CHAPTER II
The stage pulled up in front of a typical western saloon, post officeand general store. There was the usual crowd of prospectors, gamblers,cow punchers and trappers assembled to meet the incoming stage. When Iscrambled off the top of the old-fashioned coach, and before I had timeto shake the alkali dust from my clothes, or moisten my dry and crackedlips, a typical western bully approached me roaring the verses of a songwith which he evidently intended to terrify me,
"He blowed into Lanigan swinging a gun A new one, A blue one, A colt's forty-one, An' swearing Declaring Red Rivers 'ud run Down Alkali Valley, An' oceans of gore 'ud wash sudden death On the sage brush shore, An' he shot a big hole--"
He got no further with the song. Another man stepped out from the crowd,a very tall, powerful man who would have attracted attention in any garbin any place by his distinguished appearance, who with little ceremonyrudely brushed the roughneck to one side, and my instinct told me thehandsome stranger could be no other than Big Pete Darlinkel.
My! my! what a man he was! Looked as if he just stepped out of one ofFred Remington's pictures, or Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show, or slippedfrom between the leaves of a volume of Captain Mayne Reid's "ScalpHunters"--Big Pete was evidently a hold-over from another age. He wouldhave fitted perfectly and with nicety in a picture of Davy Crockett'smen down in old Texas. He seemed, however, perfectly at home in thisborder town, and I noted that the most hard-boiled and toughest men inthe crowd treated him with marked respect and deference.
Pete was a wilderness fop and a dandy, and evidently was as careful ofhis clothes as a West Point cadet. In dress he affected theold-fashioned picturesque garb of the mountains. His appearance filledme with wonder and admiration; he stood six feet two or three inches inhis moccasins, straight as an arrow and lithe as a cat.
His costume consisted of a tunic of dressed deer skin, smoked to thesoftness of the finest flannels. He wore it belted in at the waist, butopen at the breast and throat where it fell back like a sailor's collarinto a short cape covering the shoulders. Underneath was the undershirtof dressed fawn skin; his leggins and moccasins were of the samematerial as his hunting shirt, and on his head he wore a fox skin cap;the fox's head adorned with glass eyes ornamented the front and the tailhung like a drooping plume over the left shoulder.
Big Pete Darlinkel was a blonde, and his golden hair hung in sunny curlsupon his massive shoulders; a light mustache, soft yellow beard, with apair of the deepest, clearest, most innocent baby-like blue eyes, allmade a face such as an angel might have after years of exposure to sunand wind.
Not only are Big Pete's revolvers gold mounted, but the shaft of hiskeen-edged knife is rich with figures, rings, and stars filed from goldcoins and set in the horn. The very stock of his long, single-barreledrifle is inlaid like an Arab's gun, and, as for his buckskin huntingsuit, it is a mass of embroidery and colored quills from his beadedmoccasins to the fringed cape of his shirt.
Big Pete was a dandy, fond of color, fond of display; yet in spite ofall this he wore absolutely nothing for decoration alone, but everyarticle of use about his person was ornamented to an oriental degree.Gaudy and rich as his costume was when viewed in detail, as a whole itharmonized not only with Pete, his hair, his complexion, his weapons,but with whatever natural objects surrounded him.
Big Pete also seemed to know me instinctively and approached with agraceful and swinging step; holding out his hand he greeted me in a low,soft, well-modulated voice with, "Howdy, kid; yes, I'm Big Pete andallow you are the tenderfoot dude from New York what wants to shoot biggame, an' reckon you'd like to meet the wild mountain man? Well, he's aqueer one, I tell you. He's got us all buffaloed out this-a-way, most ofus don't care to meet him close up and we give him wide range when wecut his trail."
That was Big Pete's greeting. Of course, I had not told him of my realinterest in this mysterious man of the mountains, only suggesting that Iwould like to do some big game shooting and see the spooky hunter.
"Well," I answered, "I would like to get a record elk head to take hometo dad. As for the mountain wildman, I wish you'd tell me more abouthim, he is awfully interesting."
"Tell you more? Well, sho, I reckon I can tell you more than most peopleround these parts for he makes my game park his stampin' grounds everyonct in a while, an' let me tell you he hunts some peculiar, he do, he'shalf man and half wolf--but shucks, I won't spoil the show, you will seehow he hunts for yourself if you stay here long. Glory be, but he's gotme some bashful and shy. But mosey along and I'll hist yore stuff onthis here cayuse while you let them tha' dogs out of their chicken coopboxes. You can cache your dude duds in the Emporium general store overyonder next to Squinty Quinn's saloon, an' then we're off for the hills.I'll yarn about this Wild Hunter while we hit the trail."
An hour spent in Grave Stone gave me an opportunity to wash myself andchange my clothes for some that would be more substantial forout-of-door wear, start several letters east telling of my safe arrival,buy the things I had overlooked, store my surplus clothes with thepostmaster at the general store, and repack my kit for pony travel.Then, after watching Big Pete skilfully throw the diamond hitch, we wereoff for the hills and our first camp. I hoped that I was on my way tofind my real father and unravel the mystery that surrounded my strangebabyhood. But I little guessed what adventures I was to have or thestrange things I was to see before my quest was ended.
We traveled fast all the remaining portion of the afternoon and towardevening we made camp and for the first time in my life I slept under thesky. At the end of the fifth day we reached the secret and narrowopening of a big valley or "park" in the midst of a wild tumble ofmountains. Big Pete said we would pitch our tent in the park.
"Tha's plenty of signs 'round too an' if we loosen t' dogs p'raps we kinstir up a mountain lion or collar some fresh meat t' start camp with,"said he as he slid off his horse and took the leashes off the dogs.
It took us but a short time to arrange our camp, then Big Pete followedby the frisking dogs slipped silently into the woods. He was gonescarcely a quarter of an hour when he reappeared again without the dogs,motioned for me to get my gun and follow him.
"Tha's elk signs all bout," he said, "an' the muts broke away on a freshtrail. Now you an' me'll climb through that draw yonder and hide out onthe runway till they drive an elk in gun shot. Come along."
I followed eagerly and presently we had climbed through a thickly grownpoplar grove and found a suitable hiding place among the small poplars.We had the wind right and a clear view of most of the open park. BigPete stooped down and motioned for me to do likewise.
I quietly crouched beside him and waited--waited until my legs werecramped, waited until the dampness from the moss struck through theheavy soles of my tenderfoot shoes and chilled my feet; waited until myarm was so numb that it felt like a piece of lead--then, in spite of thedanger of incurring Big Pete's displeasure and in spite of my dread ofbeing thought a dude tenderfoot, I changed my position, rubbed life intomy arm and assumed an easier pose.
In front of us was a small lake, deep, dark and unruffled. All aroundthe edge was a natural wharf formed from the gigantic trunks of treeswhich had fallen for ages into the lake and been washed by wind andwaves and forced by winter ice into such regular order and positionalong the shore that their arrangement looked like the work of men. Backof this wharf and all about was the wilderness of silent wood; awilderness enclosed by a wall of mountains, whose lofty heads wereuplifted far above the soft white clouds that floated in the blue skyoverhead and were mirrored in the lake below. An eagle, on apparentlyimmovable wings, soared over the lake in spiral course. As I watched thebird its wings seemed suddenly endowed with life. At the same instant myguide gave a low grunt of warning.
"What is it?" I asked in a whisper, for there was a strange expressionin my companion's eyes.
"It's--it's him, so help me!--Keep yer ears open and yer meat-trapshut!" growled Pete.
I d
id so. The trained ear of the hunter had detected the sound ofcrackling twigs and swishing branches made by some animals in rapidmotion.
"Ah!" I exclaimed, "the dogs. You startled me; I thought it wasIndians."
"I wish it was nothing wuss," muttered my guide, as he examined hisweapons with a critical eye and loosened the cartridges for hisrevolvers in his belt to make sure that they would be easy to pluck out.
"Those hain't our dogs, mister," he remarked after he had examined hiswhole arsenal.
As I again fixed my attention on the noise, in place of the resonantvoice of the hounds, I heard nothing but the crackling of branches, withan occasional half-suppressed wolf-like yelp.
Big Pete turned pale and muttered, "It's them for sartin; it's themagin! And I hain't been drinkin', nuther!"
Big Pete Darlinkel remained crouching in exactly the same pose he hadfirst assumed, but his face looked sallow and worn. I marveled. Was thisbig westerner really awed by the situation we were facing? What disasterimpended?
My guide's eyes were fixed upon an opening in the woods and I knew thatsomething would soon bound from that spot. I could hear the crashing ofbrush and half-suppressed wolf-like yelps, followed by a pause, then arushing noise, and out leaped as beautiful a bull elk as I had everseen--in fact the first I had ever seen at close range in his nativewilderness. I had only time to take note of his muscular neck, clean cutlimbs, his grand branching antlers, and--not my dogs but a pack of_immense black wolves_ at his heels before I instinctively brought mygun to my shoulder. But before I could draw a bead Big Pete struck it,knocking the muzzle up.
"Hist!" he exclaimed, pointing to the bird.
The eagle screamed, descended like a thunderbolt and skilfully avoidingthe branching antlers, struck the bull, driving one talon into the neckand the other into the back, flapping its huge wings as it tore with itsbeak at the body of the elk like a trained "_bear coote_."
I was thunderstruck. The evident partnership of the wolves and birdneeded explanation and it was not long in coming. A shrill whistlepierced the air, the black wolves immediately ceased to worry the elk,the eagle soared overhead, and for an instant the elk stood confused,then leaped high in the air and fell dead. The next moment I heard thecrack of a rifle and saw a puff of blue smoke across the lake.
"That's no ghost," I said, when partly recovered from my astonishment.
"Wait," said Pete laconically.
The eagle screamed, descended like a thunderbolt ... andstruck the bull]
Not long afterward there was a movement among the wolves and,noiselessly as a panther the figure of a man lithe and youthful in everymovement slipped to the side of the dead elk. He made no noise, utteredno word to the fierce black animals that sat with their red tongueshanging from their panting jaws, but without a moment's hesitationwhipped out a knife and with a dexterity and skill that brought thecolor to Big Pete's face, proceeded to take the coat off the wapiti,while the great eagle perched upon the branching antlers. The skin wasremoved and with equal dexterity all the best parts of the meat wereskilfully detached and packed in the green hide, after which, removing alarge slice of red flesh, the strange hunter held up one finger. One ofthe wolves gravely walked up to him, received the morsel, gulped it downand retired. Each in turn was fed, then the great bird flopped on hisshoulder and was fed from his hand, and before I could realize what hadhappened the man, the wolves and the eagle had disappeared, leavingnothing but the dismembered carcass of the elk to remind us of thestrange episode.