Chapter Thirty Six.
A Tardy Reparation.
Vipan, left alone, felt drowsy, and kicking up the lodge fire into a blaze, rolled himself in a blanket and lay down in the long wicker basket which did duty as his bed. But sleep refused to come. This strange meeting had something weird about it. That this woman, whose selfish reticence had ruined his life, to screen whom he had sacrificed his prospects up to blighting point, as to whose whereabouts he had long ceased to speculate, should appear before him alone in the camp of the hostile Sioux—living there as one of themselves—struck him as little short of miraculous, and a superstitious feeling seemed to warn him, eagerly as he strove to dismiss it, that an occurrence so startling, so entirely out of all reckoning, portended some grave crisis to himself. Was her appearance after all these years destined to herald some other turning-point in his life? Thus musing, sleep at length overcame him, and still his dreams were haunted by the sad face of the ex-society belle, doomed to spend her life among savages, even resigned to that deplorable destiny.
A stealthy form wormed itself quickly through the opening of the teepe. Vipan, who slept with one eye open, never moved, but his hand tightened on the stock of the pistol in his breast. Only for a moment, though; for he recognised the hideous lineaments and beady eyes of the Shoshone slave girl.
“Rise quickly, Golden Face,” whispered the latter. “The Sun Queen sends for you. Come at once.”
Prepared for any emergency, he obeyed without a word. It was already dusk, and at the other end of the village were signs of a gathering of some sort which was about to take place. Unobserved, he entered Isabel D’Arcy’s tent.
Enjoining caution by a sign, she beckoned him to a seat. The firelight glinted on her shining hair, and he noticed that her still handsome face was clouded with anxiety. The teepe was furnished in quasi-civilised style. There was a camp bedstead instead of the Indian wicker basket, a table, two trunks, and even a few books.
“I have just learned something,” she began, “that renders it necessary for you to make the attempt at once. Listen. Time is short, and we must lose none of it. There is to be a big scalp-dance to-night in the Ogallalla camp. Hark! They are beginning now. Afterwards you are to be seized and put to the torture. I know the plot—never mind how. Nothing can save you. The Ogallallas have fourteen hundred warriors in the village, and are all-powerful. The whole of our band, except about fifty, are away with Mahto-sapa, and even he could hardly protect you if he were here. Mountain Cat, War Wolf, Long Bull, and a dozen others are all in the plot. Now, quick—quick, I say!” stamping her foot. “Obey me or you are lost. Take as much as you can carry of this,” handing him a parflèche half full of dried meat. “And this is the only weapon I can find.”
With a thrill of satisfaction he found himself in possession of a large navy revolver, loaded in every chamber.
“But,” he objected, “if I get clear will they not visit it upon you?”
“No. They dare not. Quick. You have only an hour’s start, with the best of luck. You may not have ten minutes. Roll your blanket round your chin, so as to hide your beard, and put on this.”
She handed him an Indian head-dress of beadwork and cloth, from whose summit rose a tall eagle-feather. Fixing it on, he stood there transformed into a stalwart savage.
“Now, my plan is simple—in fact, ridiculous. You must personate an Indian larking with my slave girl here. She will pretend to run away, and you must pursue her. She will lead you to the nearest herd of ponies; you must catch one and trust to luck. Now, good-bye. God speed you!”
He thought he detected a quaver in her voice as she grasped his hands, and would have lingered. She stamped her foot angrily.
“Go, go! You are endangering both of us, and the plan will fall through.” And she almost pushed him from the lodge.
A mischievous cackle, and the dark form of the Shoshone girl glided round the outside of the teepe. Vipan, entering thoroughly into his rôle, started boldly in pursuit. So well did he act up to it that a group of squaws whom he passed within ten yards screamed with laughter at the sight of a stalwart buck larking after the Sun Queen’s hideous slave, no less than at the broad jests which he was gruffly hurling after her as she ran.
The dark figure still glided on between the teepes, hardly visible in the falling gloom. To those who did see it the sight was an everyday one, so that beyond a shout of mirth and a boisterous wish for his success, no notice was taken of it.
The last line of teepes was passed. In front lay the timber belt, then a subdued “crunch, crunch,” betokened the proximity of a group of ponies. The dark figure of the Shoshone girl had disappeared. “The nearest,” his deliverer had said. His lariat rope was ready. Gently, soothingly, he approached the one he reckoned the best. Up went the perverse brute’s head with a resentful snort, as it sidled and backed away. He tried another, with the same result. His heart was in his mouth. The ponies had stopped feeding, and were gazing at him in alarm. The least thing might stampede the herd and arouse the attention of its owners. There was no time to lose. Whirling the noose around his head he let fly. The coils tautened out. The affrighted animal thus noosed, plunged, and fell heavily. He was upon it like lightning. Avoiding the kicking hoofs, he wrenched a bight of the rope into its mouth, jerked the trembling and terrified steed to its feet, and was on its back like a circus-rider. The rest of the herd trotted away, snorting and throwing up their heels.
Suddenly a wild, shrill whoop went up from the village. Ah! now for the race for life; but what were the odds in his favour? They had discovered his flight.
On, through the darkness, the fugitive urged his unwilling steed, whose bucking and plunging would have unseated any less skilful horseman. And as he fled, carefully picking his ground with the instinct of a consummate plainsman, he strained his ears through the darkness to catch the first sounds of pursuers behind, of a possible manoeuvre to outflank and head him in front. But the discovery had not, in fact, been made. The wild shouts were the yells of the scalp-dance just beginning. Fainter and fainter behind him sounded the savage chorus, then died away, and amid the solitude of the grim mountain waste only the soft hoof-beats of his steed, and the occasional scream of a panther among the craggy heights, broke upon the dead and ghostly silence of the night.