The Wild Man of the West: A Tale of the Rocky Mountains

by R. M. Ballantyne

There was no refusing to obey that voice. The Indian cast one uneasy glance towards his camp, which was now far away on the plain, but there was no sign of any one coming to the rescue. His captor had got the credit of being an evil spirit, and he felt that he was left to his fate. A hasty repetition of the order compelled him to turn and seize the mane of the horse. Dick held out his toe for him to step on; the next moment he was seated in front of the pale-face, galloping towards the mountains.

Whatever astonishment the Indian felt at this singular treatment, or whatever his curiosity as to the result of it all, his countenance expressed nothing but calm scorn and defiance. He was evidently working himself into that state of mind which these redskin warriors endeavour to assume when they are captured and taken to the stake and the torture, there to prove their title to the name of brave by enduring the most inconceivable agonies with stoical indifference, or there to bring discredit on their tribe, infamy on their name, and joy to their enemies, by breaking down under the infliction of tortures at the bare mention of which humanity shudders.

For some time they maintained the same headlong speed. When, however, all danger of pursuit was over, Dick drew rein, and proceeded more leisurely, in order to relieve his now jaded steed. But that was a steed of the true metal. It possessed that generous spirit which would have induced it willingly to exert itself even to the death. Its owner might have ridden it till it fell prostrate and dying on the plain, but he could not have ridden it to the point of refusing to advance because of exhaustion. He was merciful to it, and went slowly during the night; but he did not come to a final halt until the rising sun found him close to the camp of the dying woman.

The Indian now for the first time began partly to guess the object of his having been brought there, and steeled his heart to bear whatever might await him.

Dick dismounted, and grasping the Indian with a force that showed him how helpless he would be in a personal struggle should he venture to attempt it, led him forward, and placed him a few paces in front of his dying mother.

She was sitting just as she had been left, but the fire had gone out, and she trembled violently beneath the blanket which she had sought to pull closer around her wasted form. Dick blamed himself mentally for having put so little wood on the fire, and proceeded to rekindle it; but, before doing so, he took a chain from his saddle-bow, with which he fastened the Indian to a tree that stood exactly opposite the spot on which the old woman sat, and not ten paces distant. He bound him in such a way that he could sit on the ground and lean his back against the tree, but he could neither stand up nor lie down.

For the first time the countenance of the savage betrayed uneasiness. He believed, no doubt, that he was to be left to witness the dying agonies of his mother, and the thought filled him with horror. To leave her, as he did, to perish, had not been difficult, because he knew that he should not see the act of perishing; but to be brought there and compelled to witness this terrible doom acted out in all its minute and horrible details on the mother whom he had once loved so tenderly, was maddening to think of. All the dread tortures that had yet been invented and practised on warriors must have seemed to him as nothing compared with this awful device of the pale-face, on whom he now glared with the eyes of implacable hate and ferocity.

“Will the pale-face,” he said fiercely, “cast me loose, and meet me hand to hand in a fair fight? Surely,” he added, changing his tone to one of ineffable scorn, “the pale-face is not weak, he is not a small man, that he should fear a chief like Bighorn.”

“Hark’ee! Bighorn,” said Dick, striding up to him, and laying the cold edge of his hatchet on the Indian’s forehead; “if you speak another word above yer breath, the pale-face will cleave ye to the chin.”

There was something so thoroughly resolute in Dick’s voice that the Indian was cowed effectually.