The Young Trailers
J >> Joseph A. Altsheler >> The Young Trailers"What a hunter and warrior he will make!" said Ross.
"A future leader of wilderness men," said Mr. Pennypacker softly, "but
there is wild blood in those veins; he will have to be handled well."
Henry threw down the deer and greeted them with cheerful words that came
spontaneously from a joyful soul. They had built their fire, not a large
one, in an oak opening and all around the trees rose like a mighty
circular wall. The red shadows of a sun that had just set lingered on
the western edge of the forest, but in the east all was black. Out of
this vastness came the rustling sound of the wind as it moved among the
autumn leaves. In the opening was a core of ruddy light and the living
forms of men, but it was only a tiny spot in the immeasurable
wilderness.
The schoolmaster and he alone felt their littleness. The autumn night
was crisp, and from his seat on a log he held out his fingers to the
warm blaze. Now and then a yellow or red leaf caught in the light wind
drifted to his feet and he gazed up half in fear at the great encircling
wall of blackness. Then he uttered silent thanks that he was with such
trusty men as the guide and the shiftless one.
The effect upon Henry was not the same. He had become silent while the
others talked, and he half reclined against a tree, looking at the sky
that showed a dim and shadowy disk through the opening. But there was
nothing of fear in his mind. A delicious sense of peace and satisfaction
crept over him. All the voices of the night seemed familiar and good. A
lizard slipped through the grass and the eye and ear of Henry alone
noticed it; neither the guide nor the shiftless one had seen or heard
its passage. He measured the disk of the heavens with his glance and
foretold unerringly whether it would be clear or cloudy on the morrow,
and when something rustled in the woods, he knew, without looking, that
it was a hare frightened by the blaze fleeing from its covert. A tiny
brook trickled at the far edge of the fire's rim, and he could tell by
the color of the waters through what kind of soil it had come.
Paul sat down near him, and began to talk of home. Henry smiled upon him
indulgently; his old relation of protector to the younger boy had grown
stronger during this trip; in the forest he was his comrade's superior
by far, and Paul willingly admitted it; in such matters he sought no
rivalry with his friend.
"I wonder what they are doing way down there?" said Paul, waving his
hand toward the southeast. "Just think of it, Henry! they are only one
little spot in the wilderness, and we are only another little spot way
up here! In all the hundreds of miles between, there may not be another
white face!"
"It is likely true, but what of it?" replied Henry. "The bigger the
wilderness the more room in it for us to roam in. I would rather have
great forests than great towns."
He turned lazily and luxuriously on his side, and, gazing into the red
coals, began to see there visions of other forests and vast plains, with
himself wandering on among the trees and over the swells. His comrades
said nothing more because it was comfortable in their little camp, and
the peace of the wilds was over them all. The night was cold, but the
circling wall of trees sheltered the opening, and the fire in the center
radiated a grateful heat in which they basked. The scholar, Mr.
Pennypacker, rested his face upon his hands, and he, too, was dreaming
as he stared into the blaze. Paul, his blanket wrapped around him and
his head pillowed upon soft boughs, was asleep already. Ross and Sol
dozed.
But Henry neither slept nor wished to do so. His gaze shifted from the
red coals to the silver disk of the sky. The world seemed to him very
beautiful and very intimate. These illimitable expanses of forest
conveyed to him no sense of either awe or fear. He was at home. He had
become for the time a being of the night, piercing the darkness with the
eyes of a wild creature, and hearkening to the familiar voices around
him that spoke to him and to him alone. Never was sleep farther from
him. The shifting firelight in its flickering play fell upon his face
and revealed it in all its clear young boyish strength, the firm neck,
the masterful chin, the calm, resolute eyes set wide apart, the lean
big-boned fingers, lying motionless across his knees.
Mr. Pennypacker began to nod, then he, too, wrapped himself in his
blanket, lay back and soon fell fast asleep; in a few minutes Sol
followed him to the land of real dreams, and after a brief interval
Ross, too, yielded. Henry alone was awake, drinking deep of the night
and its lonely joy.
The silver disk of the sky turned into gray under a cloud, the darkness
swept up deeper and thicker, the light of the fire waned, but the boy
still leaned against the log, and upon his sensitive mind every change
of the wilderness was registered as upon the delicate surface of a
plate. He glanced at his sleeping comrades and smiled. The smile was the
index to an unconscious feeling of superiority. Ross and Sol were two or
three times his age, but they slept while he watched, and not Ross
himself in all his years in the wilderness had learned many things that
came to him by intuition.
Hours passed and the boy was yet awake. New feelings, vague and
undetermined came into his mind but through them all went the feeling of
mastery. He, though a boy, was in many respects the chief, and while he
need not assert his leadership yet a while, he could never doubt its
possession.
The light died far down and only a few smoldering coals were left. The
blackness of the night, coming ever closer and closer, hovered over his
companions and hid their faces from him. The great trunks of the trees
grew shadowy and dim. Out of the darkness came a sound slight but not in
harmony with the ordinary noises of the forest. His acute senses, the
old inherited primitive instinct, noticed at once the jarring note. He
moved ever so little but an extraordinary change came over his face. The
idle look of luxury and basking warmth passed away and the eyes became
alert, watchful, defiant. Every feature, every muscle was drawn, as if
he were at the utmost tension. Almost unconsciously his figure sank down
farther against the log, until it blended perfectly with the bark and
the fallen leaves below. Only an eye of preternatural keenness could
have separated the outline of the boy from the general scene.
For five minutes he lay and moved not a particle. Then the discordant
note came again among the familiar sounds of the forest and he glanced
at his comrades. They slept peacefully. His lip curled slightly, not
with contempt but with that unconscious feeling of superiority; they
would not have noticed, even had they been awake.
His hands moved forward and grasped his rifle. Then he began to slip
away from the opening and into the forest, not by walking nor altogether
by crawling, but by a curious, noiseless, gliding motion, almost like
that of a serpent. Always he clung to the shadows where his shifting
body still blended with the dark, and as he advanced other primitive
instincts blazed up in him. He was a hunter pursuing for the first time
the highest and most dangerous game of all game and the thrill through
his veins was so keen that he shivered slightly. His chin was projected,
and his eyes were two red spots in the night. All the while his comrades
by the fire, even the trained foresters, slumbered in peace, no warning
whatever coming to their heavy heads.
The boy reached the wall of the woods, and now his form was completely
swallowed up in the blackness there. He lay a while in the bushes,
motionless, all his senses alert, and for the third time the jarring
note came to his ears. The maker of it was on his right, and, as he
judged, perhaps a couple of hundred yards away. He would proceed at once
to that point. It is truth to say that no thought of danger entered his
mind; the thrills of the present and its chances absorbed him. It seemed
natural that he should do this thing, he was merely resuming an old
labor, discontinued for a time.
He raised his head slightly, but even his keen eyes could see nothing in
the forest save trunks and branches, ghostly and shapeless, and the
regular rustle of the wind was not broken now by the jarring note. But
the darkness heavy and ominous, was permeated with the signs of things
about to happen, and heavy with danger, a danger, however, that brought
no fear to Henry for himself, only for others. A faint sighing note as
of a distant bird came on the wind, and pausing, he listened intently.
He knew that it was not a bird, that sound was made by human lips, and
once more a light shiver passed over his frame; it was a signal,
concerning his comrades and himself, and he would turn aside the danger
from those old friends of his who slept by the fire, in peace and
unknowing.
He resumed his cautious passage through the undergrowth, and, the
inherited instinct blossoming so suddenly into full flower, was still
his guide. Not a sound marked his advance, the forest fell silently
behind him, and he went on with unerring knowledge to the spot from
which the discordant sounds had come.
He approached another opening among the trees, like unto that in which
his comrades slept, and now, lying close in the undergrowth, he looked
for the first time upon the sight which so often boded ill to his kind.
The warriors were in a group, some sitting others standing, and though
there was no fire and the moonlight was slight he could mark the
primitive brutality of their features, the nature of the animal that
fought at all times for life showing in their eyes. They were hard,
harsh and repellent in every aspect, but the boy felt for a moment a
singular attraction, there was even a distant feeling of kinship as if
he, too, could live this life and had lived it. But the feeling quickly
passed, and in its place came the thought of his comrades whom he must
save.
The older of the warriors talked in a low voice, saying unknown words in
a harsh, guttural tongue, and Henry could guess only at their meaning.
But they seemed to be awaiting a signal and presently the low thrilling
note was heard again. Then the warriors turned as if this were the
command to do so, and came directly toward the boy who lay in the
darkest shadows of the undergrowth.
Henry was surprised and startled but only for a moment, then the
primeval instinct came to his aid and swiftly he sank away in the bushes
in front of them, as before, no sound marking his passage. He thought
rapidly and in all his thoughts there was none of himself but as the
savior of the little party. It seemed to come to him naturally that he
should be the protector and champion.
When he had gone about fifty yards he uttered a shout, long, swelling
and full of warning. Then he turned to his right and crashed through the
undergrowth, purposely making a noise that the pursuing warriors could
not fail to hear. Ross and the others, he knew, would be aroused
instantly by his cry and would take measures of safety. Now the savages
would be likely to follow him alone, and he noted by the sounds that
they had turned aside to do so.
At this moment Henry Ware felt nothing but exultation that he, a boy,
should prove himself a match for all the cunning of the forest-bred, and
he thought not at all of the pursuit that came so fiercely behind him.
He ran swiftly and now directly more than a mile from the camp of his
friends. Then the inherited instinct that had served him so well failed;
it could not warn him of the deep little river that lay straight across
his path flowing toward the Mississippi. He came out upon its banks and
was ready to drop down in its waters, but he saw that before he could
reach the farther shore he would be a target for his pursuers. He
hesitated and was about to turn at a sharp angle, but the warriors
emerged from the forest. It was then too late.
The savages uttered a shout of triumph, the long, ferocious, whining
note, so terrible in its intensity and meaning, and Henry, raising his
rifle, fired at a painted breast. The next moment they were hurled upon
him in a brown mass. He felt a stunning blow upon the head, sparks flew
before his eyes, and the world reeled away into darkness.
CHAPTER XII
THE PRIMITIVE MAN
When Henry came back to his world he was lying upon the ground, with his
head against a log, and about him was a circle of brown faces, cold,
hard, expressionless and apparently devoid of human feeling; pity and
mercy seemed to be unknown qualities there. But the boy met them with a
gaze as steady as their own, and then he glanced quickly around the
circle. There was no other prisoner and he saw no ghastly trophy; then
his comrades had escaped, and, deep satisfaction in his heart, he let
his head fall back upon the log. They could do now as they chose with
him, and whatever it might be he felt that he had no cause to fear it.
Three other warriors came in presently, and Henry judged that all the
party were now gathered there. He was still lying near the river on
whose banks he had been struck down, and the shifting clouds let the
moonlight fall upon him. He put his hand to his head where it ached, and
when he took it away, there was blood on his fingers. He inferred that a
heavy blow had been dealt to him with the flat of a tomahawk, but with
the stained fingers he made a scornful gesture. One of the warriors,
apparently a chief, noticed the movement, and he muttered a word or two
which seemed to have the note of approval. Henry rose to his feet and
the chief still regarded him, noting the fearless look, and the hint of
surpassing physical powers soon to come. He put his hand upon the boy's
shoulder and pointed toward the north and west. Henry understood him.
His life was to be spared for the present, at least, and he was to go
with them into the northwest, but to what fate he knew not.
One of the warriors bathed his head, and put upon it a lotion of leaves
which quickly drove away the pain. Henry suffered his ministrations with
primitive stoicism, making no comment and showing no interest.
At a word from the leader they took up their silent march, skirting the
river for a while until they came to a shallow place, where they forded
it, and buried themselves again in the dark forest. They passed among
its shades swiftly, silently and in single file, Henry near the middle
of the column, his figure in the dusk blending into the brown of theirs.
He had completely recovered his strength, and, save for the separation
from his friends and their consequent wonder and sorrow, he would not
have grieved over the mischance. Instinct told him--perhaps it was his
youth, perhaps his ready adaptability that appealed to his captors--that
his life was safe--and now he felt a keen curiosity to know the outcome.
It seemed to him too that without any will of his own he was about to
begin the vast wanderings that he had coveted.
Hour after hour the silent file trod swiftly on into the northwest, no
one speaking, their footfalls making no sound on the soft earth. The
moonlight deepened again, and veiled the trunks and branches in ghostly
silver or gray. By and by it grew darker and then out of the blackness
came the first shoot of dawn. A shaft of pale light appeared in the
east, then broadened and deepened, bringing in its trail, in terrace
after terrace, the red and gold of the rising sun. Then the light swept
across the heavens and it was full day.
They were yet in the forest and the dawn was cold. Here and there in the
open spaces and on the edges of the brown leaves appeared the white
gleam of frost. The rustle of the woods before the western wind was
chilly in the ear. But Henry was without sign of fatigue or cold. He
walked with a step as easy and as tireless as that of the strongest
warrior in the band, and at all times he held himself, as if he were one
of them, not their prisoner.
About an hour after dawn the party which numbered fifteen men halted at
a signal from the chief and began to eat the dried meat of the buffalo,
taken from their pouches. They gave him a good supply of the food, and
he found it tough but savory. Hunger would have given a sufficient sauce
to anything and as he ate in a sort of luxurious content he studied his
captors with the advantage of the daylight. The full sunshine disclosed
no more of softness and mercy than the night had shown. The features
were immobile, the eyes fixed and hard, but when the gaze of any one of
them, even the chief, met the boy's it was quickly turned. There was
about them something furtive, something of the lower kingdom of the
animals. That inherited primitive instinct, recently flaming up with
such strength in him, did not tell him that they were his full brethren.
But he did not hate them, instead they interested him.
After eating they rested an hour or more in the covert of a thicket and
Henry saw the beautiful day unfold. The sunshine was dazzling in its
glory, the crisp wind made one's blood sparkle like a tonic, and it was
good merely to live. A vast horizon inclosed only the peace of the
wilderness.
The chief said some words to Henry, but the boy could understand none of
them, and he shook his head. Then the chief took the rifle that had
belonged to the captive, tapped it on the barrel and pointed toward the
southeast. Henry nodded to indicate that he had come from that point,
and then smiling swept the circle of the northwestern horizon with his
hands. He meant to say that he would go with them without resistance,
for the present, at least, and the chief seemed to understand, as his
face relaxed into a look of comprehension and even of good nature.
Their march was resumed presently and as before it was straight into the
northwest. They passed out of the forest crossed the Ohio in hidden
canoes and entered a region of small but beautiful prairies, cut by
shallow streams, which they waded with undiminished speed. Henry began
to suspect that the band came from some very distant country, and was
hastening so much in order not to be caught on the hunting grounds of
rival tribes. The northwesterly direction that they were following
confirmed him in this belief.
All the day passed on the march but shortly after the night came on and
they had eaten a little more of the jerked meat, they lay down in a
thicket, and Henry, unmindful of his captivity, fell in a few minutes
into a sleep that was deep, sweet and dreamless. He did not know then
that before he was asleep long the chief took a robe of tanned deerskin
and threw it over him, shielding his body from the chill autumn night.
In the morning shortly before he awoke the chief took away the robe.
That day they came to a mighty river and Henry knew that the yellow
stream was that of the Mississippi. The Indians dragged from the
sheltering undergrowth two canoes, in which the whole party paddled up
stream until nightfall, when they hid the canoes again in the foliage on
the western shore, and then encamped on the crest. They seemed to feel
that they were out of danger now as they built a fine fire and the
captive basked in its warmth.
Henry had not made the slightest effort to escape, nor had he indicated
any wish to do so, finding his reward in the increased freedom which the
warriors gave to him. He had never been bound and now he could walk as
he chose in a limited area about the camp. But he did not avail himself
of the privilege, for the present, preferring to sit by the fire, where
he saw pictures of Wareville and those whom he loved. Then he had a
swift twinge of conscience. When they heard they would grieve deep and
long for him and one, his mother, would never forget. He should have
sought more eagerly to escape, and he glanced quickly about him, but
there was no chance. However careless the warriors might seem there was
always one between him and the forest. He resigned himself with a sigh
but had he thought how quickly the pain passed his conscience would have
hurt him again. Now he felt much comfort where he sat; the night was
really cold, bitingly cold, and it was a glorious fire. As he sat before
it and basked in its radiance he felt the glorious physical joy that
must have thrilled some far-away primeval ancestor, as he hugged the
coals in his cave after coming in from the winter storm.
Henry had the best place by the fire and a warrior who was sitting where
his back was exposed to the wind moved over and shoved him away. Henry
without a word smote him in the face with such force that the man fell
flat and Henry thrust him aside, resuming his original position. The
warrior rose to his feet and rubbed his bruised face, looking doubtfully
at the boy who sat in such stolid silence, staring into the coals and
paying no further attention to his opponent. The Indian never uses his
fists, and his hand strayed to the handle of his tomahawk; then, as it
strayed away again he sat down on the far side of the fire, and he too
began to stare stolidly into the red coals. The chief, Black Cloud,
bestowed on both a look of approval, but uttered no comment.
Presently Black Cloud gave some orders to his men and they lay down to
sleep, but the chief took the deerskin robe and handed it to Henry. His
manner was that of one making a gift, and a gesture confirmed the
impression. Henry took the robe which he would need and thanked the
chief in words whose meaning the donor might gather from the tone. Then
he lay down and slept as before a dreamless sleep all through the night.
Their journey lasted many days and every hour of it was full of interest
to Henry, appealing alike to his curiosity and its gratification. He was
launched upon the great wandering and he found in it both the glamour
and the reality that he wished, the reality in the rivers and the
forests and the prairies that he saw, and the glamour in the hope of
other and greater rivers and forests and prairies to come.
Indian summer was at hand. All the woods were dyed in vivid colors, reds
and yellows and browns, and glowed with dazzling hues in the intense
sunlight. Often the haze of Indian summer hung afar and softened every
outline. Henry's feeling that he was one of the band grew stronger, and
they, too, began to regard him as their own. His freedom was extended
more and more and with astonishing quickness he soon picked up enough
words of their dialect to make himself intelligible. They took him with
them, when they turned aside for hunting expeditions, and he was
permitted now and then to use his own rifle. Only six men in the band
had guns, and two of these guns were rifles the other four being
muskets. Henry soon showed that he was the best marksman among them and
respect for him grew. The Indian whom he knocked down was slightly gored
by a stag when only Henry was near, but Henry slew the stag, bound up
the man's wound and stayed by him until the others came. The warrior,
Gray Fox, speedily became one of his best friends.
Henry's enjoyment became more intense; all the trammels of civilization
were now thrown aside, he never thought of the morrow because the day
with its interests was sufficient, and from his new friends he learned
fresh lore of the forest with marvelous rapidity; they taught him how to
trail, to take advantage of every shred of cover and to make signals by
imitating the cry of bird or beast. Once they were caught in a
hailstorm, when it turned bitterly cold, but he endured it as well as
the best of them, and made not a single complaint.
They came at last to their village, a great distance west of the
Mississippi, a hundred lodges perhaps, pitched in a warm and sheltered
valley and the boy, under the fostering care of Black Cloud, was
formally adopted into the tribe, taking up at once the thread of his new
life, and finding in it the same keen interest that had marked all the
stages of the great journey.
The climate here was colder than that from which he had come, and
winter, with fierce winds from the Great Plains was soon upon them. But
the camp which was to remain there until spring was well chosen and the
steep hills about them fended off the worst of the blast. Yet the snow
came soon in great, whirling flakes and fell all one night. The next
morning the boy saw the world in white and he found it singularly
beautiful. The snow he did not mind as clothing of dressed skins had
been given to him and he had a warm buffalo robe for a blanket. Now,
young as he was, he became one of the best hunters for the village and
with the others he roamed far over the snowy hills in search of game.
Many were the prizes that fell to his steady aim and eye, chief among
them the deer, the bear and the buffalo.
His fame in the village grew fast, and it would be hiding the fact to
deny that he enjoyed it. The wild rough life with its limitless range
over time and space appealed to every instinct in him, and his new fame
as a tireless and skillful hunter was very sweet to him. He thought of
his people and Wareville, it is true, but he consoled himself again with
the belief that they were well and he would return to them when the
chance came, and then he plunged all the deeper and with all the more
zest into his new life which had so many fascinations. At Wareville
there were certain bounds which he must respect, certain weights which
he must carry, but here he was free from both.