Transcriber’s Note:

New original cover art included with this eBook is granted to the public domain.

ESTHER:
A STORY OF THE OREGON TRAIL.

LONDON:

GEORGE ROUTLEDGE AND SONS,

THE BROADWAY, LUDGATE.

CONTENTS

ESTHER:

A

STORY OF THE OREGON TRAIL.

CHAPTER I.
WESTWARD.

Our every footstep treads upon a grave! The keel of the snowy-pinioned vessel but turns a fleecy furrow while plowing its way over the abodes of death. Earth is but one vast tomb, where sleep, side by side, commingling their dust, the king and peasant, the master and slave, the beautiful and the repulsive. Beneath the iron-clad feet of our swift steeds—beneath the thunder-rush and lightning speed of engines—beneath the quick, firm tread of business men, and beneath the gentle pressure of the daintily-slippered feet of lovely women, lie the mouldering form—the dust of stalwart men and the more delicate clay that was fashioned by the Master hand into childhood, girlhood, womanhood—beauty. We turn from scenes of busy life, and enter the deep forest, unthinking and careless that beneath our footsteps lie the mouldering bones of the war-painted warrior, beside his broken spear and stringless bow; and, in another place, the dusky forest-maiden, who once wreathed amid the dull blackness of her hair the gorgeously-tinted buds and blossoms of the God-cultured prairie. But so it is. The star that leads civilization westward shines sadly upon the graves of a people almost extinct—a people that have been hunted ruthlessly from their greenwood haunts till every year has seen their graves multiplying thicker and thicker in the wilderness. Then the Anglo-Saxon comes to plow it up and plant corn above the dead warriors, stooping now and then to pick up a stone arrow-head from his furrow, and examine it curiously, as if he did not know what soil his sacrilegious plow was upturning.

The Indian sees his council fires flicker out one by one, scarcely rising skyward long enough to gild the ruins of his bark and skin-covered wigwam, or light up the ashes over his deserted altars.

Yon star that leads westward has no halting-place for him till it sets on the calm Pacific, writing on its blue waters the history of a people that have perished.

It was a lovely morning. The sun rose from its nightly course, radiant with beauty, kissing the dew from the tiny cups of the myriad flowers, tinging with gold the emerald leaves of the forest, and gilding the crests of a thousand little billows that were just waking to life in the shaded pools of the mountain streams. It was a scene of wondrous loveliness—a scene that the eye might willingly rest upon forever, while the soul drank in its freshness till satiated with the very excess of beauty. A scene like that the pen or pencil of man are impatient to portray. The Master Artist—God! upon the canvass of his own created world, has alone written it out.

Under one of those picturesque clumps of trees that broke the luxuriant monotony of the rolling grass-land, a corral of covered wagons had been drawn up for the night, and now stood with the canvass swaying in the breeze, circling a snowy little tent which had been pitched against the trunk of a noble tulip-tree, and stood beneath its deep-green branches like a great white bird rested on the grass.

The little camp had formed itself late the night before, and the deep breathing of many a stalwart sleeper came from the covered wagons, while the guard kept his post yet, but with a weary fall of the body and a wistful look at the wagons; for he envied the sleepers there with all the earnestness of a tired man.

In the midst of the stillness, the covering of the pretty white tent began to flutter, as if the great bird it represented so much were stirring its plumage; first one curtain was lifted, then another, and after a little peeped forth one of the most beautiful faces you ever set eyes on—only the more beautiful because her hair, black as a crow’s plumage, hung in great undulating waves down her shoulders, just as she had dropped it, half-braided, when tired of holding its weight in her small hands. It was a radiant face, rich with health and fine coloring. Her brown eyes—sometimes black when she was excited, but of a warm, loving brown now—cast a bright glance out upon the morning, the curtain fell again, there was a fluttering motion of life within the tent, then all the canvass was flung back from the front, and as queenly a young creature as you ever saw stepped out upon the trampled sward. In form and face the girl was something wonderful to look upon; and now that her hair was coiled in a raven braid around her head, and her figure was clearly defined by a close-fitting dress of richly-toned calico, there was an air of high breeding in her carriage singularly at variance with the scene around her.

Some clusters of wild blossoms grew within the circle of the wagons still untrampled and pure. She saw them drooping heavily beneath a rain of dew, and going up to them, swept the drops off with her hands, thus taking a morning bath which was half moisture, half perfume.

“Now,” she said, looking around upon the green undulations of the prairie, “now for a straggle among the flowers. One never gets a lonely walk when we are on the move. I am tired of being forever cautioned to keep close to the wagons. Now for the prairie. How the green waves rise and swell to the morning wind. It is like launching forth on an ocean. It seems as if one could swim through the grass.”

Esther Morse—this was her name—ran back to the tent and brought forth a pretty straw hat, very coarse, but so garnished with crimson ribbons that it had a look of dainty sumptuousness, which she carried away by the strings. Thus she left the camp, singing as she went, but in a low voice that harmonized with the gush of bird-songs that swelled through the morning.

Esther passed the almost sleeping guard, who, tired with his night of watchfulness against the prowling Utes, was leaning noddingly upon his rifle. She flashed upon his sight rather as some visitor from starry climes than that compound of earth we call woman.

“’Tain’t my business, Miss Esther,” he muttered, more to himself than her, “but who knows what red-skins may be a-watchin over behind them rocks yender.”

“Never fear for me, Abel Cummings,” replied the girl cheerfully and with a sweet smile upon her face; “I only want to take a short walk in the grass. Never fear for me, I will be back long before breakfast is ready.”

“If ever thar was an angel thar goes one,” soliloquized the man as she passed him.

And on she rambled, far beyond the usual limits prescribed by camp regulations. Well might a poetic fancy be lured by such a scene. The cloud-crowned caps of the Wind River Mountains loomed ghost-like in the rare, blue air—the sloping prairie around was green in its spring freshness—the foliage, that marked the river’s tide, glitteringly bright, and the just rising sun throwing over all its rare and delicate sheen of golden-vermilion. These before, and above, and around; while behind, the tented wagons dotted the greensward, looking as if a fairy caravan had encamped in a new Eden.

Careless of all danger—thinking but of the glorious scene around her, Esther Morse stepped rapidly over the rolling ground and soon was lost to sight. Now and then she paused and stooped to examine some dainty bud, and then, as if anxious to make the most of her time, pressed forward again. The plash of swiftly-running waters greets her ears, and soon she stoops over the sparkling tide which came surging over a pile of rocks. Well might she look in the pool below. Such rare beauty was never mirrored before in that sylvan looking-glass; the foot of a being so fit to be the sovereign of the scene never before trod the mossy brink. She cools her brow with the spray, and the foam-beads flash amid the blackness of her luxuriant hair. She bends still more closely over the silvery tide, and can almost count the snowy pebbles beneath. A bird flits by and she listens to its song for a moment, but to send back a reply still more sweet. An antelope stays its rapid course for an instant, upon the opposite bank, to gaze upon her with its pensive eyes, ere its hoofs, swift almost as light, ring a merry chorus as it speeds away, buoyant with innocent life. Truly it is a bower of beauty—a very paradise in the far distant wilderness. The spirit of evil should indeed forbear to set his foot or leave his serpent trail in a place like that.

Hark! Like the aroused stag, her ear is bent to listen. She holds her breath and stands poised for flight. Is it the wind playing idly among the branches—the stir of her father’s train preparing for their onward march—the rush and thunder of the buffalo herd, or the stealthy tread and long, shambling gallop of the gaunt, gray wolf? Is it the step of some one sent in pursuit of her—some one to guard her against danger—or—and the very thought sent a thrill of fear quivering through her entire frame—is it, can it be the wily savage seeking for plunder, prisoners, perhaps scalps?

Little time did she give herself for thought, but with a quick, startled glance around she turned to go; but with the first step confronted an Indian girl standing in her very path. To pass her and rush to the camp before the red warriors could cut her off from the way, appeared to be her only hope; but even as she hurried past, the skirt of her dress was caught and retained, while a not unmusical voice whispered, in strangely broken accents:

“Look. Me no enemy to you. Look! Has the pale-face no thought of the Laramie? The memory of the white squaw is not true like the heart of the red one.”

In a moment the swiftly-retreating blood flowed back to Esther’s heart. She recognized the Indian girl as one whom she had slightly befriended weeks before.

“The white squaw good to me. She has no forgotten?” asked the Indian girl, or rather wife, for she was in fact the bride of a dusky chief of the Sioux.

In the bright sunlight, as she stood there waiting to be recognized, this Indian woman was the very incarnation of that rare, almost spiritual beauty sometimes to be found among the daughters of the red-men. Slight, yet tall, with movements so perfectly graceful that they approached those of a leopard; with a small foot, whose richly-ornamented moccasins fell light, almost, as the dew upon the prairie-blossoms; with long, black hair, knotted with scraps of gorgeous ribbon, she stood before Esther. Her eyes, large, lustrous and pensive as those of the antelope, were fixed upon the young girl. You would not have thought, from the expression at the moment, that they could be piercing as the sun-gazing eagle, when insult or danger aroused the slumbering passions of uneducated nature. With that look, and a voice flute-like and musical, it would have been strange indeed if she could so soon have been forgotten.

“Yes,” replied Esther, “I remember you well; but what could have brought you so far from your tribe? You Indian women are not used, I think, to stray away from your wigwams or leave your husbands.”

“Waupee has no husband,” was the response of the young wife.

“No husband! What do you mean? It is not a month since I saw you the bride of a great warrior—high in power and famous on the hunting-path.”

“One day there came to the wigwam of the Black Eagle a woman fair as a white rose. The warrior forgot Waupee, his wife, and his heart turned to the white rose. Waupee has no husband.”

“Waupee—White Hawk—what story is this? What do you mean?”

“The warrior can not see the moon when the sun is showering its golden arrows to the earth.”

“Why talk to me in this ambiguous manner? Speak plainly, so that I may understand.”

“The Black Eagle of the Sioux has feasted his eyes on the beauty of the pale-face.”

“On me? You can not mean me?”

“The tongue has traveled the trail of truth.”

“But it is folly—madness! He will never see me again. I shall soon be forgotten, Waupee, and then all will be well with you again.”

“The red-man never forgets.”

“And you have traveled so far—so many long miles, to tell me of this—to tell me that—”

“The wigwam of Waupee is desolate.”

“But you must have had some other motive. It can not be this alone could bring you so far.”

“Let the daughter of the pale-face bend her head so low that Waupee can whisper to her. The woods have ears, the flowers hearken, and the trees drink in words.”

“What mystery—what new fear is this? Tell me quickly, for my heart leaps wildly in terror of some danger that you know of.”

“The Black Eagle of the Sioux is flying swiftly upon the trail of the pale-face he would have for his mate!”

“Horror! Even now he may be concealed between me and my father’s camp. Thanks, thanks, good Waupee, and—”

“Hark!” and the Indian woman laid her ear close to the ground and listened for some time in silence. Then rising, she continued: “The earth is thundering beneath the hoofs of swift-running horses, but they are still afar. Let the daughter of the pale-face hasten to her people, and never again let her moccasin wander. The eye of the Black Eagle is keen, his wings swift, his talons sharp, and his heart knows neither pity or fear.”

“And you, Waupee?”

“The Great Spirit directs me. The poor Indian woman has risked her life to save you, for you were kind to her. But now—” she started suddenly as if serpent-stung, and without another word disappeared in the thick undergrowth.

Left to herself, the white girl paused but for a moment—a single one, as if to consider her nearest and most secure path to the camp, then darted off, with the swiftness of a frightened deer. Now and then she listened intently, while pausing to gather breath, and once, in passing, bent over the swift-running water that washed the green grasses and tiny flowers at her feet, attracted, even in her flight, by some unwonted object.

Was it the eyes of a basilisk that so enchained her? What was the form, but half hid by the drooping bushes, that robbed her cheeks of their healthy red and brought a cry of anguish to her quivering lips. Do demons lave their black limbs in the limpid waters of the mountain streams, or forms Plutonian sport where the salmon should alone flash its silver sides?

The waters parted with a turbulent dash, and a dark form arose, dripping like a water-god, before her. It was Black Eagle, of the Sioux.

“Ugh!” The arms of the Indian were extended, his eyes flashed with the fires of savage triumph. He gathered her up from where she stood white as death and frozen with fear, and, as a hawk seizes rudely on its prey, bore her off.

CHAPTER II.
NATURE’S NOBLEMAN—WALTERMYER.

“Abel Cummings, what are you a-doing there, my good man? Come, be stirring;” and the speaker issued from a large wagon near at hand.

“Doin’, Squire? Only lookin’ out to see if I could see any thing of Miss Esther. But it ain’t of no use, for she’s gone clear out of sight,” replied the man, addressing the owner of the train, and the father of the wandering girl.

“You might be in better business than spying after a runaway girl. Let her go. Hunger will soon bring her back again, I’ll warrant. So stir around—wake up the men, and have every thing ready for a start.”

“But, Squire, they say that thar’s lots an’ lots of Indians a-skulkin’ around, and who knows but that they may carry Miss Esther off and—”

“Eat her up, I suppose!” interrupted the parent, with a hearty laugh.

Checked in his speech, the man turned sullenly away, and in the bustle of the hour had soon forgotten his fears. So, indeed, it was with the majority, if they had in fact any curiosity about a young creature who had always been accustomed to wander at will and without restraint. But, careless as the father apparently was, he often turned his eyes in the direction pointed out by the man, and grew more and more troubled that she did not return.

Strange, very strange it would have been if that father had not been anxious, for she was all that remained to him of a beloved family. Wife and sons had fallen victims to the terrible reaper of the scythe and hour-glass, as he swept in a fearful epidemic through the land. This beautiful daughter was now his sole idol. Heart-sick, he had turned his back upon the place of his birth—gathered up his means, and, following the westering star, had determined to make for himself a new home in the regions “where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound save its own dashings.”

The breakfast-hour arrived and still the girl came not; passed, and she had not appeared. The time of starting was delayed, until a feeling of intense uneasiness—a vague sense of danger, took possession of every heart. Anxious eyes were strained prairie-ward, but in vain. No flutter of dress or springing step told of her coming. Once, only, moving life appeared in the distance: they saw a troop of horse sweeping over a far-off eminence—wild horse they must have been, for none bore riders. For one moment they flashed before their eyes, floundering madly on, and then were lost in a cloud of whirling dust, which alone told of their passage.

Simple as the incident was, they remembered it well in the hereafter.

“Saddle up your best horses, boys!”

The order came with startling sternness, for the heart of that poor father was now sorely troubled.

“Abel Cummings, lead the way. You saw her last, and should be a sure guide.”

“Waal, Squire, yes; but, yer see—”

“Silence! This is no time for words. Action, man, prompt and decisive action may save my child; nothing else. A hundred silver dollars to him who first brings me news of her. Mount and forward! Mount all, except those who guard the wagons. Mount and—”

A little cloud of dust, scarcely larger than an infant’s hand, arose suddenly in the distance, whirling in eddies aloft, and checking further speech, for in those regions slight causes often produced events of the most startling character. Who could tell that this little cloud of dust might not be caused by the hoofs of a savage band, resolved on robbery, if not murder!

Without waiting for commands, the circular line of the corral was again formed, the cattle and horses secured within, and each man, fully armed, at his post. Then every eye was turned upon the prairie, eager to learn what the cloud might portend.

Nearer, still nearer, it came, as if lightning were trailing its red flashes along the earth, searing the foliage as it passed and leaving only a train of whirling dust behind. Nearer it came, and soon the beating of each heart was less fitful, and every rifle was dropped from its poise. Nearer—still nearer, and two horsemen came bounding up the slope, “bloody with spurring, fiery red with speed.”

The foremost—for his good steed, though held in check, came many lengths ahead—was mounted on a horse of great power. With the exception of a single snowy spot in his forehead, the superb animal was black from hoof to fore-top. He cleared the earth with great, vigorous bounds, his thin, open nostrils red as coral, his head matchless in its symmetry, ears delicate and pointed, and tail and mane waving like twin banners in the breeze. With a firm, yet light hand, the rider controlled his slightest motion, and guided him at will. When he had reached the corral, and the rider flung himself carelessly to the ground, there was not a quivering of the limbs or heaving flank to tell of the rapid race he had just finished.

“Who and what are you?” demanded Miles Morse, as the new-comer glanced around and appeared to take in the entire scene with a single look, while every eye was riveted upon him.

Well might these men gaze upon the new-comer both in admiration and surprise, for a more superb specimen of the Western hunter and border scout never trod the earth. More than six feet in height, with long black hair, and a thick beard sprinkled with gray, an aquiline nose, and eyes piercing and restless as the eagle’s, he was a man well worth remembering as a noble specimen of the class.

His dress was the usual picturesque costume, formed mostly of doeskin, curiously fringed and embroidered. His hat was the true slouch—“rough and ready,” with a gold band glittering around it. He held a long rifle in one hand, while pistols and a knife bristled defiantly in his belt. As he stood stroking the arched neck of his good horse, you saw the very beau ideal of that pioneer race who, scorning the ease and fashionable fetters of city life, have laid the foundation of new States in the unexplored regions of the giant West, and dashed onward in search of new fields of enterprise, leaving the great results to be gathered by the settlers that come slowly after him. There he stood, leaning against his horse, lithe as a panther, fearless as a poor honorable man may well be after he has, companionless, traversed the trackless desert, and fought the grizzly bear in his own fastnesses.

“Who am I, stranger?” he said, with something like a smile. “May be you have heard of Kirk Waltermyer?”

“Waltermyer? I think I have heard your name before.”

“Heard of me, stranger? Why, I am well known from the pines of Oregon to the chapparel of Texas. Ask La Moine, there, if we haven’t danced at every fandango, hunted in every thicket, and trapped on every stream.”

His companion, whom he had called La Moine, was a tough and wiry specimen of the half-breed Frenchman, so often found among the north-western hunters and voyageurs—a man of but few words, but true as steel to a friend, and implacable in his hate of an enemy.

“Yes, I have heard of you,” continued Morse. “I remember, now, and was expecting to find you somewhere in the vicinity of Salt Lake. I was told you could guide me by the best route to the Walla Walla valley.”

“I guide you!” and the weather-bronzed man laughed in a reckless and heart-whole manner. “I guide you? Why, stranger, I could do it blindfolded.”

“Well, I believe you, but we’ll talk of it another time. First, let me ask what brought you here?”

“Why, my good horse—the best-limbed, swiftest, surest horse on the perarer. None of your mustangs, that, stranger, but a full-blooded cretur, worth his weight in diamonds.”

“I know that; but your business? From what I learned about you, this is not your usual trail.”

“Waal, it hain’t, that’s a fact; but some of the skulkin’ followers of that devil-worshiper, Brigham Young, ukered me out of nigh a hundred head, and I’m not the man to play such games with, sure as you live.”

“Hundred head? What do you mean?”

“Ha! ha! Waal, you must’er come from the tother side of sunrise. Head? Why, cattle, to be sure; but they didn’t steal them, for they knew my rifle had a rayther imperlite way of speakin’ its mind, so they bought them and have forgot to pay.”

“I understand. And now, listen to me. My daughter wandered away from the camp early this morning and has not returned. I fear that—”

“La Moine,” interrupted Waltermyer, somewhat rudely, while the cheerful expression of his face changed into a frown as black as a thunder-cloud, and his entire nature appeared to have assumed a stern purpose, “La Moine, do you remember the red rascals we saw dashing over the perarer like so many frightened wild horses? I told you thar was something wrong—that some traveler had lost his stock or something worse had happened. Which way did the girl take, stranger?”

“There—toward the timber.”

“And some skulkin’, thievin’ savage was lyin’ in ambush for her, I’ll bet a dozen beaver-skins. La Moine, go with—who saw her last—you, man?—well, go with him and see if you can find the trail.” As the Frenchman departed, accompanied by Abel Cummings, he continued: “Ef thar ever was a man that was part hound, had the hearing of a deer and the cunning of a fox, thar he goes;” and he stripped the heavy saddle from his horse, took the bit from his mouth, and allowed him to graze at will.

A half-hour—which appeared very long to the watchers—and the two men returned.

“Waal, La Moine?”

“The girl has been carried off, Waltermyer, that’s sartin. But one Indian did it. Thar is the print of another moccasin, but it is a little one—that of a squaw. I should say that the white gal and the squaw had been talkin’ together, and after they had separated, some Indian devil of a warrior jumped from an ambush—dragged the gal inter the stream and across it—found his braves waitin’, and after lifting the gal inter a saddle, off they went like so many black thieves.”

“Ef you say so, it is so, and I’ll swear to it.”

“We saw a troop of horses in the distance,” said the father, “but as they had no riders, thought they must have been wild ones. No, no! they could never have carried Indians.”

“Not them!” replied Waltermyer, “not them! Why, man, any boy that ever saw a perarer could have told you how it was. They were hiding behind their horses—with only one foot thrown over the saddles, if they had any at all, while the girl was bound down and kept on the further side. It’s too old a trick to fool any one. But which way were they going, the prowlin’ wolves carryin’ off young lambs? West, were they? They will strike for the South Pass; but what in the name of common sense should take them thar with a stolen girl?”

No one appeared competent to solve the question, and all was silence until the Frenchman—for so he habitually called himself, notwithstanding his Indian blood—whispered in the ear of Waltermyer the single word “Mormons.”

“Right, man! Right for a thousand slugs! Stranger, did you come by the way of Laramie?”

“Certainly, we stayed there a number of days.”

“War thar any followers of the holy prophet—as the infernal sinners call themselves, though I call them thieves—around?”

“A large train. We left them there.”

“And they saw your girl?”

“Every day. Several of them visited us. One in particular came often and appeared very anxious to converse with us.”

“What sort of man was he?”

“Large, rather good-looking, and a plausible and gentlemanly appearing man.”

“With black hair, as smooth as my colt’s skin, and a scar on one cheek?”

“Yes. I remember it distinctly.”

“I know him, stranger.”

“You! But that is not improbable.”

“I’ll bet my rifle I do, and a bigger Satan never disgraced the name of man. He’s a hull mule train in rascality, that man is. It isn’t the first of his infernal capers that I have been knowing to, and unless you travel swift you may make up your mind to find your daughter in that serpent’s nest, Salt Lake City.”

“Heaven keep her from it! Death, even, would be a blessing compared to that.”

“Amen to that, stranger, and ef you had seen and knew as much as I do you would say it with your hull heart.”

“What can be done to save her Waltermyer? She is my only child—all that is left to me. You will help a father in his worst troubles? Go with me—help me and name your price—any thing, all, I possess shall be yours, if you save her.”

“Stranger, I will go. Thar’s my hand on it, and though I say it who shouldn’t, it’s just as honest a hand as thar is on the frontier, and never yet took money for a kindness.”

“I know it—I believe it.”

“Then don’t talk to me of pay. Kirk Waltermyer ain’t no Digger Indian, or yaller greaser to take blood-money. If thar is any thing, stranger, that would have kept me from lendin’ you a helpin’ hand it is that same offer to pay.”

“Forgive me and forget. Trouble—this terrible trouble, should outweigh my mistake.”

“And so it does. Besides, you didn’t know any better. You men who are brought up in cities and have your souls cramped up between brick walls—who buy and sell one another like horses, don’t know what it is to live out human freedom on the perarers—to enjoy life—to be MEN! But we are losin’ time. Let half a dozen of your best men mount their swiftest horses, arm themselves to the teeth and follow me. La Moine, you stay, guide the train to Fort Bridger and wait thar until you hear from me. Every hour we can gain now is worth a day to us. Come, stranger, don’t get downhearted. Kirk Waltermyer will see your girl righted or thar shall be more howlin’ and prayin’ in Salt Lake than Brigham Young ever got up at one of his powows.”

The words were scarcely out of his mouth before he had whistled his horse to his side, saddled and bridled him, flung himself on his back, and was dashing away with the perfect grace and horsemanship of an Arapahoe. Rude as he was in speech and manner—unlettered and unrefined—a purer diamond never yet was concealed in any man’s breast than the heart of Waltermyer.

CHAPTER III.
THE APOSTLE.

The followers of Joseph Smith, the martyr to his own fanaticism, were traveling slowly, like the Israelites of old, from their ruined homes in Illinois to the far-off Salt Lake. On the night in which our story deals with them, they had pitched their tents for the night on the grassy banks of the Sweet Water river. Before them loomed up Independence Rock, like some castellated tower of feudal times—grand, hoary, grim and picturesque. Beyond was the “Devil’s Gate,” through which they would soon have to pass. A strikingly appropriate name this for the passage that was to usher them to the valley of the “Saints” beyond! He who named it must have been gifted with prophetic wisdom with regard to the people who were to travel it in after days.

The scene was attractive, even beautiful, for these people wandered like the Patriarchs of old, with flocks and herds, pitching their tents in the wilderness. The last rays of the sun struck with slanting light the canvass homes, tinging them with dusky gold. The cheerful hum of busy labor rose healthfully on the breeze. The song of the maidens while milking the cows—the prattle of little children—the gay laughter of young people and the tones of manly voices swelled together—an anthem of toil. Bright fires were already sending their smoke on high, wreathing in fanciful coils and drifting through the air, tinged with a glorious brightness like thunder-clouds when the sun strikes them. Busy mothers bent over the coals, preparing the evening meal, while their husbands wheeled the heavy wagons into a circle, and formed a temporary fort, calculated to protect them from attack from without, and stampede within. The air was soft, and the clouds mottled, dolphin-like, changing as the sun went down into deeper hues of crimson, gold and purple. The trees were aflame—the swiftly-running stream, molten silver—the burning death-fires of the day had flooded the earth with evanescent brightness.

“Showered the maples with celestial red;

The oaks were sunsets—though the day was dead;

The green was gold—the willows drooped in wine;

The ash was fire—the humblest shrub divine;

The aspen quivered in a silver stream.”

Amid all this loveliness, selfish passions were at work, striving for their own ends, with a deluded people toiling on to erect a molten calf in the wilderness to be worshiped in the place of the true God!

But the smoke of the evening fires became thin, and faded away; the glowing coals died out amid the whitened ashes. The children, innocent as yet, thank Heaven, had passed into the sweet dreams that infancy alone can know, and the elders gathered to hear the mockery of an evening service, to profane that almost holy solitude with the idolatry of a purely sensual religion.

The master spirit rose, the beguiling serpent who had lured these ignorant men and women from their quiet homes in the old world, and desecrated the quiet of that lovely evening with his pointless ravings—inflammatory pictures of the “promised land” that should soon dawn upon their longing eyes; all the blasphemous teachings of a wily brain.

A man, subtle in his nature and in his speech—with a superfluity of words, and gifted with the low cunning of an adroit impostor, he yet was looked up to as one on whom the sacred mantle of “the prophet” had fallen. Practice, and his own nature had enabled him to assimilate himself with the peculiar ideas of those he wished to influence—to lower himself to any level, and cunningly use it for his own selfish ends and personal aggrandizement.

Nature had done much toward enabling him to become the living lie he was. In youth his figure had been fine and his face attractive; and though years had told upon the one, rendering it somewhat coarse, and evil thoughts had plowed unmistakable furrows upon the other, enough of early grace and manly beauty remained to enforce the iniquity of his doctrines.

With great unction and show of reverence his discourse was delivered; the sweet strains of the evening hymns rolled forth, echoed by the rocky reverberations of the grand old hills afar off; the smouldering fires were extinguished; the guards placed, and silence settled down upon the shores of the Sweet Water.

But Elelu Thomas—for so the prophet was named—had no inclination for sleep. His tent had been pitched apart from the others, and with little difficulty and no fear of observation he could make his way from the corral into the open prairie.

Alone, if one filled with evil thoughts can ever be alone, he sat for a long time. No sweet memories gathered around his heart and thronged the mystic cells of the brain. No tender recollections flashed, fairy-footed, through the halls of thought, but unholy fancies alone had power with him.

“Yes,” he muttered, between his closely compressed lips; “Yes. The plan will work to a charm. Never yet has a human soul escaped me. This shall be the master-stroke of my life. Hark! No, no, it is not what I long to hear. It is but the half-suppressed song with which the sentinel cheats the long hours. But it is so near midnight—the poor fools who have so blindly followed and given me their gold are asleep—dreaming, perhaps, of the bright valley I have so often told them of. What a waking there will be soon! Well, well, it is necessary to keep up the delusion, and I would be but a fool like them to kill the goose that lays my golden eggs.”

The man opened a trunk upon which he had been seated, took out some arms, and cautiously left the tent. He crept stealthily through the wagons, skirted along them, half hid by the shadows, and gained the woods unobserved.

“Rare sentinels these,” he thought. “To-morrow I will teach them a lesson that they will not soon forget. But here is the spot, and—”

A touch upon his arm caused his cowardly soul to leap to his lips, while a deep voice whispered in his ears:

“The pale chief watches not well the stars.”

“Ah! Black Eagle, is that you?”

“The red-man has been waiting. When the moon first touched the tops of the trees he was to be here. It’s light is now creeping down the trunks.”

“Yes, I know I am late, but now that I am here tell me how you have succeeded?”

“Has the pale-face forgotten his promise?”

“No; here is the gold; the rest you shall have at the proper time. Now, about your mission.”

“He who would keep should watch also. When the fawn wanders far from the horns of the buck, the wolves are soon on its trail.”

“Yes, yes; but tell me plainly what you mean.”

“The eye of Black Eagle is keen, his arm is strong and his horse swift.”

“Bah! with your Indian circumlocution. Tell me about the girl, man. Have you got her?”

“There is mourning and blackened faces in the wigwam of her tribe.”

“You have carried her off then?”

“As the eagle of the mountains does the young dove of the valley.”

“And you brought her here? Here? Where is she, man?”

“Not like the children of the prairies can the pale squaw ride. She is feeble as the little pappoose, and her heart is sick as the snake-charmed bird.”

“What of it?” and a dark frown settled on the face of the speaker. “Why did you not bind her to a horse and bring her here at all hazards? My people would have tended her as—”

“The wolf the lamb.”

A strange speech that, to come from a nomadic, red warrior, and the eye of the white man quailed under the fiery glance fastened upon him.

“Well, yes, something like it,” he replied, trying to conceal his feelings under an unpleasant laugh. “But where is the girl?”

“In the lodges of the Sioux.”

“I must see her this very night.”

“Has the pale-face become a child? Is he a woman, that he forgets the thoughts of yesterday, and would, like the serpent, sting itself to the death.”

“No, no. I had forgotten the plan for a moment. She is safe, you say?”

“As the beaver in the iron-tooth trap.”

“And her father knows nothing of the trail—who carried her off—when or where?”

“The red-man leaves his footsteps in the running water; It rolls over them and they are gone.”

“Keep watch of her, then, as you would guard the very apple of your eye, for she is to my heart as the ‘rose of Sharon and the lily of the valley.’” The old hypocrisy would break out from his impious lips, and the deception of a lifetime found utterance even when his soul was unmasked.

“The lodge of the red-man is as safe as the log war-house of the pale-face.”

“Well, you know the plan. In the roughest part of the cañon—even in the ‘Devil’s Gate,’ as the children of the world call it, I will be prepared to rush down upon you and rescue her. She will be grateful, for her heart is warm and loving. Be sure you are at the appointed spot at the right time, and then—”

He had half turned away from his companion, and on looking for the Black Eagle again, found himself alone. Silent as had been the coming of the Indian was his departure. With a mind filled with conflicting emotions, the impostor turned back again toward the encampment. Very little faith had he in the fidelity of Black Eagle, for his own treacherous heart made him suspicious of others, and this, added to the well-known character of the red-man, made him fear the result. Reaching the corral in safety, he crept through the barricades made by the wagons, and was soon sleeping calmly as the most innocent child in the encampment. Looking on that man, you might have fancied that some angel’s prayers had showered poppy leaves around him, and some kind hand had held to his lips a balmy nepenthe against all the trials, cares and passions of life.

When guilt sleeps, then let the pure in heart rejoice. But what a strange anomaly it is, when an evil nature can throw off its corroding fetters—its whirlwind passions, debasing influences, and slumber like untainted childhood—that even the most depraved can for a time change the entire current of their lives, and, touched by the leaden wand, become oblivious of their own wickedness. “To the pure, all things are pure,” and a very paradox it is that sin, when slumbering, can throw off the crushing millstone and wander like innocence joyously among the roses.

The Indian, when he had secured the gold of his infamous patron, and noiselessly departed, struck at once into the middle of the stream, and dropping into the current, swam leisurely down, till he reached the shadow of an overhanging rock. Here he drew his lithe form cautiously up, shook the water from his garments, and then plunged into the thicket.

His savage nature had mapped out the path he was to follow, and no meddling fancies were allowed to intrude upon him. A double purpose he had in view—gain, and the gratification of his own selfish purposes. The tenets of his savage religion offered no bar to their accomplishment, and he knew quite as little of conscience as his employer.

An hour later, and just as the sun was lighting the fleecy clouds, and all nature sung its first song of praise for the coming day, Black Eagle emerged from the forest, many miles distant, and entered the camp of his followers.

CHAPTER IV.
CLAUDE AND ELLEN.

The great West has its villas and palaces now crowding out the log-cabins of thirty years ago. You find them sheltered superbly by the ancient forest-trees, and surrounded by velvet lawns, through which the wild prairie-flowers will peep out and make an effort at their old free blossoming, but only to be uprooted for the hot-house roses and fuchsias of other climes.

In one of these luxurious dwellings lived the La Clides, the most refined and wealthy family to be found in the neighborhood of St. Louis. The owner, a young man, not yet four and twenty, and his mother, one of the most beautiful women of her time, occupied this noble dwelling, and the vast wealth which had been left to their control was day by day expended in making it still more beautiful.

Claude La Clide’s grandfather had been a French fur-trader, when western enterprise of this kind yielded enormous profits. Like many of his class, he married among the Indians, choosing for his forest-bride a daughter of the Dacotahs, as the tribe loved to call itself, or more commonly in their savage relations, Ochente Shacoan—the nation of the Seven Council Fires—though by the white traders they were designated as Sioux.

The fur-trader soon accumulated a fortune in his profitable traffic, and having buried his Indian wife in the forest, took his only child, a daughter, back to St. Louis to be educated.

There La Clide invested his money in real estate, which rapidly rose in value, and, almost without an effort or a wish, he became one of the richest men of the West. While his daughter was in her first youth, the fur-trader died, leaving her his great wealth in direct possession.

Two years after her father’s death, a young French gentleman, impoverished and exiled for his participation in one of those revolutions which are constantly scattering the old families of France into strange lands, came to St. Louis. He was a man of peculiar refinement, handsome and modest as refined men usually are. He met the young heiress. Her beauty, the shy, wild grace inherited from her mother, softened and toned down by education, fascinated him at once. She was something so fresh, so unlike the females of his own world, that her very presence was full of romance to the young exile. She loved him and they were married.

La Clide brought all his taste and knowledge of architecture into action, when a new home for his bride was built near the town, and yet removed from its bustle and crowds. It commanded a fine view of the monarch river, whose eternal flow could be heard from the veranda and balconies when the day was quiet. Its stone walls were soon draped with the choicest climbing plants. Passion flowers twined in and out through the stone carvings of the balconies, roses curtained the windows. Great forest-trees waved their branches over the roof, and clothed the distant grounds, and above all, love reigned within—that quiet, deep love for which a man or woman is so grateful to God that it breaks forth in thanksgiving with every smile and word.

But not even love can stay the black-winged angel. He came one night when the first tinge of silver had crept into the husband’s brown locks, found the mysterious mechanism of the heart diseased, and gently stopped its beating. So, without one sigh or word of farewell to the beloved wife slumbering by his side, he passed away.

Never was grief so sacred or so quiet as that which fell upon the mistress of that residence when she found herself alone, the guardian of a young son, and a widow forevermore. She had been a proud woman in married life—proud of her husband, proud of her beauty for his sake, and, oh, how more than proud of his noble son, her only child. The fiery Indian blood that ran in her veins, and gave that splendid brunette complexion, was no bar to her reception in society with the people of St. Louis, for an intermarriage with the Indians had been no uncommon thing with the first settlers, and in her the savage blood was so graced with refinement that it was forgotten even by the new-comers, who had begun to bring their prejudices beyond the great river.

But enterprise and civilization, as it concentrated in the neighborhood, had sometimes shot its poisoned arrows at this noble woman, and a shrinking thought that there might be something in her Dacotah blood to wound the pride of her son, or impede his generous ambition, had silently taken force in her nature.

But there was nothing in this to disturb her position as a leader of society. In her husband’s lifetime his house had been the center of all that was intellectual and of worth in society for miles and miles around. A genial hospitality had won the talented and the good to his roof. The widow permitted no change in this. All that her husband had thought right became a religion with her. All that he had been, all that he had enjoyed, should reappear in her son.

Was it wonderful that she almost worshiped the young man as he grew so like his father in expression and voice, so like herself in the rare beauty of his person?

Five years of widowhood, and this idol of her life had become perfect in his manliness. The raven hair of his grandmother, but softened, finer and glossy, fell in thick waves over his forehead. The tall, lithe form, erect and graceful, the eagle eye, the proud poise of the head, were splendid in their regal beauty; while the soft, olive-tinged skin, warmed by the flashing blood of his transatlantic father, the tender light that sometimes filled his eyes, the blush that flushed his pure forehead, were perfect in their blending of refined and savage beauty. Just enough of the wild grace and insouciance of his Indian ancestry had been mingled with the pure blood of the old French nobility to render this young man strikingly beautiful in person and most alluring in mind.

La Clide’s physical education had been perfect. A more fearless horseman could not be found, even in his grandmother’s tribe; yet, in the dance he was quiet and graceful, his walk remarkable only for its stately ease. Like his person was that proud, tender and fiery nature. No frown could swerve him from the right, no allurements win him to the wrong. He neither gave offense nor brooked insult. Love, with him, was a sacred passion; women, creatures that stood half way between him and the angels, not worth winning save by aspiration. And this man was in love. That pure, strong heart had been given away blindly, as such hearts will sometimes go from their own keeping. He had been accepted, and was now betrothed.

One spring evening, when the perfume came sweetest from the balcony which opened from his mother’s sitting-room, the young man came in from the city. Springing from his horse, he tossed the bridle to an attendant, flung his whip after it, and entered the house. The moss-like carpets smothered the sound of his heavy footsteps, or the mother must have guessed at his agitation before he reached her.

As it was, Mrs. La Clide sat quietly amid the cushions of her easy-chair, reading. Even in his passion, the young man paused a moment to regard her; with those surroundings she broke upon him so like a picture of the old masters. The walls of that room were lined in every part by richly-bound volumes that gleamed out richly in the first twilight. Near the broad sashes that opened into the balcony, two statues, a bacchantic and a graceful dancing-girl, were holding back the frost-like lace of the curtains, allowing the light to fall on that calm face, surmounted by its coronal of braided hair.

Was he mistaken, or did that face look paler than usual? Was it pain or thought that drew those beautiful brows together?

This anxious thought held the anger with which he had entered the house in abeyance. He stepped forward.

“Mother!”

She started and dropped her book, pressed one hand suddenly against her heart, and gasped out:

“Well, my son.”

“Are you reading? Have I frightened you?”

“Reading? No, I only held the book. One falls into thought sometimes, forgetting every thing.”

La Clide took up the volume she had dropped. It was a medical book, and had fallen upon the floor open at a treatise on diseases of the heart.

“Why, mother, what is this?”

“That? Oh, nothing. It chanced to be on the table. But what is the matter? You look strangely, Claude.”

“Do I? Very likely, mother, for I come to tell you that I can never marry Ellen Worthington.”

“My son—my son! Another lover’s quarrel—is that all?”

“It is no lover’s quarrel. But she is heartless—my wishes are nothing to her.”

“Heartless, dear Claude. I think you do the girl wrong.”

“No, mother. She treats our engagement as if it were a spider’s web, to be swept through with a dash of her hand. Not an hour ago I saw her in the most public street of St. Louis, leaning on the arm of that miserable gambler, young Houston.”

“No, no. It can not be so bad as that.”

“Worse than that; she was hanging lovingly on his arm, while he bent and whispered—yes, mother, whispered in her ear.”

Mrs. La Clide seemed surprised; but she was a good woman, too good for hasty conclusions. She thought a moment, and answered her son gently.

“Ellen may be giddy, my son. That is a fault of youth, and she is young. But I think—I am sure she loves you.”

“She loves the wealth I have, and the position we can give her.”

“Now you are harsh, Claude.”

“Harsh? No woman trifles with the man she loves.”

“Yes, dear; sometimes in mere thoughtlessness.”

“But when her fault has been more than once pointed out?”

“Perhaps you have not done it with sufficient gentleness. We are sometimes haughty in our demands without knowing it.”

“You are kind—very kind, mother. All this would console me if I did not know how resolutely Ellen has persisted in disregarding my wishes—if I did not know that she has attempted to conceal her intimacy with this man from me.”

“Is this really so, Claude?”

“Would I make the charge if it were not true?”

“Miss Worthington!”

In their excitement, the mother and son had not heard the colored waiter, and his voice startled them when he announced the very person they were talking of.

“Show her in here,” said the mother, seating herself, and again pressing a hand to her side.

The man retired, and directly a light voice and the flutter of a pretty muslin dress came through the outer room.

“Where are you, my beautiful mamma that is to be? Oh, Claude, I did not expect to find you here,” cried the golden-haired beauty, turning her deep blue eyes upon him. “Wait one moment, while I kiss your mother.”

Down she fell upon her knees, winding one arm around Mrs. La Clide, and holding up her rosebud mouth for a kiss, which the elder lady gave her very gravely.

“There, now!”

She started up, drew the perfumed glove from her hand, and held it toward him, glowing from its imprisonment.

“What, you will not take my hand?” she cried, turning away to use the hand in smoothing the braids of her hair. “Never mind; it isn’t a butterfly, to settle twice in the same spot;” and, with a careless movement of the head, she ran for a cushion and sat down at Mrs. La Clide’s feet. “Oh, my sweet, black-eyed mamma, how I have longed to see you,” she said, in a sweet, caressing whisper.

“I have always been at home to you, Ellen,” was the somewhat cold reply.

“But I have been so busy. Claude, I say, angry yet? What is it all about?”

She held out her hand again, glancing at him a little anxiously from under her long lashes. No ordinary man could have withstood that look, the creature was so lovely in her rich health and graceful position.

“Don’t be cross, Claude. Only think, I haven’t seen you in three whole days. How can you treat me so cavalierly?” she pleaded, a little frightened by his persistent coldness.

“Still, I passed you in the street but little more than an hour ago,” was his grave answer.

The color fluttered unsteadily over her face.

“Indeed? I did not see you.”

“I presume not. You were occupied.”

“Was I? Oh, dear, yes—I remember. I happened to meet Mr. Houston. He was telling me of—”

She caught the force of those large black eyes bent upon her, and broke off, while a blush rose visibly from the crests of foamy hair on her neck, up to her forehead.

“Ellen, why will you associate with that bad man?”

Claude asked the question in a grave, steady voice, which would have warned a wiser person not to trifle with the subject. But Ellen possessed the coquetry and craft of a small character—no real wisdom.

“Bad man! Everybody that I know of calls him a gentleman, except you.”

“You can not be a judge where a person like this is concerned. No refined woman could have the power to understand him.”

“But other people receive him.”

“I do not, and with good reason.”

“Claude, you—yes, I see it—you are jealous.”

The reckless girl clapped her hands like a child, and, burying her head on Mrs. La Clide’s lap, broke into a forced laugh.

“No, Ellen, I am not jealous. No honorable man could be, here.”

“Then do be good, and let this poor man alone.”

“Ellen, listen to me.”

“Well, I listen, but do get it over with. I hate scolding.”

“This has become a serious question between us—a question which may end in a separation.”

The girl flushed crimson, and sat upright, with angry gleams coming into her eyes.

“Well, sir, what is it you want of me?”

“I wish you to give up any acquaintance which exists between you and young Houston.”

“Indeed!”

There was a sneer in her voice, but he did not notice it.

“I desire that you will never walk with or speak to him again.”

“And turn hermit or nun—which would please you best?”

“Neither would please me. You know how well I like society, and I know how well you can adorn it. Let this be happily and worthily, and I ask no more. Look around these rooms. How often you have seen them filled with the best and highest of the land. I wish nothing different in my married life. But no disreputable man shall ever cross my threshold or speak to my wife; of that be assured.”

“Indeed, you begin early to play the censor over me and my friends.”

There was something in her voice now that hardened her lover.

“The woman I marry must be so far above suspicion that censorship can not reach her,” he answered, almost sternly.

“Suspicion, sir—suspicion!”

“Do not mistake me. I charge you with nothing. On the contrary, I believe it is your very innocence that leads you into the appearance of evil.”

“Evil! evil!”

She sprung to her feet, and confronted him, like a beautiful fury. All her craft, all her cunning forsook her in that storm of temper. In a single moment she was dashing the work of her life into fragments. All this was so different from the honeyed words she had just been listening to from the lips of that bad man, that her true nature broke forth, but not yet in words.

“Still you misunderstand me,” said Claude, grieved and astonished, “and to avoid this I must speak more plainly. This Houston is not a proper associate for any woman, much less for the one who is to share my home. You are young; you are ignorant of the stories afloat about him, or you would not thus persist in wrecking both my happiness and your own.”

The girl had been growing pale with suppressed anger; every fiber in her frame quivered, but still she had a smile upon her lips.

“Pray, Claude, reserve these lectures till you have a right to force them on me.”

“That time will never come, Ellen.”

Claude spoke in sorrow, but firmly.

“Then I am to understand you break our engagement?”

She turned white to the lips; he, too, was pale and cold.

“Better that than see my name dishonored. Mother—mother, do not leave us!”

Mrs. La Clide seemed frightened. There was something strangely wild in her eyes. This scene was becoming too painful for her. She looked imploringly on her son.

“Yes, I must go; the air of this room is close. Do not be unkind, my son. Ellen, remember how we have loved you!”

The young girl turned upon her almost insolently. Her lips curved into a sneer, but she restrained her speech, and Mrs. La Clide left the room. Claude was softened by his mother’s words. He followed her with loving glances from the room, then turned more gently to his betrothed.

“Ellen, dear Ellen, I do not wish to be unkind. You know well how I have loved you. Your wish has always been my law, but I can not surrender my self-respect.”

“Nor can I.”

“Ellen, I beg—beseech you to listen to me.”

“I do listen, sir.”

The rapid beat of her foot on the carpet, the firm clinch of her hands, the compressed lip and suppressed breath, told in unmistakable language with what spirit she listened.

“Give up the society of that man, for my sake, for my noble mother’s sake—she, so honorable, so sensitive to all the proprieties of life, it would kill her were a breath of shame to fall on one of our household.”

“Well, sir, I will not forget your mother. She has been in my thoughts very often since this engagement.”

“Well!”

“No, it is not well; of what more do you accuse me?”

“I accuse you of nothing—only plead with you. Give up this dangerous acquaintance.”

“Suppose I do not choose to gratify your jealous demand?”

He stood in silence a moment, looking at her steadily, with a glance in those velvety eyes that would have touched any other woman to the soul.

“Then you and I must part.”

“Then be it so!”

The rage in her heart broke forth, now she had lost all control of herself.