CHAPTER VII--HOWLING WOLF

“They will land on Stable Islet, sure, and try and carry off the horses there,” growled Uncle Alf. “They’ll tow the beasts off, swimming, behind a canoe.”

“Better that,” said Muriel, “than that they should kill the animals or burn them alive in the stable. Poor old Dobbin and Betty. I’ll never see you again, I expect.”

“Wait,” said Sergeant Dick. “I will speak to the Indians. It is my duty to. Perhaps I can pacify them--prevail on the mad fools to abandon the warpath and return peacefully to the Reservation.”

Alf Arnold guffawed derisively.

“Mout as well try to reason with tigers that hev tasted or smelt blood,” he said. “They’ll not listen to you, sergeant, but be far more likely to give ye a volley. You’ll never be so dodrotted foolish as to put your nose outside the door?”

“It is my duty as an officer of the law to try and avert bloodshed and reason with them, and I mean to,” answered Dick quietly. “I am going to unbar the door again.”

“Don’t show yourself, sergeant, for Heaven’s sake,” implored Muriel, “or if you must, display a white flag first, and--and stand just within the door, ready to skip behind it if they show any signs of firing on you.”

She ran to the table-drawer, as Dick started unbarring the door, and took out a folded, newly washed and ironed white tablecloth.

“Your blood ’ull be on your own head, sergeant,” said Uncle Alf. “You are asking for it if you go outside that door. Still, in this darkness you’ve a chance--just a chance--of coming in again unhurt, mebbe.”

“What’s that? The sergeant going out to talk to ’em?” called the youngest son, Abner, from his station in his parents’ bedroom. “He must be dotty.”

“There’s one thing you’ve forgotten, father,” sang out the other unmarried son, Amos, from the room opposite. “The skylights.”

“Jumping snakes, so I had! Jenny and Muriel--no, Amos, you’d better see to ’em. You can be spared from your loophole long enough to, sure, ’specially as the sergeant here’s agoin’ to hold ’em in talk an hour or two. Ha, ha, ha!”

His sons within hearing and Jenny echoed his laughter; and Amos came out into the central passage, and, opening a cupboard door in it, passed inside.

Within the cupboard was a sloping ladder leading up to a trap-door in the flat ceiling or inner log-roof.

As soon as he had unfastened the front door, Sergeant Dick stepped out onto the verandah or landing-stage, and waved the tablecloth to and fro. Muriel had tied the improvised flag of truce to the muzzle of his rifle.

Putting his open left hand to his mouth trumpet-fashion, he roared at the top of his voice:

“My redskin brothers, I want speech with you. I am a policeman, a sergeant of the Royal Mounted Police. Can you hear me?”

It was so dark now that he could hardly make out the black smudges the canoes made upon the water; and he feared that the Indians would not be able to discern his figure against the background of the “castle,” in spite of his red coat.

No answering hail came back from the canoes; but he was satisfied that his voice had carried to the ears within them.

And the Indians could hardly fail to observe his white flag, if not himself.

“Miss Arnold,” he called within the doorway, “will you take this electric torch from me and shine it upon me so that they may be able to see me plainly?”

“Oh, no, no! That will be to make a target of yourself--to show you up plainly as a mark for their bullets.”

“Do as I ask. They are coming in; they see the white flag.”

“I can’t have that there door open too long, sergeant,” called out Uncle Alf. “You know redskin cunning, and I ain’t agoin’ to allow ’em to come in too close with that door open, nor without afirin’ on ’em neither.”

Muriel, without further demur, tremblingly took the proffered electric torch from Dick and, standing inside the doorway, flashed it upon his red-coated figure.

“You see and hear me, my redskin brothers,” John Dick shouted again. “Go back to your wigwams and squaws and papooses, like sensible men, and give up your foolish idea of going on the warpath, and so bringing down upon you the terrible vengeance of Government. What is your quarrel with us white men? It was not the fault of the fathers of this land, of the Canadas, that the money was not paid before. It was the delay of our brothers over the frontier--of the Fathers of the United States. And the money has been sent you now, as I can swear. My redskin brothers know that they can believe the word of an officer of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.”

“The chief, Howling Wolf, will speak to the redcoat officer,” came back a faint shout.

“Mind yourself, sergeant. Howlin’ Wolf’s a chief with no good reputation to lose. He’s the wickedest of the hull boilin’ lot of ’em red-skinned varmint on Paquita Island, though he ain’t there now, more’s the pity; for he’s to be dreaded more’n all the others yonder.”

“Yes, be on your guard, sergeant, for Heaven’s sake. We’ve all heard of Howling Wolf’s ferocity and cunning,” added Muriel. “I feel sure you are only risking your life to no good. You’ll not turn them from their purpose after my uncle and cousins killing some of their number.”

“That’s right,” chimed in Aunt Kate in her deep, siren-like voice. “You and the lads, Alf, just now down the lake, sent some on ’em to the happy hunting-grounds, didn’t ye? It looked so to us, anyways.”

“Sure we did, a good half-dozen on ’em; and more carry the marks of our bullets on ’em, if they haven’t got the lead still under their skins. Haw, haw, haw! You’ll never pacify them now, sergeant. They thirst for our blood in revenge, and they’re not to be turned away by mere words, as you may find to your cost. But a willful man will have his way; and, as I said afore, if anything happens to ye, your blood is on your own head.”

All the canoes remained as stationary black smudges afar off, except one, which came speeding swiftly towards “Water Castle.”

It came on without a word from any of its occupants, who Sergeant Dick was soon able to discern were four in number, to all appearances.

And then suddenly a jet of flame leaped like a fiery bowsprit from the curved prow of the canoe; and, even as the report of a rifle rang over the silent waters, waking echoes far and near out of the black night, Sergeant Dick heard the “zip” of a bullet, felt the wind from it fan his right cheek, and heard it clang against the iron-plated tiller-screen which had been set just within the doorway.

Rebounding upwards on account of the backwardly slanting angle at which the screen stood, the leaden messenger ended its flight by burying itself in the wooden ceiling of the living-room.

Muriel screamed, and Sergeant Dick was within the house at a bound.

“Miss Arnold, are you hurt at all?” he asked, anxiously, catching her in his arms as she reeled against the door.

“No, no; but you?”

His reply that he was untouched was drowned to all other ears but hers by the sharp “crack-crack-crack!” of the rifles of Uncle Alf and Aunt Kate as they returned the treacherous shot, concentrating a ceaseless fire for several seconds upon Howling Wolf’s canoe.

But the four paddlers had promptly thrown themselves prone in its bottom, and in the thickening darkness the craft presented but an indifferent mark, so that it was doubtful if a single shot struck it.

Instantly the dreaded war-whoop of the savages pealed forth, awaking still greater echoes than the rifle-fire. And, like a pack of hounds let loose, all the black, indistinct smudges behind the chief’s canoe came racing for “Water Castle.”

“Quick, secure the door there!” roared Uncle Alf. “Ye see, sergeant, the folly of your attempt to palaver with ’em.”

Amos came rushing from the ladder-cupboard in the central passage, and roughly jostled Sergeant Dick aside from the rebarring of the door.

“Get to your loophole,” he snarled, resentfully, “and show your mettle wi’ your rifle. You mout hev bin the death of the gal. Muriel, you take another window! I’ll see to the securing o’ the door.”