Gentle Maiden and the Quaker had finished the distribution of dried venison brought from the cabin by the time John had concluded his talk with the two Indian lads and others who clustered around to see and to hear, and as an early homeward start was desirable, John suggested to Mr. Hatch that they would better be going.
No word had yet been received at the Delaware town from Captain Pipe and there was no knowing when he would be home. However, provisions sufficient to last the Indians three or four days had now been furnished them, and there would be no necessity of visiting the town so soon again. Yet the Quaker, whose whole heart was in this work of teaching and caring for the Indians, which he had taken upon himself, told Gentle Maiden he would come again the next day, as they bade the girl and the people of the snow-bound village good-bye.
As when on their journey to the town Mr. Hatch and his dapple-gray led the way, so did they take the lead in traveling homeward. The wind had risen again, but the path broken in the morning was not yet filled in with the snow and very good progress was made. The short day, however, was near its close and the gloom of the coming night settled down in the silent forest while the strangely mated travelers were still three miles or more from home.
“I’ll have some news to tell Ree—the fact that the mysterious Indian’s name is Killdeer and that he is a friend of Captain Pipe, who for some reason doesn’t mind who he kills,” John was thinking as he rode carelessly along, when the Quaker called out to him:
“Beware of the strange savage who desireth only to kill, and hath no courage in him—always shooting from behind.”
“He’s got you marked up on his arm as already dead, you know, Mr. Hatch, and you should be in no danger,” John laughingly called in reply.
But barely had he finished the sentence when he was seized from behind and a dirty hand was clasped so quickly and tightly over his mouth that he could not utter a sound. Vainly he struggled, but he was dragged down into the snow and could not release himself.
So occupied was John in doing his best to escape, or at least to cry out in warning to the Quaker, that he did not see what had happened to his companion.
The facts were that Mr. Hatch’s mare, being very much more sensitive and alert than slow-going Neb, had suddenly shied upon passing a large poplar tree, and as a man sprang from behind it to seize him, as another seized John, the horse gave so violent a leap forward that the fellow grasped only at the air, though his intended victim was almost thrown from the saddle.
The old gentleman looked around, and seeing John’s horse, startled from its slow walk to a gallop, coming up behind, and having no doubt that the boy was lying low on the animal’s back to escape whatever danger threatened, he gave his mare free rein. On and on he hastened through the snow, followed by the frightened unridden horse, nor did he stop until, dazed by excitement, the dapple-gray panting and perspiring as though it were a hot day in July, he drew up at the cabin door.
Meanwhile John’s captor had been reinforced by the fellow who had failed to catch the Quaker.
“Nice mess you made of the job, I must say!” angrily growled the man who held John down, the lad’s face buried in the snow, as the other man came up.
By a vigorous squirm, rising partly on his hands and knees, John succeeded in turning over and getting his first look at the fellow who had seized him. Instantly he recognized the “Indian” who had visited the cabin, still in Indian costume, though there was no doubt that his skin was white.
“So it is you, is it, Duff?” said the boy calmly as he could. “I would recognize your angelic temper anywhere.”
Duff paid no attention to the remark, save to hold his captive the tighter, but continued to upbraid his companion for failing to secure the “blasted, pious old fool of a Quaker.”
“Ain’t no use jawin’; nobody never did nothin’ what they couldn’t do,” the other man made answer.
“And you, too, Dexter,” John spoke up. “We had a nice visit with Mr. Duff, the other evening, and wished you could have come along. And how is it that Landlord Quilling is not with you?”
The feelings of Return Kingdom when he saw the Quaker come galloping up to the cabin door, his beloved mare wet with perspiration, and closely followed by their own horse, riderless, were different than he had ever experienced. He had never known the true meaning of fear and never had he known a moment when his courage and hope seemed to desert him so entirely as now.
There flashed upon his mind a picture of John Jerome’s body stretched in the snow as he had seen Quilling’s; of the lone Indian stooping over it to secure the awful trophy of his silent warfare against the whites. With his old-time determination, however, the lad shook off these fearful thoughts, and as Theodore Hatch’s feet touched the ground, was at his side.
“John—?”
Ree could not ask the question in his mind. His voice sunk to a husky whisper.
“Verily, I do not know,” said the Quaker in hushed, frightened tones. “I thought he was on his horse until but a little while ago. An Indian attacked me and I escaped. I thought thy friend was coming on behind till I chanced to look back, a mile from here.”
“Tell me all about it just as quick as you can, Mr. Hatch.” There was pleading and yet an imperative command in Kingdom’s voice.
“We were midway betwixt here and the Indian town, but I scarce know what happened. A savage in hiding behind a tree leaped out upon me and would have seized me but Phœbe bounded beyond his reach, nor stopped till now. Thy beloved friend was behind me. His horse kept close up and I thought the lad was with me till but a few minutes since.”
“Were no guns fired? Did you hear John cry out?”
“Verily, I know not.”
“It may be that John was swept off his horse by the low limbs of a tree,” said Ree, hope coming to him with the thought. “Was it the lone Indian—the one you saw before, who attacked you?”
“I cannot say—I cannot say.”
The Quaker was trembling violently from his exertion and fright, and Ree pitied him, though he almost despised the man who could give only so wretched an account of what had happened, when information was so badly needed.
“Mount your mare and come after me. Show me the place where you were attacked.”
Kingdom seized his rifle, which was always within reach, and at one bound was upon Neb’s back. The Quaker began a protest, but the lad did not—would not—hear. It was now quite dark and the howling wind and penetrating cold added to the hardship of the work to be done and lessened the likelihood of success; but the man dared not disobey the boy’s command.
The sweeping gale was fast filling in the path the horses had made along the trail to the Indian town, but the animals themselves were able to find it, though in the darkness the men would not have been. The Quaker recollected the point at which he had first missed John and there Ree dismounted and walked. But it was no use; for, though often he mistook a half-buried log or stump for the body of him he sought, he discovered nothing in the darkness which would indicate whether John had been killed or carried off, or had only fallen, wounded, from his horse.
Not until they had reached the village of the Delawares did the searchers pause in their hunt. Theodore Hatch had been unable to locate definitely the spot at which he was attacked, and Ree pushed on to the Indian town hoping to find some tidings. But neither Gentle Maiden nor any of the others could give any information.
“Has the lone Indian been seen near here to-day?”
The question revealed Ree’s secret fear.
“He has not been here,” the girl answered. “Gentle Maiden would tell the white brother if he had come or gone. His hate is deep, his gun shoots straight. His war is his own war.”
There was sadness in the Indian maiden’s voice which betrayed her own fears. Thus did she confirm her white friend’s belief that John had fallen a victim of the solitary savage whose thirst for revenge upon the whites knew no limit.
What was the reason of the bitter, personal, persistent warfare he carried on? In his heart, as the thoughts stirred his kindly nature to vengefulness, Ree vowed that he would not quit the country of the Ohio until he had killed this lone Indian, and without John he would remain no longer than he should need to complete that task.
The Quaker would have remained in the Indian village for the remainder of the night, and the Indians, roused from their slumbers by the arrival of the white men, invited Ree, also, to stay, but he would not think of it. Back along the trail, therefore, the boy walking, the Quaker astride his mare, the two plodded the weary miles to the cabin again, searching all the way for the body they dreaded to find.
Ree fed the jaded horses when home was reached, and the exhausted Quaker, lying down, was soon asleep, hugging his prized saddle bags with one arm beneath his pillow, as usual.
For the younger man there was no rest. He put the rude snowshoes he had made, in order, and broiled and ate portions of a wild turkey he had caught in the deep snow while making the rounds of their traps in the absence of his chum and Mr. Hatch during the day. He reloaded his two pistols and refilled his powder horn and bullet pouch, then waited.
Impatiently he spent the remaining hour or two until the first sign of daylight, and then, awakening the Quaker, cautioned him to remain near the cabin and watch closely for any indication of danger. He feared that Duff and Dexter might chance to visit the vicinity, and knew they would not hesitate to kill the old gentleman, to procure his portion of the divided fortune letter, if they found him alone.
The morning was breaking over the bleak, wintry forest as Ree set forth. With two pistols in his belt, his rifle over his shoulder and food and medicine in the pouch hung at his side, he had no concern for his own safety; but he did fear deeply for one he loved more.
He went at once along the trail toward the Indian town, closely scrutinizing the drifted snow and the trees and bushes on both sides thereof. Nowhere did he find the least encouragement until he came to a great poplar tree about which there was evidence that the snow had been disturbed and tramped down the day before, though the traces were now well-nigh obliterated.
The place answered to the meager description Theodore Hatch had given of the spot at which the assault was made, but in his uncertainty the anxious boy knew but one thing to do. He hurried on, resolving, if he found no better clue, to return and look far and wide about this spot in hope of discovering some sign of tracks leading away from it.
With desperate haste the unhappy boy traversed the trail clear back to the Delaware town. The Indians were astir and two boys, Flying Fish and Little Wolf, were preparing to go hunting with bows and arrows. They were equipped with snowshoes and ready for a long journey. Both offered to join the “white brother” in his search, but Ree thanked them and told them only that if they discovered any trace of the missing one to carry word to the town and the cabin as quickly as they could. He would reward them well, he said.
Without loss of time the anxious lad then returned to the big poplar tree beside the trail. Half the forenoon had passed, but the day had come bright and clear with scarcely any wind. It would have been a glorious day for hunting, but any day must be gloomy when one’s best friend is strangely missing, and may be dead or dying, and there was no sunshine in the heart of the lonely boy who traversed the snow-bound forest.
At last, a quarter of a mile to the right of the point where the trail passed the big poplar, Ree did discover, in a protected valley, the tracks of three persons. Minutely he examined them, but the fine snow had so sifted in that he could not tell whether they were those of Indians or otherwise, or whether or not John might have made any of the footprints. He hastened in the direction in which they led, however, though surprised to see that they would pass only a mile or so to the eastward from the cabin, unless the course changed.
As a more open portion of the forest was reached, the last evidence of the tracks disappeared. Still Ree kept on. He saw that he would come out somewhere in the sheltered valley of the Cuyahoga, if he continued in the direction he had first taken, and if he found no one in hiding there, as he believed he might, since the valley gave protection from the winds and snow, he might at least discover the lost trail there, in some of the sheltered places.
As time proved, Ree’s decision was wise. He had gone scarcely a half mile farther when he came upon fresh tracks in the snow. They were those of but two persons apparently, and of Indians, the young pioneer believed; but he remembered that frequently in traveling Indians take great care to step in the footprints of one another and thus conceal their real number from any one discovering their trail, and he took up this fresh clue at increased speed. Five minutes later he caught sight of two figures ahead of him. One was a white man, he judged from the dress, the other an Indian.
“Ho, brothers! What’s your hurry?” the boy called.
The men stopped and looked back. Both were Indians, Ree then saw, though one was dressed in the clothing of a white man.
“How?” called one of them.
“White Fox—white brother—how?” the other of the Redmen exclaimed, and Ree then recognized them as Long Arrow and Beaver Hair, the Mingoes whom he had caught in the act of stealing the canoe he and John had purchased the year before of Captain Pipe. Moreover, he discovered, as he approached, that the fellow in white men’s clothing was wearing the identical suit which he had seen the robber, Duff, wear. It was easy to guess then how Duff had come by the Indian costume he wore on his recent visit to the cabin.
“Tell me where I will find the white brother with whom you traded clothes,” said Ree, as he shook hands with the Indians. “His name is Duff and he now wears the dress of the Mingo for no good purpose.”
“Ugh,” was the only answer the Indians made. They could not understand how the white lad could tell at once with whom the exchange had been made.
“No see Spotted Face—Spotted Face no friend of young brother White Fox,” said Long Arrow, who wore Duff’s clothes.
It was Duff whom he called “Spotted Face,” referring to the marks the smallpox had left.
“Spotted Face ask Long Arrow and ask Beaver Hair to burn house of white brothers,” put in the other Indian. “Say white brother killed Black Eagle.”
Here was news of a very interesting kind. Duff, then, had been trying to turn these two Indians against himself and John, had he? These were Ree’s thoughts.
“Spotted Face say give heap firewater—heap money—for Long Arrow and Beaver Hair to carry off white brother and hide him in cave where Spotted Face has his bed,” Long Arrow said.
This was more interesting news. Duff, it may have been, had kidnaped John, after having failed to prevail upon the Indians to do it.
“And my Mingo friends would not do so,” Ree answered, shaking hands with the savages again. “I thank you both; and Spotted Face—”
“Tongue of Spotted Face speaks crooked—crooked as snakes when asleep,” said Beaver Hair, referring to serpents which lie coiled when sunning themselves. “Because Killdeer—him you call the lone Indian—saw Spotted Face kill Black Eagle. Young white brother not kill Black Eagle. Killdeer saw him die.”
What in the world would he next hear of this marvelous lone Indian who seemed in all places at all times? So thought Ree, deeply impressed by the pointed climax his Indian friends had reached. Inwardly, as the thought flew upon his mind, he thanked fortune that the vanishing savage had at least been the means of thwarting the design of the unscrupulous Duff to turn these Mingoes against himself and John, by telling them of the cruel murder of kind old Black Eagle.
“Does Duff—Spotted Face—know that Killdeer saw him strike the Black Eagle down?” Ree asked, glad to know the name of the solitary savage, at last.
The Indians shook their heads.
“Killdeer get him bime-by,” said Long Arrow significantly. “Killdeer’s war is his own war.”
And here was still more to set Ree to thinking—two Mingoes, not especially friendly with the Delawares, saying of the lone Indian just as Gentle Maiden had said, “His war is his own war.” What was the secret of it all? He asked Long Arrow and he asked Beaver Hair then and there. Neither would answer.
“Killdeer has not shot at me nor at your other white brother for a long time,” said Ree. “Has he no war against us?”
“Yes, Killdeer has,” was the answer. “He be heap bad—kill anybody—get many scalps.”
This was not very pleasant information, but time was passing and Ree could not press his inquiries further. He asked the Indians whether they had seen the trail of any persons in the woods, and they answered that they had not. He told them briefly then of John’s disappearance, but they did not volunteer to help him in his search, and bidding them good-bye, he hastened on, eating some dried venison as he went.
The unhappy lad’s mind was filled with conflicting thoughts. Was it the mysterious savage, Killdeer, or was it Duff who had attacked John and the Quaker? Why should Duff have wished to have John kidnaped? The questions were still puzzling him when suddenly he discovered another freshly-made trail in the snow. The tracks were those of a man, but whether Indian or Paleface he could not tell.
“A white man, I should guess from their size,” the boy was saying to himself, “Indians nearly always have small—”
“Stand!”
It was the voice of Duff, and as Ree looked up, startled by the unexpected command, he gazed at the muzzle of a rifle in the hands of that scoundrel, not a score of yards distant.
“I’ve been hunting you this good while, and now, by the eternal, I’ve got ye,” the villain said.
“Get up!”
It was Duff who spoke, and he accompanied the command with a volley of oaths.
In wonderfully quick time Duff went through John’s pockets and the pouch which hung at his belt, taking everything he found, which, fortunately, was nothing more than a hunting knife and pistol.
“Take his gun and push out fast, ahead, Dexter. I’ll follow close behind, and you, young fellow, keep just behind your good friend here, and just ahead of me, and attempt no monkey business, or I’ll blow your brains out! Now, march!”
With a quick glance around to get his bearings, John walked off as Dexter led the way. He noticed regretfully that it was now quite dark in the woods, and the wind was again blowing so hard that their tracks through the snow would be quickly obscured.
For hours, it seemed to John, the silent march continued. At first he knew just where he was, but as it became darker and wolves howled not only on one but on all sides, and the wind swirled and swept so in all directions that he could not keep his bearings, he lost all knowledge of his whereabouts except to know that he was in a very unpleasant predicament, to say the least, and he wished heartily that he was out of it.
It was almost midnight, as nearly as John could judge, when, after winding in and out for some time through dark ravines, whose rocky walls rose high above their heads, making the darkness so intense that they could scarcely see the snow at their feet, Duff and Dexter mounted to a rough ledge four or five feet above the level of the valley in which they were, and dragged their captive up after them. He knew at once, as he found a low, rocky roof above his head, that they were in the mouth of a cave of some sort.
“Make a light,” commanded Duff, and stepping forward he seized John’s arm, as if afraid the boy might attempt to escape.
Dexter, obedient to his chief’s order, knelt in the darkness and by much puffing and blowing kindled a small fire from a few live coals remaining of a blaze the two men evidently had left when starting out.
“Get something to eat,” was the next order of the captain, and Dexter slunk away to another part of the cave.
While he waited by Duff’s side John made as thorough an inspection of the cave as he could by the flickering firelight. It did not appear very deep though the roof was twice as high as a man, and its yawning mouth extended nearly its entire width of probably twenty feet. Still comparatively little snow had drifted in and the floor was dry and hard. In one corner not far from the fire was a pile of leaves on which some skins and blankets were spread, while hanging on the forks of a sapling cut off half way up and now leaning against the wall, were a frying pan and other cooking utensils.
“Kind of ghost-like around here,” the boy remarked, smiling grimly as the firelight cast spectral shadows in the deeper parts of the cavern and upon the rough walls. “Seems to me I can see the ghosts of Quilling and Black Eagle right now.”
“Dry up! Blast your noisy tongue, dry up!” growled Duff beneath his breath, while involuntarily he shuddered and glanced around.
“Oh, what a guilty conscience,” thought John, mentally resolving to make use of this discovery that his captor was afraid of ghosts, if the opportunity came to him.
Their meager supper of venison over, Dexter, at Duff’s command—it seemed that the former was obliged to do all the physical labor—brought stout thongs of twisted buckskin and John was speedily bound hand and foot, and then pushed and thrown upon the bed of leaves and skins in the corner. Duff and Dexter also lay down, one on either side of the prisoner.
It was daylight when John awoke, the bonds upon his wrists and ankles instantly, painfully reminding him of where he was and bringing to his mind the unhappy recollection of all that had happened. Neither Duff nor Dexter was on the bed beside him, and, rolling over, he looked around. There sat Dexter on the log by the fire.
“Hi, there!” called John.
“Jest don’t you say nothin’. I’m to knock yer blasted brains out if ye holler, er say a word. Them’s Duff’s own words. Lay still an’ don’t say nothin’ an’ I won’t do ye no harm, an’ I’ll git ye a bite to eat.”
So saying Dexter sliced off a few cuts of meat from a nearly consumed fore quarter of a deer and prepared it for the prisoner.
“It was too bad Quilling was killed the way he was,” said John, as he ate, wishing to appear friendly, for he believed Dexter was not at heart nearly so villainous as his companion.
“Bub, jest you shet up. Ye ain’t allowed to say nothin’. Them’s the orders.”
But after a pause of several minutes, Dexter added: “Duff didn’t say as I couldn’t talk none, though, an’ I kin say yes, ’twas too bad as Quilling got killed. But it was his own fault. When Duff goes to yer hut as an Injun, plannin’ to get what he was after, an’ left me an’ Quilling at the edge o’ the woods t’ help him if he needed it, or to draw you chaps out some way, an’ give him a better chance, if he didn’t come back by midnight, Quilling an’ me stood under a tree with low limbs where we wouldn’t be seen by anybody. Then Quilling got scared—allus was a blamed baby anyhow,—an’ he begun to chatter an’ talk ’bout how he wished he had stayed to home. ‘An’ I’m goin’ to holler to Duff this minute that I want t’ go home an’ he’s got t’ go with me,’ he says, speakin’ up loud. An’ with that he steps out into the clearin’, when ‘bang!’ he tumbled over like a rabbit, an’ in a jiffy there come pouncin’ onto him a devil of an Injun that has been hangin’ round these parts a long time.
“An’ this Injun ain’t no nat’ral critter at all. He comes an’ goes too quick fer that. He’s a Injun witch, that’s what he is, an’ ’fore I knew it I was yellin’ ‘help,’ an’ hootin’ like a owl, which was the sign agreed on to call Duff out if we had to have him; an’ then I goes racin’ into the woods like all get out. Duff comes runnin’ after me, cursin’ awful, he was that mad. But he knew Quilling was a goner an’ we—we jest lit out fer our cave here. We was watchin’ from the woods when you an’ the Quaker chap started out to the Injun town an’ then it was that Duff says we would ketch ye, an’ we did, an’ what’s next to be did is fer me to know an’ you to find out, as the sayin’ is.”
John, it is sure, was greatly interested in what he had heard. And now, as Dexter showed no signs of speaking further, though he seemed to like to hear his own tongue going, the captive tried hard to think of some seemingly innocent question or remark which would start the fellow talking once more. At last he said:
“Honest truth, Mr. Dexter, I was not spying on you that night away back at the Eagle tavern when I went for a drink of water and found you and Duff and Quilling reading a letter.”
“Young feller, you keep still. Don’t you say nothin’; that’s what! But ye needn’t think Duff lays it up ag’in ye that ye came onto us sudden-like that night at Quilling’s place. He don’t remember nothin’ about it, I don’t s’pose. Why, him an’ me had only got to Quilling’s that same night; an’ of course we didn’t know what Quilling wanted till we got there. He was jest a-goin’ to show us that letter or piece o’ one, when you chaps come along. Quilling didn’t know himself jest what the thing meant, but he knew it told about money buried in the ground an’ he knew that this chap Nesbit had done good business liftin’ jew’lry an’ coin from folks along the roads an’ places. He knew enough to guess pretty straight as how Duff would be the man to help find the other part of the letter, ’cause he had seen Nesbit have it, an’ he sent fer him, an’ Duff an’ me went together. But while yer talkin’, boy, only ye ain’t allowed to talk none, an’ I’ll knock yer blasted brains out if ye do, this here ain’t my reg’lar trade, an’ I vow, if there’s much more killin’ an’ slavin’ fer Duff, I’m a-goin’ t’ quit it.”
Dexter paused and put a few sticks of wood on the fire.
“It’s ’bout time Duff was comin’ back,” he said, as he sat down again. “Duff’s gone to hunt yer pardner an’ if he don’t give him what he wants, he’s goin’ to knock yer blasted brains out an’ scalp ye jest the same as though that Injun witch had did it, an’ it’ll be laid onto the Injun. Duff’s wrote a letter on bark with charcoal that says that, an’ now ye know what yer chances be.”
John was far from comfortable as he learned Duff’s monstrous plan. He could not believe that Ree would surrender the letter, which was not his property, but the property of Theodore Hatch, without a struggle, and he knew that Duff would not hesitate to kill. The result, it was all too likely, would be that Duff, in one of his furious passions would commit murder and John Jerome would never greet his friends again.
“Ye see I was jest a farm hand an’ never was in the line as Duff was in, until he got me into this one, sayin’ it would only be a job of findin’ a box o’ gold buried in the ground, an’ I could handle a spade so good,” Dexter continued, talking as though to himself. “But it ain’t been like he said. I ain’t no coward like Quilling, but if this here scheme Duff’s now workin’ don’t do the business, I’m goin’ to quit—I’m goin’ to quit.”
Dexter shook his head gloomily. It was undoubtedly a “blue” day for him. He rose and walked out just beyond the mouth of the cave.
“I’m goin’ to quit,” the fellow murmured despondently again, and his words were as a prophecy.
From a clump of bushes above, at the top of the steep hill across the ravine, clearly visible through the bare, gray trees, there came a puff of smoke; a rifle sounded, and Dexter, shading his eyes with one hand, looking down the valley in search of Duff, whom he would see never again, sprang high into the air. As though it were some inanimate thing his body fell backward at full length upon the ground, and from his temple trickled a tiny stream of crimson, staining the snow.
So ended the life of Dexter. If the thrilling adventures that awaited John Jerome, his prisoner, and Return Kingdom on the edge of civilization urge you to further reading, turn with me the pages of “The Lone Indian” that together we may learn the full history of the little cabin on the banks of the Cuyahoga.
W. B. C.