Frank Merriwell's Bravery

by Burt L. Standish

The boys followed, ready for a trap.

When they were behind the bowlders, the stranger whispered:

"They are coming—I hear their footsteps afar. They come swiftly, but they will not find their prey. They are the last of the Danites, and they are in hiding here amid these mountains, but they have not forgotten how to strike and destroy. Crouch low, keep still, and you shall see them pass."

It seemed that the old man's ears must be good, for it was quite a while before the boys heard a sound. At length, with a sudden rush of feet, six or eight dark figures flitted past and quickly disappeared.

"They come like shadows, and like shadows they go," softly breathed Old Solitary. "The day has passed forever when their power is felt and dreaded throughout Utah. Once they were far more dreadful than a pestilence. Started upon the trail of a man who had been doomed by the church, there was not one chance in ten thousand for him to escape. No man could seek his bed at night and be sure he would not become the victim of the Destroying Angels before dawn. No man could be sure he had not done something to offend Brigham Young. If by any means he became aware that 'the decree of death' had been made against him, it was no better than useless for him to take to flight. He might flee to the desert, but the Destroyers tracked him through shifting sands and across waterless wastes till he was run to earth and his body was left for the vultures and coyotes. If he plunged into the mountains, the canyons and ravines were not deep enough or dark enough to hide him from the keen eyes of the death-dealers on his track. Knowing his doom had been decreed, he might flee madly from his home and his loved ones, his heart alternating between hope and despair, knowing all the while that those deadly pursuers were on his track, hurrying on and on when he was in desperate need of rest, fearing to close his eyes in sleep, lest he open them to look upon his murderers, weak for want of food, his throat parched for a swallow of water, his blood pouring like melted lead through his veins, his brain on fire, and still all his struggles were unavailing. Relentless, unwearying, bloodthirsty and sure as death, the Destroying Ones tracked him down. He might begin to fancy that he had escaped, that he had thrown them off his trail. At last, overcome by his terrible exertions, he might sleep, feeling certain that in a few more hours he would be beyond their reach. They would come upon him like shadows, and they would leave him weltering in his gore. A curse they have been, and a curse they shall remain till the last one of them all is perished from the face of the fair earth which they have polluted."

The boys were spellbound by the intense language of the strange man. All fears that he might be one of the Danites departed from their minds.

"Begobs!" gasped Barney; "it's Satan's oun brewing they must be!"

"Come," said Old Solitary, "we must move on again. They will not find you, and the morning will see them on your trail."

"If what you say is true, it were better to be trailed by bloodhounds or wild Indians," said Frank.

"Far better. The Destroying Ones hastened to the slaughter with no more mercy in their hearts than is to be found in the heart of a fierce Apache. If they were instructed to kill, they believed it their duty—more than that, they would suffer the tortures of hell if they shirked or shrank from committing the deed."