10 Classics Western Stories. Samuel Merwin. Читать онлайн. Newlib. NEWLIB.NET

Автор: Samuel Merwin
Издательство: Bookwire
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Жанр произведения: Языкознание
Год издания: 0
isbn: 9782380373714
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filled the silence of the night.

      Around him was the barbarian encampment, with here and there a fire burning and a group of warriors talking beside it. He walked forth among the lodges. Some were silent, save for the heavy breathing of the sleepers; others were lighted up within, and he could hear the murmur of voices.

      At one place he found around a large fire a crowd who were feasting, late as was the hour, and boasting of their exploits. He stood in the shadow a moment and listened. One of them concluded his tale by springing to his feet, advancing a few paces from the circle of firelight, and making a fierce speech to invisible foes. Looking toward the land of the Shoshones, he denounced them with the utmost fury, dared them to face him, scorned them because they did not appear, and ended by shaking his tomahawk in their direction, amid the applause of his comrades.

      Cecil passed on and reached the outer limit of the camp. There, amid some large bowlders, he almost stumbled on a band of Indians engaged in some grisly ceremony. He saw them, however, in time to escape observation and screen himself behind one of the rocks.

      Why did they wish to go to the council with poisoned arrows?

      He made his way back to the camp and sought his lodge. He heard the wolves howling on the hills, and a dark presentiment of evil crept over him.

      “It is not to council that these men are going, but to war,” he murmured, as he threw himself on his couch. “God help me to be faithful, whatever comes! God help me to keep my life and my words filled with his spirit, so that these savage men may be drawn to him and made better, and my mission be fulfilled! I can never hope to see the face of white man again, but I can live and die faithful to the last.”

      So thinking, a sweet and restful peace came to him, and he fell asleep. And even while he thought how impossible it was for him ever to reach the land of the white man again, an English exploring-ship lay at anchor at Yaquina Bay, only two days’ ride distant; and on it were some who had known and loved him in times gone by, but who had long since thought him lost in the wilderness forever.

      Chapter 3 THE GREAT CAMP ON THE ISLAND.

      Of different language, form and face,

       A various race of men.

      Scott.

      “You say that we shall see the Bridge of the Gods to-day?” asked Cecil of the young Willamette runner the next morning. “Tell me about it; is it high?”

      The young Willamette rose to his full height, arched his right hand above his eyes, looked skyward with a strained expression as if gazing up at an immense height, and emitted a prolonged “ah-h-h!”

      That was all, but it was enough to bring the light to Cecil’s eyes and a sudden triumphant gladness to his heart. At last he approached the land of his vision, at last he should find the bridge whose wraith had faded before him into the west eight years before!

      The Cayuse band had started early that morning. The chief Snoqualmie was impatient of delay, and wished to be one of the earliest at the council; he wanted to signalize himself in the approaching struggle by his loyalty to Multnomah, whose daughter he was to marry and whom he was to succeed as war-chief.

      The women were in advance, driving the pack-horses; Cecil rode behind them with the Shoshone renegade and the young Willamette runner; while Snoqualmie brought up the rear, looking sharply after stragglers,—for some of his young men were very much inclined to linger at the rendezvous and indulge in a little gambling and horse-racing with the other bands, who were not to start till later in the day.

      The young Willamette still rode the pretty little pony whose ears and tail he had so barbarously mutilated. It reeled under him from sheer weakness, so young was it and so worn by the journey of the day before. In vain did Cecil expostulate. With true Indian obtuseness and brutality, the Willamette refused to see why he should be merciful to a horse.

      “Suppose he rode me, what would he care? Now I ride him, what do I care? Suppose he die, plenty more hiagua shells, plenty more horses.”

      After which logical answer he plied the whip harder than ever, making the pony keep up with the stronger and abler horses of the other riders. The long train of squaws and warriors wound on down the trail by the river-side. In a little while Wishram and Tumwater passed from sight. The wind began to blow; the ever drifting sand of the Columbia came sifting in their faces. They passed the Dalles of the Columbia; and the river that, as seen from the heights the evening before, wound like a silver thread among the rocks, was found to be a compressed torrent that rushed foaming along the narrow passage,—literally, as it has been described, “a river turned on edge.”

      Below, the scenery was less barren; the river entered the Cascade Range, and the steep banks, along which wound the trail, grew dark with pines, relieved here and there with brighter verdure. They saw bands of Indians on the opposite shore, descending the trail along that side on the way to the council. Many were on foot, though some horses were among them. They were Indians of the nine tribes of the Klickitat, and as yet had but few horses. A century later they owned thousands. Indian women never accompanied war-parties; and Cecil noticed that some of the bands were composed entirely of men, which gave them the appearance of going to war. It had an ominous and doubtful look.

      At the Wau-coma (place of cottonwoods), the modern Hood River, they found the tribe that inhabited that beautiful valley already on the march, and the two bands mingled and went on together. The Wau-comas seemed to be peaceably inclined, for their women were with them.

      A short distance below the Wau-coma, the young Willamette’s horse, urged till it could go no farther, fell beneath him. The blood gushed from its nostrils; in a few moments it was dead. The Willamette extricated himself from it. “A bad horse, cultus [no good]!” he said, beating it with his whip. After venting his anger on it in that way, he strode forward on foot.

      And now Cecil was all expectation, on the alert for the first sight of the bridge.

      “Shall we see it soon?” he asked the young Willamette.

      “When the sun is there, we shall see it,” replied the Indian, pointing to the zenith. The sun still lacked several hours of noon, and Cecil had to restrain his impatience as best he could.

      Just then an incident occurred that for the time effectually obliterated all thought of the bridge, and made him a powerful