Billy Whiskers, Jr.

by Frances Trego Montgomery

While Billy Jr. was eating, the Chinaman threw himself down upon a wooden bench in the corner of the room, took two or three whiffs from his opium pipe and was soon fast asleep, dreaming doubtless of his almond-eyed sweetheart in the Orient. When Billy saw the pipe fall from his hand, he took first a smell and then a taste of the powder that had spilled out of it upon the floor; and soon he felt the most delightful, drowsy sensation stealing over him, and he, too, curled himself up by the bench near the Chinaman and was soon dreaming that he was back in the old home meadow with his father, mother, and Day; but the meadow he dreamed of was covered with sweeter clover blossoms than any goat ever ate and the breeze that fanned his face was laden with sweeter perfume than mortals ever breathed.

Billy was rudely awakened from this beautiful vision by a vigorous kick and on recovering his bewildered senses, he found the room filled with excited cow-boys all talking at once. From their conversation he soon learned that the Indians were out on the warpath and were even now within sight of the house.

With wondering eyes Billy watched the boys board up the windows, barricade the doors, and stick the gun-barrels into the holes in the wall. Presently, he was driven into the sitting-room and to his surprise he found that five of the cow-boys’ ponies had also been driven in here for safety, as the boys well knew that the Indians would steal them if left outside. He had no sooner entered this room than he heard a loud bang, and a bullet flattened itself against the doorjamb just as the Chinaman ran in carrying a bucket of water from the well; for during a siege, water is a necessity for both man and beast, and while the boys had been boarding up the windows from the inside, the Chinaman had been busy filling an old barrel with water from the well.

“The red devils are upon us,” he heard a cow-boy say, and then the door was slammed shut and he was alone with the ponies. While the bullets sped thick and fast, and showers of arrows fell, all of which were answered by the cow-boys’ bullets as they tried to pick off the Indians skulking around the house, the ponies told Billy when and how the raid began.

An old roan pony that had been on the ranch for years said, “When we went out this morning to round up and count the cattle, Jim Dowsen, the man who rides me, said, ‘Something has happened during the night, for the cattle are frightened and restless,’ and when we got near them we saw at a glance what was the matter.” And he proceeded to tell Billy about the last raid of the redskins.

The Indians had ridden into the herd during the night, had stolen fifty head of the company’s best cattle, and had ham-strung about fifteen more out of wanton cruelty, because the savage nature delights in torture. When Jim saw what had been done he was furious and he rode off like the wind to find the herder who had been with the cattle. After riding around the whole herd twice without discovering any trace of him, he at last found him lying face downward on the ground, his body without arms, his head minus its scalp. After mutilating him, the savages had left him for the wolves and vultures to devour, and then satisfied with their fiendish work had stolen his pony and ridden away. Billy discovered that the Apache Indians were the most cruel and fiendish of all the tribes living in the territories.

During all this time the fury of the savages had increased.

Before leaving the ranch, the redskins intended finishing their work of destruction. They wanted pale faces. They wanted scalps. But most of all, they wanted fire-water (the Indian name for whisky). And so the attack lasted for three days or more. Provisions were getting low within the cabin, the fuel to cook the meals with was gone, and the horses were neighing for fodder, as they had been fed only potatoes and cabbage once a day, and then as a last resort, straw out of the mattresses; and still the Indians skulked outside and waited for the little band of men in the house either to surrender or to starve.

The third night of the siege the boys began to lose courage. Constant watching, loss of sleep, little to drink and less to eat had nearly worn them out, while their enemies seemed to be in perfect condition and acted as though satisfied to camp outside their door for the rest of their natural lives.

At last, one of the cow-boys named Henry Staples said, “I have it, boys! I know just how we can get out of here; save our scalps and, what is better still, kill every one of those fiends sitting outside grimly waiting to see our finish.”