CHAPTER VIII.

PRAIRIE FIRE.

Not long, although the scene around them was verdant and peculiarly enticing after their severe struggle for life, did Waltermyer allow his men to rest, for he knew well that the enemy he was following would make no pause, and their steeds, prairie-born and trained, wild and hardy as those they carried, would make light of what to them had been a sore trial. He knew, also, that night would put an almost effectual barrier to their progress. As soon, therefore, as he thought the horses sufficiently refreshed for travel, he gave the requisite order, and, seconded by the poor, anxious father, found but little difficulty in forcing obedience.

“Up, men!” he shouted. “Ef your horses hain’t rested by this time, ’tain’t no use tryin’ to go on.”

“Which way are we to proceed, Waltermyer? No more prairie-work, I trust.”

“No; we’ve done with that kinder thing, but we shall have to cross the sloo again, before we can strike the trail. It ain’t very wide. Then we’ll skirt along it, until we strike the p’int thar whar the nose of the mounting runs inter the perarer.”

“Can we not keep on this side?”

“Onpossible; thar isn’t footin’ for a crawlin’ snake, and I reckon them things can go almost onyw’ares. Ef you’ve a mind to try it you can, but Kirk Waltermyer hasn’t parted company with his senses yet, by a long shot.”

“Of course we trust entirely to your guidance. Lead on and we will follow.”

“Ef you only could foller as I could lead, we’d soon overhaul the red rascals. But it ain’t no use in tryin’ to make such brutes as yours keep up with a horse! Stranger, I told you before there wasn’t but one on the perarer that could, and he is—”

“What sound is that?”

“Only some stun rollin’ down the mounting. I’ve often done the thing myself, just to see it jump and hear what an infernal noise it would make.”

“May it not be Indians?”

“Indians? Now just you look a-here, stranger; if you consate that any red-skin ever cut up such a white man’s caper as that, you don’t know any more about them than I do about Scriptur’, and that is mighty little. But this isn’t followin’ the trail and savin’ the gal. Inter your saddles—no, thank fortune you haven’t got any, and your beasts would never stand them ef you had. But mount, onyway, and mind you don’t go stragglin’ through the sloo, for though thar isn’t any water thar now, there are quicksand beds, and ef you git inter one you’ll go way down—down—down into China.”

Jaded as they had been by their previous journey, the sparkling waters of the chalybeate spring, that foamed clear as crystal and aeriform as champagne, and the soft, juicy grasses that margined them, had revived the horses, and again they sprung forward, as if endowed with new life. Restraining and petting his noble black, Waltermyer took the lead, and soon they were lost to all surrounding objects in the tall dry rushes that ever mark the course of what the Western borderers call “sloo.” Fully two miles wide, the task of crossing was not only seriously uncomfortable, on account of the heat and the clouds of insects that arose before and around them, but the footing was insecure, mined with holes and tangled with treacherous roots.

They rode on in silence, save when, now and then, some serpent, gliding suddenly from under the feet of the horses, startled them, and they leaped madly aloft with a wild snort, their riders wondering at the movement, for their eyes had not fallen on the reptile, with its gorgeous skin and fire-like eyes, as it glided rustling along to seek some deeper hole in which to coil its shiny folds.

“Many a time,” exclaimed Waltermyer, with an almost noiseless laugh, as one of the company was dismounted by the leaping of the animal he rode, “I’d been willin’ to have been thrown higher nor Independence Rock, to have just caught sight of one of the critters.”

“Of what? What was it? I didn’t see any thing.”

“No, nor know any thing until you found yourself flat. Why, man, it was a rattlesnake, that’s all.”

“A rattlesnake!”

“To be sure it was; and I suppose you didn’t know either that the reptiles and perarer dogs and owls all lived in one hole—sorter family parties.”

“Pshaw!”

“Waal, you may pshaw, for you don’t know any better; but when you have hunted for them to eat as long as I have, you’ll be up to the dodge.”

“Eat snakes!”

“Yes, and mighty good eatin’ they are, though I don’t hanker after them when thar’s any thing else round.”

“I’d starve first.”

“Wait till you try, boy. I tell you, a starvin’ man ain’t no way perticular about what he eats. It’s a sorter first come first served game. Now a mule isn’t the best kinder meat, but it’s palytable then. Horse is juicy, ef he hasn’t been worked to death, and rattlesnake is prime.”

A hearty laugh followed the epicurean opinion of the hardy frontiersman, and the march was resumed, with many an eye turned to the ground to watch for the unwelcome visitors that are a terror alike to man and beast, when Waltermyer continued:

“Just hold your horses, boys, for a minute. A little rest won’t hurt them none, and mayhap they’ll need all the vim they’ve got in them when it comes to the mountings. It’s about four years ago since La Moine and I was crossin’ this very sloo. It was a dreadful hot day—August—when the snakes are blind as bats and ten times as venermous as in any other month. You knew that, didn’t you? If one bites you then it’s sartin death. Waal, as I was a-sayin’, the Frenchman and I was a-ridin’ along—it was before I got this horse—when, all of a sudden, I heard him give two of the orfulest yells that ever was. It wasn’t any time to ask questions, so I kinder looked, and, as I hope for mercy, ef thar’ wasn’t two of the biggest kind of rattlers twisted around his horse, and bitin’ away with all thar might at his throat. Somehow, I never could understand the right of it. The horse must have trod on their tails. Onyway, they didn’t live long, and the poor horse died the orfulest to behold.”

“I thought you could cure the bite,” remarked Morse.

“Waal, yes, so we can, ef we are only whar the blue-ash grows or the snake-fern is to be found. But I can tell you, stranger, that ef a man’s time has come ’tain’t no manner of use to doctor him. It is only wastin’ whisky and time. Remember that, boys, and—”

The same war-whoop that had so startled the companions of the Mormon fell upon their ears, but so faintly that few, even if they had ever heard one before, could determine what it was.

“Thar they go, way up in the mountings, the yellin’ painters.”

“What, the Indians that stole—”

The heart-broken father could not finish the sentence. His feelings rose beyond his control, and when they burst through the fetters manhood attempted to impose upon them, they ran riot and ended in tears.

“I don’t think it is them, stranger, or else they have got inter a fight. They wouldn’t be howlin’, and yelpin’, and tearin’ round in that style, ef they was tryin’ to escape. No, no; they are cunnin’ brutes, and know how to keep their tongue between their teeth better than white folks. Anyhow, we shan’t catch sight of them by stayin’ here talkin’ snake, and get afeard of seein’ the crawlin’ reptiles.”

“Let us press forward, then, and lose no more time.”

“Waal, we ain’t a losin’ time. Haven’t you found out, stranger, that a day’s restin’ when on a journey sometimes was a day gained?”

“Certainly, and have never traveled on the Sabbath.”

“Sunday or week day, the same thing is a fact; but them that know, say that rest is sweeter on that day. It may be, stranger, and I ain’t book-learned enough to deny it, ’specially as I hain’t known Sunday come more’n twice in the last ten years, and that was when I was among the _Bois Brulé_ gals, way up on the Red river. Somehow, they keep count with beads and little crosses, and I used to go to church with them, and throw the worth of a beaver-skin onter the plate, so that they wouldn’t refuse me when I wanted them to dance.”

A smile flitted over the faces of his band at the peculiar reason given by the guide for his piety. Perchance many of his more civilized neighbors could have offered no better one. Once more he dashed to the front and led the way. But very careful, indeed, were his movements, often standing erect upon his horse, and looking over the waving sea of parched foliage. Once, on again resuming his seat, he called the band to his side.

“What now?” questioned a man who was among the most restive of the group. “Why not dash ahead and get out of this confounded mud-hole? Whew! its enough to worry a man to death in here. No air, no nothing but dust, gnats and poisonous snakes.”

“Are you ready to die?” said Waltermyer, solemnly, his usual gay demeanor changing, and his honest face wearing an expression of intense anxiety, if not pain.

“To die? What kind of a question is that? No man is ready to die.”

“Yet death is around you. Hark! Do you hear that noise?”

“Yes, something is rushing through the dry reeds. One of the horses we left, perhaps.”

“No horse ever traveled so fast as that. Even a deer could not keep the pace.”

“What is it, then?”

“Stand up on your horse and look.”

“I see a great cloud of thick dust—thick as if a hundred buffalo were crowding along.”

“Thar may be buffalo, and thar may be deer, but, my life for it, they are not coming this way.”

“Tell us, Waltermyer,” interrupted Miles Morse, “what is it George Cary sees?”

“Smoke!”

“Smoke? I do not understand you.”

“Smoke and fire. But you will soon learn for yourselves.”

Every one sprung upright, and from the backs of their steeds could see dense volumes of smoke, through which flashed red tongues of living flame, and again the question was asked as to what it could be.

“The sloo is on fire!” he replied. “We are cut off—surrounded!”

“Great heavens, can this be true?”

“Just as true as the heaven you call upon!”

“Then we are lost!”

“Thousands have been before you, and not enough left of thar bones to tell whar the fire has been.”

“Let us hurry on—run our horses, and gain the open ground.”

“You might just as well try to reach the moon. I tell you the horse was never yet shod that could outrun perarer fire. Even my good black, that can go two lengths to your one, would never live in such a race.”

“And must we perish thus? Die a horrible death without so much as a struggle for safety?”

“It is gaining rapidly on us! It is coming a perfect whirlwind of flame!” said the now agonized father. “Oh, God, that I should perish thus! Oh, my poor, poor lost daughter!”

“At least, let us make a trial to outrun it,” said another. “Any thing is better than standing idle.”

“Come!” shouted his companions. “Come, we’ll dash through and reach the high ground. What are you thinking of, Waltermyer, standing here?”

“Thinkin’,” blurted out the guide, “how little men like you know of the great perarers.”

“If you are going to stay here and be burned, I am not.”

“Hold!” and the strong hand of Waltermyer was laid on the bridle-rein, effectually checking the course of the steed, that now, like its mates, snuffing the smoke that was fast closing around, stood trembling, snorting and pressing against the restraining bit, with wildly tossed head and flashing eyes.

“What do you mean? Are you mad?”

“Not I, but you. You know Kirk Waltermyer by this time, and ef you don’t you’ll learn him soon enough. So hear what I say, and remember it, too. I know that the fire is comin’—will soon be here, but the first one that offers to stir will have a short journey, for I’ll send a bullet straight through his skull.”

“But to stand still, Waltermyer,” said Miles Morse, “when there is at least a chance of escape.”

“What do you take me for, stranger—a crazy man or a fool?”

“Neither, but—”

“Now you just keep cool and listen. Tie your horses heads together, every man of you, and mind you don’t make knots that will slip, for all the men on the perarer couldn’t keep them from stampedin’, when the flames roar around them.”

The command was obeyed, for there, as everywhere, in the hour of danger, the master spirit controls and directs—the firm hand and heart, and unflinching eye, tell of the pilot, that shall, unquestioned, guide, though the course he travels is crowded with shoals, quicksands and breaker-foaming rocks.

“Now bring us yours,” they said, when all the rest had been securely fettered.

“Not it! He ain’t none of your city-bred horses, and it ain’t the first time that he has been surrounded by red fire and black smoke. He knows his business here, better than you do,” and, at a motion, and slight touch of the bridle-rein, the noble black lay down and stretched his sinewy limbs, as if enjoying a grateful rest. This accomplished to his satisfaction, for he was very proud of this perfect command over his steed—(and what true horseman is not?) he stripped himself of his hunting-shirt, and threw it over his head, in such a fashion that it perfectly protected his lungs from smoke; then turning to his comrades, continued:

“Now, men, it is time you were to work. Just now you talked about being idle. Strip a circle clear of the grass—as large as ever you can, and mind you do it clean. At it, boys, hand and knife, tooth and nail! Ef you want to live, be active;” and he set the example, tearing up the rank grass with his immense strength, and piling it around the ring of horses.

Perchance, in his scorn at their want of knowledge, he had waited too long, for the mad flames were leaping upon them before they had time to make a cleared area of any considerable dimensions. In their very faces the fire came roaring on, darting through the black smoke, which rolled in clouds, threatening them every moment with destruction. Waltermyer saw that something must be done to turn it aside, or there was but little chance for escape.

“Fight it! fight it! and die for the ground!” he exclaimed, snatching the hunting-shirt from off his head, and beating out the fire where it came nearest. “Whip it—whip it—thrash it—out with it” he shouted, as he rushed recklessly into the danger, burning his hands, with his hair and whiskers curling and scorching, as he gave the command.

“Thar, that will do,” he continued, seeing that the danger had passed, and the fire had swept by, leaving a black, smoky belt of earth behind. “And now, boys, as you never saw a perarer fire before, look! It ain’t every day you’ll see such a sight, I can tell you.”

Though his words were rude, they were simply true! Words are powerless to describe a broad prairie conflagration, and the brush of the most gifted artist would fail to paint a tithe of its dazzling beauty.

See, where it begins, when either purpose or chance has dropped a tiny spark into the dry herbage. A little curl of smoke, a tiny flame struggles for a moment for life. The slightest breath of air falls upon it—a gleam, scarcely larger than a fire-fly among the tangled leaves, and in an instant a lurid flame leaps forth—is kindled into a furnace-like glare, and directly a wandering hill of flame is sweeping resistlessly over the prairie. The harvest was ready for the flame-sickle—the sapless and withered stalks were waiting the reaping. Spreading like a circle in the tideless lake, the fire knows no bounds, save when exhausted for want of fuel, it turns back on itself and dies.

See, with bounds swift and longer than an antelope ever compassed, it o’ertops the tallest leaves—runs stealthily along like a golden serpent, darting spitefully its forked tongue of living flame on every side, while crackling, hissing, roaring, its terrible writhings uncoil. In waves of living fire, flashing from a background of dense inky smoke, it rushes on, regardless of barriers, and scornful of bounds, a winged maelstrom of devastation.