The Prairie Chief

Chapter Four.

Circumventing the Blackfeet

On reaching the neighbourhood of the Blackfoot camp, Whitewing, and his companions crept to the top of the eminence which overlooked it, taking care, however, to keep as far away as possible from the sentinel who still watched there.

Brighteyes proved herself to be quite as expert as her male companions in advancing like a snake through the long grass, though encumbered with a blanket wrapped round her shoulders. The use of this blanket soon became apparent. As the three lay prone on their faces looking down at the camp, from which the sound of voices still arose in subdued murmurs, the young chief said to his sister—

“Let the signal be a few notes of the song Brighteyes learned from the white preacher. Go.”

Without a word of reply, the girl began to move gently forward, maintaining her recumbent position as she went, and gradually, as it were, melted away.

The moon was still shining brightly, touching every object with pale but effective lights, and covering hillocks and plains with correspondingly dark shadows. In a few minutes Brighteyes had crept past the young sentinel, and lay within sight—almost within ear shot of the camp.

Much to her satisfaction she observed that the Indians had not bound their captives. Even the missionary’s hands were free. Evidently they thought, and were perhaps justified in thinking, that escape was impossible, for the horses of the party were all gathered together and hobbled, besides being under a strong guard; and what chance could women and children have, out on the plains on foot, against mounted men, expert to follow the faintest trail? As for the white man, he was a man of peace and unarmed, as well as ignorant of warriors’ ways. The captives were therefore not only unbound, but left free to move about the camp at will, while some of their captors slept, some fed, and others kept watch.

The missionary had just finished singing a hymn, and was about to begin to read a portion of God’s Word when one of the women left the group, and wandered accidentally close to the spot where Brighteyes lay. It was Lightheart.

“Sister,” whispered Brighteyes.

The girl stopped abruptly, and bent forward to listen, with intense anxiety depicted on every feature of her pretty brown face.

“Sister,” repeated Brighteyes, “sink in the grass and wait.”

Lightheart was too well trained in Indian ways to speak or hesitate. At once, but slowly, she sank down and disappeared. Another moment, and Brighteyes was at her side.

“Sister,” she said, “Manitou has sent help. Listen. We must be wise and quick.”

From this point she went on to explain in as few words as possible that three fleet horses were ready close at hand to carry off three of those who had been taken captive, and that she, Lightheart, must be one of the three.

“But I cannot, will not, escape,” said Lightheart, “while the others and, the white preacher go into slavery.”

To this Brighteyes replied that arrangements had been made to rescue the whole party, and that she and two others were merely to be, as it were, the firstfruits of the enterprise. Still Lightheart objected; but when her companion added that the plan had been arranged by her affianced husband, she acquiesced at once with Indian-like humility.

“I had intended,” said Brighteyes, “to enter the Blackfoot camp as if I were one of the captives, and thus make known our plans; but that is not now necessary. Lightheart will carry the news; she is wise, and knows how to act. Whitewing and Leetil Tim are hid on yonder hillock like snakes in the grass. I will return to then, and let Lightheart, when she comes, be careful to avoid the sentinel there—”

She stopped short, for at the moment a step was heard near them. It was that of a savage warrior, whose sharp eye had observed Lightheart quit the camp, and who had begun to wonder why she did not return.

In another instant Brighteyes flung her blanket round her, whispered to her friend, “Lie close,” sprang up, and, brushing swiftly past the warrior with a light laugh—as though amused at having been discovered—ran into camp, joined the group round the missionary, and sat down. Although much surprised, the captives were too wise to express their feelings. Even the missionary knew enough of Indian tactics to prevent him from committing himself. He calmly continued the reading in which he had been engaged, and the Blackfoot warrior returned to his place, congratulating himself, perhaps, on having interrupted the little plan of one intending runaway.

Meanwhile Lightheart, easily understanding her friend’s motives, crept in a serpentine fashion to the hillock, where she soon found Whitewing—to the intense but unexpressed joy of that valiant red man.

“Will Leetil Tim go back with Lightheart to the horses and wait, while his brother remains here?” said the young chief.

“No, Little Tim won’t,” growled the trapper, in a tone of decision that surprised his red friend. “Brighteyes is in the Blackfoot camp,” he continued, in growling explanation.

“True,” returned the Indian, “but Brighteyes will escape; and even if she fails to do so now, she will be rescued with the others at last.”

“She will be rescued with us, just now,” returned Little Tim in a tone so emphatic that his friend looked at him with an expression of surprise that was unusually strong for a redskin warrior. Suddenly a gleam of intelligence broke from his black eyes, and with the soft exclamation, “Wah!” he sank flat on the grass again, and remained perfectly still.

Brighteyes found that it was not all plain sailing when she had mingled with her friends in the camp. In the first place, the missionary refused absolutely to quit the captives. He would remain with them, he said, and await God’s will and leading. In the second place, no third person had been mentioned by her brother, whose chief anxiety had been for his bride and the white man, and it did not seem to Brighteyes creditable to quit the camp after all her risk and trouble without some trophy of her prowess. In this dilemma she put to herself the question, “Whom would Lightheart wish me to rescue?”

Now, there were two girls among the captives, one of whom was a bosom friend of Lightheart; the other was a younger sister. To these Brighteyes went, and straightway ordered them to prepare for flight. They were of course quite ready to obey. All the preparation needed was to discard the blankets which Indian women are accustomed to wear as convenient cloaks by day. Thus unhampered, the two girls wandered about the camp, as several of the others had occasionally been doing. Separating from each other, they got into the outskirts in different directions. Meanwhile a hymn had been raised, which facilitated their plans by attracting the attention of the savage warriors. High above the rest, in one prolonged note, the voice of Brighteyes rang out like a silver flute.

“There’s the signal,” said Little Tim, as the sweet note fell on his listening ear.

Rising as he spoke, the trapper glided in a stooping posture down the side of the hillock, and round the base of it, until he got immediately behind the youthful sentinel. Then lying down, and creeping towards him with the utmost caution, he succeeded in getting so near that he could almost touch him. With one cat-like bound, Little Tim was on the Indian’s back, and had him in his arms, while his broad horny hand covered his mouth, and his powerful forefinger and thumb grasped him viciously by the nose.

It was a somewhat curious struggle that ensued. The savage was much bigger than the trapper, but the trapper was much stronger than the savage. Hence the latter made fearful and violent efforts to shake the former off; while the former made not less fearful, though seemingly not quite so violent, efforts to hold on. The red man tried to bite, but Tim’s hand was too broad and hard to be bitten. He tried to shake his nose free, but unfortunately his nose was large, and Tim’s grip of it was perfect. The savage managed to get just enough of breath through his mouth to prevent absolute suffocation, but nothing more. He had dropped his tomahawk at the first onset, and tried to draw his knife, but Tim’s arms were so tight round him that he could not get his hand to his back, where the knife reposed in his belt. In desperation he stooped forward, and tried to throw his enemy over his head; but Tim’s legs were wound round him, and no limpet ever embraced a rock with greater tenacity than did Little Tim embrace that Blackfoot brave. Half choking and wholly maddened, the savage suddenly turned heels over head, and fell on Tim with a force that ought to have burst him. But Tim didn’t burst! He was much too tough for that. He did not even complain!

Rising again, a sudden thought seemed to strike the Indian, for he began to run towards the camp with his foe on his back. But Tim was prepared for that. He untwined one leg, lowered it, and with an adroit twist tripped up the savage, causing him to fall on his face with tremendous violence. Before he could recover, Tim, still covering the mouth and holding tight to the nose, got a knee on the small of the savage’s back and squeezed it smaller. At the same time he slid his left hand up to the savage’s windpipe, and compressed it. With a violent heave, the Blackfoot sprang up. With a still more violent heave, the trapper flung him down, bumped his head against a convenient stone, and brought the combat to a sudden close. Without a moment’s loss of time, Tim gagged and bound his adversary. Then he rose up with a deep inspiration, and wiped his forehead, as he contemplated him.

“All this comes o’ your desire not to shed human blood, Whitewing,” he muttered. “Well, p’raps you’re right—what would ha’ bin the use o’ killin’ the poor critturs. But it was a tough job!”—saying which, he lifted the Indian on his broad shoulders, and carried him away.

While this fight was thus silently going on, hidden from view of the camp by the hillock, Whitewing crept forward to meet Brighteyes and the two girls, and these, with Lightheart, were eagerly awaiting the trapper. “My brother is strong,” said Whitewing, allowing the faintest possible smile to play for a moment on his usually grave face.

“Your brother is tough,” returned Little Tim, rubbing the back of his head with a rueful look; “an’ he’s bin bumped about an’ tumbled on to that extent that it’s a miracle a whole bone is left in his carcass. But lend a hand, lad; we’ve got no time to waste.”

Taking the young Blackfoot between them, and followed by the silent girls, they soon reached the thicket where the horses had been left. Here they bound their captive securely to a tree, and gave him a drink of water with a knife pointed at his heart to keep him quiet, after which they re-gagged him. Then Whitewing led Lightheart through the thicket towards his horse, and took her up behind him. Little Tim took charge of Brighteyes. The young sister and the bosom friend mounted the third horse, and thus paired, they all galloped away.

But the work that our young chief had cut out for himself that night was only half accomplished. On reaching the rendezvous which he had appointed, he found the braves of his tribe impatiently awaiting him.

“My father sees that we have been successful,” he said to Bald Eagle, who had been unable to resist the desire to ride out to the rendezvous with the fighting men. “The great Manitou has given us the victory thus far, as the white preacher said he would.”

“My son is right. Whitewing will be a great warrior when Bald Eagle is in the grave. Go and conquer; I will return to camp with the women.”

Thus relieved of his charge, Whitewing, who, however, had little desire to achieve the fame prophesied for him, proceeded to fulfil the prophecy to some extent. He divided his force into four bands, with which he galloped off towards the Blackfoot camp. On nearing it, he so arranged that they should attack the camp simultaneously at four opposite points. Little Tim commanded one of the bands, and he resolved in his own mind that his band should be the last to fall on the foe.

“Bloodshed may be avoided,” he muttered to himself; “an’ I hope it will, as Whitewing is so anxious about it. Anyhow, I’ll do my best to please him.”

Accordingly, on reaching his allotted position, Tim halted his men, and bided his time.

The moon still shone over prairie and hill, and not a breath of air stirred blade or leaf. All in nature was peace, save in the hearts of savage man. The Blackfoot camp was buried in slumber. Only the sentinels were on the alert. Suddenly one of these—like the war-horse, who is said to scent the battle from afar—pricked his ears, distended his nostrils, and listened. A low, muffled, thunderous sort of pattering on the plain in front. It might be a herd of buffaloes. The sentinel stood transfixed. The humps of buffaloes are large, but they do not usually attain to the size of men! The sentinel clapped his hand to his mouth, and gave vent to a yell which sent the blood spirting through the veins of all, and froze the very marrow in the bones of some! Prompt was the reply and turn-out of the Blackfoot warriors. Well used to war’s alarms, there was no quaking in their bosoms. They were well named “braves.”

But the noise in the camp prevented them from hearing or observing the approach of the enemy on the other side till almost too late. A whoop apprised the chief of the danger. He divided his forces, and lost some of his self-confidence.

“Here comes number three,” muttered Little Tim, as he observed the third band emerge from a hollow on the left.

The Blackfoot chief observed it too, divided his forces again, and lost more of his self-confidence.

None of the three bands had as yet reached the camp, but they all came thundering down on it at the same time, and at the same whirlwind pace.

“Now for number four,” muttered Little Tim. “Come boys, an’ at ’em!” he cried, unconsciously paraphrasing the Duke of Wellington’s Waterloo speech.

At the some time he gave utterance to what he styled a Rocky Mountain trapper’s roar, and dashed forward in advance of his men, who, in trying to imitate the roar, intensified and rather complicated their own yell.

It was the last touch to the Blackfoot chief, who, losing the small remnant of his self-confidence, literally “sloped” into the long grass, and vanished, leaving his men to still further divide themselves, which they did effectually by scattering right and left like small-shot from a blunderbuss.

Great was the terror of the poor captives while this brief but decisive action lasted, for although they knew that the assailants were their friends, they could not be certain of the issue of the combat. Naturally, they crowded round their only male friend, the missionary.

“Do not fear,” he said, in attempting to calm them; “the good Manitou has sent deliverance. We will trust in Him.”

The dispersion of their foes and the arrival of friends almost immediately followed these words. But the friends who arrived were few in number at first, for Whitewing had given strict orders as to the treatment of the enemy. In compliance therewith, his men chased them about the prairie in a state of gasping terror; but no weapon was used, and not a man was killed, though they were scattered beyond the possibility of reunion for at least some days to come.

Before that eventful night was over the victors were far from the scene of victory on their way home.

“It’s not a bad style o’ fightin’,” remarked Little Tim to his friend as they rode away; “lots o’ fun and fuss without much damage. Pity we can’t do all our fightin’ in that fashion.”

“Waugh!” exclaimed Whitewing; but as he never explained what he meant by “waugh,” we must leave it to conjecture. It is probable, however, that he meant assent, for he turned aside in passing to set free the Blackfoot who had been bound to a tree. That red man, having expected death, went off with a lively feeling of surprise, and at top speed, his pace being slightly accelerated by a shot—wide of the mark and at long range—from Little Tim.

Three weeks after these events a number of Indians were baptised by our missionary. Among them were the young chief Whitewing and Lightheart, and these two were immediately afterwards united in marriage. Next day the trapper, with much awkwardness and hesitation, requested the missionary to unite him and Brighteyes. The request was complied with, and thenceforward the white man and the red became more inseparable than ever. They hunted and dwelt together—to the ineffable joy of Whitewing’s wrinkled old mother, whose youth seemed absolutely to revive under the influence of the high-pressure affection brought to bear on a colony of brown and whitey-brown grand-children by whom she was at last surrounded.

The doubts and difficulties of Whitewing were finally cleared away. He not only accepted fully the Gospel for himself, but became anxious to commend it to others as the only real and perfect guide in life and comfort in death. In the prosecution of his plans, he imitated the example of his “white father,” roaming the prairie and the mountains far and wide with his friend the trapper, and even venturing to visit some of the lodges of his old foes the Blackfoot Indians, in his desire to run earnestly, yet with patience, the race that had been set before him—“looking unto Jesus.”

Full twenty years rolled by, during which no record, was kept of the sayings or doings of those whose fortunes we have followed thus far. At the end of that period, however, striking incidents in their career brought the most prominent among them again to the front—as the following chapters will show.

Chapter Five.

The Mountain Fortress

In one of those numerous narrow ravines of the Rocky Mountains which open out into the rolling prairies of the Saskatchewan there stood some years ago a log hut, or block-house, such as the roving hunters of the Far West sometimes erected as temporary homes during the inclement winter of those regions.

With a view to render the hut a castle of refuge as well as a home, its builder had perched it close to the edge of a nearly inaccessible cliff overhanging one of those brawling torrents which carry the melting snows of the great rocky range into one of the tributaries of the Saskatchewan river. On what may be called the land side of the hut there was a slight breastwork of logs. It seemed a weak defence truly, yet a resolute man with several guns and ammunition might have easily held it against a considerable band of savages.

One fine morning about the time when the leaves of the forest were beginning to put on their gorgeous autumnal tints, a woman might have been seen ascending the zigzag path that led to the hut or fortress.

She was young, well formed, and pretty, and wore the Indian costume, yet there was something in her air and carriage, as well as the nut-brown colour of her hair, which told that either her father or her mother had been what the red men term a “pale-face.”

With a light, bounding step, very different from that of the ordinary Indian squaw, she sprang from rock to rock as if in haste, and, climbing over the breastwork before mentioned, entered the hut.

The interior of the little fortress was naturally characteristic of its owner. A leathern capote and leggings hung from a nail in one corner; in another lay a pile of buffalo robes. The rough walls were adorned with antlers of the moose and other deer, from the various branches of which hung several powder-horns, fire-bags, and bullet-pouches. Near the rude fireplace, the chimney of which was plastered outside and in with mud, was a range of six guns, of various patterns and ages, all of which, being well polished and oiled, were evidently quite ready for instant service. Beside them hung an old cavalry sabre. Neither table nor chairs graced the simple mansion; but a large chest at one side served for the former, and doubtless contained the owner’s treasures, whatever these might be, while three rough stools, with only nine legs among them, did service for the latter.

The action of the young woman on entering was somewhat suggestive of the cause of her haste. Without a moment’s delay, she seized a powder-horn and bullet-pouch, and began to charge the guns, some with ball, others with slugs, as fast as she could. There was a cool, quiet celerity in her proceedings which proved that she was accustomed to the handling of such weapons.