The Westerners

by Stewart Edward White

On the hillside opposite a white-faced little boy rose from behind a mesquite clasping the neck of a homely dog. He ran at once to town, where he burst in on Moroney, crying, "Pop, pop, Black Mike's gone and killed old Bugchaser with a knife," after which he began to cry hysterically. It took time for the camp to arouse, to dress, to hear the tale, to believe, to visit the scene of the deed, to believe again after finding Billy's knife, to discuss, to decide, and finally to saddle horses and depart, puzzled, on the trail of Lafond. It had a rope. But it also wanted to hear more about it. Therefore its speed was not as rapid as it might have been, had a horse thief, for instance, been the object of pursuit.

So Lafond, after his first impulse to get away from the scene of his deed had spent itself, jogged along unmolested toward Rapid. His brain was working like lightning, but always on one line. He saw himself alone, standing opposed to this huge black Bad-luck. Everything was against him. But they couldn't get him down. He was Man-who-speaks-Medicine, the Sioux; he was Lafond, the half-breed; he was Black Mike, the pioneer. Let them come on! They thought they could corner him. He would show them. One was gone. There remained the other two. Lafond's mind saw red; he was set on murder. No consideration of reason, probability, or common sense obtruded itself athwart his plan. He could perceive one fact—that three men knew his secret, of whom one was dead and the other two were living. Why Knapp and Buckley should have told Durand; what they expected to gain by going to Rapid; or what benefit the naturalist imagined could accrue to him from his insinuating the state of affairs to the half-breed, the latter did not inquire. He only knew that he wanted to catch Knapp's buckboard before it had left the pine belt. Ambush would then be easier. He lashed his horses unmercifully.

Rockerville told him the two men had passed through not half an hour before, and wondered at the wildness of his eye.

That was well. They could not escape him now, for their wagon was heavily loaded, and they were travelling leisurely, having no reason for haste. Remembering appearances, he told Rockerville that it did not much matter, he would not try to catch up; and then drove back toward Copper Creek, only to make a detour by a wood road into the Rapid trail again. As he approached the foothills, he could hear occasionally the creak of a brake below him, by which he knew that he was drawing near. He slowed up at once, for he knew of a short cut a mile or so ahead, which the prospectors would not attempt because of their heavy load, but by which he could come out ahead of his victims. Then he would lie in wait. The short cut in question dipped steeply down into the bed of a creek, and as steeply up on the other side; while the main stage-road made a long horseshoe curve around the head of the cañon. Lafond decided to drive rapidly down, to leave his team in the creek bottom, and to climb on foot to the level of the main road on the other side. In the meantime he drew as near to the other wagon as he could without being seen. The minutes seemed to drag.

At last he discerned the dimly blazed trail, rocky and dangerous enough, which dropped sheer away into the underbrush below. He locked the brakes and turned sharply down to the right. The descent was hazardous, bumpy, exceedingly noisy. For this reason, it was not until he had reached the level ground at the bottom of the cañon and the clash of iron tire against stone had ceased, that he became aware the ravine was already occupied. A sound of voices and laughter floated up through the thin screen of leaves. As the half-breed's vehicle pushed out toward the creek itself, he saw that he had unwittingly stumbled on a camp of Indians up in the Hills on one of their annual jaunts after teepee poles.

Once a year they make these excursions. The whole band—men, women, children, ponies, dogs, and household goods—goes along. It is an outing. The women fell and strip the long slender saplings. The men loaf lazily in front of their temporary shelters or ride about the Hills to the various camps, giving war dances for nickels and silver pieces. The occasion is eminently peaceful.

Of such a nature was the gathering which Michaïl Lafond came upon in the level of the little cañon. The wigwams had been pitched either side of the old overgrown road. Children had cut away the slight underbrush to clear a round smooth park of perhaps thirty yards diameter, in the circumference of which were crowded the persons and household belongings of four score people. Near the centre stood the chief's lodge distinguished by a shield and spear. The whole was a facsimile of a plains camp, except that here the whole affair was in miniature—little wigwams, little kettle-tripods, little space—for the camp was but temporary. Perhaps a score of men were idling about, dressed in blue overalls and old flannel shirts. Moccasins and no hats left still a slight flavor of savagery. The women were clothed for the most part in dirty calico prints. The children had on just nothing at all.

Lafond cursed a little excitedly as he became aware of this not unpicturesque gathering. It was plainly out of the question to leave his horses and wagon in the creek bottom as he had intended; and it was now equally impossible to waylay the prospectors at the top of the grade. A shot would bring out the entire band. The situation was much complicated, for just beyond lay the rolling treeless foothills. More bad luck!

Still the half-breed remembered it was yet many miles to Rapid; and an ambush would not be impossible in some one of the numerous gullies that seamed the foothills. He must hurry his tired horses up the steep slope in order to emerge on the main road ahead of Knapp and Buckley.

"How!" said the nearest warrior, raising his hand palm outward.