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ERSKINE DALE--PIONEER
BY JOHN FOX, JR.
ERSKINE DALE--PIONEER THE HEART OF THE HILLS THE TRAIL OF THE LONESOME PINE THE LITTLE SHEPHERD OF KINGDOM COME CRITTENDEN. A Kentucky Story of Love and War THE KENTUCKIANS AND A KNIGHT OF THE CUMBERLAND A MOUNTAIN EUROPA AND A CUMBERLAND VENDETTA CHRISTMAS EVE ON LONESOME, HELL-FER-SARTAIN AND IN HAPPY VALLEY BLUE GRASS AND RHODODENDRON, Outdoor Life in Kentucky
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
The third stayed behind a moment, bowed over her hand,and kissed it]
ERSKINE DALE PIONEER
BY
JOHN FOX, JR.
ILLUSTRATED BY F. C. YOHN
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS NEW YORK 1920
Copyright, 1919, 1920, by CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
Published September, 1920
ILLUSTRATIONS
The third stayed behind a moment, bowed over her hand, and kissed it Frontispiece
"The messenger is the son of a king" 36
"I don't want nobody to take up for me" 56
"Four more days," he cried, "and we'll be there!" 100
"That is Kahtoo's talk, but this is mine" 132
The sword blades clashed, Erskine whipping back and forth in a way to make a swordsman groan 168
"Make no noise, and don't move" 238
To his bewilderment he found Barbara at his mother's bedside 256
ERSKINE DALE--PIONEER
I
Streaks of red ran upward, and in answer the great gray eye of thewilderness lifted its mist-fringed lid. From the green depths came thefluting of a lone wood-thrush. Through them an owl flew on velvety wingsfor his home in the heart of a primeval poplar. A cougar leaped from thelow limb of an oak, missed, and a shuddering deer streaked through aforest aisle, bounded into a little clearing, stopped rigid, sniffed adeadlier enemy, and whirled into the wilderness again. Still deeper inthe depths a boy with a bow and arrow and naked, except for scalp-lockand breech-clout, sprang from sleep and again took flight along abuffalo trail. Again, not far behind him, three grunting savages weretaking up the print of his moccasined feet.
An hour before a red flare rose within the staked enclosure that wasreared in the centre of the little clearing, and above it smoke was soonrising. Before the first glimmer of day the gates yawned a little andthree dim shapes appeared and moved leisurely for the woods--each manwith a long flintlock rifle in the hollow of his arm, a hunting-knife inhis belt, and a coonskin cap on his head. At either end of the stockadea watchtower of oak became visible and in each a sleepy sentinel yawnedand sniffed the welcome smell of frying venison below him. In the poundat one end of the fort, and close to the eastern side, a horse whinnied,and a few minutes later when a boy slipped through the gates with feedin his arms there was more whinnying and the stamping of impatient feet.
"Gol darn ye!" the boy yelled, "can't ye wait till a feller gits _his_breakfast?"
A voice deep, lazy, and resonant came from the watch-tower above:
"Well, I'm purty hungry myself."
"See any Injuns, Dave?"
"Not more'n a thousand or two, I reckon." The boy laughed:
"Well, I reckon you won't see any while I'm around--they're afeerd o'_me_."
"I don't blame 'em, Bud. I reckon that blunderbuss o' yours would comemight' nigh goin' through a pat o' butter at twenty yards." The sentinelrose towering to the full of his stature, stretched his mighty arms witha yawn, and lightly leaped, rifle in hand, into the enclosure. A girlclimbing the rude ladder to the tower stopped midway.
"Mornin', Dave!"
"Mornin', Polly!"
"I was comin' to wake you up," she smiled.
"I just waked up," he yawned, humoring the jest.
"You don't seem to have much use for this ladder."
"Not unless I'm goin' up; and I wouldn't then if I could jump as high asI can fall." He went toward her to help her down.
"I wouldn't climb very high," she said, and scorning his hand with atantalizing little grimace she leaped as lightly as had he to theground. Two older women who sat about a kettle of steaming clotheswatched her.
"Look at Polly Conrad, won't ye? I declare that gal----"
"Lyddy!" cried Polly, "bring Dave's breakfast!"
At the door of each log cabin, as solidly built as a little fort, ahunter was cleaning a long rifle. At the western angle two men werestrengthening the pickets of the palisade. About the fire two motherswere suckling babes at naked breasts. A boy was stringing a bow, andanother was hurling a small tomahawk at an oaken post, while a third whowas carrying wood for the open fire cried hotly:
"Come on here, you two, an' he'p me with this wood!" And grumbling theycame, for that fort harbored no idler, irrespective of age or sex.
At the fire a tall girl rose, pushed a mass of sunburned hair from herheated forehead, and a flush not from the fire fused with her smile.
"I reckon Dave can walk this far--he don't look very puny."
A voice vibrant with sarcasm rose from one of the women about thesteaming kettle.
"Honor!" she cried, "Honor Sanders!"
In a doorway near, a third girl was framed--deep-eyed, deep-breasted.
"Honor!" cried the old woman, "stop wastin' yo' time with that weavin'in thar an' come out here an' he'p these two gals to git Dave hisbreakfast." Dave Yandell laughed loudly.
"Come on, Honor," he called, but the girl turned and the whir of a loomstarted again like the humming of bees. Lydia Noe handed the hunter apan of deer-meat and corn bread, and Polly poured him a cup of steamingliquid made from sassafras leaves. Unheeding for a moment the food inhis lap, Dave looked up into Polly's black eyes, shifted to Lydia,swerved to the door whence came the whir of the loom.
"You are looking very handsome this morning, Polly," he said gravely,"and Lydia is lovelier even than usual, and Honor is a woodland dream."He shook his head. "No," he said, "I really couldn't."
"Couldn't what?" asked Polly, though she knew some nonsense was coming.
"Be happy even with two, if t'other were far away."
"I reckon you'll have to try some day--with all of us far away," said thegentle Lydia.
"No doubt, no doubt." He fell upon his breakfast.
"Purple, crimson, and gold--daughters of the sun--such are not for thepoor hunter--alack, alack!"
"Poor boy!" said Lydia, and Polly looked at her with quickening wonder.Rallying Dave with soft-voiced mockery was a new phase in Lydia. Davegave his hunting-knife a pathetic flourish.
"And when the Virginia gallants come, where will poor Dave be?"
Polly's answer cut with sarcasm, but not at Dave.
"Dave will be busy cuttin' wood an' killin' food for 'em--an' keepin' 'emfrom gettin' scalped by Indians."
"I wonder," said Lydia, "if they'll have long hair like Dave?" Daveshook his long locks with mock pride.
"Yes, but it won't be their own an' it'll be _powdered_."
"Lord, I'd like to see the first Indian who takes one of their scalps."Polly laughed, but there was a shudder in Lydia's smile. Dave rose.
"I'm goin' to sleep t
ill dinner--don't let anybody wake me," he said, andat once both the girls were serious and kind.
"We won't, Dave."
Cow-bells began to clang at the edge of the forest.
"There they are," cried Polly. "Come on, Lyddy."
The two girls picked up piggins and squeezed through the opening betweenthe heavy gates. The young hunter entered a door and within threwhimself across a rude bed, face down.
"Honor!" cried one of the old women, "you go an' git a bucket o' water."The whir stopped instantly, the girl stepped with a sort of slow majestyfrom the cabin, and, entering the next, paused on the threshold as hereyes caught the powerful figure stretched on the bed and already inheavy sleep. As she stepped softly for the bucket she could not forbearanother shy swift glance; she felt the flush in her face and to concealit she turned her head angrily when she came out. A few minutes latershe was at the spring and ladling water into her pail with a gourd. Nearby the other two girls were milking--each with her forehead against thesoft flank of a dun-colored cow whose hoofs were stained with the juiceof wild strawberries. Honor dipped lazily. When her bucket was full shefell a-dreaming, and when the girls were through with their task theyturned to find her with deep, unseeing eyes on the dark wilderness.
"Boo!" cried Polly, startling her, and then teasingly:
"Are you in love with Dave, too, Honor?"
The girl reddened.
"No," she whipped out, "an' I ain't goin' to be." And then she reddenedagain angrily as Polly's hearty laugh told her she had given herselfaway. For a moment the three stood like wood-nymphs about the spring,vigorous, clear-eyed, richly dowered with health and color and body andlimb--typical mothers-to-be of a wilderness race. And as Honor turnedabruptly for the fort, a shot came from the woods followed by awar-whoop that stopped the blood shuddering in their veins.
"Oh, my God!" each cried, and catching at their wet skirts they fled interror through the long grass. They heard the quick commotion in thefort, heard sharp commands, cries of warning, frantic calls for them tohurry, saw strained faces at the gates, saw Dave bound through and rushtoward them. And from the forest there was nothing but its silence untilthat was again broken--this time by a loud laugh--the laugh of a whiteman. Then at the edge of the wilderness appeared--the fool. Behind himfollowed the other two who had gone out that morning, one with a deerswung about his shoulders, and all could hear the oaths of both as theycursed the fool in front who had given shot and war-whoop to frightenwomen and make them run. Dave stood still, but his lips, too, were busywith curses, and from the fort came curses--an avalanche of them. Thesickly smile passed from the face of the fellow, shame took its place,and when he fronted the terrible eyes of old Jerome Sanders at the gate,that face grew white with fear.
"Thar ain't an Injun in a hundred miles," he stammered, and then heshrank down as though he were almost going to his knees, when suddenlyold Jerome slipped his long rifle from his shoulder and fired past thefellow's head with a simultaneous roar of command:
"Git in--ever'body--git in--quick!"
From a watch-tower, too, a rifle had cracked. A naked savage had boundedinto a spot of sunlight that quivered on the buffalo trail a hundredyards deep in the forest and leaped lithely aside into the bushes--bothrifles had missed. Deeper from the woods came two war-whoops--realones--and in the silence that followed the gates were swiftly closed andbarred, and a keen-eyed rifleman was at every port-hole in the fort.From the tower old Jerome saw reeds begin to shake in a cane-brake tothe left of the spring.
"Look thar!" he called, and three rifles, with his own, covered thespot. A small brown arm was thrust above the shaking reeds, with thepalm of the hand toward the fort--the peace sign of the Indian--and amoment later a naked boy sprang from the cane-brake and ran toward theblockhouse, with a bow and arrow in his left hand and his rightstretched above his head, its pleading palm still outward.
"Don't shoot!--don't nobody shoot!" shouted the old man. No shot camefrom the fort, but from the woods came yells of rage, and as the boystreaked through the clearing an arrow whistled past his head.
"Let him in!" shouted Jerome, and as Dave opened the gates another arrowhurtled between the boy's upraised arm and his body and stuck quiveringin one of its upright bars. The boy slid through and stood panting,shrinking, wild-eyed. The arrow had grazed his skin, and when Davelifted his arm and looked at the oozing drops of blood he gave astartled oath, for he saw a flash of white under the loosenedbreech-clout below. The boy understood. Quickly he pushed the cloutaside on his thigh that all might see, nodded gravely, and proudlytapped his breast.
"Paleface!" he half grunted, "white man!"
The wilds were quiet. The boy pointed to them and held up three fingersto indicate that there were only three red men there, and shook his headto say there would be no attack from them. Old Jerome studied the littlestranger closely, wondering what new trick those red devils were tryingnow to play. Mother Sanders and Mother Noe, the boys of the fort, thegigantic brothers to Lydia, Adam and Noel, the three girls had gatheredabout him, as he stood with the innocence of Eden before the fall.
"The fust thing to do," said Mother Sanders, "is to git some clothes forthe little heathen." Whereat Lydia flushed and Dave made an impatientgesture for silence.
"What's your name?" The boy shook his head and looked eagerly around.
"Francais--French?" he asked, and in turn the big woodsman shook hishead--nobody there spoke French. However, Dave knew a little Shawnee, agood deal of the sign-language, and the boy seemed to understand a goodmany words in English; so that the big woodsman pieced out his storywith considerable accuracy, and turned to tell it to Jerome. The Indianshad crossed the Big River, were as many as the leaves, and meant toattack the whites. For the first time they had allowed the boy to go ona war-party. Some one had treated him badly--he pointed out the bruisesof cuffs and kicks on his body. The Indians called him White Arrow, andhe knew he was white from the girdle of untanned skin under hisbreech-clout and because the Indian boys taunted him. Asked why he hadcome to the fort, he pointed again to his bruises, put both handsagainst his breast, and stretched them wide as though he would seekshelter in the arms of his own race and take them to his heart; and forthe first time a smile came to his face that showed him plainly as acurious product of his race and the savage forces that for years hadbeen moulding him. That smile could have never come to the face of anIndian. No Indian would ever have so lost himself in his own emotions.No white man would have used his gestures and the symbols of nature towhich he appealed. Only an Indian could have shown such a cruel,vindictive, merciless fire in his eyes when he told of his wrongs, andwhen he saw tears in Lydia's eyes, the first burning in his life came tohis own, and brushing across them with fierce shame he turned Indianstoic again and stood with his arms folded over his bow and arrows athis breast, looking neither to right nor left, as though he were waitingfor judgment at their hands and cared little what his fate might be, asperfect from head to foot as a statue of the ancient little god, who, inhim, had forsaken the couches of love for the tents of war.