CHAPTER IV.
THE MAN WHO RAN RIGHT INTO TROUBLE.
The prisoner of the Cherokee half-breed was in a forlorn state, moreparticularly as regarded apparel. Hardly suited for mountaineering attheir best, his clothes were sorry rags, which an attempt at mendingwith bark fibre and rawhide had even rendered more lamentable. Ahorsehair lasso, of remarkable fineness and strength, was wound roundand round him with a care which a Chinese would have envied. A handfulof moss was the gag which nearly choked him, but his eyes were morefull of rage than supplication, and they seemed to burn with enhancedindignation when he found the Indian was in concert with a white hunter.
Young Bill Williams flung his captive down on some dry rushes, and,laying aside his gun and the stranger's, which was broken, he sat downat the fire.
"It was a coyote," he remarked, scornfully. "But the Cherokee did notgive him even time to yelp."
"Ah!" said Ridge, "I wonder you did not shoot him thar. Thar willalways be plenty of that game on the prairie for the greenhorn hunter,I opine. It is all very well our discovering this country, but we don'twant any raw Eastern fellows, with Boston dressing, discovering _us!_"Bill made no comment. He had pulled the soused bears' paws over to him,poured out some coffee--from which the full aroma was extracted by asudden chill at the height of its boiling with cold water--and was thusbeginning his meal.
The silence that fell was broken only by the champing of the two men asthey repaid themselves for the travail since Monday. Each had a brandyflask, and their supplies included spirits, but neither drank anythingbut the sweet, pure water of the snow torrent. Ridge was naturallyabstemious, the half-Cherokee sober from having seen the mischiefwrought his mother's race by the firewater.
After the meal, the two smoked, and the white man faintly whistled alively tune. Neither gave heed to the prisoner, who had ample leisureto gaze on the strange resort into which he had been unceremoniouslyconveyed.
The firelight illuminated the grotto; several gaps were outlets orstorehouses; bales of furs, bundles of army and trade guns, kegs ofpowder, pigs of lead, packages of fancy goods used in Indian trading,harness, simple cooking utensils, these encumbered the place; but onecould guess that they would form a barricade at emergency in case theenemy penetrated to this inmost hold. At first glance, and even at theleisure gaze of the prisoner, it seemed the den of a bandit.
"What did you bring him into the ranche for, chief?" inquired Ridge, inthat pigeon-English of the Northwest, called the "Chinnook" dialect,though composed of Chinnook, Scotch, English, and Canadian-French, aswell as hunters' English, to which confusing medley these two friendsimparted still another zest by an infusion of Cherokee, Creole, French,and Spanish-American, for which good reason we forbear the sentencesverbatim.
"Because," replied the other, "it was too dark to see the trail, andhe must tell whether he is alone or the spy of a band. At all events,it doesn't look as if he had been in to the fort for his pay lately,"added Bill, with a quiet fleeting smile, "and bought any clothes!"
"You are right. Loose him, and we'll try him. By the way, that's abeauty lariat, I can tell you."
Indeed, as before hinted, the lasso confining the captive was composedof selected horsehair, and toilsomely and deftly plaited.
"I was still on the scout," said Bill, whilst engaged undoing thebonds, rolling the man to and fro as suited his desires, "when suddenlya movement of a scrub pine half a pistol shot off made me bring myrifle to bear on it. I was just about to pull, when up pops my man,crying: 'Hold hard, or you're a dead Injun!' _Me?_ It looked as if wewere going to make our bullets kiss in midair, but I reckon I was aleetle the quicker, and while his ball whistled upon the top storeysof the sierra, mine cut his barrel in half, right there at the stock,which remained in his hand. So, as he staggered in surprise, I sprangon him, took off from his belt the lasso--a real article, and nomistake! Worth a war pony!--and girdled him like a papoose. Moreover,I wrapped my robe round his head, so that he should not see how weglide into the Rocky Mountain House, proprietors, Messrs. Ridge andWilliams, and here he is dumped down."
The man was hardly able to stand when unbound. He wiped his mouth withthe tattered sleeve of his old army overcoat, shook himself, and reeledround toward the fire, whither the half-breed had given him a gentlepush.
"We don't often meet a white man away here," said Ridge, sitting uplike a judge. "Let me have a good long look."
The firelight fell full upon him. Already, whilst waiting, the strangerhad fortified himself: he was cold, calm, save for his lips curling ina mocking smile, though he very well saw that his confronters were hisjudges, and, possibly, executioners, if they determined on death.
He was a man about five and forty, rather tall, with legs "split up sofar" as to be as good a walker almost as Ridge himself. He was the moregaunt from recent privations. His "weather skin" seemed newly assumed,and, seen in the town, he would have been taken for a schoolmaster ofthe Indian Reservations or a trader's bookkeeper.
"You are a white, an American, from the Eastern States," said Ridge,after a couple of minutes. "You are not a hunter or trapper, agentleman sportsman, or a squaw man. What brings you out here up in themountains?"
"You are a white, an American of these Western States," returned theother, quietly, "whence your right to pull me about and question me? Ifthis Indian is on the land of his forefathers, I will pay him tributeas far as in my power. As for you, why stop my wandering? Have I soughtto run against you? Have I done anything more than essay to defend mylife when a firearm was levelled at my breast? State anything thatgives you a right to deal with a citizen of the United States in theUnited States?"
"These are big words," replied Ridge, puzzled whether to be angry oramused, though there was no doubt that Cherokee Bill felt the firstsentiment; "but I am not exchanging Fourth of July speeches with you,but asking questions."
"To answer? 'Spose I don't choose?"
"You'll be made to, I guess," rejoined the mountaineer, hotly.
"You mean you two will cut my throat in this den, or hang me in my ownlasso! The latter will serve me right, as I took it at the cost of alife from the redskin who hurled me off my horse with the same. Well,suppose you do kill me, will you know more about me than you do now?"
"What! Killed an Indian for the rope?" said Ridge, turning to theCherokee. "What breed?"
"Comanche!" said the latter, examining the lasso critically.
"The lasso is of Comanche make," went on the mountain man, severelyfrowning again. "And I'll swear your cheek has never been burnt southof the Platte."
"That's so. It was a 'foot Indian' who tried to kill me. I boast noknowledge of these gentry. That's one of his shoes. The other I wore todeath on these cursed flinty hills."
"Crow!" cried the Half-breed, with a glance at the moccasin. "MountainCrow! And a war shoe!"
"The Crows 'out,'" repeated Ridge, biting his lips. "You see, we aregetting information, though you are so stingy. Come, as your news leadsoff so good, continue it. Who are you, I say? And what is your businesswhere few of us who are regular trappers venture?"
"A trapper?"
"An honest trapper! What did you take us for?--robbers and murderers?"said the hunter, indignantly.
"Well, I kind o' don't know," rejoined the stranger, with a significantglance at Cherokee Bill, whose savage eyes were not reassuring like theother's. "My name is no value out here, four thousand miles from myfolks, I guess; but if you are a regular trapper--"
"I am called the Old Man of the Mountain," said Ridge, sadly ratherthan proudly. "I am about the last of the old guard--I fear one of theoldest men. I am Jim Ridge. That's the young man's best companion outhere, that's called the Yager--same name put on me, too, by the hearingof it; the Yager of the Yellowstone. When I handled that first in '42,I bent a trifle under the weight. Them was the grand, good old times!The sort of men we get now don't grade up with the brand that passedup to 1850. They don't hunt now--they butcher. They don't trap--theysurround and sl
aughter. They'll be clearing out a beaver lake with adiving bell, next! I wonder! Yes, I am the Old Man, the Yager of theYellowstones," he repeated, a little piqued at his fame falling on adead ear--"Injin or white, they all know this child."
The stranger seemed easier; but, unfortunately, the ghost of a smile onhis wan features was assumed to be impudence.
"Answer, then," went on Ridge, testily, "for I don't want none of yourblood on my knife, though it is itching to be in at your ribs."
"Nonsense. You are neither hasty nor bloodthirsty, Mr. Ridge. Onequestion from me first, if you please--"
Old Jim waved his hand disgustedly at this polite address, and the"Mistering."
"I just want to know if you know Mr. Brasher, of Varina?"
"Do I know 'Trading Jake?' Muchly; and ever so long. Those bales arefor him," pointing to a stack against the walls.
"Then I have a message for you, Mr. Ridge," went on the prisoner,relieved entirely.
"A letter?"
"The letter is lost; I ate it up when a gang of Digger Indians playedthe joke of making me exchange a good outfit for these rags. Luckily,they thought it was a talisman, and that to cook me and eat me withthat medicine paper in my gullet was an error, and so I got away,together with my gun. But I know the contents, and they are important,Mr. Brasher said."
"Fire away!" said Ridge, more and more thawed out towards the speaker.
"But first, some proof I am not being deceived."
"Hang the man!" laughed Jim, amused at being an unknown to one personin this world. "Show him my brand on those packs, Bill."
"'J. Ridge'--hem! Well," said the captive, "this is the communication:'The man they call _Captain Kidd_ and a gang of border troublers slidout of town with tools, stores, and firearms galore, and I want theOld Man of the Mountain to know that they are bound for the Big Placerin the Yellowstone Region.' That is what I was to tell every regularhunter and trapper until Mr. Ridge heard of it."
"Oh, call me Jim! I am much obliged to Brasher. Well, stranger, you aretoo deep for me if this is a getup of your'n. Resarve your own secret,and meanwhile there's sage ile and snake grease for your bruises, andfire and meat and Injin 'taters; and you can have whiskey if yourappetite calls that way. Fall on! As the soldiers say."
Then vacating the fireside, he drew aside with the Indian, and the twoeyed the captive inquisitorially while he devoured the supper, whichrepresented probably two or three meals he had missed.
"Drink free!" said Ridge, offering a horn cup. "You need fear nothingnow. One who has shared the trapper's hospitality has to be a preciousmean skunk to deserve kicking out."
"Nobody's going to say a word against your hospitality," retorted thestranger, sarcastically. "The feed's capital, and the liquor a reviver,for, though a temperance man, I need it as medicine, I can tell you.But the way the trapper introduces guests to his hospitality byshooting a welcome at him, trussing him up like a turkey, and tossinghim down on the floor like a roll of carpet to be beaten, is not what asimple traveller from the Atlantic seaboard approves of."
"Stranger," said Ridge, sitting down on a buffalo skull stool coveredluxuriously with furs which a Russian grand duchess might give herearrings to possess, "this is our home round here by all the rights thefirst discoverer and the constant defender may claim. My _companyero_was not to know with what intentions you were making yourself aneighbour. You may think yourself lucky that his shot did not pierceyour brain or heart, and that he did not use the slipknot of yourlariat to decorate the nearest larch with you. It is necessary thatour mountain fort should be kept hid from everybody. Gentlemen likeMr. Brasher do not know it, sir. Tell me your name, show that you areno evildoer, and after you have rested you may equip yourself and goyour way. We can trust to your being led out, hoodwinked as you werebrought, to maintain our secret. So much I will do for Trading Jake'smessenger. Anything else, stranger?"
The ex-prisoner was surprised at so much confidence, and the promise toplace him on a fair footing for the task upon his shoulders.
"You will do this, eh?" cried he with frank joy; "A good rifle insteadof that broken musket, food and powder, clothes against this searchingair?"
"Jim Ridge never yet broke his word," remarked the Cherokee, for thefirst time relenting in his suspicion so as to address his late captive.
"My name goes for nothing, but I will tell you my mission out here, andwhy your gift will put me under a great obligation. Besides, you havethe experience which I lack, and who knows but that your comments on mystory may be of service."
"Make yourself at home, then," said the old mountaineer, pleasantly;"there's a pipe for you, too, and the night is only begun. We so seldomhave company, eh, Bill? that a couple of hours for a storyteller willbe a real treat. Stranger, we listen, if the grub has put you in prettygood shape again."
"One moment," demurred the other; "you talk of the need to guard thisplace from spies. Now, I can't compliment you on your vigilance andprudence when you squat here in the broad firelight with the caverngaping open yonder--an Indian boy could riddle us with arrows."
Ridge laughed.
"If you don't mind getting up and coming to the opening, you shall seethat--but not so near the brink--the crust is shaky. See, how readilyI detach a chunk. Don't lean forward. Look forth--it is a clear night."
It was serene and lovely. The stars shone unveiled, and that was all inthe deep indigo black, where, beneath, the deep-rooted pines could beheard slowly swaying, not seen, like a field of grain in a zephyr.
"I see nothing."
"No trees, no rocks?"
"No. Nothing but stars."
"You would see nothing but stars if you were to step after that stone.Hark!"
Jim trundled the rocky lump out of the cave; but not the faintest soundor echo betokened that it touched bottom or anywhere.
"Heaven preserve us!" ejaculated the guest, recoiling. "'Tis theBottomless Pit!"
"Pretty nigh," answered the mountaineer, laughing; "that's fallen fivethousand feet. This is not a precipice sheer down, but a peak hollowedout--a cut-off, _we_ say; the Injins say a devil's jump. Stranger, onthis side, we shall not be invaded. Now for your tale! Stir up the firebrightly, Bill."
"Yes, for it is a dark and horrid story, gentlemen."