An Indian TrapperThis Indian trapper depicted by Remington may be a Cree, or perhaps a Blackfoot, whom one was apt to run across in the Selkirk Mountains, or elsewhere on the plains of the British Territory, or well up north in the Rockies, toward the outbreak of the Civil War.Illustration fromSOME AMERICAN RIDERSbyColonel Theodore Ayrault Dodge, U.S.A.Originally published inHarper’s Magazine,May, 1891
This Indian trapper depicted by Remington may be a Cree, or perhaps a Blackfoot, whom one was apt to run across in the Selkirk Mountains, or elsewhere on the plains of the British Territory, or well up north in the Rockies, toward the outbreak of the Civil War.
Indian and cowboy on horsebackA Questionable CompanionshipIn frontier days when the white man and the Indian met on a lonely trail it was natural for them to watch each other with suspicion as they rode side by side. To both the companionship seemed questionable, until finally some words of the red man convinced the white man that his companion was trustworthy. After that there were a sharing of food or water or tobacco and an admixture of comfort to the companionship.Illustration fromA QUESTIONABLE COMPANIONSHIPOriginally published inHarper’s Weekly,August 9, 1890
A Questionable CompanionshipIn frontier days when the white man and the Indian met on a lonely trail it was natural for them to watch each other with suspicion as they rode side by side. To both the companionship seemed questionable, until finally some words of the red man convinced the white man that his companion was trustworthy. After that there were a sharing of food or water or tobacco and an admixture of comfort to the companionship.Illustration fromA QUESTIONABLE COMPANIONSHIPOriginally published inHarper’s Weekly,August 9, 1890
In frontier days when the white man and the Indian met on a lonely trail it was natural for them to watch each other with suspicion as they rode side by side. To both the companionship seemed questionable, until finally some words of the red man convinced the white man that his companion was trustworthy. After that there were a sharing of food or water or tobacco and an admixture of comfort to the companionship.
The other agent had sworn at him and once had kicked at him—“for which I will kill him”—he added with quiet menace. “Hehas tried to steal away my children to teach them white man’s ways. I don’t want them to learn white man’s ways. White man lie, and steal and quarrel. Then the agent cut off my rations which are a part of our treaty and I was hungry. For all this I am angry at white men.”
When he had finished the agent said, “You’re all wrong, Howling Wolf. Some white men are bad, but many are good and want to do the Indian good. I am one of those who are set aside by the Great Father to see that your rights are secured. You may depend on me. Go ask Red Beard, Wolf Voice, or White Calf, they will tell you the kind of man I am. I’m going to be your friend whether you are my friend or not. I want you to come and see me. I want you to draw your rations and be friends with me. Will you do it? I want you to think about this to-night and come and see me again.”
For fully five minutes Howling Wolf sat thinking deeply with his eyes on the floor. His lips twitched occasionally and his broad breast heaved with profound emotion. It was hard to trust the white man even when he smiled, for his tongue had ever been forked like the rattlesnake and his hand exceedingly cunning. His deeds also were mysterious. Out of the east he came and monstrous things followed him—canoes that belched flame and thunder, iron horses that drew huge wagons, with a noise like a whirlwind. They brought plows that tore the sod, machines that swept away the grass. Their skill was diabolical. They all said, “dam Injun,” and in those words displayed their hearts. They desolated, uprooted and transformed. They made the red men seem like children and weak women by their necromancy. Was there no end to their coming? Was there no clear sky behind this storm? What mighty power pushed them forward?
And yet they brought good things. They brought sugar and flour and strange fruits. They knew how to make pleasant drinks and to raise many grains. They were not all bad. They were like a rainstorm which does much harm and great good also. Besides,here was this smiling man, his agent, waiting to hear what he had to say.
At last he was able to look up, and though he did not smile, his face was no longer sullen. He rose and extended his hand. “I will do as you say. I will go home and think. I will come to see you again and I will tell you all my mind.”
When he came two days later he met the agent with a smile. “How! My friend—How!” he said pleasantly.
The agent took him to his inner office where none might hear and made the sign “Be seated.”
Howling Wolf sat down and began by saying, “I could not come yesterday, for I had not yet finished thinking over your words. When night came I did as you said. I lay alone in my tepee looking up at a star just above and my thoughts were deep and calm. You are right, Howling Wolf is wrong. Nobody ever explained these things to me before. All white men said, ‘Go here,’ ‘Do that,’ ‘Don’t go there,’ ‘Don’t do that,’—they never explained and I did not understand their reasons for doing so. No white man ever shook hands with me like a friend. They all said, ‘Dam Injun’—all Shi-an-nay know those words. You are not so. You are a just man—everybody tells me so. I am glad of this. It makes my heart warm and well. I have taken on hope for my people once more. I had a heart of hate toward all the white race—now all that is gone. It is buried deep under the ground. I want to be friends with all the world and I want you to make me a paper—will you do it?”
“Certainly,” replied the agent. “What shall it be?”
The old man rose and with deep solemnity dictated these words to be mysteriously recorded in the white man’s wonderful tablet:
“Say this: I am Howling Wolf. Long I hated the white man. Now my heart is good and I want to make friends with all white men. I want to work with a plow and live in a house like the white man. These are my words. Howling Wolf.”
To this the old man put his sign: and as he folded the paper and put it away in his pouch, he said, “This shall be a sign to all men. This paper I will show to all Shi-an-nay and to all the white men. It will tell them that my heart is made good.”
And he went out with the glow of good cheer upon his face.
Now Howling Wolf was a chief. He had never lifted a heavy burden in his life—though others of the Shi-an-nay came often to the Agency farmer for work. They enjoyed freighting and whenever there were hides to go to the distant railway or goods to be fetched, the agent employed them and, though their ponies were small and shifty, they managed, nevertheless, to do creditable work with them. They cut wood and made hay and mended bridges cunningly and well. Howling Wolf had kept away from all this work. He did not believe in it.
Two days after his talk with the agent the clerk was amazed to see Howling Wolf drive down to the warehouse to secure a load of hides. He had no wagon of his own, but he had hired one of his son-in-law, Painted Feather, and was prepared to do his share. In the glow of his new peace he wished to do more than his share. He helped everybody to load and waited till the last, willing to take what was left.
The agent, hearing of this zeal of his convert, came down to see him and smilingly asked, “Why work so hard, Howling Wolf?”
“I will tell you,” said Howling Wolf. “In my evil days I took no part in making the fences and laying the bridges—now I want to catch up. Therefore I must work twice as hard as anyone else.”
“Howling Wolf, you do me honor,” said the agent. “I shake your hand. You are now safely on the white man’s road.”
To this Howling Wolf only said, “My heart is very good to-day. I am happy and I go to see the white man’s big camp. I shall keep my eyes open and learn many good things.”
The teams laden with their skins had just passed the big red jaws of Bitterwood Cañon when a party of cowboys overtook them.
“Hello there,” yelled one big fellow. “Where you going with those hides?”
Howling Wolf heard the curses, but his heart was soft with newborn love for his enemies and he smilingly greeted his foes. “How! how!”
“See the old seed grin. Let’s shoot him up a few and see him hustle.”
“Oh come along, let ’em alone, Bill,” said one of the other men.
“That’s old Howling Wolf,” put in the third man. “Better let him be. He’s a fighter.”
“Are you old Howling Wolf?” asked Bill, riding alongside.
Howling Wolf nodded and smiled again—though he understood only his name.
“Fighter, are you?” queried the cowboy, “Eat men up—hey?”
“How, how!” repeated the old man as pleasantly as he was able, though his eyes were growing stern.
“I’d like to hand him out a package just for luck. He’s too good-natured. What say?”
“Oh, come along Bill,” urged his companions. As they rode by the next wagon, wherein sat a younger man, Bill called out, “Get out o’ the road!”
“Go to hell!” replied the driver, Harry Turtle, a Carlisle student. “You are a big fool.”
Bill drew his revolver and spurred his horse against Harry’s off pony and bawled, “I’d cut your hide into strips for a cent!”
Harry rose in his wagon and uttered a cry of warning which stopped every team, and his eyes flamed in hot anger. “You go!” he said, “or we will kill you.” The cowboys drew off, Brindle Bill belching imprecations, but his companions were genuinely alarmed and rode between him and the wagons and in this way preventedan outbreak. Howling Wolf reproved young Turtle and said: “Do not make any reply to them. We must be careful not to anger the white men.”
They reached the railway safely and, having unloaded their freight, went into camp about a half mile from the town on the river flat beneath some cottonwood trees.
To every white man that spoke to him Howling Wolf replied pleasantly and was very happy to think he was serving the agent and also earning some money. The citizens were generally contemptuous of him, and some of them refused his extended hand, but he did not lay that up against them. It had been long since he had seen a white man’s town and he was vastly interested in everything. He was amazed at the stores of blankets and saddles and calico which he saw. He looked at the gayly painted wagons with envy, for he had no wagon of his own and he saw that to travel on the white man’s road a wagon was necessary. He looked at harnesses also with covetous eyes. Every least thing had value to him, the pictures on the fences, on the peach cans, on the tobacco boxes, the pumps, the horse troughs and fountains—nothing escaped his eager eyes. He was like a boy again.
He was standing before a shop window lost in the attempt to understand the use of all the marvelous things he saw there, when a saloon door opened and a party of loud-talking white men came out. He turned his head quickly and perceived the three cowboys who had passed him on the road. They recognized him also and their leader swaggered up to him, made reckless with drink, and began to abuse him.
“So you’re Howling Wolf, are ye? Big chief. Drink blood. Why I’d break you in two pieces for a leatherette. I’m Brindle Bill, you understand, I’d a killed you on the road only——”
Howling Wolf again understood only the curses, but he turned a calm face upon his enemy and extended his hand. “How? How, white man?”
Bill spat into his hand.
Quick as a flash Howling Wolf slapped the ruffian’s face. “Coyote!” he cried in his own tongue.
The cowboy jerked his revolver from its holster, but Howling Wolf leaped behind a signpost and the bullet, going wild, glanced from an iron rod and entered the knee of a man who stood in the doorway of the saloon. With a scream of terror he fell flat on the walk as if killed.
Instantly the peaceful street became a place of savage outcry.
“Kill him! Kill the red devil!” shouted a dozen who knew nothing of what had happened, except that a man was shot and an Indian was present.
Like a bear at bay, Howling Wolf faced his hereditary enemies. “I am peaceful. I have done nothing,” he called, jerking a paper from his pocket. “See, this is true, read it!”
The paper saved his life, for all were curious to see what this long official envelope contained. It occurred to one of the men in the circle to investigate.
“Hold on, boys! Wait a minute! This may be a courier. Be quiet now till I see.”
He took the envelope and opened the paper while the crowd waited. “Read it Lannon.”
Lannon read in a loud voice: “I am Howling Wolf. Long I hated the white man. Now my heart is good.”
A burst of derisive laughter interrupted the reader.
“Oh, is it!”
“Kill the old fool for luck!”
“Lynch him.”
But, though they laughed at it, the letter cooled the excitement of the crowd, and when the sheriff came he had no trouble in arresting Howling Wolf, who went willingly, for he feared for his life in the face of the crowd in the street—which grew greater each moment.
He recoiled sharply as they came to the door of the jail. He knewwhat that meant. “I will not go!” he said. “Why do you put me in there? I have done nothing.”
The sheriff, ready to make capital for himself in the eyes of the mob which had followed him, put his revolver to his captive’s head and said brutally:
“Git in there or I’ll blow your head off.”
Wolf understood the man’s action, and, fearing the crowd which followed, submitted to be pushed into the cell and was locked in. He still held in his hand the document which had been contemptuously thrust back upon him, and now sat half-stunned by the sudden fury of the white men toward him. That the three cowboys should make trouble did not surprise him—but that all the white men should run toward him with angry faces and armed fists appalled and embittered him. Perhaps there were only a few friendly white men after all. Perhaps the agent was mistaken and the Shi-an-nay must war to the death with these infuriated cattlemen.
“I did wrong to come here,” he thought. “I should have remained deep in my own country among the rocks and the coyotes. I have put myself into the hands of my deadly enemies. I shall die here alone, because I have been a child and have listened to sweet words.”
Meanwhile grossly distorted accounts of the affair passed from saloon to barber shop and at last it took this shape: “A gang of drunken reds had struck Hank Kelly for a drink and when he refused one of them shot him in the stomach. All escaped but one, old Howling Wolf, one of the worst old reprobates that ever lived. He ought to be lynched and we’ll do it yet.”
Bill the cowboy was a hero. He swaggered about saying, “I had him in a hole. I winged him so’t sheriff had him easy.”
Ultimately he grew too drunk to throw any light on the subject at all and his companions took him and fled the town, leaving Howling Wolf to bear the weight of the investigation.
Harry Turtle went to the sheriff and said abruptly: “I want see Howling Wolf.”
“You can’t see him,” replied the sheriff.
“Why can’t I see him?”
“Because I say so. Get out o’ here.... The whole tribe of ye ought to be wiped out. Git—or I’ll put you where the dogs can eat ye.”
Turtle went away with a face dark with anger. He said to his companions, “I must go back to the agent at once to tell him what has happened. You better all keep together with me so if the cowboys try to kill us we can defend ourselves. Come, let us go.”
They went out into the darkness and traveled all night very hard, and when morning came they were out of danger.
When Turtle entered the agent’s office late next day he showed little sign of what he had been through.
“Hello, Harry, I thought you went to town?”
“I did. I got back. Heap trouble come.”
“What’s matter?”
“Cowboy fight Howling Wolf—Howling Wolf fight, too. White man get killed. Howling Wolf in calaboose. I come quick to tell you.”
Cook grew grave. “Is that so, where are the other men?”
“Outside.”
“Bring ’em in, Claude,” he said to his interpreter. “You talk with these people and find out what it is all about.”
In the end he ordered his team and with Claude drove away to town, a long, hard, dusty road. He reached the hotel that night too late to call on the sheriff and was forced to wait till morning. The little rag of a daily paper had used the shooting as a text for its well-worn discourse. “Sweep these marauding fiends out of the State or off the face of the earth,” it said editorially. “Get them out of the path of civilization. Scenes of disorder like that of yesterday are sure to be repeated so long as these red pets of the Governmentare allowed to cumber the earth. The State ought to slaughter them like wolves.”
Cook read this with a flush of hot blood in his face. He was quite familiar with such articles, but he went to bed that night feeling more keenly than ever in his life the difficult position he was called upon to fill. To race hatred these people had added greed for the Shi-an-nay lands. In this editorial was vented the savage hate of thousands of white men. There could be no doubt of it—and were it not for a fear of the general government the terms of its hatred would have been carried out long ago.
In the early morning he took Claude and went to the jail.
The sheriff met him suavely. “Oh—certainly captain—you can see him,” he said, but his tone was insulting.
When the agent and his interpreter entered his cell Howling Wolf looked up with a low cry of pleasure. He took Cook’s hand in both of his and said slowly:
“My friend, take me away from here. I cannot bear to be locked up. I have done nothing. When I showed my paper the cattlemen laughed. When I reached my hand in friendship they spat upon it. This made my heart very bitter but I did not fight.”
When he had secured Wolf’s story in detail, the Major said, “Do not worry, Wolf, I will see that you are released.”
To the sheriff he said: “What are you holding this man for?”
“For shooting with intent to kill.”
“But he didn’t shoot. He had no weapon. It is absurd.”
“How doyouknow he didn’t?”
“Because all his companions say so; he says so.”
“Oh! You’d take his word would you?”
“Yes in a thing of that kind. Did you find a gun on him?”
“No—but—”
“What chance did he have for concealing it? Were you there when the shooting took place?”
“No—but credible witnesses——”
“As a matter of fact the saloon keeper was struck by a bullet aimed at Howling Wolf by a cowboy. Where is that cowboy? Why has he not been arrested?”
“I don’t believe it. You’ll take——”
“It’s not your business to believe or disbelieve. Did you have a warrant to arrest Wolf?” asked the captain sternly.
“No matter whether I did or not,” replied the sheriff insolently, “he’s here and you can’t take him away. You can protect your thieves and murderers in the reservation, but when they come in here and go howling around you’ll find the case different.” In this tone he blustered.
The captain was firm. “I believe Wolf to be entirely innocent and I’ll see justice done.” He called Claude again and said, “Tell Howling Wolf to be quiet—tell him not to be scared. He’ll have to remain in jail till I can get a release. I’m going to see the judge now. Tell him I’m his friend and I won’t let these people harm him.”
The visit to the judge was still more disheartening. He, too, was suave and patient, but it was plain he intended to do nothing to help the agent. “It may be that a mistake has occurred, but if so the trial will clear your man. As it is the Indian is arrested in a street brawl in which a man is shot. The Indian is arrested, I may add, in due course of law and must stand trial.”
“Very well, we’ll go to trial—but meanwhile release my man on parole. I’ll answer for him.”
The judge had been expecting this, but professed to ponder. “I don’t think that would be wise. We’ve had great difficulty in apprehending offenders. We might find this man hard to reapprehend. I appreciate your desire to——”
“Judge Bray, you are mistaken,” replied Cook with heat, for he understood the covert insult. “You have never failed of getting your man but once, and then, as you know, it was the fault of your sheriff. Where could this man go? I know every man on myreservation. He could not hide out on the hills, and he would be a marked man on any other reservation. Besides all these considerations—I know Howling Wolf. I am peculiarly anxious to have him released till his trial. He dreads confinement—he feels his arrest as an injustice and it will embitter him. More than this I have pledged my word to him to secure his release.”
The judge was obdurate. “The citizens are incensed at the frequent depredations of your charges,” he said, “and they will not submit longer to any laxity. I cannot help you.”
The agent rose grimly. “Very well, I’ll see justice done this man if I bring the whole power of the department to bear on you. I will enlist the aid of every lover of justice in the country. Howling Wolf has been abused. So far from shooting he came in here as my messenger unarmed and peaceful. Your drunken citizens assaulted him. I do not wonder that my people say you have the hearts of coyotes.”
As Cook drove away out of the squalid town he felt as he had several times before—the cruel, leering, racial hate of the border man, to whom the red man is big game. He had a feeling that, among all these thousands of American citizens, not one had the heart to stand out and say, “I’ll help you secure justice.”
His heat made him momentarily unjust, for there were many worthy souls, even in this village, who would have joined him could they have been made intimately informed of the case. At the moment he felt the helpless dismay of the red man when enmeshed by the laws of the whites.
But he was not a man to yield a just position without a struggle. As he rode he planned a campaign which should secure justice for Howling Wolf. His meeting with the half-frenzied wife of the captive only added new vigor to his resolution. With face haggard with suffering the poor woman cried out to him, “Where is he—my husband?”
He gave her such comfort as he could and drove on mentallywriting letters, which should make the townsmen writhe with shame of their inhumanity.
Court did not sit for many weeks, but Howling Wolf knew nothing of that. He lived in daily hope of being released. He fed his heart on the words of his friend the agent. He brooded over his wrongs like a wounded wolf in his den, till his heart became bitter in his bosom. The glow of his new found love of the white man had died out—smothered by the cold gloom of his prison. He remembered only one white face with pleasure—that of his agent. All others were grinning or hateful or menacing.
He would have gone mad but for the visits of his wife and children who came to see him and were allowed to approach the bars of his cell so that he might lay his hands on the head of his little son. These brief visits comforted him—for the sake of his wife and children he lived.
In a week or two the people of Big Snake had quite forgotten Howling Wolf. If any word recalled him to their minds they merely said, “Do him good to feel the inside of a stone wall. It’ll take the fight out of him. He’ll be good Injun once he gets out. He’s in luck to escape being strung up.”
Now the town possessed a baseball team that had defeated every other club in the State, excepting one. St. Helen’s had proved a Waterloo to Big Snake on the Fourth of July and so its citizens fairly ached for a chance to “do St. Helen’s up,” and win back some of the money they had lost.
One morning about two weeks after his imprisonment Howling Wolf’s keen ears caught the sound of far-off drums and he wondered if the soldiers were coming at last to release him. His heart leaped with joy and he sprang to his feet vigorous, alert, and so listened long. He could hear plainly the voice of the bugle and he fancied he could detect the marching of columned feet. His friend, the agent, was coming to punish his captors.
He was not afraid of the soldier chiefs. They fought honorably.They did not shut their enemies up in cells and take their arms away. They made war in the open air and on the hills. A shout of joy was about to break from his lips when the jailer entered the corridor much excited. He talked as he came, “I’ll take the redskin along—anyhow.”
He made a great many signs to his captive, but Howling Wolf only understood one or two of them. “Come with me,” and “I’ll kill you.”
He drew his blanket round him and thought. “I will go. I will at least escape these walls. If I die I will die under the sky where the sun can see me.”
He quietly followed the sheriff outside, but when he saw the handcuffs he rebelled and shook his head.
The sheriff made bungling signs again and said, “All right—but if you try to run away I’ll bore a hole in ye big as a haystack—that’s all. I won’t stand any funny business.”
Howling Wolf comprehended nothing of all this save the motion toward the gun, which he took to mean that he was to be killed. The excitement of his captor, the mystery of all he did, his threatening gestures were convincing. But Howling Wolf was a chief. He had never flinched in battle and as he felt the wind of the wide sky on his face he lifted his head and said in his heart:
“If I am to die, I am ready; but I will die fighting.”
The sheriff motioned him to get into his buggy and he obeyed—for the hand of the sheriff was on his revolver—and they rode through the town, which was almost deserted. Far up the street Howling Wolf could hear the noise of the drum and his heart swelled big with a sense of coming trouble. Was he being led out to be tortured? Perhaps he would be permitted to fight his way to death? “No matter—I am ready.”
A man at the door of the drug store called jovially:
“Where are you going, Mr. Sheriff?”
“Out to see the ball game. I happened to have only this oneprisoner so thought I’d take him along. Blowed if I’m going to miss the game for a greasy buck-Injun.”
“Look out he don’t give you the slip.”
The sheriff winked meaningly. “There’ll be a right lively fox hunt if he does. The boys would like nothing better than to rope an Injun to-day. It would draw better than a bullfight.”
They both laughed at this notion and Howling Wolf seized upon the menace in the sheriff’s voice though his words were elusive. As they neared the grand stand the noise of the great crowd reached across the quiet fields and Howling Wolf saw hundreds of people streaming along the road before him. His limbs grew tense. It was plain that his captor was driving directly toward this vast throng of savage white people.
He looked round him. On either side were rows of growing corn and beyond the field on the right was the grove of trees which marked the course of the river. As he remembered this his final resolution came. “If I am to die I will die now,” and he sprang from his seat to the ground and dived beneath the wire fence. He heard the sheriff’s gun crack twice and thrice, but he rose unhurt and with a wild exultation in his heart ran straight toward the river. Again the sheriff fired, his big revolver sounding loud in the windless air.
Then, as if his shooting were a signal, a squad of cowboys rose out of a gully just before the fugitive, and with wild whoopings swept toward him. They came with lariats swinging high above their heads, and Howling Wolf, knowing well their pitiless ferocity, turned and ran straight toward the sheriff, who stood loading his gun on the inside of the fence. As he ran Howling Wolf could see great ranks of yelling people rushing over the field. He ran now to escape being dragged to death, hoping the sheriff might shoot him through the heart as he came near.
Indian scouts arrest one of their ownThe Arrest of the ScoutSuspected of having kidnaped an Indian girl and murdered her mother, this man was traced to a tiswin camp, where he was found carousing with other drinkers. Though a member of their own corps, his brother scouts, after disarming and binding him, brought him back to the post, where he was lodged in the guard-house.Illustration fromMASSAI’S CROOKED TRAILbyFrederic RemingtonOriginally published inHarper’s Magazine,January, 1898
The Arrest of the ScoutSuspected of having kidnaped an Indian girl and murdered her mother, this man was traced to a tiswin camp, where he was found carousing with other drinkers. Though a member of their own corps, his brother scouts, after disarming and binding him, brought him back to the post, where he was lodged in the guard-house.Illustration fromMASSAI’S CROOKED TRAILbyFrederic RemingtonOriginally published inHarper’s Magazine,January, 1898
Suspected of having kidnaped an Indian girl and murdered her mother, this man was traced to a tiswin camp, where he was found carousing with other drinkers. Though a member of their own corps, his brother scouts, after disarming and binding him, brought him back to the post, where he was lodged in the guard-house.
Duel with lances on horsebackAn Indian DuelThe Indian on the pinto pony is armed with a big buffalo-lance, while his opponent wields a skin-knife. As depicted by the artist the buffalo-lance is being driven clean through his antagonist’s shoulder.Illustration fromSUN-DOWN LEFLARE’S WARM SPOTbyFrederic RemingtonOriginally published inHarper’s Magazine,September, 1898
An Indian DuelThe Indian on the pinto pony is armed with a big buffalo-lance, while his opponent wields a skin-knife. As depicted by the artist the buffalo-lance is being driven clean through his antagonist’s shoulder.Illustration fromSUN-DOWN LEFLARE’S WARM SPOTbyFrederic RemingtonOriginally published inHarper’s Magazine,September, 1898
The Indian on the pinto pony is armed with a big buffalo-lance, while his opponent wields a skin-knife. As depicted by the artist the buffalo-lance is being driven clean through his antagonist’s shoulder.
The officer shot twice at long range but missed, and, as the panting red man ran straight toward him the sheriff fell to the earthand crawled away, leaving Howling Wolf to face a squad of twenty infuriated cowboys and a thousand citizens just behind on foot. With the light of hell on their faces they shot down the defenseless man and then alighted, and, with remorseless hate, crushed his face beneath their feet as if he were a rattlesnake. They stabbed his dead body and shot it full of bullets. They fought for a chance to kick him. They lost all resemblance to men. Wolves fighting over the flesh of their own kind could not have been more heartlessly malevolent—more appalling in their ferocity.
In the clamor of their breathless cursing and cries of hate a strong clear voice made itself heard—a vibrant manly voice:
“Stop,in the name o’ Christ!” And through the wolfish mass a tall young man in the garb of a Catholic priest forced his way. His big, broad face was set with resolution and his brow gleamed white in the midst of the tumbling mass of bronzed weather-beaten border men.
“Stand back!Are you fiends of hell? Where is your shame? A thousand to one! Is this your American chivalry? Oh, you cowards!”
He stood above the fallen man like a lion over the body of his mate. His voice quivered with the sense of his horror and indignation.
“God’s curse on ye if you touch this man again.” The crowd was silent now and the priest went on: “I have seen the beasts of the African jungles at war and I know the habits of the serpents of Nicaragua—I know your American bears and wolves, but I have never seen any savagery like this.”
Every word he spoke could be heard by the mob; every man who listened looked aside. They were helpless under the lash of the young priest’s scorn. “You are the brave boys of whom we read,” he said, turning to the cowboys. “You are the Knights of the plains——” Then his righteous wrath flamed forth again. “Knights of the plains! The graveyard jackals turn sweet inyour presence. Brave men are ye to rope and drag a defenseless man—and you!” He turned to the slinking sheriff. “You are of my parish—I know you. The malediction of the church hangs overyoufor this day’s work.” He paused for breath; then added: “Take up the body of this man. He is dead but his blood will yet make this town a stench in the nostrils of the world. You cannot do these things to-day and not be condemned of all Christian peoples.”
With a contemptuous wave of his hand he dismissed the mob. “Go home! Go back to your wives and children and boast of your great deed. Leave the dead with me.”
The crowd slunk away, leaving the sheriff, the priest, and a doctor, who volunteered his services, to examine the bleeding flesh that had once been a tall and powerful red chieftain.
“The man is alive!” said the doctor with a tone of awe. “Life is not extinct. Bring me some water.”
“Save him—for the love of Christ!” exclaimed the priest as he dropped on his knees beside the torn and trampled red man. “It would be a miracle, a blessed miracle, if he should live. It is impossible!”
“His heart is beating—and I think it grows stronger,” repeated the doctor as he fell to work with deft energy.
“What is this?” asked the priest as he picked up a bloody and crumpled paper. He opened it and, as he finished reading it, he raised his eyes and prayed silently with a sort of breathless intensity, while the tears ran down his cheeks:
“Lord Jesus, grant me humbleness and patience with these people. Let my heart not harden with hate of this injustice.”
Then, looking at the poor bruised body of Howling Wolf, he said:
“O God, the pity of it! The pathos of it! His heart was good toward all men and they crushed him to earth!”
They took Howling Wolf up, the priest received him in hishouse and cared for him and he lived—but so battered, so misshapen that his own wife did not know him.
The cloud of his hate and despair never lifted. He spoke no word to any white man save to the good priest and to his friend, the agent, and when he died neither of them knew of it. No white man knows where his body was hidden away.