Camp-fire and Wigwam

by Edward Sylvester Ellis

CHAPTER XXVIII.

A PATIENT OF THE MEDICINE MAN.

When Jack Carleton awoke, it was night and the rain was falling. He was feverish and his brain was so overwrought that it was a full minute before he could call to mind where he was. His slumber had been disturbed toward the latter part by dreams as wild, vague and unimaginable as those which taunt the brain of the opium eater.

When he remembered that he was in the wigwam of Ogallah, the chieftain, he turned upon his side and raised his head on his elbow. The fire at the other end of the apartment that had been burning brightly, had gone down somewhat, but enough remained to light up the interior so that the familiar objects could be seen with considerable distinctness.

He observed the figure of the sachem stretched out in the dilapidated slouchiness peculiar to himself. He did not bother to remove any of his clothing, and, though the place was quite chilly he drew none of the bison robes over him. He had lain down on one, but had managed in some way to kick it half way across the lodge, and his couch, therefore, was the simple earth, which served better than a kingly bed of eider down could have done.

The favorite posture of the queenly consort was not a prone one, but that of crouching in a heap near the coals, where, with a blanket that had never been washed since it was put together years before, gathered about her shoulders, her skinny arms clasping her knees and her head bowed forward, she would sleep for hours at a time. The reflection of the flickering flames against her figure caused it to look grotesque in the fitful light, and the captive gazed at her for a long time, led to do so by an infatuation which was not strange under the circumstances.

There, too, was the dog which, could he have been given his way, would have done nothing all his life but sleep and eat. As was his custom, he was at the feet of his mistress, a position which he seemed to prefer above all others. Then the blankets, deer and bison skins, and rude articles hanging about the room, the two columns in the center supporting the clumsy roof, the craggy logs and sticks at the side, the hanging skin which served as a door and was barely visible, the tumble down appearance of everything, and withal the solemn stillness which brooded within the lodge: all these made the scene weird and impressive in a striking degree.

The fire burned so fitfully that it threw ghostly shadows about the apartment, sometimes flooding it with light, and again falling so low that the other end of the lodge could not be seen at all. Without, the night could not have been more dismal. There was no thunder or lightning, and the rain fell with that steady patter on the leaves, which at ordinary times forms the most soothing accompaniment of sleep, but which to Jack Carleton only added to his dismal dejection of spirits.

The roof of the lodge was so thick and diversified in its composition that the music of the patter on the shingles was lost. At intervals the wind stirred the limbs, and, though none of the trees were very close, the lad could hear the soughing among the branches, as the hunter hears it in early autumn when the leaves begin to fall.

Could the melancholy croaking of frogs in the distance have fallen on the ears of the boy, he would have had all the factors that go to bring on the most absolute loneliness of which a human being is capable. Unfortunately Jack did not need that addition to render his misery complete, for it was furnished by his own condition and situation.