesters.
The very suddenness of the hold-up made it a complete success. Apart,and moving, we might have scattered in the brush like young quail, andso have been able to give the gentlemen a hard run for the money. But wewere bunched together, shocked out of all caution, staring at thepitiful figure at our feet when MacRae unmasked the fire, and the flareof it surrounded us with a yellow nimbus that made us fair marks for agun. With that dazzling light in our eyes and those ugly-lookingcustomers at the business end of the guns, it would have been out andout suicide to reach for a six-shooter. For at that period inNorthwestern history, when a man had the drop on you under suchconditions, there was absolutely no question of what would happen if youmade a suspicious move. We were fairly caught, and there was nothing todo but elevate our digits and paw the air as commanded.
It took one of those Western Turpins about a minute to relieve us of ourartillery, after which he silently proceeded to lead our horses out ofsight. When he did that I began to hope the horses were all they wanted,that they had no knowledge of the money I carried; but my hopes died anearly death, for he was back in a moment, and the man behind the gunindicated me with a motion of the Winchester.
"That long, stoop-shouldered gazabo's got the stuff on him," he growled.
There was half a second when I entertained a wild notion of gettingfractious. A fellow hates to make a bungle of the first decent trusthe's had in a long time; but I was in a tight place, and I couldn'tfigure where I'd delay giving up beyond the length of time it would takethe gentleman with the Winchester to drill me. Under the circumstancesit didn't take long to decide that it was a heap better all around to berobbed alive than dead--they'd get the money anyway, and if I got myselfshot up to no purpose that would spoil all chance of getting back atthem later.
The silent partner wasted no time in fruitless search of my person. Heseemed to know right where to look, which was another feature of theplay that I didn't _sabe_ at the time. He reached down inside my shirt,with a none too gentle hand, and relieved me of the belt that held themoney. Then the pair of them backed up, still covering us, and fadeda
way in the gloom.