“Hold on hard,” urges her father. “Thet’s a stout gurl. I won’t be a minnit.”
While giving this admonition, he is hurrying to get hold of his knife.
It is out, and with a spring upward, as if youth had returned to his sinews, the old hunter succeeds in reaching the rope. It is severed with a “snig!” and the body, bearing the girl along with it, drops to the ground.
The noose is instantly slackened and switched off; the old hunter with both hands embraces the throat, pressing the windpipe back into it; then, placing his ear close to the chest, listens.
With eyes set in agonised suspense, and ears also; Lena listens, too, to hear what her father may say.
“Oh! father, do you think he is dead? Tell me he still lives.”
“Not much sign o’ it. Heigh! I thort I seed a tremble. You run to the shanty. Thar’s some corn whisky in the cubberd. It’s in the stone bottle. Bring it hyar. Go, gurl, an’ run as fast as your legs kin carry ye!”
The girl springs to her feet, and is about starting off.
“Stay, stay! It won’t do to let Dick know; this’ll drive him mad. Durn me, if I know what ter do. Arter all he may as well be told on’t. He must find it out, sooner or later. That must be, an’ dog-gone it ’twon’t do to lose time. Ye may go. No, stay! No, go – go! an’ fetch the bottle; ye needn’t tell him what it’s for. But he’ll know thars suthin’ wrong. He’ll be sure to know. He’ll come back along wi’ ye. That’s equilly sartin. Well, let him. Maybe thet’s the best. Yes, fetch him back wi’ ye. Thar’s no danger o’ them chaps – showin’ here arter this, I reck’n. Hurry him along but don’t forget the bottle. Now, gurl, quick as lightnin’, quick!”
If not quite so quick as lightning, yet fast as her feet can carry her, the young girl starts along the trace leading to the shanty. She is not thinking of the sad tidings she bears to him who hides in her father’s cabin. Her own sorrow is sufficient for the time, and stifles every other thought in her heart.
The old hunter does not stand idly watching her. He is busy with the body, doing what he can to restore life. He feels that it is warm. He fancies it is still breathing.
“Now, how it came abeout?” he asked himself, scanning the corpse for an explanation. “Tied one o’ his hands an’ not the tother! Thar’s a puzzle. What can it mean?
“They must a meant hangin’ anyhow, poor young fellar! They’ve dud it sure. For what? What ked he hev done, to hev engered them? Won the rifle for one thing, an’ thet they’ve tuk away.
“The hul thing hez been a trick; a durned, infernal, hellniferous trick o’ some sort.
“Maybe they only meant it for a joke. Maybe they only intended scarin’ him; an’ jess then that varmint kim along, an’ sot the houn’s on to it, an’ them arter, an’ they sneaked off ’thout thinkin’ o’ him? Wonder ef that was the way.
“Ef it warn’t, what ked a purvoked them to this drefful deed? Durn me ef I kin think o’ a reezun.
“Wal, joke or no joke, it hev ended in a tregidy – a krewel tregidy. Poor young fellar!
“An’ dog-gone my cats! ef I don’t make ’em pay for it, every mother’s chick o’ ’em. Yes, Mr Alf Brandon, an’ you, Master Randall, an’ you, Bill Buck, an’ all an’ every one o’ ye.
“Ya! I’ve got a idea; a durned splendifirous idea! By the Etarnal, I kin make a good thing out o’ this. Well thought o’, Jeremiah Rooke; ye’ve hed a hard life o’t lately; but ye’ll be a fool ef ye don’t live eezier for the future, a darned greenhorn o’ a saphead! Oh, oh! ye young bloods an’ busters! I’ll make ye pay for this job in a way ye ain’t thinkin’ o’, cussed ef I don’t.
“What’s fust to be done? He musn’t lie hyar. Somebody mout kum along, an’ that ’ud spoil all. Ef ’twar only meent as a joke they mout kum to see the end o’t. I heerd shots. That must a been the finish o’ the anymal. ’Tain’t likely they’ll kum back, but they may; an’ ef so, they musn’t see this. I’ll tell them I carried the corp away and berried it. They won’t care to inquire too close ’beout it.
“An’ Dick won’t object. I won’t let him object. What good would it do him? an’ t’other ’ll do me good, a power o’ good. Keep me for the balance o’ my days. Let Dick go a gold gatherin’ his own way, I’ll go mine.
“Thar ain’t any time to lose. I must toat him to the shanty; load enough for my old limbs. But I’ll meet them a comin’, an’ Dick an’ the gurl kin help me. Now, then, my poor Pierre, you come along wi’ me.”
This strange soliloquy does not occupy much time. It is spoken sotto-voce, while the speaker is still engaged in an effort to resuscitate life; nor is he yet certain that Pierre Robideau is dead, while raising his body from the ground and bearing it out of the glade.
Staggering under the load, for the youth is of no light weight, he re-enters the trace conducting to his own domicile. The old bear-hound slinks after with a large piece of flesh between his teeth, torn from the carcase of the butchered bear.
The vultures, no longer scared by man’s presence, living or dead, drop down upon the earth, and strut boldly up to their banquet.
Story 1-Chapter VIII.
The Oath of Secrecy
While the black buzzards are quarrelling over the carcase, not far off there is another carcase stretched upon the sward, also of a bear.
But the grouping around it is different; six hunters on horseback and double the number of dogs.
They are the boy hunters late bivouacking in the glade, and the bear is the same that had strayed unwittingly into their camp.
The animal has just succumbed under the trenchant teeth of their dogs, and a bullet or two from their rifles. Nor have the hounds come off unscathed. Two or three of them, the young and rash, lie dead beside the quarry they assisted in dragging down.
The hunters have just ridden up and halted over the black, bleeding mass. The chase, short and hurried, is at an end, and now for the first time since leaving the glade do they seem to have stayed for reflection. That which strikes them is, or should be, fearful.
“My God!” cries young Randall, “the Indian! We’ve left him hanging.”
“We have, by the Lord!” seconds Spence, all six turning pale, and exchanging glances of consternation.
“If he have let go his hold – ”
“If! He must have let go; and long before this. It’s full twenty minutes since we left the glade. It isn’t possible for him to have hung on so long – not possible.”
“And if he’s let go?”
“If he has done that, why, then, he’s dead.”
“But are you sure the noose would close upon his neck? You, Bill Buck, and Alf Brandon, it was you two that arranged it.”
“Bah!” rejoins Buck; “you seed that same as we. It’s bound to tighten when he drops. Of course we didn’t mean that; and who’d a thought o’ a bar runnin’ straight into us in that way? Darn it, if the nigger has dropped, he’s dead by this time, and there’s an end of it. There’s no help for it now.”
“What’s to be done, boys?” asks Grubbs. “There’ll be an ugly account to settle, I reckon.”
There is no answer to this question or remark.
In the faces of all there is an expression of strange significance. It is less repentance for the act than fear for the consequences. Some of the younger and less reckless of the party show some slight signs of sorrow, but among all