Wyoming Part 18

As the faithful fellow was running such risk, Mr. Brainerd crept forward, and with some danger to himself thrust his head and shoulders out, so as to watch the actions of his servant.

Gimp a.s.sumed a crouching posture, and began moving up the narrow, sloping path like the shadow that creeps over the face of the dial.

"I wonder whether it is possible to see him," the elder one asked himself, with a pang of fear, as he looked across the brief intervening s.p.a.ce; "it hardly seems credible that they would leave the door wide open in that manner."

But speculation was useless: Gimp was outside the cavern, and if really detected by the watchful red men, he was beyond help.

Mr. Brainerd could hear the rustling of the African's body as he slowly glided along, often loosening the dirt and gravel with his hands and knees, and sending it rolling down toward the mouth of the cavern, but there came no sign from the rocks beyond, where it was believed the main body of their enemies was gathered.

Like a huge turtle the bulky negro climbed the steep path, until his outlines were lost in the gloom as he neared the top, and his master drew back into the cavern and wondered what it could mean.

If a man could walk from the cavern in that fas.h.i.+on, why might not the entire party, one after the other, file out in the same manner?

This was a natural question, but the settler was too wise to believe the attempt was feasible.

There would be nothing extraordinary in the fugitives' going to the top of the path without molestation, but it would be absurd to suppose they could walk off into the woods undisturbed, when such a vigilant foe was in watch for them.

The American Indian does not prosecute his warfare in that fas.h.i.+on.

CHAPTER XXIII.

The experience of Gravity Gimp, after reaching the outside of the cavern, was remarkable in more than one respect.

When he found himself creeping up the narrow path, to the high ground above, and realized that he would make a capital target for one or a dozen of the Seneca sharpshooters, his teeth fairly rattled, and he would have retreated, but for his affection for the members of the Brainerd family.

"'Spect dere's two hundred ob 'em a-settin' in a row on a log up dere and waitin' for me, and when I come along dey'll each one hit me ober de head wid de b.u.t.t end ob dere tomahawks, and by de time dey gots frough I'll hab de headache so bad dat I'll be as dizzy as Haberkick down dere."

Gravity paused for a minute, and then resumed creeping forward. Within the succeeding ten minutes he had reached the high level ground above, without sight or sound of an Indian.

No wonder he was mystified, for it occurred to him, naturally enough, that if he could pa.s.s out unchallenged in that fas.h.i.+on all the others might do the same, and what seemed to be a very perilous situation might thus resolve itself into nothing of the kind.

He came near turning back and inviting his friends to follow him, but fortunately he changed his mind and decided to go farther, before believing that the cloud had lifted.

"Dere don't seem to be anybody loafing 'bout here," he muttered, "and I'll promenade a little further."

He now began cautiously moving over the same ground he and his friends had hurried along when so hotly chased by the Indians.

Only a short distance was pa.s.sed in the deep shadows of the trees, when he paused, still mystified.

The question presented itself as to how he was to accomplish anything that could benefit those whom he had left behind, for if they should seek to leave the cavern during the night, there was no other way, so far as he could judge, excepting that which he himself had taken.

"It must be dat the Injuns are down on de oder side de ravine, and I think dere's where I'll take an observation."

No task could be more delicate than this, and Gravity, with all his shrewdness, was unfitted to undertake it. There were scouts, who under the circ.u.mstances, would have gathered all the knowledge desired, and would have placed themselves among their enemies without detection, but the African was a different kind of personage.

He picked his way along the wood above the cavern, and had gone less than two rods beyond, when he stopped to gaze about him. The gloom was so dense that he could see very little, excepting when he looked across the ravine, where the moonlight fell and where the ma.s.s of rocks, so dreaded by the fugitives, was in plain sight.

He saw nothing there which could enlighten him, but his heart nearly stood still, when he not only heard a movement behind him near the point where the path to the cavern reached the high ground above, but despite the gloom detected several dark figures moving stealthily about.

That these were Indians there could be no doubt, and the conclusion was inevitable that they had seen him come out and had allowed him to pa.s.s by them without molestation.

Being now between him and the shelter, his return was cut off, and no matter what important discoveries he might make, he had no means of telling them to his friends.

"I might have knowed dere would be some goings on like dis," he said, with a throb of alarm. "De best thing I kin do is to strike out for Stroudsburg alone, widout waitin' for de folks."

Though he might have been justified in this course, yet his conscience would not permit it, and he started again, with the purpose of pa.s.sing around to the other side of the ravine, and making a closer reconnoissance of the spot where he was certain of finding enemies.

This required a long detour, and a full half-hour pa.s.sed before he got across the short ravine and began climbing up the other side, near where the Indians were known to be only a short time before.

As might have been antic.i.p.ated, he went wrong, and got into the worst trouble of his life.

He had seen nothing more of the Senecas, but several faint whistles he recognized as signals pa.s.sing between them, and he should have understood, from what had already taken place, that his movements were watched by the wary foe.

He was climbing a narrow pa.s.sage, and was, perhaps, a dozen feet above the bottom of the ravine, when, to his dismay, a sinewy warrior sprang up in front of him, as though leaping out of the ground itself, and with tomahawk raised and a guttural exclamation, made for him.

The a.s.sault was so sudden that Gimp had no time to use his rifle, but he was not taken altogether at fault. Dropping the weapon, he recoiled a step or two and escaped the implement as it came down with a vicious whiz.

Before the warrior could recover or retreat, the African threw both arms about him, and, lifting him as though he were an infant, flung him headlong into the ravine below.

"Dere! guess dat'll jar you a little--"

But, to his amazement, a second brawny Indian appeared directly where the other had first shown himself, and he was immediately followed by others, who, it was plain, were pus.h.i.+ng up through a narrow pa.s.sage for the purpose of capturing the African.

The latter had succeeded so well a minute before, that he again resorted to the same tactics, and, catching hold of the first warrior he could reach, he hurried him after the first. Then the next was treated in the same manner, and, for the time, Gravity Gimp became a sort of sable geyser or miniature volcano, throwing into the air sprawling Seneca Indians with a vehemence that was as picturesque as it was amazing.

The exercise of hurling full-grown men aloft, regardless of how high they go, and in what posture they strike, is an exhausting diversion, no matter how powerful the gymnast who engages in it.

Thus it came about that the herculean African speedily found that he had his hands more than full, and his terrific efforts so told upon him that he grew more sluggish in his movements, until at last he was fairly smothered with the crush of warriors, and, despite his fierce resistance, was made prisoner.

CHAPTER XXIV.

Meanwhile the fugitives in the cavern were placed in a situation almost as grave as that of Gravity Gimp himself.

The departure of the latter created a stir that lasted some minutes after Mr. Brainerd drew back and whispered to his friends the fact that the servant had reached the ground above, and was unmolested.

"He must pa.s.s over the spot where the man stood who fired the shot,"

said Maggie Brainerd, "and he ought to find out who he is."

"Provided the stranger remains there, which isn't likely."

The reader knows that this hope was disappointed, for the negro saw nothing of the man nor did he once think of him, while making the reconnoissance that resulted in his own capture.