Redskin and Cow-Boy: A Tale of the Western Plains

Not a shot was fired by the whites until the two lines were within twenty paces of each other, then the revolvers of the ten men in front cracked out sharply. Several of the Indians fell. Then there was a crash as the lines met, and then for a moment a confused medley – the Indians fighting with tomahawk and spear, the whites with their deadly revolvers. The conditions were too unequal. There was not one among the band of whites who could not rely with certainty upon his aim, and as in a close line, boot touching boot, they pressed on, the Indians melted like snow before them. It seemed to Hugh but a moment from the time the fight began till the path before them to the buttes was open.

"Forward!" shouted Steve. "We are through them, boys."

As Hugh dashed on he heard Broncho Harry's shout, the cracking of the revolvers, and the yell of the Indians. The women were riding abreast with them now.

"Never mind the gals," Steve shouted. "All tumble off together."

It was but a few seconds before the first band threw themselves from their horses and took up their post behind boulders and bushes. As they dismounted Steve gave a loud shout, and almost at the same moment the party that had fought under the leadership of Broncho Harry wheeled round and rode towards them. Had there been only the Indians that had tried to bar their way to reckon with, there would have been no need for them to seek refuge at the buttes. Half their number had fallen under the bullets of the front line of the whites as they fell upon them. The charge of Broncho Harry's detachment had completed the effect of the blow. The whole conflict had only lasted half a minute, but in that time the deadly six-shooters had wrought terrible havoc with the band of Indians. Less than half of them went galloping back to meet their advancing friends, and several of these were leaning over their saddles evidently badly wounded. Over twenty lay together at the spot where the two parties had met. A few of the horses stood quietly beside their dead owners, the rest were careering wildly over the plain. A loud cheer broke from both parties of the whites as Broncho Harry's band rode in and dismounted.

"That has been a pretty tight race," Long Tom said, "but we beat them handsome."

"Tom, do you all stow away your horses and ours as snug as you can among the rocks and trees, then take your places down here. We will get a bit higher up so as to get a wider range for our rifles, but we haven't time for that now, we must just give this other crowd a hint that we have got rifles and can use them. Now, boys, take steady aim at that clump of Red-skins. Don't throw away a shot. There is nothing like straight shooting for skeering a Red. Here goes;" and Steve, taking a steady aim, fired, while his companions followed his example.

CHAPTER XIV.

SURROUNDED BY RED-SKINS

THE large band of Indians had checked their horses some five hundred yards from the foot of the buttes as they saw the survivors of the party in front galloping back to them, and realized that the whites had gained shelter. Some of the more impetuous spirits had, however, ridden on, and were some distance in advance when the rifles of the defenders cracked out. Four of the Indians fell from their horses, three others were wounded, and these, with their companions, wheeled round and rejoined the main body, who now, at the order of their chief, fell back, and were, a few minutes later, reinforced by the band that had followed on the footsteps of the fugitives.

"Now, boys, we can go up to the top, but first let us see how we stand. Has any gone down?"

"Yes, there are two missing," Long Tom said. "I saw two of the first line go down as we charged them."

"John Spencer wur killed," Jim Gattling said. "He wur riding next to me."

"Boston wur the other," Broncho Harry said. "I wur riding in a line with him behind, and saw him go back ker-plumb. I knew he wur hit through the head by the way he fell."

Four other men were, it was now found, wounded, and one of the women had been hit in the shoulder with a rifle ball.

"The Red-skins ain't no account with their rifles on horseback," Long Tom said. "Let them lie down and get their piece on a log and they can shoot pretty straight, but it's just throwing away lead to try to shoot with a rifle from a horse. I never knew more than two or three whites who was anyway sartin with their pieces when their horses was on the move. A six-shooter's worth ten rifles on horseback. A fellow kin gallop and keep his arm straight, but when it comes to holding out a long tube with both arms, and your pony going on the jump, it stands to reason there ain't no keeping the thing straight. If those Red-skins had hurried up and dismounted, and steadied their rifles on their saddles, I reckon they might have wiped out half of us before we reached them. Waal, Steve, you and the women, and best part of the others, may as well get up to the top; but Broncho and me, and two or three of the boys, will stop down here and look after the horses. Lightning, you may as well stop down here with a kipple of other fellows with rifles, so as just to give them a hint to keep at a distance, otherwise they will be sending their lead up while the others are getting to the top."

But the Indians showed no signs of any intention of harassing them for the present. They knew that the rifles in the hands of the defenders carried farther and straighter than their own. They had suffered heavy losses already, and were in no way disposed to do anything rash. They knew that there was no occasion for haste, and no fear of the fugitives attempting to make their escape. After some consultation they drew further off into the plain, and in a short time smoke could be seen ascending at several points.

"There ain't no occasion to wait down here no longer," Long Tom said. "The Injuns know well enough that they can't take this place, not at least without losing a hundred men; and it ain't Red-skin fashion to throw away lives, special when they know they have only got to wait to do the job without any fighting at all. So let us go up."

The path was comparatively easy for three-quarters of the way to the summit of the buttes. It seemed that on this side either the rock had crumbled away in past ages so as to make a gradual slope, or else water or wind had thrown up a bank against it. The height of the butte above the broad valley would be about three hundred feet, and the slope was covered with trees and undergrowth, until it terminated abruptly at the face of a wall of rock fifty feet from the summit. At one point only this wall was broken by a sort of gap or cleft some three feet wide at the bottom, and slanting as steeply as the roof of a house. The bottom was worn almost smooth by the rains of centuries and by the feet of cattle, and Hugh had to sling his gun behind him and use both hands to grasp the irregularities of the rock on either side to get up. On reaching the top he found that the summit was almost flat, a couple of hundred yards in length, and as many feet in width. It was covered with grass, and several trees, some of considerable size, were scattered about over the surface.

"Well, Bill," he said as Royce came up to him, "have you found any water?"

"Yes, there is a rock pool in the centre there by that big tree. There is water enough for us and the horses for maybe a week. Enough for us without the horses for a month or more."

"What are you going to do? Bring the horses up here?"

"We haven't settled that yet. I reckon we shall bring the best of them up anyhow."

"I suppose there is no possible place the Indians can get up except by that gap?"

"Nary one, everywhere else the rock goes straight down to the plain. There ain't no way, except by flying, to get up here if you don't come by this gap. Anyhow we shall bring the horses a good long way up the slope; it is a long line along the bottom there, and the Red-skins might crawl up in the night, and we should pretty nigh all have to keep guard. Steve says that though where we came up the ground wur smooth enough, it ain't so over the rest of the slope, but that, what with the boulders and the undergrowth and thorns, it is pretty nigh impossible to get up through the trees anywhere else. He expects that it's been water washing down the earth and sand through that gap that has filled up between the boulders, and made it smooth going where we came up. So we will bring up the horses, and get the best of them up here, and tie the others just below the gap. We can take them down water in our hats if we decide to keep them, or get them up to-morrow if we like. Anyhow all we shall want will be to keep four men at watch down below them."

"I should have thought it best to bring them all up at once, Bill; what is the use of leaving them below?"

"Waal, Hugh, there ain't grass enough to bring them all up here, and every morning we can take them down and let them graze below. There air no fear of the Injuns coming close to drive them off, and if they tried it, the critturs would come up the path again of their own accord, except those we took from the Indians. They can get a good lot of sweet grass under the trees down thar, and as long as they get that they can do pretty well without water. Thar, do you see thar are two or three more lots of Indians coming down to join the others. They'll have three hundred of them down thar before long."

"It don't make much difference how many of them there are, if they dare not attack us," Hugh said.

"That's where you are wrong, Hugh," Broncho Harry, who had now joined them, said. "The more thar are of them the closer watch they can keep to see that none of us gets away, and the more thar are of them the bigger the party must be that comes to rescue us. You may be sure that they have scouts for miles and miles off, and if they get news that there is a party coming up, they will just leave a guard to keep us here, and go down and fall on them."

"I didn't think of that, Harry. Yes, it will need a very strong party to bring us off. But perhaps they will get tired and go."

"Don't you bet on that, Hugh. Ef thar air one thing an Injun never gets tired of, it's waiting. Time ain't nothing to them. Them chaps can send out parties to hunt just as if they wur in their own villages. The boys will bring them down corn, and gather their firewood for them, and as long as we are up here, they will stop down thar, if it was six months. They know how many of us thar are here. Lots of them must have been up here at one time or another, and knowing the time of year, and how much rain has fallen lately, there ain't no doubt they can calkilate pretty well how much water there is in this pool. They will know that we shall keep our horses as long as we can, and they will reckon that three weeks at the outside will see the end of the water. As for food, of course, we are all right. We have got the horses to eat, and horse is pretty nigh as good as cow-beef. I would just as soon have one as the other. A young broncho's a sight tenderer than an old cow any day."

Hugh now took a turn round the edge of the butte. It was, as Royce had said, a mass of rock rising perpendicularly from the plain. It was separated from the other butte by a gap a hundred and fifty feet wide. It was clear that they had once formed one mass, for between them was a rocky shoulder connecting them. This was very steep on both sides, narrowing almost to a razor edge at the top, where it joined the butte on which they were standing. This edge was fifty feet below the top, but it rose as it retreated from it, and on the opposite side reached up to a level with the plateau.

A fire had already been lighted on the top of the butte, and over this the women were cooking some of the meat they had brought from the Indian village, and in a short time the whole party except two, who were placed on sentry to watch the movements of the Indians, gathered round it.

"Waal, boys," Steve said when the meal was finished, "I reckon that thar ain't no time to lose, and that I had best start to-night. There ain't no denying that we air in a pretty tight fix here, and it won't be easy to get a force as can fight their way through that crowd. I reckon I shall not be able to gather over fifty cow-boys on the Canadian, and so I'll have to ride to the nearest fort and get the troops to help. That air about two hundred miles from the Canadian. It ull take me three days to get there after I leave the ranches. It ull take four at the very least before the troops will get down there. You can't reckon less than a week. I shall be two days getting down to the ranches, as there won't be any travelling by day. So you see if I start to-night, you can't reckon on seeing us back afore ten days at the earliest."

"That will be about it, Steve. I don't see as you can do without the troops noway. Waal, we can hold out a fortnight easy. We must put the horses on mighty short allowance of water, so as to make it last a fortnight. If we find it running out quicker'n we expect, we must kill off half the animals. It don't matter about them a bit, ef you come up strong enough to thrash the Red-skins without our help. Yes, I think you had better go to-night. You are as likely to get out to-night as any night, but you'll have to look mighty sharp, Steve, for you may bet your life them Injuns will be as thick as bees round the butte."

"How do you mean to go, Steve?" Hugh asked.

"Tie the ropes together, Lightning, and get lowered down over the edge."

"I have been looking at the ridge that runs from this butte to the other," Hugh said, "and it struck me that if you were lowered down on to it you might get along on to the other butte. Of course two others would be lowered with you, and then you could be let down from the farthest side of the other butte. You said nobody had ever been on it, and anyhow the Indians are not likely to be as thick over there as they would be round this one."

"Thunder! You are right again, Lightning. I will go and have a look at it at once. It will soon be getting dark; Broncho, do you and Long Tom go along with me. We will lie down afore we get to the edge. You may be sure that there are plenty of sharp eyes watching all round, and if they was to see us standing there, and looking at that ledge of rock, they might guess what we had in our minds. While we are away, the rest of you might go down and get up the ponies."

It took some time to lead all the horses up the slope. Prince and four others were brought up to the plateau, but it was necessary to tie strips of blanket under their feet to enable them to get sufficient footing to climb up through the gap.

"I shouldn't have thought that cattle could have come where horses can't," Hugh said.

"Cattle can climb pretty nigh anywhere," the cow-boy he addressed replied. "I have seen cattle climb places where you would have thought that nothing but a goat could get to. You see their hoofs are softer than horses, and get a better hold on rocks. But horses could get up here easy enough if they weren't shod. They don't have a fair show with shoes on."

By the time the horses had been brought up, night had fallen. Four men were told off as a guard; two of them took up their post half-way down the slope; two went down to its foot. No attack was anticipated, for the Indians would be sure that a sharp watch would be kept, and there would be no chance whatever of their making their way up to the summit unobserved. Hugh was not with the first party on watch, and joined the crowd round the fire.

"What time are you going to start, Steve?"

"As soon as it gets quite dark. Thar ain't no good in waiting. They air on watch now, and they will be on watch all night, so thar is no difference that way, and the sooner I goes, the farther I will git afore morning. It is settled that if I am caught to-night, Jim Gattling will try next; ef he goes down too, Broncho Harry will try. After that you can settle among yourselves."

"I will volunteer to be next," Hugh said. "Another couple of days and Prince will be ready to do anything. If I was to try I should start on his back and take my chance. The Indians cannot have many horses as fast as he is, and if I can get through safely, they may ride as hard as they like. There won't be many who can catch me anyhow, and if they came up one at a time, I have my revolver and can hold my own. I shouldn't like to try to-night, for many of their horses are fresh, and Prince wants at least twenty-four hours before he is fit for work again; but if you like to give up your attempt to-night, Steve, I will try to-morrow night."

"No, no, lad, we will do as we have planned. You might do it, and you might not. More likely you would not, for like enough you would run agin a dozen of them going out, and would get a lasso dropped over your shoulders afore you saw or heard them. Besides, you are young, lad. You have got your life afore you. I am getting on, and Rosie will have Jim to look after her, so it don't make much matter along of me."

An hour later it was perfectly dark. Steve had left his hat lying on the edge of the rock exactly above the ridge, when he had visited it with Harry and Long Tom. Several of the ropes were knotted together; while this was being done, Steve withdrew with his daughter and Jim Gattling from the fire, and was absent five or six minutes. He came back by himself.

"I am ready," he said. "Good-bye to you all! I hope as I'll see you all agin afore long." He shook hands with them all round, and then, taking up his rifle, walked away without looking round, followed by Broncho Harry and Long Tom, the latter saying to Hugh and two others, "You come too. We shall want you to lower the last of us down, and to hoist us up again."

The hat was soon found. All three men took off their boots. Broncho Harry tied those of Steve together by a short piece of rope and slung them over his shoulder, and he and Tom left their revolvers and belts behind them.