Henty George Alfred
In the Heart of the Rockies: A Story of Adventure in Colorado
"The worst of it was we hadn't struck water the evening before, and it was just one of the hottest days on the plains, and we were pretty nigh mad with thirst before evening. I believe when the soldiers rode up I was about as glad to get a drink from one of their bottles as I was that the Navahoes bolted when they saw them coming. No, the red-skins ain't any good for an open attack; they would have lost fewer men by riding straight at us than they did by fooling round, but they could not bring themselves to do it, and I reckon that is what it will be here. They may, as the chief says, try, say six weeks on, when the frost begins to break, in hopes that we may have given up keeping watch: but if they find us awake they will never try an open attack, for they could not reckon on taking the place without losing a score of men in doing so. If the snow was off the ground it would be different. Then of a dark night they could crawl up close and make a rush."
After breakfast the chief and Hunting Dog went out scouting. When they returned they brought news that three Indians had come over the snow along the side of the hills, that three others had come up the valley, and that in a wood half a mile below where they had seen the fire, there had been a large party encamped.
"I reckoned that would be about it, chief. Three fellows came along over the hill, in case we should be keeping guard at the top of the path, and they had a big force somewhere down below, so that if the scouts reported that there was nothing to prevent them falling on us they would come up before morning and wipe us out. I suppose they have all ridden off?"
"All gone. Leaping Horse and Hunting Dog followed right down valley. No stop anywhere, gone back to lodges."
"Then in that case, Harry, we had best get the critters down to their shed again. They have eaten all that stuff they brought up three days ago, I gave them the last of it this morning. The Indians know that we keep a pretty sharp look-out during the day and there ain't no fear of their coming up here when it is light."
As the chief was also of opinion that there was no danger, the horses were taken down the path into the valley, where on having their bridles unbuckled they at once trotted off of their own accord towards the beaver meadow.
For the next six weeks a watch was kept regularly, but by only one man at a time. The horses were driven down to the valley every morning and brought up again before sunset. There was little hunting now, for they had as many skins as they could carry comfortably, and a supply of frozen meat sufficient to last well into the spring. In March the weather became perceptibly warmer, and the snow in the valley began to melt where the full power of the sun at mid-day fell upon it. Day by day the crashes of distant avalanches became more frequent, and they began to look forward to the time when they should be able to proceed on their journey.
One night towards the end of the month Tom was on watch, when he heard a rustling sound far up beyond the wall of cliff in front of him. It grew louder and rose to a roar, and then a white mass came pouring down over the cliff. Leaping from the wall he dashed down the path to the hut. It needed no word to call the men to their feet, for a deep rumbling filled the air and the rock seemed to quiver. The horses struggled to break their head-ropes and snorted with fright.
"Your backs to the wall!" Harry shouted, and as all leapt across at his order there was a crash overhead. The roof above them fell in and a mass of snow followed; a minute later a deep silence followed the deafening roar.
"Anyone hurt?" Harry shouted, and the replies came in muffled tones. Tom was jambed against the rock by the snow; he was nearest to the entrance, his uncle was next to him.
"I am all right at present, uncle, but I feel half smothered."
"All right, lad; I am pretty free, and I will soon clear you a bit."
The snow was pushed away from before Tom's face, his left arm was cleared, and then his uncle with a vigorous pull brought him back close to him. Here he was comparatively free, for a part of the roof had fallen close to the wall and had partially kept off the snow. Then Harry turned, and with some difficulty managed to get Jerry, who was next to him, freed from the snow.
"Now, Jerry, you work along that way and get at the others. Tom and I will try to burrow a way out."
It was a difficult task. Once through the passage in the log wall they pushed to the left towards the edge of the platform, taking it by turns to go first until the snow became lighter; then by a vigorous effort Harry rose to his feet, sending a mass of snow tumbling over the edge of the platform. As soon as Tom had joined him they set to work with hands and knives, and soon cleared a passage back to the entrance. Just as they did so Jerry crawled out from within.
"Are they all right, Jerry?"
"Yes, the others are coming; only about twelve feet of the roof caved in, and the two Indians and Sam soon got in among the horses. I had a lot of trouble with Ben; he had been knocked down, and I thought that he was gone when I got him out; but he is all right now, though he can't walk yet. The Indians and Sam have got the shovels, and are working away to clear a passage along by the wall; there is no getting Ben out through that rabbit-hole you have made."
"Thank God we are all right," Harry said; "it does not matter a bit, now that we know no one is badly hurt. We will begin at this end, but we sha'n't be able to do much until we get the shovels, the snow will fall in as fast as we get it out."
They soon found that they could do nothing in this way.
"We will try to tunnel again," Harry said, "it is not more than ten feet along. If we get in and hump ourselves, we shall soon get it big enough to drag Ben out, then the others can follow, and we can set to work with the spades to clear the place."
After a good deal of effort they succeeded in enlarging the hole, and then got Ben through it, one crawling backwards and pulling him while the other shoved at his legs.
"How do you feel, Ben?" Harry asked him when they laid him down outside.
"I dunno, Harry; I am afraid my back is badly hurt. I don't seem to feel my legs at all. I expect they are numbed from the weight of snow on them."
"I will crawl into our store and fetch out the keg."
"I reckon a drop of whisky will do me good if anything will," Ben said. "I was crushed pretty near flat, and if my head hadn't been against the wall I should have been smothered. Are you all right, young Tom?"
"Yes, I am not hurt at all. The snow squeezed me against the rock, and I could not move an inch, but uncle managed to get me a little free and then pulled me out of it."
Harry soon came back with the whisky, and was followed by the Indians and Sam, who found that they could do nothing with the snow, which fell in as fast as they cleared it. Their first step was to dig out a buffalo robe to wrap Ben in. His voice was stronger after he had drank some spirit, and he said that he felt better already. The others at once set to work with the shovels. They first cleared the platform along by the wall to the entrance, and then attacked the snow which filled the space between the two rock walls to the top.
Two of them worked with poles, loosening the snow above, and bringing it down in masses, while those with shovels cast it out on to the platform, going out occasionally to throw it over into the ravine. Hunting Dog made his way up over the snow to the top of the path, and called down to say that the fort was entirely swept away, and the chief told him to take up his post at once at the top of the path leading from below.
"He need not have told us that the fort was gone," Jerry grumbled. "If it had been made of cast-iron it would not have stood. The sooner we get our rifles out the better."
This could not be done for a time, for the loosening of the snow above had caused that below to slip, and the passage along by the wall had fallen in. The Indians, however, who had slept beyond the part filled by snow, had brought their pieces out with them, and could have defended the path alone. Several times those at work were buried by falls of snow, and had to be dragged out by the others. By daylight a considerable gap had been made in the snow, and they were able to get into the space beyond the fall. A number of logs, and a joint of meat that had been taken in the day before to thaw, were brought out, and a fire was soon blazing on the platform.
"I wonder why the snow did not shoot over as it did before?" Ben, who was now able to sit up, remarked.
"I reckon it is the fort did it," Harry said. "Of course it went, but it may have checked the rush of the snow for a moment, and those thick walls couldn't have got the same way on as the rest of the snow had."
"But the fort wasn't over the roof, uncle," Tom remarked.
"No, but it may have blocked the slide a little, and thrown some of it sideways; you see it is only this end that gave, while it shot right over the rest of the roof just as before."
"It is mighty lucky it did not break in all along," Sam Hicks said, "for it would have left us without horses if it had; and it would have been mighty rough on us to have lost them, just as we are going to want them, after our taking such pains with them all through the winter."
The chief took Hunting Dog's place as soon as he had finished his meal, and remained on watch all day. The men worked without ceasing, but it was not until sunset that the snow was completely cleared away.
"I reckon that we shall have to be starting before long," Jerry said as they sat round the fire in what they before called their store-room, having driven the horses as far in as possible to make room. "We could have held out before as long as we liked, but it is different now. The rock's cleared now for a hundred yards on each side of us, our fort's gone, and there is nothing to prevent the redskins from crawling close up the first dark night and making a rush. They are like enough to be sending scouts up the valley occasionally, and it won't be long before they hear that our fort has gone and the ground cleared of snow."
Leaping Horse nodded. "Two men must watch at top of path," he said.
"That is right enough, chief; but we know three of them came along the hills before, and it is like enough they will all come that way next time. They are safe to reckon that we shall hold the path."
"It is very unfortunate," Harry said; "in another month, we should have been able to travel. Anyhow, it seems to me that we have got to try now; it would never do to be caught in here by the red-skins. If we are to go, the sooner the better. All our meat has been carried over the edge. This is about the time we expected the Indians back, and it would be dangerous to scatter hunting. It is a big risk, too, taking the horses down to the meadow. No, I think we can manage to get over the pass. The snow gets softer every day when the sun is on it; but it freezes at night. We have the moon, too, so we shall be able to travel then; and even if we take three or four days getting over the divide we can sleep in the daytime."
"We must get a little more meat anyhow before we start," Jerry said. "This joint ain't more than enough for another square meal for us, and though I reckon the bighorns will be coming up to the hills again now, it won't do to risk that."
"We have the pack-horses, Jerry."
"Yes, I did not think of them. Horseflesh ain't so bad on a pinch; but I don't want to lose our skins."
"Better our skins than our hair," Sam laughed.
"That is right enough, Sam, but I would like to save both."
"Perhaps there is some of the meat under the snow," Tom suggested. "It hung near the wall, and the snow must have come straight down on it from above, as it did in here."
"That is so, Tom; we will have a look the first thing in the morning. I am so tired now I would not dig for it if it were gold."
As soon as it was light the next morning they began to clear the snow from the rest of the platform, and found to their great satisfaction four bear hams. The rest of the meat had been swept over the edge. The two Indians had not shared in the work, having started away early without saying where they were going. They returned to breakfast, each carrying a hind-quarter of venison, which they had found in the snow below.
It was agreed that a start should be made that evening. By sunset the horses were loaded, and half an hour later they moved away. Ben Gulston had to be assisted on to his horse, for although in other respects recovered, it was found that he had so severely strained his back across the loins that he was scarcely able to walk a foot. The moon was shining brightly, and as soon as they were on the snow they could see as plainly as if it were day. All were in high spirits that they had left the spot where for six months they had been prisoners. They had difficulty in restraining themselves from shouting and singing, but the chief before starting had warned them of the necessity for travelling silently. "Snow-slides very bad now; shouting might set them going."
The others looked rather incredulous, but Harry said:
"I know he is right, boys; for I have heard that in the Alps the guides always forbid talking when they are crossing places exposed to avalanches. At any rate we may as well give the snow as little chance as may be of going for us."
They travelled in Indian file from habit rather than necessity, for the snow was firm and hard, and the horses made their way over it without difficulty. There had been some debate as to the way they should go; but they determined at last to take the valley through the cliff wall, and to strike to the right whenever they came upon a likely spot for crossing. Two such attempts were made in vain, the upper slopes of snow being found too steep for the horses to climb; but at the third, which was made just after morning broke, they succeeded in getting up the hill to their right, and, after great difficulty, descended into another valley. This they had little doubt was the one that led to the pass, for from the hill they could see the great peak along whose foot the trail ran.
It was ten o'clock before they got down into the valley. The snow was beginning to be soft on the surface, and the horses were tired out. They therefore halted, made a fire with two or three of the logs they had brought with them for the purpose, boiled water and had breakfast, and gave half a bucket of gruel to each of the animals. Then wrapping themselves in their buffalo robes they lay down and slept till late in the afternoon. The journey was resumed at sunset, and before morning they had crossed the divide; and when the sun rose obtained a view over the country far to the south.
CHAPTER XIII
A FRESH START
In the evening they camped on the banks of the Green River, here a stream of but small size, except when the melting snow swelled its waters into a torrent. At the spot where they halted a rivulet ran into the stream from a thickly-wooded little valley. It was frozen, but breaking the ice with their axes they found that water was flowing underneath. They had observed that there was a marked difference in temperature on this side of the mountains, upon which the strength of the southern sun had already in many places cleared away the snow.
"It is a comfort to be able to sit by a fire without the thought that red-skins maybe crawling up towards you," Sam Hicks said heartily, "and to sleep without being turned out to stand watch in the cold.
"You say the country ahead is bad, chief?"
"Bad lands both sides of Green River. Deep canons and bare rock."
"Well, we need not follow it; it don't make any difference to us whether we get down to the fort in a fortnight or six weeks."
"None at all," Harry said. "We have agreed that when summer fairly sets in we will try that place I hit on just as the Utes came down on us. It is the richest place I have ever seen, and if the Indians will but let us alone for a month we ought to bring back a big lot of dust; and if we do, we can sell our share in it for a big sum, and take down enough men to thrash the Utes out of their boots if they interfere with us. By our reckoning it is the end of March now, though we don't at all agree as to the day; but at any rate, it is there or thereabouts. That gives us a good six weeks, and if we start in the middle of May it will be time enough. So I propose that we strike more to the west, or to the east, whichever you think is the best, chief, and try and pick up a few more pelts so as to lay in a fresh stock of goods for our next trip."
"Bad hills everywhere," the chief said; "better go west, plenty of game there."
"No fear of Indians?"
"Indians there peaceable; make good trade with whites. Ten years ago fight, but lose many men and not get much plunder. Trappers here good friends with them. Traders bring up powder and cloth and beads. Indians no give trouble."
For the next six weeks, therefore, they travelled slowly, camping sometimes for two or three days on a stream, and then making a long march until they again came to water. The beaver traps had been left behind, but they were fortunate enough to come upon several beaver villages, and by exercising patience they were able to shoot a good many, getting in all some fifty skins. Tom used to go out in the evening and lie down to watch the beavers at work, but he would not take a gun.
"I could not shoot them down in cold blood, uncle. It is almost like looking at a village of human beings at work. One can shoot a man who is wanting to shoot you, without feeling much about it, but to fire at a man labouring in the fields is murder. Of course, if we wanted the flesh for food it would be different."
"I did not see you refuse that beaver-tail soup we had last night, Tom."
"No, and it was very good, uncle; but I would very much rather have gone without it than shoot the beaver the tail belonged to."
"Well, Tom, as we have all got guns, and as none of us have any scruples that way, there is no occasion whatever for you to draw a trigger on them. They take some shooting, for if you hit them in the water they sink directly, and you have got to kill them dead when they are on land, otherwise they make for the water at once and dive into their houses and die there."
They killed a good many other animals besides the beaver, including several wolverines, and by the time they got down to the fort in the middle of May they had had to give up riding and pack all the animals with the skins they had obtained. None of these were of any great value, but the whole brought enough to buy them a fresh outfit of clothes, a fresh stock of provisions and powder, and to give them a hundred dollars each.
The evening after the sale was effected Tom wrote home to his sisters, giving them a brief account of what had taken place since the letter he had posted to them before starting for the mountains, but saying very little of their adventures with Indians. "I am afraid you have been in a great fright about me," he said, "but you must never fidget when you don't get letters. We may often be for a long time away from any place where we can post them, or, as they call it here, mail them, though I certainly do not expect to be snowed up again for a whole winter. Owing to the Indians being hostile we did not do nearly so well as we expected, for we could not go down to hunt in the valleys. So after getting a fresh outfit for our next journey our share is only a hundred dollars each. I did not want to take a share, for of course I was not of much use to them, though I have learnt a lot in the last six months, and can shoot now as well as any of them, except the two Indians.
"However, they all insisted on my having the same share as the rest. Uncle wanted me to take his hundred dollars and send them home to you with mine, but I told him that I would not do so, for I know you have money enough to go on with, even if your school has turned out a failure. So I think it would be as well for us to keep our money in hand for the present. There is never any saying what may happen; we may lose our horses and kit, and it would be very awkward if we hadn't the money to replace them. As soon as we get more we will send it off, as you know I always intended to do. I have still some left of what I brought out with me, but that and the two hundred dollars would not be more than enough to buy an entirely new outfit for us both.
"I hope you got the five hundred dollars uncle sent you. He told me he sent it off from Denver, and it ought to have got home a few weeks after I left. It is horrid to think that there may be letters from you lying at Denver, but it serves me right for being so stupid as not to put in the short note I wrote you from here before I started, that you had better direct to me at Fort Bridger, as I shall almost be sure to come back to it before I go to Denver. I like uncle awfully; it seems to me that he is just what I expected he would be. I suppose they all put in equal shares, but the other men quite look upon him as their leader. Sometimes when he is talking to me he speaks just as people do at home. When he talks to the men he uses the same queer words they do. He is taller than father was, and more strongly built. What I like in him is, he is always the same. Sometimes the others used to get grumbly when we were shut up so long, but it never seemed to make any difference in him.
"I told you when I wrote from Denver that he was called 'Straight Harry,' because he always acted straightforwardly, and now I know him I can quite understand their calling him so. One feels somehow that one could rely upon his always being the same, whatever happened. Leaping Horse is a first-rate fellow, and so is Hunting Dog, though of course he does not know nearly as much as the chief does, but he knows a lot. The other three are all nice fellows, too, so we were a very jolly party. They know a tremendous lot of stories about hunting and red-skins and that sort of thing. Some of them would make all you girls' hairs stand on end. We are going to start off in two or three days to hunt up a gold mine uncle found three years ago. The Indians are going, too; they will hunt while the rest of us work. It will be quite a different journey to the last, and I expect it will be just as hot this time as it was cold last. We may be away for four months, and perhaps we may not come back till the snow sets in, so don't expect a letter till you see it."
This was by far the longest letter Tom had ever written, and it took him several hours to get through. He had the room to himself, for the others were talking over their adventures with old friends they had met at the fort. His uncle returned about ten o'clock.
"Where are the others?" Tom asked.
"In the saloon; but they are not drinking, that is, not drinking much. I told them that if they were to get drunk one of them would be sure to blab as to where we were going, or at any rate to say enough to excite suspicion among some of the old miners, that we knew of a good thing, and in that case we should get a lot of men following us, and it would interfere with our plans altogether. A party as small as ours may live for months without a red-skin happening to light on us, but if there were many more they would be certain to find us. There would be too much noise going on, too much shooting and driving backward and forward with food and necessaries. We want it kept dark till we thoroughly prove the place. So I made them all take an oath this morning that they would keep their heads cool, and I told them that if one of them got drunk, or said a word about our going after gold, I would not take him with us. I have given out that we are going on another hunting party, and of course our having brought in such a lot of skins will make them think that we have hit on a place where game is abundant and are going back there for the summer."
Two more pack-ponies had been added to the outfit. They might be away for five or six months, and were determined to take a good supply of flour this time, for all were tired of the diet of meat only, on which they had existed for the last six months, having devoted by far the greater part of the flour to the horses.
When they started next day they turned their faces north, as if they intended to hunt in the mountains where they had wintered. They made but a short march, camped on a stream, and long before daybreak started again, travelling for some hours to the west and then striking directly south. For two days they travelled rapidly, Tom going out every morning with the Indians hunting, while the others kept with the pack-horses. Ben had now quite recovered from the strain which had crippled him for the first three weeks of their march down to Fort Bridger. They were now fairly among the Ute hills, and at their third camping-place Harry said:
"We must do no more shooting now till we get to our valley. We have got a supply of deer-flesh for a week at least, and we must be careful in future. We heard at the fort that several miners have been cut off and killed by the Utes during the winter, and that they are more set than ever against white men entering their country. Everyone says those rascally Saints are at the bottom of it. We must hide our trail as much as we can. We are just at the edge of the bad lands, and will travel on them for the next two days. The red-skins don't go out that way much, there being nothing either to hunt or to plunder, so there is little fear of their coming on our trail on the bare rocks, especially as none of the horses are shod. On the third day we shall strike right up into their mountains."
"Are you sure that you will know the place again, Harry?"
"I reckon I could find it, but I should not feel quite certain about it if I had not the chief with me. There is no fear of his going wrong. When a red-skin has once been to a place he can find his way straight back to it again, even if he were a thousand miles off."
"You said when we were talking of it among the hills, uncle," Tom said, as he rode beside him the next morning, "that Leaping Horse and you each took two shares. I wonder what he will do with his if it turns out well."
"He won't do anything with it, Tom. The chief and I are like brothers. He does not want gold, he has no use for it; and, besides, as a rule, Indians never have anything to do with mining. He and Hunting Dog really come as hunters, and he has an understanding with me that when the expedition is over I shall pay them the same as they would earn from any English sportsman who might engage them as guides and hunters, and that I shall take their shares in whatever we may make. I need not say that if it turns out as well as we expect, the Indians will get as many blankets and as much ammunition as will last them their lives. You can't get a red-skin to dig. Even the chief, who has been with us for years, would consider it degrading to do work of that kind; and if you see an Indian at mining work, you may be sure that he is one of the fellows who has left his tribe and settled down to loaf and drink in the settlements, and is just doing a spell to get himself enough fire-water to make himself drunk on.
"The Seneca would be just as willing to come and hunt for us for nothing. He would get his food and the skins, which would pay for his tobacco and ammunition, and, occasionally, a new suit of leggings and hunting-shirt, made by an Indian woman, and with this he would be happy and contented. He doesn't mind taking money in return for skins, and he and Hunting Dog had their full share in the division at the fort. When I last talked to him about this business, he said, 'Leaping Horse doesn't want money. Of what use is it to him? He has got a bagful hidden at home, which he has been paid when he was scouting with the army, and for the skins of beasts he has shot. It is enough to buy many horses and blankets, and all that a chief can want. He is going with his friend to hunt, and to fight by his side if the Utes come; he wants none of the gold.' I explained the matter to him, and he said carelessly: 'Leaping Horse will take the two shares, but it will be for his brother, and that he may send it to the girls, the sisters of his friend Tom, of whom he spoke one night by the fire.'
"Hunting Dog is like Leaping Horse, he will take no gold. I have told the three men how matters stand. Of course, it makes no difference to them whether the Indians keep their share or hand it over to me, but at the same time I thought they ought to know how we stood. They said it was no business of theirs; that as I was the discoverer I had a right to sell the whole thing if I chose, and that they thought I had done the friendly thing by them in letting them in as partners. So you see it is all right and square. It is like enough, too, that we shall find some other lodes, and of course there they will come in on even terms with us. So they are pleased with the look-out, and know well enough it is likely to be the best strike they ever made in their lives."
They kept near the edge of the bad lands, as had they gone farther out they would have been obliged to make long detours to get round the head of the cañons made by rivers running down into the Colorado. They had filled their water-skins at the last stream where they had camped, and had taken with them enough dried wood for their fires. These they lit each night in a hollow, as from the upper slopes of the Ute hills a view could be obtained for a great distance over the flat rocky plateau. Tom was heartily glad when the two days' journey was over. Not a living creature had met their eyes; there was no grass on which beasts could exist, no earth in which prairie-dogs could burrow; even birds shunned the bare waste of rock.
"It is a desolate country," he said, as they sat round the fire; "it would be enough to give one the horrors if one were alone. It is hot now, and in the height of summer the heat and glare from the rock must be awful."
