The Patrol of the Sun Dance Trail Part 34

"Come along, then, Jerry," said Cameron impatiently. And on they went.

The throb of the drum grew clearer until it seemed that the next turn in the trail should reveal the camp, while with the drum throb they began to catch, at first faintly and then more clearly, the monotonous chant "Hai-yai-kai-yai, Hai-yai-kai-yai," that ever accompanies the Indian dance. Suddenly the drums ceased altogether and with it the chanting, and then there arose upon the night silence a low moaning cry that gradually rose into a long-drawn penetrating wail, almost a scream, made by a single voice.

Jerry's hand caught Cameron's arm with a convulsive grip.

"What the deuce is that?" asked Cameron.

"Sioux Indian--he mak' dat when he go keel."

Once more the long weird wailing scream pierced the night and, echoing down the canyon, was repeated a hundred times by the black rocky sides.

Cameron could feel Jerry's hand still quivering on his arm.

"What's up with you, Jerry?" said Cameron impatiently.

"Me hear dat when A'm small boy--me."

Then Cameron remembered that it was Sioux blood that colored the life-stream in Jerry's veins.

"Oh, pshaw!" said Cameron with gruff impatience. "Come on!" But he was more shaken than he cared to acknowledge by that weird unearthly cry and by its all too obvious effect upon the iron nerves of that little half-breed at his side.

"Dey mak' dat cry when dey go meet Custer long 'go," said Jerry, making no motion to go forward.

"What are you waiting for?" said Cameron harshly. "Come along, unless you want to go back."

His words stung the half-breed into action. Cameron could feel him in the dark jerk his hand away and hear him grit his teeth.

"Bah! You go h.e.l.l!" he muttered between his clenched teeth.

"That is better," said Cameron cheerfully. "Now we will look in upon these fire-eaters."

Sharp to the right they turned behind a cliff, and then back almost upon their trail, still to the right, through a screen of spruce and poplar, and found themselves in a hole of a rock that lengthened into a tunnel blacker than the night outside. Pursuing this tunnel some little distance they became aware of a light that grew as they moved toward it into a fire set in the middle of a wide cavern. The cavern was of irregular shape, with high-vaulted roof, open to the sky at the apex and hung with glistening stalact.i.tes. The floor of this cavern lay slightly below them, and from their position they could command a full view of its interior.

The sides of the cavern round about were crowded with tawny faces of Indians arranged rank upon rank, the first row seated upon the ground, those behind crouching upon their haunches, those still farther back standing. In the center of the cavern and with his face lit by the fire stood the Sioux Chief, Onawata.

"Copperhead! By all that's holy!" cried Cameron.

"Onawata!" exclaimed the half-breed. "What he mak' here?"

"What is he saying, Jerry? Tell me everything--quick!" commanded Cameron sharply.

Jerry was listening with eager face.

"He mak' beeg spik," he said.

"Go on!"

"He say Indian long tam' 'go have all country when his fadder small boy.

Dem day good hunting--plenty beaver, mink, moose, buffalo like leaf on tree, plenty hit (eat), warm wigwam, Indian no seeck, notting wrong. Dem day Indian lak' deer go every place. Dem day Indian man lak' bear 'fraid notting. Good tam', happy, hunt deer, keel buffalo, hit all day. Ah-h-h!

ah-h-h!" The half-breed's voice faded in two long gasps.

The Sioux's chanting voice rose and fell through the vaulted cavern like a mighty instrument of music. His audience of crowding Indians gazed in solemn rapt awe upon him. A spell held them fixed. The whole circle swayed in unison with his swaying form as he chanted the departed glories of those happy days when the red man roamed free those plains and woods, lord of his destiny and subject only to his own will. The mystic magic power of that rich resonant voice, its rhythmic cadence emphasized by the soft throbbing of the drum, the uplifted face glowing as with prophetic fire, the tall swaying form instinct with exalted emotion, swept the souls of his hearers with surging tides of pa.s.sion.

Cameron, though he caught but little of its meaning, felt himself irresistibly borne along upon the torrent of the flowing words. He glanced at Jerry beside him and was startled by the intense emotion showing upon his little wizened face.

Suddenly there was a swift change of motif, and with it a change of tone and movement and color. The marching, vibrant, triumphant chant of freedom and of conquest subsided again into the long-drawn wail of defeat, gloom and despair. Cameron needed no interpreter. He knew the singer was telling the pathetic story of the pa.s.sing of the day of the Indian's glory and the advent of the day of his humiliation. With sharp rising inflections, with staccato phrasing and with fierce pa.s.sionate intonation, the Sioux wrung the hearts of his hearers. Again Cameron glanced at the half-breed at his side and again he was startled to note the transformation in his face. Where there had been glowing pride there was now bitter savage hate. For that hour at least the half-breed was all Sioux. His father's blood was the water in his veins, the red was only his Indian mother's. With face drawn tense and lips bared into a snarl, with eyes gleaming, he gazed fascinated upon the face of the singer. In imagination, in instinct, in the deepest emotions of his soul Jerry was harking back again to the savage in him, and the savage in him thirsting for revenge upon the white man who had wrought this ruin upon him and his Indian race. With a fine dramatic instinct the Sioux reached his climax and abruptly ceased. A low moaning murmur ran round the circle and swelled into a sobbing cry, then ceased as suddenly as there stepped into the circle a stranger, evidently a half-breed, who began to speak. He was a French Cree, he announced, and delivered his message in the speech, half Cree, half French, affected by his race.

He had come fresh from the North country, from the disturbed district, and bore, as it appeared, news of the very first importance from those who were the leaders of his people in the unrest. At his very first word Jerry drew a long deep breath and by his face appeared to drop from heaven to earth. As the half-breed proceeded with his tale his speech increased in rapidity.

"What is he saying, Jerry?" said Cameron after they had listened for some minutes.

"Oh he beeg damfool!" said Jerry, whose vocabulary had been learned mostly by a.s.sociation with freighters and the Police. "He tell 'bout beeg meeting, beeg man Louis Riel mak' beeg noise. Bah! Beeg damfool!"

The whole scene had lost for Jerry its mystic impressiveness and had become contemptibly commonplace. But not so to Cameron. This was the part that held meaning for him. So he pulled up the half-breed with a quick, sharp command.

"Listen close," he said, "and let me know what he says."

And as Jerry interpreted in his broken English the half-breed's speech it appeared that there was something worth learning. At this big meeting held in Batoche it seemed a pet.i.tion of rights, to the Dominion Parliament no less, had been drawn up, and besides this many plans had been formed and many promises made of reward for all those who dared to stand for their rights under the leaders.h.i.+p of the great Riel, while for the Indians very special arrangements had been made and the most alluring prospects held out. For they were a.s.sured that, when in the far North country the new Government was set up, the old free independent life of which they had been hearing was to be restored, all hampering restrictions imposed by the white man were to be removed, and the good old days were to be brought back. The effect upon the Indians was plainly evident. With solemn faces they listened, nodding now and then grave approval, and Cameron felt that the whole situation held possibilities of horror unspeakable in the revival of that ancient savage spirit which had been so very materially softened and tamed by years of kindly, patient and firm control on the part of those who represented among them British law and civilization. His original intention had been to stride in among these Indians, to put a stop to their savage nonsense and order them back to their reserves with never a thought of anything but obedience on their part. But as he glanced about upon the circle of faces he hesitated. This was no petty outbreak of ill temper on the part of a number of Indians dissatisfied with their rations or chafing under some new Police regulation. As his eye traveled round the circle he noted that for the most part they were young men.

A few of the councilors of the various tribes represented were present.

Many of them he knew, but many others he could not distinguish in the dim light of the fire.

"Who are those Indians, Jerry?" he asked.

And as Jerry ran over the names he began to realize how widely representative of the various tribes in the western country the gathering was. Practically every reserve in the West was represented: Bloods, Piegans and Blackfeet from the foothill country, Plain Crees and Wood Crees from the North. Even a few of the Stonies, who were supposed to have done with all pagan rites and to have become largely civilized, were present. Nor were these rank and file men only. They were the picked braves of the tribes, and with them a large number of the younger chiefs.

At length the half-breed Cree finished his tale, and in a few brief fierce sentences he called the Indians of the West to join their half-breed and Indian brothers of the North in one great effort to regain their lost rights and to establish themselves for all time in independence and freedom.

Then followed grave discussion carried on with deliberation and courtesy by those sitting about the fire, and though gravity and courtesy marked every utterance there thrilled through every speech an ever deepening intensity of feeling. The fiery spirit of the red man, long subdued by those powers that represented the civilization of the white man, was burning fiercely within them. The insatiable l.u.s.t for glory formerly won in war or in the chase, but now no longer possible to them, burned in their hearts like a consuming fire. The life of monotonous struggle for a mere existence to which they were condemned had from the first been intolerable to them. The prowess of their fathers, whether in the slaughter of foes or in the excitement of the chase, was the theme of song and story round every Indian camp-fire and at every sun dance.

For the young braves, life, once vivid with color and thrilling with tingling emotions, had faded into the somber-hued monotony of a dull and spiritless existence, eked out by the charity of the race who had robbed them of their hunting-grounds and deprived them of their rights as free men. The l.u.s.t for revenge, the fury of hate, the yearning for the return of the days of the red man's independence raged through their speeches like fire in an open forest; and, ever fanning yet ever controlling the flame, old Copperhead presided till the moment should be ripe for such action as he desired. Back and forward the question was deliberated.

Should they there and then pledge themselves to their Northern brothers and commit themselves to this great approaching adventure?

Quietly and with an air of judicial deliberation the Sioux put the question to them. There was something to be lost and something to be gained. But the loss, how insignificant it seemed! And the gain, how immeasurable! And after all success was almost certain. What could prevent it? A few scattered settlers with no arms nor ammunition, with no means of communication, what could they effect? A Government nearly three thousand miles away, with the nearest base of military operations a thousand miles distant, what could they do? The only real difficulty was the North West Mounted Police. But even as the Sioux uttered the words a chill silence fell upon the excited throng. The North West Mounted Police, who for a dozen years had guarded them and cared for them and ruled them without favor and without fear! Five hundred red coats of the Great White Mother across the sea, men who had never been known to turn their backs upon a foe, who laughed at noisy threats and whose simple word their greatest chief was accustomed unhesitatingly to obey! Small wonder that the mere mention of the name of those gallant "Riders of the Plains" should fall like a chill upon their fevered imaginations. The Sioux was conscious of that chill and set himself to counteract it.

"The Police!" he cried with unspeakable scorn, "the Police! They will flee before the Indian braves like leaves before the autumn wind."

"What says he?" cried Cameron eagerly. And Jerry swiftly interpreted.

Without a moment's hesitation Cameron sprang to his feet and, standing in the dim light at the entrance to the cave, with arm outstretched and finger pointed at the speaker, he cried:

"Listen!" With a sudden start every face was turned in his direction.

"Listen!" he repeated. "The Sioux dog lies. He speaks with double tongue. Never have the Indians seen a Policeman's back turned in flight."

His unexpected appearance, his voice ringing like the blare of a trumpet through the cavern, his tall figure with the outstretched accusing arm and finger, the sharp challenge of the Sioux's lie with what they all knew to be the truth, produced an effect utterly indescribable. For some brief seconds they gazed upon him stricken into silence as with a physical blow, then with a fierce exclamation the Sioux s.n.a.t.c.hed a rifle from the cave side and quicker than words can tell fired straight at the upright accusing figure. But quicker yet was Jerry's panther-spring.

With a backhand he knocked Cameron flat, out of range. Cameron dropped to the floor as if dead.

"What the deuce do you mean, Jerry?" he cried. "You nearly knocked the wind out of me!"

"Beeg fool you!" grunted Jerry fiercely, dragging him back into the tunnel out of the light.

"Let me go, Jerry!" cried Cameron in a rage, struggling to free himself from the grip of the wiry half-breed.

"Mak' still!" hissed Jerry, laying his hand over Cameron's mouth.

"Indian mad--crazy--tak' scalp sure queeck."