Lone Pine: The Story of a Lost Mine

by R. B. Townshend

And why was this debate between the American and the Navajos so stubborn and tedious?

When two shrewd men are each determined to drive the best bargain he can, and neither trusts the other, the diplomacy between a frontiersman and a redskin may be as lengthy as if it were between rival ambassadors of contending empires. In their secret hearts both Stephens and Mahletonkwa were anxious to come to an understanding, but each thought it politic to simulate comparative indifference, and not to give any advantage to his opponent by betraying undue eagerness.

Stephens demanded at the outset the immediate restoration of the captive to her father, safe and sound. Granted that, he was willing to promise fair compensation for the Navajo who had been slain, and amnesty for the subsequent outrage of carrying off the girl; and also he was ready in person to guarantee these terms. He could offer no less, much as he longed to see her abductors punished, because it was obvious that, as long as they were not secure from retaliation, they would prefer to keep possession of her to the last possible moment, and take their punishment fighting.

To this first demand Mahletonkwa signified his willingness to agree, but only on conditions. Stephens's offer was an amnesty and fair compensation. That was precisely what he wanted. Fair compensation, plus an amnesty. But the question arose, what was fair compensation? and here for a time they split. Stephens maintained that Don Nepomuceno's offer of a hundred and twenty-five dollars cash, was fair. Mahletonkwa would not hear of it. His dead brother was worth a great deal more than that. He had asked a thousand dollars for him, and a thousand dollars he intended to have. Apart from that he had no use for the captive.

"Pay the bill, and take the girl," that was the sum and substance of his argument; "and if her father won't pay, will you?"

Right here the American saw it was essential to make a stand. If he weakly yielded to this preposterous claim, Mahletonkwa would be sure to conclude that he was scared into acquiescence and could have no soldiers or Indian scouts in any force to back him up. That being so, most likely the Navajo would raise his terms, and ask perhaps double, treble, quadruple,—anything he pleased in short,—till the whole affair became a farce! No, Mahletonkwa's thousand-dollar demand was almost certainly a bluff. Then why shouldn't he try a bluff, too?

"I can't do it, Mahletonkwa," said he with an air of finality, but speaking more in sorrow than in anger, as one who sees good business slipping through his fingers. "I'd like to come to terms first-rate, but I can't meet you there. You're too stiff in your figures. It's not a deal."

He thought of the girl sitting there all alone in the cave, and his kindly heart longed to say, "What's a thousand dollars, more or less? Hang it all, here, take it! or rather, take my word for it, and let's be off home." But prudence whispered, No.

Mahletonkwa calmly repeated his demand. He, too, thought it wisest to play the part of the close-fisted trader, and show no hurry to make a bargain.

"Well, look here then, Mahletonkwa and Navajos all," said the American, appealing directly to the cupidity of the followers as well as of the chief. "It's a big thing I've offered you on my own hook already in this matter of the amnesty. It's a big thing for me to say I'll stand between you and Uncle Sam" (he did not say Uncle Sam, but the Great Father at Washington); "but I stick by that, and I'll do it. And I've offered you payment for the dead man, same as Don Nepomuceno, a hundred and twenty-five dollars; and you say it aint enough. Now, I can't meet you the whole way, but I'll raise my offer a bit, and you can take it or leave it. It's my last word." He rose to the level of the part he was playing, and threw himself into it with all the sincerity he was master of. "You see that rifle"—he pointed to the long, heavy, muzzle-loading hunter's rifle that lay beside Mahletonkwa's right knee—"well, I'll give you the weight of that rifle in silver dollars. Me, looking as I do, I'll see that you get them. There's my word upon it. This is my personal offer to compensate you for your dead brother. You shall have silver dollars enough to weigh down that rifle on the scales. I don't know how many that'll take, but it's bound to be a right big pile. Now understand me, you chaps, we'll take a balance, a fair and square balance, and put the rifle in one scale and pour silver dollars into the other till the rifle kicks the beam. Sabe?"