The Lone Ranche

Chapter Ten.

A Brave Steed Abandoned

In making his bold dash, Walt Wilder was not acting without a preconceived plan. He had one. The smoke, with its covering cloud, might be the means of concealment, and ultimate salvation; at all events, it would cover their retreat long enough to give them a start of the pursuers, and then the speed of their horses might possibly be depended upon for the rest.

They at first followed this plan, but unfortunately soon found that it would not long avail them. The smoke was not drifting in the right direction. The breeze carried it almost straight towards the line of the cliffs, while their only chance was to strike for the open plain. At the cliffs their flight would be stopped.

So far the smoke had favoured them. Thick and stifling in the immediate vicinity of the waggons, it enabled them to slip unobserved through the ruck of savages. Many of these, still mounted, had seen them pass outward, but through the blue film had mistaken them for two of their own men. They perhaps knew nothing of there having been horses inside the corral, and did not expect to see any of their caged enemies attempting to escape in that way. Besides, they were now busy endeavouring to extinguish the fires, all resistance being at an end.

As yet there was no sign of pursuit, and the fugitives rode up with the projecting nimbus around them. In the soft sand their horses’ hoofs made no noise, and they galloped towards the cliff silent as spectres.

On reaching its base, it became necessary for them either to change the direction of their flight, or bring it to a termination. The bluff towered vertically above them, like a wall of rude masonwork. A cat could not have scaled it, much less horse, or man. They did not think of making the attempt.

And now, what were they to do? Ride out from the smoke-cloud, or remain under its favouring shelter? In either case they were sure of being discovered and pursued. It would soon clear off, and they would be seen from the waggons. Already it was fast thinning around them; the Indians having nearly extinguished the fires in order to save the treasure, which had no doubt been their chief object for attacking the caravan. Soon there would be no smoke – and then?

The pursued men stayed not to reflect further. Delay would only add to their danger; and with this thought urging them on, they wheeled their horses to the left, and headed along the line of the bluff. Six seconds after they were riding in a pure atmosphere, under clear dazzling sunlight.

But it gave them no delight. A yell from the savages told them they were seen, and simultaneously with the shout, they perceived a score of horsemen spurring from the crowd, and riding at full speed towards them.

They were both splendidly mounted, and might still have had a fair chance of escape; but now another sight met their eyes that once more almost drove them to despair.

A promontory of the cliff, stretching far out over the sandy plain, lay directly in their track. Its point was nearer to the pursuers than to them. Before they could reach, and turn it, their retreat would be intercepted.

Was there still a chance to escape in the opposite direction?

Again suddenly turning, they galloped back as they had come; again entered the belt of smoke; and, riding on through it, reached the clear sunlight beyond.

Again a torturing disappointment. Another promontory – twin to the first – jutted out to obstruct them.

There was no mystery in the matter. They saw the mistake they had made. In escaping under cover of the cloud they had gone too far, ridden direct into a deep embayment of the cliff!

Their pursuers, who had turned promptly as they, once more had the advantage. The outlying point of rocks was nearer to them, and they would be almost certain to arrive at it first.

To the fugitives there appeared no alternative but to ride on, and take the chance of hewing their way through the savages surrounding – for certainly they would be surrounded.

“Git your knife riddy, Frank!” shouted Wilder, as he dug his heels into his horse’s side and put the animal to full speed. “Let’s keep close thegither – livin’ or dead, let’s keep thegither!”

Their steeds needed no urging. To an American horse accustomed to the prairies there is no spur like the yell of an Indian; for he knows that along with it usually comes the shock of a bullet, or the sting of a barbed shaft.

Both bounded off together, and went over the soft sand, silent, but swift as the wind.

In vain. Before they could reach the projecting point, the savages had got up, and were clustering around it. At least a score, with spears couched, bows bent, and clubs brandishing, stood ready to receive them.

It was a gauntlet the pursued men might well despair of being able to run. Truly now seemed their retreat cut off, and surely did death appear to stare them in the face.

“We must die, Walt,” said the young prairie merchant, as he faced despairingly toward his companion.

“Maybe not yet,” answered Wilder, as with a searching glance, he directed his eye along the façade of the cliff.

The red sandstone rose rugged and frowning, full five hundred feet overhead. To the superficial glance it seemed to forbid all chance either of being scaled, or affording concealment. There was not even a boulder below, behind which they might find a momentary shelter from the shafts of the pursuers. For all that, Wilder continued to scan it, as if recalling some old recollection.

“This must be the place,” he muttered. “It is, by God!” he added more emphatically, at the same time wrenching his horse around, riding sharp off, and calling to his companion to follow him.

Hamersley obeyed, and rode after, without knowing what next. But, in another instant, he divined the intent of this sudden change in the tactics of his fellow fugitive. For before riding far his eyes fell upon a dark list, which indicated an opening in the escarpment.

It was a mere crack, or chine, scarce so wide as a doorway, and barely large enough to admit a man on horseback; though vertically it traversed the cliff to its top, splitting it from base to summit.

“Off o’ yur hoss!” cried Wilder, as he pulled up in front of it, at the same time flinging himself from his own. “Drop the bridle, and leave him behint. One o’ ’em’ll be enough for what I want, an’ let that be myen. Poor critter, it air a pity! But it can’t be helped. We must hev some kiver to screen us. Quick, Frank, or the skunks will be on to us!”

Painful as it was to abandon his brave steed, Hamersley did as directed without knowing why. The last speeches of the guide were somewhat enigmatical, though he presumed they meant an important signification.

Slipping down from his saddle, he stood by his horse’s side, a noble steed, the best blood of his own State, Kentucky, famed for its fine stock. The animal appeared to know that its master was about to part from it. It turned its head towards him; and, with bent neck, and steaming nostrils, gave utterance to a low neigh that, while proclaiming affection, seemed to say, “Why do you forsake me?”

Under other circumstances the Kentuckian would have shed tears. For months he and his horse had been as man and man together in many a long prairie journey – a companionship which unites the traveller to his steed in liens strong as human friendship, almost as lasting, and almost as painful to break. So Frank Hamersley felt, as he flung the bridle back on the animal’s withers – still retaining hold of the rein, loth to relinquish it.

But there was no alternative. Behind were the shouting pursuers quickly coming on. He could see their brandished spears glancing in the sun glare. They would soon be within reach, thrusting through his body; their barbed blades piercing him between the ribs.

No time for sentiment nor dallying now, without the certainty of being slain.

He gave one last look at his steed, and then letting go the rein, turned away, as one who, by stern necessity, abandons a friend, fearing reproach for what he does, but without the power to explain it.

For a time the abandoned steed kept its place, with glances inquiringly sent after the master who had forsaken it. Then, as the yelling crew came closer behind, it threw up its head, snorted, and tore off with trailing bridle.

Hamersley had turned to the guide, now also afoot, but still retaining hold of his horse, which he was conducting towards the crack in the cliff, with all his energies forcing it to follow him; for the animal moved reluctantly, as though suspecting danger inside the darksome cleft.

Still urging it on, he shouted back to the Kentuckian, “You go first, Frank! Up into the kanyon, without losin’ a second’s time. Hyar, take my gun, an’ load both, whiles I see to the closin’ o’ the gap.”

Seizing both guns in his grasp, Hamersley sprang into the chine, stopping when he got well within its grim jaws.

Wilder went after, leading his steed, that still strained back upon the bridle.

There was a large stone across the aperture, over which the horse had to straddle. This being above two feet in height, when the animal had got its forelegs over Wilder checked it to a stand. Hitherto following him with forced obedience, it now trembled, and showed a strong determination to go back. There was an expression, in its owner’s eye it had never seen before – something that terribly frayed it. But it could not now do this, though ever so inclined. With its ribs close pressing the rocks on each side, it was unable to turn; while the bridle drawn firmly in front hindered it from retiring.

Hamersley, busily engaged in loading the rifles, nevertheless found time to glance at Wilder’s doings, wondering what he was about.

“It air a pity!” soliloquised the latter, repeating his former words in similar tones of commiseration. “F’r all that, the thing must be done. If thar war a rock big enough, or a log, or anythin’. No! thar ain’t ne’er another chance to make kiver. So hyar goes for a bit o’ butcherin’.”

As the guide thus delivered himself, Hamersley saw him jerk the bowie knife from his belt, its blade red and still reeking with human gore. In another instant its edge was drawn across the throat of the horse, from which the blood gushed forth in a thick, strong stream, like water from the spout of a pump. The creature made a last desperate effort to get off, but with its forelegs over the rocks and head held down between them, it could not stir from the spot. After a convulsive throe or two, it sank down till its ribs rested upon the straddled stone; and in this attitude it ended its life, the head after a time drooping down, the eyes apparently turned with a last reproachful look upon the master who had murdered it!

“It hed to be did; thar war no help for it,” said Wilder, as he hurriedly turned towards his companion, adding: “Have you got the guns charged?”

Hamersley made answer by handing him back his own rifle. It was loaded and ready. “Darn the stinkin’ cowarts!” cried the guide, grasping the gun, and facing towards the plain. “I don’t know how it may all eend, but this’ll keep ’em off a while, anyhow.”

As he spoke he threw himself behind the body of the slaughtered steed, which, sustained in an upright position between the counterpart walls, formed a safe barricade against the bullets and arrows of the Indians. These, now riding straight towards the spot, made the rocks resound with exclamations of surprise – shouts that spoke of a delayed, perhaps defeated, vengeance.

They took care, however, not to come within range of that long steel-grey tube, that, turning like a telescope on its pivot, commanded a semicircle of at least a hundred yards’ radius round the opening in the cliff.

Despite all the earnestness of their vengeful anger, the pursuers were now fairly at bay, and for a time could be kept so.

Hamersley looked upon it as being but a respite – a mere temporary deliverance from danger, yet to terminate in death. True, they had got into a position where, to all appearance, they could defend themselves as long as their ammunition lasted, or as they could withstand the agony of thirst or the cravings of hunger. How were they to get out again? As well might they have been besieged in a cave, with no chance of sortie or escape.

These thoughts he communicated to his companion, as soon as they found time to talk.

“Hunger an’ thirst ain’t nothin’ to do wi’ it,” was Wilder response. “We ain’t a goin’ to stay hyar not twenty minutes, if this child kin manage it as he intends ter do. You don’t s’pose I rushed into this hyar hole like a chased rabbit? No, Frank; I’ve heern o’ this place afore, from some fellers thet, like ourselves, made caché in it from a band o’ pursuin’ Kimanch. Thar’s a way leads out at the back; an’ just as soon as we kin throw dust in the eyes o’ these yellin’ varmints in front, we’ll put straight for it. I don’t know what sort o’ a passage thar is – up the rocks by some kind o’ raven, I b’lieve. We must do our best to find it.”

“But how do you intend to keep them from following us? You speak of throwing dust in their eyes – how, Walt?”

“You wait, watch an’ see. You won’t hev yur patience terrifically tried: for thar ain’t much time to spare about it. Thar’s another passage up the cliffs, not far off; not a doubt but these Injuns know it; an’ ef we don’t make haste, they’ll git up thar, and come in upon us by the back door, which trick won’t do, nohowsomdever. You keep yurself in readiness, and watch what I’m agoin’ to do. When you see me scoot up back’ards, follor ’ithout sayin’ a word.”

Hamersley promised compliance, and the guide, still kneeling behind the barricade he had so cruelly constructed, commenced a series of manoeuvres that held his companion in speechless conjecture.

He first placed his gun in such a position that the barrel, resting across the hips of the dead horse, projected beyond the tail. In this position he made it fast, by tying the butt with a piece of string to a projecting part of the saddle. He next took the cap from his head – a coonskin it was – and set it so that its upper edge could be seen alongside the pommel, and rising about three inches above the croup. The ruse was an old one, with some new additions and embellishments.

“It’s all done now,” said the guide, turning away from the carcase and crouching to where his comrade awaited him. “Come on, Frank. If they don’t diskiver the trick till we’ve got time to speed up the clift, then thar’s still a chance for us. Come on, an’ keep close arter me!”

Hamersley went, without saying a word. He knew that Wilder, well known and long trusted, had a reason for everything he did. It was not the time to question him, or discuss the prudence of the step he was taking. There might be danger before, but there was death – sure death – behind them.

Chapter Eleven.

A Descent into Darkness

In less than a dozen paces from its entrance the chine opened into a wider space, again closing like a pair of callipers. It was a hollow of elliptical shape – resembling an old-fashioned butterboat scooped out of the solid rock, on all sides precipitous, except at its upper end. Here a ravine, sloping down from the summit-level above, would to the geologist at once proclaim the secret of its formation. Not so easily explained might seem the narrow outlet to the open plain. But one skilled in the testimony of the rocks would detect certain ferruginous veins in the sandstone that, refusing to yield to the erosion of the running stream, had stood for countless ages.

Neither Walt Wilder nor the young Kentuckian gave thought to such scientific speculations as they retreated through the narrow gap and back into the wider gorge. All they knew or cared for was that a gully at the opposite end was seen to slope upward, promising a path to the plain above.

In sixty seconds they were in it, toiling onward and upward amidst a chaos of rocks where no horse could follow – loose boulders that looked as if hurled down from the heavens above or belched upward from the bowels of the earth.

The retreat of the fugitives up the ravine, like their dash out of the enclosed corral, was still but a doubtful effort. Neither of them had full confidence of being able eventually to escape. It was like the wounded squirrel clutching at the last tiny twig of a tree, however unable to support it. They were not quite certain that the sloping gorge would give them a path to the upper plain; for Wilder had only a doubtful recollection of what some trapper had told him. But even if it did, the Indians, expert climbers as they were, would soon be after them, close upon their heels. The ruse could not remain long undetected.

They had plunged into the chasm as drowning men grasp at the nearest thing afloat – a slender branch or bunch of grass, a straw.

As they now ascended the rock-strewn gorge both had their reflections, which, though unspoken, were very similar. And from these came a gleam of hope. If they could but reach the summit-level of the cliff! Their pursuers could, of course, do the same; but not on horseback. It would then be a contest of pedestrian speed. The white men felt confidence in their swiftness of foot; in this respect believing themselves superior to their savage pursuers. They knew that the Comanches were horse Indians – a significant fact. These centaurs of the central plateaux, scarce ever setting foot upon the earth, when afoot are almost as helpless as birds with their wings plucked or pinioned.

If they could reach the crest of the cliff, then all might yet be well; and, cheered by this reflection, they rushed up the rock-strewn ravine, now gliding along ledges, now squeezing their bodies between great boulders, or springing from one to the other – in the audacity of their bounds rivalling a brace of bighorns.

They had got more than half-way up, when cries came pealing up the glen behind them. Still were they hidden from the eyes of the pursuers. Jutting points of rock and huge masses that lay loose in the bed of the ravine had hitherto concealed them. But for these, bullets and arrows would have already whistled about their ears, and perhaps put an end to their flight. The savages were near enough to send either gun-shot or shaft, and their voices, borne upward on the air, sounded as clear as if they were close at hand.

The fugitives, as already said, had reached more than halfway up the slope, and were beginning to congratulate themselves on the prospect of escape. They even thought of the course they should take on arriving at the summit-level, for they knew that there was an open plain above. All at once they were brought to a stop, though not by anything that obstructed their path. On the contrary, it only seemed easier; for there were now two ways open to them instead of one, the ravine at this point forking into two distinct branches. There was a choice of which to take, and it was this that caused them to make a stop, at the same time creating embarrassment.

The pause, however, was but for a brief space of time – only long enough to make a hasty reconnoissance. In the promise of an easy ascent there seemed but little difference between the two paths, and the guide soon came to a determination.

“It’s a toss up atween ’em,” he said; “but let’s take the one to the right. It looks a little the likest.”

Of course his fellow-fugitive did not dissent, and they struck into the right-hand ravine; but not until Walt Wilder had plucked the red kerchief from his head, and flung it as far as he could up the left one, where it was left lying in a conspicuous position among the rocks.

He did not say why he had thus strangely abandoned the remnant of his head-gear; but his companion, sufficiently experienced in the ways and wiles of prairie life, stood in no need of an explanation.

The track they had now taken was of comparatively easy ascent; and it was this, perhaps, that had tempted Wilder to take it. But like most things within the moral and physical world, its easiness proved a delusion. They had not gone twenty paces further up when the sloping chasm terminated. It debouched on a little platform, covered with large loose stones, and there rested after having fallen from the cliff above. But at a single glance they saw that this cliff could not be scaled.

They had entered into a trap, out of which there was no chance of escape or retreat without throwing themselves back upon the breasts of their pursuers.

The Indians were already ascending the main ravine. By their voices it could be told that they had reached the point where it divided; for there was a momentary suspension of their cries, as with the baying of hounds thrown suddenly off the scent.

It would not be for long. They would likely first follow up the chasm where the kerchief had been cast, but, should that also prove a cul-de-sac, they would return and try the other.

The fugitives saw that it was too late to retrace their steps. They sprang together upon the platform, and commenced searching among the loose rocks, with a faint hope of finding some place of concealment.

It was but a despairing sort of search, again like two drowning men who clutch at a straw.

All at once an exclamation from the guide called his companion to his side. It was accompanied by a gesture, and followed by words low muttered.

“Look hyar, Frank! Look at this hole! Let’s git into it!”

As Hamersley came close he perceived a dark cavity among the stones, to which Wilder was pointing. It opened vertically downward, and was of an irregular, roundish shape, somewhat resembling the mouth of a well, half-coped with slabs.

Dare they enter it? Could they? What depth was it?

Wilder took up a pebble and flung it down. They could hear it descending, not at a single drop, but striking and ricochetting from side to side.

It was long before it reached the bottom and lay silent. No matter for that. The noise made in its descent told them of projecting points or ledges that might give them a foothold.

They lost not a moment of time, but commenced letting themselves down into the funnel-shaped shaft, the guide going first.

Slowly and silently they went down – like ghosts through the stage of a theatre – soon disappearing in the gloom below, and leaving upon the rock-strewn platform no trace to show that human foot had ever trodden it.

Chapter Twelve.

A Storm of Stones

Fortunately for the fugitives, the cavity into which they had crept was a shaft of but slight diameter, otherwise they could not have gone down without dropping far enough to cause death, for the echoes from the pebbles betokened a vast vertical depth.

As it was, the void turned out to be somewhat like that of a stone-built chimney with here and there a point left projecting. It was so narrow, moreover, that they were able to use both hands and knees in the descent, and by this means they accomplished it.

They went but slowly, and took care to proceed with caution. They knew that a false step, the slipping of a foot or finger, or the breaking of a fragment that gave hold to their hands, would precipitate them to an unknown depth.

They did not go farther than was necessary for quick concealment. There was noise made in their descent, and they knew that the Indians would soon be above, and might hear them. Their only hope lay in their pursuers believing them to have gone by the left hand path to the plain above. In time the Indians would surely explore both branches of the ravine, and if the cunning savages should suspect their presence in the shaft there would be no hope for them. These thoughts decided them to come to a stop as soon as they could find foothold.

About thirty feet from the top they found this, on a point of rock or ledge that jutted horizontally. It was broad enough to give both standing room, and as they were now in the midst of amorphous darkness, they took stand upon it.