CHAPTER XIV.

WALTERMYER—A CHAMPION.

“Waal,” exclaimed Kirk Waltermyer, as his good horse floundered along in the darkness, “of all the rides I ever had this is the beat. I’ve hearn tell of storms in the mountings, and thought I had seen them, but they were nowhar compared to this. Whew! how the wind tussles with the tree-tops and whistles in the gulches. I tell you, this is some! I’ve half a mind to camp, and would, only—poor little Est! I wonder if the rain falls as heavily, and the wind soughs as mournfully around your grave, my poor gal?”

The recollection of his little dead sister, now ever kept in memory by the name of the young creature he was seeking to save, humanized and softened his usual rough speech. Still he continued, as if addressing a companion who could reply, and not his faithful horse, with whom his one-sided conversation was held. And yet, if the doctrine of the transmigration of souls were true, might not this matchless steed have been gifted with the keen perception of some great man whose death the world still mourns? We know the foolish falsehood of the story, and yet there exist examples in the brute creation, that, weighed in the scale of worth, would make many a man shrink into littleness.

“I know some horses, Star,” he continued, “that I wouldn’t ride across this mountain in a dark night—nary a time. No, not for all the gold in Shasta. Hello! what kind of a caper is that?”

The horse had come to a sudden stop—so sudden as to shake even his perfect rider, and stood with braced feet, snorting nostrils, and eyes flashing fire, immovable in limb as if sculptured from the very rock on which he stood, and yet his whole body trembling with fear. His keen sight—far more keen than mortal eye in the darkness—had discovered something unusual in the path before him.

“By heaven!” exclaimed the startled frontiersman, as his ready rifle was braced against his shoulder, “if it hain’t an Indian. No, it’s a creepin’, snarlin’ wolf. No, ’tis a b’ar. No, it hain’t none of them. It’s—by thunder, I don’t know what it is;” and he swung himself from his horse, and, bending down, closely watched.

That it was something endowed with life he readily perceived, but what it was he could not make out. Wolf nor bear ever made those stealthy motions, or crept thus slowly along. It was very indistinct, and again he raised his rifle.

“If you be a human, speak,” he shouted; “but if a b’ar or a cowardly cayote, then I’m arter your scalp, and no mistake. But no, no; I don’t need it, and such a night is enough to make beast and man brothers. No, no, I’ll not shoot. Go your way, and if—as I live by bread and buffalo meat, it’s gone! I’ve traveled many a long mile in my day, and this bangs all the other doin’s I ever saw. I do think it was a human, or”—and he raised his hand to his head, as if to be certain that his hair would not lift his cap off in terror of the thought, and his voice dropped to a whisper—“or it mought have been a ghost!”

“Yes, it was a speerit,” he whispered, under his breath; “a poor, wanderin’ speerit, that can not rest quietly in the grave. Poor soul—who knows but that it mought come back again;” and, for the first time during the night, his spurs touched his horse’s flank, and with a great leap the generous brute bounded forward.

But he could not shake the fear from his mind, and he who, single-handed, would have dauntlessly rode into the face of death, now looked anxiously around in the quest of something that his better judgment told him could not exist.

With a feeling of vague terror, Waltermyer still urged his horse on. He had but one object in view, that was to reach the topmost cliff, and there, when morning’s dawn transfigured earth, he could command a boundless view. But the frontiersman had not a heart or mind to linger on imaginary danger.

Soon the cool breeze swept downward, and wantoned with his wet hair, and made merry with his draggled garments, and in its freshness his hardihood returned; even the strain of an old hunting-song hung upon his lips and struggled for utterance as he rode along.

Clearly above him, through the sharp-cut walls of the cañon, he soon began to see the stars shine brightly, and, as the golden light came shimmering down through the leaves, his way became clear, and he urged his good steed more rapidly forward. Then came the gray of morning, the hour when the cloudy waves of night are at full ebb, and stand transfixed, as it were, with golden arrows for a moment, before the flood of day comes surging from the eastern ocean. In the weird semi-light he rode blithely on. A foaming rivulet that a few hours before had held no drop of moisture rolled before him. The whole earth was refreshed, and he felt the glorious influence.

“Come, Star!” he lifted his horse with hand and rein, and rode boldly in.

To the very saddle-bow sunk the horse, as he plunged in the stream, and the foam-beads danced among his tawny mane as his feet failed to reach the bottom.

“Come, Star! Come, good horse!” and his manly voice rang above even the roar of the swollen waters.

But spur, and rein, and voice were all needed now, and when the noble steed reached the opposite bank, it required all his strength and agility to mount it. His fore-feet rest upon the shelving, rocky brink—he rears for the leap—he rises light as a bird on the wing—his hindermost hoofs strike upon the bank, but the insecure footing gives way—he trembles like a strong man, struggling against a giant in the wrestling ring.

“Come, Star! Once more, my boy!”

A giant effort, and a giant leap, and he stands trembling on secure ground, with the water dripping from his glossy hide, and the snowy spot in his forehead gleaming from amid its blackness—a very blazing star, looking out from a storm.

A moment given only to rest, to the recuperation of the vast energy he has just exhibited, and again that tireless horse takes the upward trail, without a word or sign from his master. But his steps are checked. Not that he needed rest—not that Waltermyer, kind-hearted as he was, and even more than tender of his favorite steed, had become doubtful of his strength; but another vision had crossed his track—a ghost appeared before him.

“By—!” but he strangled the oath, and beat back the impious word, before it could find utterance. “Ef it’s not the same thing I saw down below! And it is—hold! don’t jump, for your life! Stop, I say! don’t do it here!” and his horse sprung, as if gifted with wings, beneath the sharp rowel.

Even in the uncertain light, his well-trained eye had discovered that it was a human being, standing on a rocky shelf full a hundred feet above him, and preparing to spring from the fearful height. Who it was he did not pause to think. Enough for him to know that some fellow-being was in trouble, and bent on self-destruction. In as many seconds the swift horse stood on the shelf of rock, and Waltermyer leaped from its back while in full career.

It was an Indian woman, intent on leaping down that fearful height. Her form was bent, and her arms thrown wildly upward for the terrible leap, when the frontiersman interposed.

“By—!” once more the oath was unuttered.

“Yes, it’s a woman!” he continued, as the form became limp, and hung heavily in his arms. “A woman, as I live! May be it’s—” he could not speak the name, but, turning up the face tenderly, saw in the dim light, not the white girl he was searching for, but the features of Waupee, the poor heart-broken wife.

“Pshaw!” he muttered, in disappointment. “It is only a squaw;” and then, as if ashamed of himself, he smoothed the long, black hair from the bronzed face, and after laying the poor creature carefully on the ground, hastened to the stream he had so lately passed, and filled his cap with water. Returning hurriedly, he bathed the upturned face. He was a rude nurse, but kind-hearted, and there was something in the utter helplessness of the wretched Indian woman that took a strong hold upon his rough nature, and exercised an influence over him a thousand women under other circumstances would have failed in producing.

“Waal, she’s real pooty, too,” he muttered, between his teeth. “The pootyest squaw I ever sot eyes on. Who would have thought a red-skinned gal could look so much like a human? But she’s waking up now;” and he seated himself by her side, looking at her with eyes full of wonder and pity.

Like a frightened fawn, the Indian woman started from the rock and gazed about her. She had been so suddenly snatched from the jaws of death, had swooned so deeply, that, for a time, she was lost to all surroundings, and when she opened her eyes, it was like one coming out of total darkness into the glaring light of day. Anxiously, afraid almost, she gazed about her—at the coal-black steed—the strong form and face of the frontiersman, and at the cliff beyond. Then, in all its fearful reality the scene came back to her, and burying her face in her lap, she sat for a long time speechless, after the fashion of her people.

“My good woman,” began Waltermyer, anxious to break the silence, and yet doubtful how or where to commence, “you came mighty near a-fallin’ off the cliff. And now,” continued Waltermyer, “as soon as you have rested a little you must git on my horse thar—he’s a good and true one and a sure-footed—and I will take you to a place of safety, if not home.”

“Waupee has no home,” was the sad response.

“No home? Waal, I might say the same of myself. But I s’pose your home is like mine—that is, your tribe’s is—any whar, whar the night overtakes you. But cheer up; I will take you to your tribe.”

“Waupee must not go to her tribe.”

“Not go to your people? Waal, this beats natur’.”

“A moon ago there was light in her wigwam—now all is darkness. Waupee would have given herself to the dark angels of death. The pale-face saved her and she thanks him. Once before, when the night was dark, she saw him.”

“Saw me?”

“Like a serpent she crawled across his path.”

“You did! Waal, I must have took you for a ghost.”

“The red fiends of murder were in her heart. She was seeking her husband—who turned her out to die, and—”

“The infernal brute!”

“She found him far up in the hills. The sharp knife was in her hand—her arm was raised—”

“But you could not strike him?”

“She had loved him once.”

“Thank God for that!” In the hour of strife, when the hot blood was rioting through the heart, the frontiersman could well and willingly fight his way; but to murder a sleeping man in cold, calculating blood, was a thought that made him, iron-nerved as he was, shudder and grow faint.

“The poor wife he had spurned from his wigwam—the bride of but little more than one small moon—kissed him as he slept, and then turned away forever.”

“That was right—the varmint.”

“She had nothing to live for. Husband, tribe—all was gone. What could she do but die?”

“And so he turned you out—a pooty woman like you, did he?”

For a moment, the black eyes of the Indian woman flashed upon his, as if to learn the meaning of the flattering words he had used, but reading sincerity and not unmeaning compliment in every feature of his face, she replied:

“He had seen a girl of snowy skin—and carried her away from her friends to fill his wigwam, and—”

“Hold your horses, thar. A white gal?”

“Fair as the flowers of spring, with hair like the silk of the maize in the autumn time—eyes like the blue summer sky—cheeks like the climbing rose of the prairie, and lips red as the sumac berries, and voice sweet as the music of spring-waters in the desert.”

“Whar is she now?”

By degrees, he learned the entire history of Esther’s capture—the wandering—the battle and the escape—all except the death of Osse ’o, for of that the woman was ignorant—then his fiery heart burst forth in no measured words. Fierce were the passions that shook his frame, and bitter would have been his revenge if the abductors had stood before him. But even in his wildest torrent of words, there came a controlling, soul-subduing influence. He murmured, “poor little Est,” and restraining himself, continued:

“I ought to know most of the chiefs at Spirit Lake. Did I ever meet this Indian?”

“He is known among the Dacotahs as the Black Eagle.”

“Black devil! Yes, I know him, and a blacker-hearted fiend never stole horses or murdered peaceful emigrants. Waal, waal, his time will come. But he’s but an Indian arter all, and it’s his natur’, I s’pose; but, as for that rascally Elder, if ever I catch him, I’ll make him think that he’s tied to a drove of buffaloes, and they are all kicking him at once.”

“The tongue of Waupee has traveled the trail of truth.”

“I believe you, gal. Thar hain’t no lyin’ hid in your looks, like a serpent in the tall sloo-grass. Yes, I believe you.”

“The pale warrior knows all the poor squaw can tell him. He will follow the trail and the great Manitou will smile upon him. He was very kind to the poor Indian woman, and she will never forget him. Now she will go.”

“Go? Whar in thunder are you goin’ to?”

“The Manitou will guide her moccasins.”

“But you said you had neither home or tribe.”

“She will make for herself a home in the caves of the mountains, and wait patiently until the death-angel shall drive away the white-winged spirit of life.”

“If you do, may I be—! Oh, poor little Est!”

“Where then shall she go?”

“Go? Why with me.”

“The chiefs of the pale-face will laugh at their brother for being kind to a woman of the Dacotahs.”

“That hain’t the safest kind of business, I can tell you, but I don’t care for their laughin’. My shoulders are broad, and can carry a pretty big load.”

“But they will look black on Waupee—will laugh at her wrongs, and trample her heart in the ashes.”

“Let them do it ef they dare! Let any one, even if he war my brother, that is, ef I had one, try to crush or hurt the feelin’s of a poor creature who has been so trampled upon, and Kirk Waltermyer will teach them a lesson they will remember longer than any thing they ever larned at school.”

“The pale-face has been very kind, and the daughter of the Dacotahs will not see him insulted for her sake.”

“Now, you just a-hear. I honor you for your feelin’s, and like you for your speerit, but I don’t go one step without you. So thar! Ef you have made up your mind to camp here until doomsday, why, I’ll pitch my tent too, and Star with me.”

“Has the pale-face thought of what his tribe will say?”

“Tribe be—blessed. Don’t frown, little Est, for that’s no swearin’. I hain’t any more of a tribe than you have, so just make up your mind to come along quietly like a good girl, and I’ll soon show you that Kirk Waltermyer has a heart that beats like a trip-hammer, and always in the right place. He hain’t any more given to braggin’ than one of your warriors; but if anybody even dares to question about you, they’ll find you have got one friend that hain’t to be easily handled.”

“Waupee will go with the pale-face for a time.”

“Waal, I reckon it will be a long time onless you find some better place to camp in than these desolate mountings. Here, Star,” and he whistled his faithful horse to his side.

Star came up ready for action. When Waltermyer had drawn the girths tighter and arranged both bridle and saddle to his liking, he lifted the light form of Waupee from the earth before she had the slightest intimation of his intention, and swung her upon the back of the horse with as little difficulty as if she had been but a feather’s weight. The hot blood welled up into cheek, brow, and neck of the woman, and shone ruddy even through her bronzed skin at the action. But the calm face of Waltermyer satisfied her that all with him was perfect kindness and good faith, before even his words had reached her ear.

“Thar now, you’ll ride like a princess—though I don’t well know what they may be. Onyhow, you’re not a-goin’ to walk, while I own a horse. I know the braves, as they call themselves in your tribe, make you go on foot while they strut off on thar horses all fiery-fired to death. But I don’t and won’t! Thar’s no use a-talkin’, it’s just what Kirk Waltermyer would do for any woman.”

“When the pale-face tires, Waupee will walk.”

“Tires? Waal, ef that isn’t about the richest thing I ever heard. When I tire!”

“But the horse will grow weary. The trail has been a long one and the night stormy.”

“My horse grow a-weary? Waal, that’s equil to the other! When he gits tired I’ll take you in my arms, for not a single step shall a woman walk on such a trail as this, while Kirk Waltermyer draws breath;” and he laid his strong hand on the rein and led the way down the mountain.