Wild Western Scenes Part 15

"Dod!" exclaimed Sneak, staring a moment at Boone, while his large eyes seemed to increase in size, and then rolling up his sleeves, he delved away with extraordinary dispatch.

In a very short s.p.a.ce of time, Ringwood and Jowler rushed from the thicket, and leaping up against the breast of their old master, evinced a positive happiness in once more beholding him. They were soon followed by Glenn, who dashed briskly through the thicket to see who it was that caused his hounds to abandon him so unceremoniously.

No sooner did he discover his aged friend than he ran forward and grasped his hand.

"I thought not of you, and yet I could think of no one else who might thus entice my n.o.ble hounds away. Return with me, and we will have the fox in a few minutes--he is now nearly exhausted," said Glenn.

"Molest him not," said Boone. "Did you not observe how reluctantly the hounds chased him?"

"I did; what was the cause of it?" asked Glenn.

"The breeze is tainted with the scent of Indians!" whispered Boone.

"Again thou art my preserver!" said Glenn, in a low tone.

"I came to give you intelligence that the Osages would probably be upon you in a few days," said Boone; "but I did not think they were really in the neighbourhood until I heard your unerring hounds. Col.

Cooper, of my settlement, made an excursion southward some ten days ago to explore a region he had never visited; but observing a large war-party at a distance, coming hitherward, he retreated precipitately, and reached home this morning. Excessive fatigue and illness prevented him from accompanying me over the river; and what is worse, nearly every man in our settlement is at present more than a hundred miles up the river, trapping beaver. If we are attacked to-night, or even within a day or two, we have nothing to depend upon but our own force to defend ourselves."

"Should it be so, I doubt not we will be able to withstand them as successfully as we did before," said Glenn.

"Let us go with Roughgrove to his house, and take his daughter and his effects to your little fortress," said Boone, joining the old ferryman, whom a single word sufficed to apprize of the state of affairs.

"I must prepare for the worst, now," said Roughgrove; "they will never forget or forgive the part I acted on the night of their defeat."

Boone, Glenn, and Roughgrove proceeded down the valley, while Joe seemed disposed to loiter, undetermined what to engage in, having cast an occasional curious glance at Boone and his master when engaged in their low conversation, and rightly conjecturing that "something wrong was in the wind," as he expressed it.

"Why don't you go home?" asked Sneak, rolling the dead body into the grave, and das.h.i.+ng the mingled earth and snow remorselessly upon it.

"I'll go when I'm ready," replied Joe; "but I should like to know what all that whispering and nodding was about."

"I can tell you," said Dan; but his speech was suddenly arrested by a sign from Sneak.

"I wish you would tell me," continued Joe, manifesting no little uneasiness.

"Have you got a plenty to eat at your house?" asked Sneak.

"To be sure we have," said Joe; "now tell me what's in the wind."

"If I was to tell you, I bet you'd be frightened half to death,"

remarked Sneak, driving down a headstone, having filled up the grave.

"No! no--I--indeed but I wouldn't, though!" said Joe, trembling at every joint, the true cause, for the first time, occurring to him.

"Ain't it Indians, Mr. Sneak?"

"Don't call me _Mister_ agin, if you please. There are more moccasins than the one you found in these parts, that's all."

"I'll go home and tell Mr. Glenn!" said Joe, whirling round quickly.

"Dod rot your cowardly hide of you!" said Sneak, staring at him contemptuously; "now don't you _know_ he knowed it before you did?"

"Yes--but I was going home to tell him that some bullets must be run--that's what I meant."

"Don't you think he knows that as well as you do?" continued Sneak.

"But I--I _must_ go!" exclaimed Joe, starting in a half run, with the hounds (which had been forgotten by their master) following at his heels.

"Let me have the hounds, to go after my gun--the red skins might waylay me, if I go alone, in spite of all my cunning woodcraft," said Sneak.

"Go back!" cried Joe, to the hounds. They instantly obeyed, and the next moment Joe was scampering homeward with all the speed of which his legs were capable.

When he reached the house, his fears were by no means allayed on beholding the most valuable articles of Roughgrove's dwelling already removed thither, and the ferryman himself, his daughter, Boone and Glenn, a.s.sembled in consultation within the inclosure. Joe closed the gate hurriedly after him, and bolted it on the inside.

"Why did you shut the gate? Open it again," said Glenn.

"Ain't we besieged again? ain't the Indians all around us, ready to rush in and take our scalps?" said Joe, obeying the command reluctantly.

"They will not trouble us before night," said Roughgrove.

"No, we need not fear them before night," remarked Boone, whose continued thoughtful aspect impressed Glenn with the belief that he apprehended more than the usual horrors of Indian warfare during the impending attack.

"They will burn father's house, but that is nothing compared to what I fear will be his own fate!" murmured Mary, dejectedly.

"We can soon build him another," said Glenn, moved by the evident distress of the pale girl; "and I am very sure that my little stone castle will suffice to preserve not only your father and yourself, but all who take shelter in it, from personal injury. So, cheer up, Mary."

"Oh, I will not complain; it pained me most when I first heard they were coming once more; I will soon be calm again, and just as composed when they are shooting at us, as I was the other time. But _you_ will be in a great deal more danger than you were that night. Yet Boone is with us again--he _must_ save us," said Mary.

"Why do you think there will be more danger, Mary?" asked Glenn.

"Yes, why do you think so?" interposed Joe, much interested in the reply.

"Because the snow is so deep and so firm, they will leap over the palisade, if there be a great many of them," replied Mary. Glenn felt a chill shoot through his breast, for this fact had not before occurred to him.

"Oh, goodness!--let us all go to work and shovel it away on the outside," cried Joe, running about in quest of the spades. "Oh, St.

Peter!" he continued, "the spades are out at the cave-spring!"

"Run and bring them," said Glenn.

"Never--not for the world! They'd take my scalp to a certainty before I could get back again," replied Joe, trembling all over.

"There is no danger yet," said Roughgrove, the deep snow having occurred to him at the first announcement of the threatened attack, and produced many painful fears in his breast, which caused a sadness to rest upon his time-worn features; "but," he continued, "it would not be in our power to remove the snow in two whole days, and a few hours only are left us to prepare for the worst."

"Let them come within the inclosure," said Glenn, "and even then they cannot harm us. The walls of my house are made of stone, and so is the ceiling; they can only burn the roof--I do not think they can harm our persons. We have food enough to last for months, and there is no likelihood of the siege lasting a single week."

"I'll make sure of the deer," muttered Joe; and before any one could interpose, he struck off the head of the doe with an axe, as it still lay bound upon the sled. And he was brandis.h.i.+ng the reeking steel over the neck of the fawn, that stood by, looking on innocently, when a cry from Mary arrested the blow.

"If you injure a hair of Mary's gift," said Glenn, in anger, "you shall suffer as severe a fate yourself."

"Pardon me," said Joe to Mary; "I was excited--I didn't hardly know what I was doing. I thought as we were going to be pent up by the Indians, for goodness only knows how long, that we'd better provide enough food to keep from starving. I love the fawn as well as you do, and Mr. Glenn loves it because you gave it to him; but its natural to prefer our own lives to the lives of dumb animals."

"I forgive you," said Mary, playing with the silken ears of the pet.