Майн Рид
Headless Horseman
Chapter Fifty Three. Just in Time
“Half-an-hour lost, and we may be too late!”
They were the last words of the hunter, as he hurried away from the hut.
They were true, except as to the time. Had he said half-a-minute, he would have been nearer the mark. Even at the moment of their utterance, the man, whose red writing had summoned assistance, was once more in dread danger — once more surrounded by the coyotés.
But it was not these he had need to fear. A far more formidable foe was threatening his destruction.
Maurice Gerald — by this time recognised as the man in the cloak and Panama hat — after doing battle with the wolves, as already described, and being rescued by his faithful Tara, had fought repose in sleep.
With full confidence in the ability of his canine companion to protect him against the black birds, or the more dangerous quadrupeds, with which he had been in conflict, he soon found, and for several hours enjoyed it.
He awoke of his own accord. Finding his strength much restored, he once more turned his attention to the perils that surrounded him.
The dog had rescued him from the jackals, and would still protect him against their attacks, should they see fit to renew it. But to what end? The faithful creature could not transport him from the spot; and to stay there would be to die of hunger — perhaps of the wounds he had received?
He rose to his feet, but found that he could not stand upright. Feebleness was now added to his other infirmity; and after struggling a pace or two, he was glad to return to a recumbent position.
At this crisis a happy thought occurred to him. Tara might take a message to the hut!
“If I could but get him to go,” said he, as he turned inquiringly towards the dog. “Come hither, old fellow!” he continued, addressing himself to the dumb animal; “I want you to play postman for me — to carry a letter. You understand? Wait till I’ve got it written. I shall then explain myself more fully.”
“By good luck I’ve got a card,” he added, feeling for his case. “No pencil! That don’t matter. There’s plenty of ink around; and for a pen I can use the thorn of yonder maguey.”
He crept up to the plant thus designated; broke off one of the long spines terminating its great leaves; dipped it in the blood of a coyoté that lay near; and drawing forth a card, traced some characters upon it.
With a strip of thong, the card was then attached to the neck of the staghound, after being wrapped up in a piece of oilcloth torn from the lining of the Panama hat.
It only remained to despatch the canine post upon his errand. This proved a somewhat difficult task. The dumb creature, despite a wondrous intelligence, could not comprehend why he should forsake the side of one he had so faithfully befriended; and for a long time resisted the coaxings and chidings, meant to warn him away.
It was only after being scolded in a tone of assumed anger, and beaten by the black-jack crutch — stricken by the man whose life he had so lately saved, that he had consented to leave the spot. Even canine affection could not endure this; and with repeated looks of reproach, cast backwards as he was chased off, he trotted reluctantly into the chapparal.
“Poor fellow!” soliloquised Maurice, as the dog disappeared from his view. “’Tis like boating one’s self, or one’s dearest friend! Well, I shall make up for it in extra kindness if I have the good fortune to see him again.
“And now, that he is gone, I must provide against the coming back of these villainous coyotés. They will be sure to come, once they discover that I’m alone.”
A scheme had been already considered.
A tree stood near — the pecân already alluded to — having two stout branches that extended horizontally and together, at six or seven feet from the ground.
Taking off his cloak, and spreading it out upon the grass, with his knife he cut a row of holes along each edge.
Then unwinding from his waist the sash of china crape, he tore it up the middle, so as to make two strips, each several yards long.
The cloak was now extended between the branches, and fast tied by the strips of crape — thus forming a sort of hammock capable of containing the body of a man laid out at full length.
The maker of it knew that the coyotés are not tree climbers; and, reclining on his suspended couch, he could observe with indifference their efforts to assail him.
He took all this trouble, feeling certain they would return. If he had any doubt, it was soon set at rest, by seeing them, one after the other, come skulking out of the chapparal, lopping a pace or two, at intervals, pausing to reconnoitre, and then advancing towards the scene of their late conflict.
Emboldened by the absence of the enemy most dreaded by them, the pack was soon reassembled, once more exhibiting the truculent ferocity for which these cowardly creatures are celebrated.
It was first displayed in a very unnatural manner — by the devouring of their own dead — which was done in less time than it would have taken the spectator in the tree to have counted a score.
To him their attention was next directed. In swinging his hammock, he had taken no pains to conceal it. He had suspended it high enough to be out of their reach; and that he deemed sufficient for his purpose.
The cloak of dark cloth was conspicuous, as well as the figure outlined within it. The coyotés clustered underneath — their appetites whetted by the taste of blood. It was a sight to see them lick their red lips after their unnatural repast — a fearful sight!
He who saw it scarce regarded them — not even when they were springing up to lay hold of his limbs, or at times attempting to ascend by the trunk of the tree! He supposed there was no danger.
There was danger, however, on which he had not reckoned; and not till the coyotés have desisted from their idle attempts, and stretched themselves, panting, under the tree, did he begin to perceive it.
Of all the wild denizens, either of prairie or chapparal, the coyoté is that possessed of the greatest cunning. The trapper will tell you it is the “cunningest varmint in creation.” It is a fox in astuteness — a wolf in ferocity. It may be tamed, but it will turn at any time to tear the hand that caresses it. A child can scare it with a stick, but a disabled man may dread its attack. Alone it has the habit of a hare; but in packs — and it hunts only in packs — its poltroonery is less observable; sometimes under the influence of extreme hunger giving place to a savageness of disposition that assumes the semblance of courage.
It is the coyotés’ cunning that is most to be feared; and it was this that had begun to excite fresh apprehension in the mind of the mustanger.
On discovering that they could not reach him — a discovery they were not long in making — instead of scattering off from the spot, the wolves, one and all, squatted down upon the grass; while others, stragglers from the original troop, were still coming into the glade. He saw that they intended a siege.
This should not have troubled him, seeing that he was secure in his suspended couch.
Nor would it, but for another source of trouble, every moment making itself more manifest — that from which he had so lately had such a narrow escape. He was once more on the eve of being tortured by thirst.
He blamed himself for having been so simple, as not to think of this before climbing up to the tree. He might easily have carried up a supply of water. The stream was there; and for want of a better vessel, the concave blades of the maguey would have served as a cistern.
His self-reproaches came too late. The water was under his eyes, only to tantalise him; and by so doing increase his eagerness to obtain it. He could not return to the stream, without running the gauntlet of the coyotés, and that would be certain death. He had but faint hopes that the hound would return and rescue him a second time — fainter still that his message would reach the man for whom it was intended. A hundred to one against that.
Thirst is quick in coming to a man whose veins are half-emptied of their blood. The torture proclaimed itself apace. How long was it to continue?
This time it was accompanied by a straying of the senses. The wolves, from being a hundred, seemed suddenly to have increased their number tenfold. A thousand appeared to encompass the tree, filling the whole ground of the glade! They came nearer and nearer. Their eyes gave out a lurid light. Their red tongues lapped the hanging cloth; they tore it with their teeth. He could feel their fetid breath, as they sprang up among the branches!
A lucid interval told him that it was all fancy. The wolves were still there; but only a hundred of them — as before, reclining upon the grass, pitiably awaiting a crisis! It came before the period of lucidity had departed; to the spectator unexpected as inexplicable. He saw the coyotés suddenly spring to their feet, and rush off into the thicket, until not one remained within the glade.
Was this, too, a fancy? He doubted the correctness of his vision. He had begun to believe that his brain was distempered.
But it was clear enough now. There were no coyotés. What could have frightened them off?
A cry of joy was sent forth from his lips, as he conjectured a cause. Tara had returned? Perhaps Phelim along with him? There had been time enough for the delivery of the message. For two hours he had been besieged by the coyotés.
He turned upon his knee, and bending over the branch, scanned the circle around him. Neither hound nor henchman was in sight. Nothing but branches and bushes!
He listened. No sound, save an occasional howl, sent back by the coyotés that still seemed to continue their retreat! More than ever was it like an illusion. What could have caused their scampering?
No matter. The coast was clear. The streamlet could now be approached without danger. Its water sparkled under his eyes — its rippling sounded sweet to his ears.
Descending from the tree, he staggered towards its bank, and reached it.
Before stooping to drink, he once more looked around him. Even the agony of thirst could not stifle the surprise, still fresh in his thoughts. To what was he indebted for his strange deliverance?
Despite his hope that it might be the hound, he had an apprehension of danger.
One glance, and he was certain of it. The spotted yellow skin shining among the leaves — the long, lithe form crawling like a snake out of the underwood was not to be mistaken. It was the tiger of the New World — scarce less dreaded than his congener of the Old — the dangerous jaguar.
Its presence accounted for the retreat of the coyotés.
Neither could its intent be mistaken. It, too, had scented blood, and was hastening to the spot where blood had been sprinkled, with that determined air that told it would not be satisfied till after partaking of the banquet.
Its eyes were upon him, who had descended from the tree — its steps were towards him — now in slow, crouching gait; but quicker and quicker, as if preparing for a spring.
To retreat to the tree would have been sheer folly. The jaguar can climb like a cat. The mustanger knew this.
But even had he been ignorant of it, it would have been all the same, as the thing was no longer possible. The animal had already passed that tree, upon which he had found refuge, and there was t’other near that could be reached in time.
He had no thought of climbing to a tree — no thought of any thing, so confused were his senses — partly from present surprise, partly from the bewilderment already within his brain.
It was a simple act of unreasoning impulse that led him to rush on into the stream, until he stood up to his waist in the water.
Had he reasoned, he would have known that this would do nothing to secure his safety. If the jaguar climbs like a cat, it also swims with the ease of an otter; and is as much to be dreaded in the water as upon the land.
Maurice made no such reflection. He suspected that the little pool, towards the centre of which he had waded, would prove but poor protection. He was sure of it when the jaguar, arriving upon the bank above him, set itself in that cowering attitude that told of its intention to spring.
In despair he steadied himself to receive the onset of the fierce animal.
He had nought wherewith to repel it — no knife — no pistol — no weapon of any kind — not even his crutch! A struggle with his bare arms could but end in his destruction.
A wild cry went forth from his lips, as the tawny form was about launching itself for the leap.
There was a simultaneous scream from the jaguar. Something appeared suddenly to impede it; and instead of alighting on the body of its victim, it fell short, with a dead plash upon the water!
Like an echo of his own, a cry came from the chapparal, close following a sound that had preceded it — the sharp “spang” of a rifle.
A huge dog broke through the bushes, and sprang with a plunge into the pool where the jaguar had sunk below the surface. A man of colossal size advanced rapidly towards the bank; another of lesser stature treading close upon his heels, and uttering joyful shouts of triumph.
To the wounded man these sights and sounds were more like a vision than the perception of real phenomena. They were the last thoughts of that day that remained in his memory. His reason, kept too long upon the rack, had given way. He tried to strangle the faithful hound that swam fawningly around him and struggled against the strong arms that, raising him out of the water, bore him in friendly embrace to the bank!
His mind had passed from a horrid reality, to a still more horrid dream — the dream of delirium.
Chapter Fifty Four. A Prairie Palanquin
The friendly arms, flung around Maurice Gerald, were those of Zeb Stump.
Guided by the instructions written upon the card, the hunter had made all haste towards the rendezvous there given.
He had arrived within sight, and fortunately within rifle-range of the spot, at that critical moment when the jaguar was preparing to spring.
His bullet did not prevent the fierce brute from making the bound — the last of its life — though it had passed right through the animal’s heart.
This was a thing thought of afterwards — there was no opportunity then.
On rushing into the water, to make sure that his shot had proved fatal, the hunter was himself attacked; not by the claws of the jaguar, but the hands of the man just rescued from them.
Fortunate for Zeb, that the mustanger’s knife had been left upon land. As it was, he came near being throttled; and only after throwing aside his rifle, and employing all his strength, was he able to protect himself against the unlooked-for assault.
A struggle ensued, which ended in Zeb flinging his colossal arms around the young Irishman, and bearing him bodily to the bank.
It was not all over. As soon as the latter was relieved from the embrace, he broke away and made for the pecân tree; — as rapidly as if the injured limb no longer impeded him.
The hunter suspected his intent. Standing over six feet, he saw the bloody knife-blade lying along the cloak. It was for that the mustanger was making!
Zeb bounded after; and once more enfolding the madman in his bear-like embrace, drew him back from the tree.
“Speel up thur, Pheelum!” shouted he. “Git that thing out o’ sight. The young fellur hev tuck leeve o’ his seven senses. Thur’s fever in the feel o’ him. He air gone dullerious!”
Phelim instantly obeyed; and, scrambling up the tree-trunk took possession of the knife.
Still the struggle was not over. The delirious man wrestled with his rescuer — not in silence, but with shouts and threatening speeches — his eyes all the time rolling and glaring with a fierce, demoniac light.
For full ten minutes did he continue the mad wrestling match.
At length from sheer exhaustion he sank back upon the grass; and after a few tremulous shiverings, accompanied by sighs heaved from the very bottom of his breast, he lay still, as if the last spark of life had departed from his body!
The Galwegian, believing it so, began uttering a series of lugubrious cries — the “keen” of Connemara.
“Stop yur gowlin, ye durned cuss!” cried Zeb. “It air enuf to scare the breath out o’ his karkidge. He’s no more dead than you air — only fented. By the way he hev fit me, I reck’n there ain’t much the matter wi’ him. No,” he continued, after stooping down and giving a short examination, “I kin see no wound worth makin’ a muss about. Thur’s a consid’able swellin’ o’ the knee; but the leg ain’t fructered, else he kudn’t a stud up on it. As for them scratches, they ain’t much. What kin they be? ’Twarnt the jegwur that gin them. They air more like the claws o’ a tom cat. Ho, ho! I sees now. Thur’s been a bit o’ a skrimmage afore the spotted beest kim up. The young fellur’s been attakted by coyoats! Who’d a surposed that the cowardly varmints would a had the owdacity to attakt a human critter? But they will, when they gits the chance o’ one krippled as he air — durn ’em!”
The hunter had all the talking to himself. Phelim, now overjoyed to know that his master still lived — and furthermore was in no danger of dying — suddenly changed his melancholy whine to a jubilant hullaballoo, and commenced dancing over the ground, all the while snapping his fingers in the most approved Connemara fashion.
His frenzied action provoked the hound to a like pitch of excitement; and the two became engaged in a sort of wild Irish jig.
Zeb took no notice of these grotesque demonstrations; but, once more bending over the prostrate form, proceeded to complete the examination already begun.
Becoming satisfied that there was no serious wound, he rose to his feet, and commenced taking stock of the odd articles around him. He had already noticed the Panama hat, that still adhered to the head of the mustanger; and a strange thought at seeing it there, had passed through his mind.
Hats of Guayaquil grass — erroneously called Panama — were not uncommon. Scores of Southerners wore them, in Texas as elsewhere. But he knew that the young Irishman was accustomed to carry a Mexican sombrero — a very different kind of head-gear. It was possible he might have seen fit to change the fashion.
Still, as Zeb continued to gaze upon it, he fancied he had seen that hat before, and on some other head.
It was not from any suspicion of its being honestly in possession of him now wearing it that the hunter stooped down, and took it off with the design to examine it. His object was simply to obtain some explanation of the mystery, or series of mysteries, hitherto baffling his brain.
On looking inside the hat he read two names; first, that of a New Orleans hatter, whose card was pasted in the crown; and then, in writing, another well known to him: —
“HENRY POINDEXTER.”
The cloak now came under his notice. It, too, carried marks, by which he was able to identify it as belonging to the same owner.
“Dog-goned kewrious, all this!” muttered the backwoodsman, as he stood with his eyes turned upon the ground, and apparently buried in a profound reflection.
“Hats, heads, an everythin’. Hats on the wrong head; heads i’ the wrong place! By the ’tarnal thur’s somethin’ goed astray! Ef ’twa’nt that I feel a putty consid’able smartin’ whar the young fellur gin me a lick over the left eye, I mout be arter believin’ my own skull-case wa’nt any longer atween my shoulders!”
“It air no use lookin’ to him,” he added, glancing towards Maurice, “for an explanation; leastwise till he’s slep’ off this dullerium thet’s on him. When that’ll be, ole Nick only knows.
“Wal,” he continued after another interval spent in silent reflection, “It won’t do no good our stayin’ hyur. We must git him to the shanty, an that kin only be did by toatin’ him. He sayed on the curd, he cudn’t make neer a track. It war only the anger kep’ him up a bit. That leg looks wusser and wusser. He’s boun to be toated.”
The hunter seemed to cogitate on how he was to effect this purpose.
“’Taint no good expektin’ him to help think it out,” he continued looking at the Galwegian, who was busy talking to Tara. “The dumb brute hev more sense than he. Neer a mind. I’d make him take his full share o’ the carryin’ when it kum to thet. How air it to be done? We must git him on a streetcher. That I reck’n we kin make out o’ a kupple o’ poles an the cloak; or wi’ the blanket Pheelum fetch’d from the shanty. Ye-es! a streetcher. That’s the eydentikul eyedee.”
The Connemara man was now summoned to lend assistance. Two saplings of at least ten feet in length were cut from the chapparal, and trimmed clear of twigs. Two shorter ones were also selected, and lashed crosswise over the first; and upon these there spread, first the serapé, and afterwards the cloak, to give greater strength.
In this way a rude stretcher was constructed, capable of carrying either an invalid or an inebriate.
In the mode of using it, it more resembled the latter than the former: since he who was to be borne upon it, again deliriously raging, had to be strapped to the trestles!
Unlike the ordinary stretcher, it was not carried between two men; but a man and a mare — the mare at the head, the man bearing behind.
It was he of Connemara who completed the ill-matched team. The old hunter had kept his promise, that Phelim should “take his full share o’ the carryin’, when it kum to thet.”
He was taking it, or rather getting it — Zeb having appointed himself to the easier post of conductor.
The idea was not altogether original. It was a rude copy from the Mexican litera, which in Southern Texas Zeb may have seen — differing from the latter only in being without screen, and instead of two mules, having for its atelage a mare and a man!
In this improvised palanquin was Maurice Gerald transported to his dwelling.
It was night when the grotesque-looking group arrived at the locale.
In strong but tender arms the wounded man was transferred from the stretcher to the skin couch, on which he had been accustomed to repose.
He was unconscious of where he was, and knew not the friendly faces bending over him. His thoughts were still astray, though no longer exciting him to violent action. He was experiencing an interval of calm.
He was not silent; though he made no reply to the kind questions addressed to him, or only answered them with an inconsequence that might have provoked mirth. But there were wild words upon his lips that forbade it — suggesting only serious thoughts.
His wounds received such rude dressing as his companions were capable of administering to them; and nothing more could be done but await the return of day.
Phelim went to sleep upon his shake-down; while the other sate up to keep watch by the bedside of the sufferer.
It was not from any unfaithfulness on the part of the foster-brother, that he seemed thus to disregard his duty; but simply because Zeb had requested him to lie down — telling him there was no occasion for both to remain awake.
The old hunter had his reasons. He did not desire that those wild words should be heard even by Phelim. Better he should listen to them alone.
And alone he sate listening to them — throughout the live-long night.
He heard speeches that surprised him, and names that did not. He was not surprised to hear the name “Louise” often repeated, and coupled with fervent protestations of love.
But there was another name also often pronounced — with speeches less pleasant to his ear.
It was the name of Louise’s brother.
The speeches were disjointed — incongruous, and almost unintelligible.
Comparing one with the other, however, and assisted by the circumstances already known to him, before the morning light had entered the jacalé, Zeb Stump had come to the conclusion: that Henry Poindexter was no longer a living man!
