Lone Pine: The Story of a Lost Mine

by R. B. Townshend

"I love this valley," repeated the cacique; "just down there is where, with one companion, I killed seven Navajos." He pointed with the hand that held the cigarette to the lower end of the park.

"You killed seven Navajos!" said Stephens, looking at him with surprise. "When was that? How did you manage it?"

"It was in the time of the war," answered the other proudly. "The Navajos used to hide here in the mountains all the time, and fall upon our people when we were at work in our lands. We could not stir outside the pueblo then without arms for fear of being waylaid by the rascals. And our scouts used to come up here in the mountains, too, and watch along the trails to see if any of the Navajos were prowling about, and give the alarm. Once I came up here on scout with another man of Santiago; and we hid and lay all night in that hill," he pointed to a rocky summit shaggy with pines that rose hard by. "And we struck the tracks of seven Navajos who were prowling about here to wait for their chance to make a descent upon our people in their fields. And for days we lay up there and watched them, and they never knew it, for we kept very still. And the third day we saw them making a sweat-house, and we knew they were going to have a bath. They built their house down there in the brush by the creek, and they covered it with willow twigs and sods to keep in the steam, and they made a fire and heated the stones red-hot, and carried them into the house and poured on water. And six of them left their arms outside with their clothes, and went into the bath, and the seventh covered the door with a blanket to keep in the hot steam. And my comrade and I crawled up on them through the brush very quickly, and making no noise, while the seventh Indian held the blanket over the door. And there I shot him with my gun,"—he threw up his rifle to his shoulder, and took aim at an imaginary Navajo as he spoke, his face glowing with pride and excitement over the recollection,—"and there he fell down dead. And we leaped forward, for we had stolen up very close behind his back, and the six Navajos inside came scrambling out of the sweat-house one after another, and we cracked their skulls, so, with our tomahawks, crack, crack, crack,"—he made an expressive pantomime of dealing heavy blows on a stooping foe,—"and we killed them all, every one. There was no chance for them; they could not escape. And we took their scalps and the plunder, and brought them home. It was a great triumph. Yes, I do love this valley."

"I don't doubt it," said the American; "you must have been very much pleased with yourselves. You scored there."

"Oh, we always scored against the Navajos," returned the other, "whenever we had fair play. The only way they ever could best us was by sneaking round like wolves and catching some of our men at work and off their guard; but fighting man to man we were far the better warriors. We always beat them then, as I did right here. Yes, I love this place. But come, Sooshiuamo, it is time for us to be moving again."

Forwards, forwards ever, through the shadow of the pine woods, over the silent carpet of brown fir-needles, where the sudden squirrel chattered and barked his alarm ere he rushed to the safety of his tree-top, over open grassy meadows and along willow-fringed streams where the mountain trout leaped and darted in the eddies. It was indeed a lovely land, rich in timber, rich in pasture, rich, too, as Stephens knew, in gold and silver, perhaps even in diamonds—who could tell? What tragedies, though, of torturer and tortured it had seen in the past,—ay, and was likely to see again; nay, what hideous things might not that unhappy girl be enduring now somewhere in its wild recesses! That thought never left Stephens for a single moment. The high, park-like country up here was much more open now that the trail had left the rugged defiles that led up into it. He urged his mare forward alongside the cacique's horse.

"When we catch up with the Navajos, Cacique," said Stephens, "what is your plan?"

"Ah," answered the cacique, "we must try the best way we can. If we can catch them off their guard we will fight them perhaps, and give it them hot. But if they are in a strong place like the Lava Beds ahead of us where we cannot get at them, we must try and make terms with them. But it will not be easy to catch them at a disadvantage and fight them; so very likely Don Nepomuceno will be glad to make terms. If he pays them well and gets his daughter back, it will be the best thing we can do."

There was a certain businesslike air of familiarity with the whole matter apparent in the cacique that struck Stephens. Evidently the carrying off of Manuelita belonged to a class of incidents that were by no means unusual according to his experience. As the prospector rode along pondering this fact, he reflected that Salvador was a man now about forty years of age, and that for thirty-five out of those forty years his people and the Navajos had been deadly enemies. It was only the recent conquest of the latter by the Americans that had put them on the novel footing of peace. Mutual slaughter and the carrying off of women had been the normal condition of things during the greater part of his life.

"I gather from what you say about ransom," said the American after a short silence, "that you think the Navajoes would be willing to restore the señorita if they were paid. But do you think Don Nepomuceno and Don Andrés will be content to recover her like that? Will not the Navajos be certain to have treated her shamefully, and will her father and her brother be content to get her back without taking vengeance? Will they be content before they have shed blood for her wrongs?"