Blazed Trail Stories, and Stories of the Wild Life Part 18

All of which seemed satisfactory to Alfred. He walked on foot in order to discover the trail in the snow. He withdrew two hundred yards from the bank of the stream that his pony might not scent the other man's horse, and so give notice of approach by whinnying. After a time he came across the trail. So he left the pony and followed it to the creek-bottom on foot. At the top of the bluff he peered over cautiously.

"Well, you got nerve!" he remarked to himself. "If I was runnin' this yere game, I'd sure scout with my blinders off."

The fugitive evidently believed himself safe from pursuit, for he had made camp. His two ponies cropped browse and pawed for gra.s.s in the bottom land. He himself had prepared a warm niche and was sleeping in it with only one blanket over him, though by now the thermometer was well down toward zero. The affair had been simple. He had built a long, hot fire in the L of an upright ledge and the ground. When ready to sleep he had raked the fire three feet out from the angle, and had lain down on the heated ground between the fire and the ledge. His rifle and revolver lay where he could seize them at a moment's notice.

Alfred could stalk a deer, but he knew better than to attempt to stalk a man trained in the West. Instead, he worked himself into a protected position and carefully planted a Winchester bullet some six inches from the man's ear. The man woke up suddenly and made an instinctive grab toward his weapons.

"Drop it!" yelled Alfred.

So he dropped it, and lay like a rabbit in its form.

"Jest select that thar six-shooter by the end of the bar'l and hurl her from you some," advised the sheriff. "Now the Win_ches_ter. Now stand up an' let's look at you." The man obeyed. "Yo' don't really need that other gun, under th' circ.u.mstances," pursued the little man. "No, don't fetch her loose from the holster none; jest unbuckle th' whole outfit, belt and all. Good! Now, you freeze, and stay froze right whar you are."

So Alfred arose and scrambled down to the bottom.

"Good-mornin'," he observed, pleasantly.

He cast about him and discovered the man's lariat, which he picked up and overran with one hand until he had loosened the noose.

"You-all are some sizable," he remarked, in conversational tones, "an'

like enough you eats me up, if I gets clost enough to tie you. Hands up!"

With a deft twist and flip he tossed the open noose over his prisoner's upheld wrists and jerked it tight.

"Thar you be," he observed, laying aside his rifle.

He loosened one of his revolvers suggestively and approached to tie the knot.

"Swing her down," he commanded. He contemplated the result. "Don't like that nohow--tied in front. Step through your hands a whole lot." The man hesitated. "Step, I say!" said Alfred, sharply, at the same time p.r.i.c.king the prisoner with his long knife.

The other contorted and twisted awkwardly, but finally managed to thrust first one foot, then the other, between his shackled wrists. Alfred bound together his elbows at the back.

"You'll do," he approved, cheerfully. "Now, we sees about grub."

Two flat stones placed a few inches apart improvised a stove when fire thrust its tongue from the crevice, and a frying-pan and tin-cup laid across the opening cooked the outlaw's provisions. Alfred hospitably ladled some bacon and coffee into their former owner.

"Not that I needs to," he observed, "but I'm jest that tender-hearted."

At the close of the meal, Alfred inst.i.tuted a short and successful search for the plunder, which he found in the stranger's saddle-bag, open and unashamed.

"Yo're sure a tenderfoot at this game, stranger," commented the sheriff.

"Thar is plenty abundance of spots to cache such plunder--like the linin' of yore saddle, or a holler horn. Has you any choice of cayuses for ridin'?" indicating the grazing ponies.

The man shook his head. He had maintained a lowering silence throughout all these cheerful proceedings.

Alfred and his prisoner finally mounted and rode northwest. As soon as they had scrambled up the precipitous side of the gully, the affair became a procession, with the stranger in front, and the stranger's second pony bringing up an obedient rear. Thus the robber was first to see a band of Sioux that topped a distant rise for a single instant. Of course, the Sioux saw him, too. He communicated this discovery to Alfred.

"Well," said Alfred, "they ain't hostile."

"These yere savages is plenty hostile," contradicted the stranger, "and don't you make no mistake thar. I jest nat'rally lifts that pinto offen them yisterday," and he jerked his thumb toward the black-and-white pony in the rear.

"And you camps!" cried Alfred, in pure astonishment. "You must be plumb locoed!"

"I ain't had no sleep in three nights," explained the other, in apology.

Alfred's opinion of the man rose at once.

"Yo' has plumb nerve to tackle a hold-up under them circ.u.mstances," he observed.

"I sets out to git that thar stage; and I gits her," replied the agent, doggedly.

The savages appeared on the next rise, barely a half-mile away, and headed straight for the two men.

"I reckon yere's where you takes a hand," remarked Alfred simply, and, riding alongside, he released the other's arms by a single slash of his knife. The man slipped from his horse and stretched his arms wide apart and up over his head in order to loosen his muscles. Alfred likewise dismounted. The two, without further parley, tied their horses' noses close to their front fetlocks, and sat down back to back on the surface of the prairie. Each was armed with one of the new 44-40 Winchesters, just out, and with a brace of Colt's revolvers, chambering the same-sized cartridge as the rifle.

"How you heeled?" inquired Alfred.

The stranger took stock.

"Fifty-two," he replied.

"Seventy for me," vouchsafed Alfred. "I goes plenty organised."

Each man spread a little semicircle of sh.e.l.ls in front of him. At the command of the two, without reloading, were forty-eight shots.

When the Indians had approached to within about four hundred yards of the white men they paused. Alfred rose and held his hand toward them, palm outward, in the peace sign. His response was a shot and a chorus of yells.

"I tells you," commented the hold-up.

Alfred came back and sat down. The savages, one by one, broke away from the group and began to circle rapidly to the left in a constantly contracting spiral. They did a great deal of yelling. Occasionally they would shoot. To the latter feature the plainsmen lent an attentive ear, for to their trained senses each cla.s.s of arm spoke with a different voice--the old muzzle-loader, the Remington, the long, heavy Sharp's 50, each proclaimed itself plainly. The mere bullets did not interest them in the least. Two men seated on the ground presented but a small mark to the Indians shooting uncleaned weapons from running horses at three or four hundred yards' range.

"That outfit is rank outsiders," concluded Alfred. "They ain't over a dozen britch-loaders in the lay-out."

"Betcher anything you say I drops one," offered the stranger, taking a knee-rest.

"Don't be so plumb fancy," advised Alfred, "but turn in and help."

He was satisfied with the present state of affairs, and was hacking at the frozen ground with his knife. The light snow on the ridge-tops had been almost entirely drifted away. The stranger obeyed.

On seeing the men thus employed, the Indians turned their horses directly toward the group and charged in. At the range of perhaps two hundred yards the Winchesters began to speak. Alfred fired twice and the stranger three times. Then the circle broke and divided and pa.s.sed by, leaving an oval of untrodden ground.

"How many did you get?" inquired Alfred, with professional interest.

"Two," replied the man.

"Two here," supplemented Alfred.

A commotion, a squeal, a thras.h.i.+ng-about near at hand caused both to turn suddenly. The pinto pony was down and kicking. Alfred walked over and stuck him in the throat to save a cartridge.