The Trappers of Arkansas: or, The Loyal Heart

"To arms! to arms! Be on your guard! The enemies are here!"

Then, with the greatest coolness, he discharged his weapons as if at a target – he had four double-barrelled pistols – repeating as every pirate fell, as loud as he could shout, —

"To arms! the enemies are here! they will surround you! Be on your guard! Be on your guard!"

The bandits, exasperated by this brave defence, rushed upon him with great rage, forgetting all the precautions they had till that time taken.

Then commenced a horrible but an almost superhuman struggle of one man against twenty or thirty; for it seemed, as every pirate fell, that another took his place.

The conflict was fearful! The young man had determined to make the sacrifice of his life, but he was equally resolved to sell it dearly.

We have said that at every shot he fired he had uttered a warning cry; his pistols being discharged, at every stroke of his machete that he dealt he did the same, to which the Mexicans replied by keeping up, on their part, a rolling fire of musketry upon the pirates, who showed themselves openly, blindly bent upon the destruction of a man who so audaciously barred their passage with the impenetrable barrier of his loyal breast.

At length the captain was brought down on one knee. The pirates rushed upon him, pell-mell, wounding each other in their frantic efforts to destroy him.

Such a combat could not last long.

Captain Aguilar fell, but in falling he drew with him a dozen pirates he had immolated, and who formed a bloody escort on his passage to the tomb.

"Hum!" muttered Captain Waktehno, surveying him with admiration, whilst staunching the blood of a large wound he had received in the breast; "a roughish sort of fellow! If the others are like him, we shall have more than our work to do. Come!" he continued turning towards his companions, who awaited his orders, "do not let us stand here any longer to be shot at like pigeons. To the assault, in God's name! – to the assault!"

The pirates rushed after him, brandishing their arms, and began to climb the rock, vociferating, "To the assault! to the assault!"

On their side, the Mexicans, witnesses of the heroic death of Captain Aguilar, prepared to avenge him.

CHAPTER IV.

THE DOCTOR

Whilst these terrible events were being accomplished, the doctor was quietly herbalizing. The worthy savant, enraptured by the rich flora he had beneath his eyes, had forgotten everything but the thoughts of the ample harvest he could make. He proceeded with his body bent towards the ground, stopping for a long time before every plant he admired, ere he resolved to pull it up.

When he had loaded himself with an infinite number of plants and herbs exceedingly valuable to him, he resolved at length to seat himself quietly at the foot of a tree, and classify them at his ease, with all the care that celebrated professors are accustomed to bring to this delicate operation, mumbling in the meantime, some morsels of biscuit which he drew from his bag.

He remained a long time absorbed in this occupation, which procured him one of those extreme delights which the learned alone can enjoy, and which are unknown to the vulgar. He would probably have forgotten himself in this labour until night had surprised him, and forced him to seek shelter, had not a dark shadow come between him and the sun, and projected its reflection upon the plants he had classified with so much care.

He mechanically raised his head.

A man, leaning on a long rifle, had stopped before him, and was contemplating him with a kind of laughing attention. This man was Black Elk.

"He! he!" he said to the doctor, "what are you doing there, my good sir? Seeing the grass moved about so, I thought there was a doe in the thicket, and, devil take me! if I was not on the point of sending a bullet at you."

"The deuce!" the doctor cried, eyeing him with an expression of terror, "you should be careful; do you know you might have killed me?"

"Well, I might," the trapper replied, laughing; "but don't be afraid! I perceived my error in time."

"God be praised!"

And the doctor, who had just perceived a rare plant stooped eagerly to seize it.

"Then you won't tell me what you are doing?" the hunter continued.

"Why, can't you see, my friend?"

"Who, I? Yes; I see you are amusing yourself with pulling up the weeds of the prairie, that is all; and I should like to know what for?"

"Oh! ignorance!" the savant murmured, and then added aloud with that tone of doctorial condescension peculiar to the disciples of Æsculapius: "my friend, I am gathering simples, which I collect, in order to classify them in my herbal; the flora of these prairies is magnificent; I am convinced that I have discovered at least three new species of the Chirostemon pentadactylon, of which the genus belongs to the Flora Mexicana."

"Ah!" said the hunter, staring with all his eyes, and making strong efforts to refrain from laughing in the doctor's face. "You think you have really found three new species of – "

"Chirostemon pentadactylon, my friend," said the doctor, patronizingly.

"Ah! bah!"

"At least; perhaps there may be a fourth!"

"Oh! oh! there is some use in it, then?"

"Some use in it, indeed!" the doctor cried, much scandalized.

"Well, don't be angry, I know nothing about it."

"That is true!" said the savant, softened by the tone of Black Elk; "You cannot comprehend the importance of these labours, which advance science at an immense speed."

"Well, only to think! And it was only for the purpose of pulling up herbs in this manner that you came into the prairie?"

"For nothing else."

Black Elk looked at him with the admiration created by the sight of an inexplicable phenomenon; the hunter could not succeed in comprehending how a sensible man should resolve willingly to endure a life of privation and perils for the, to him, unintelligible object of pulling up useless plants; therefore he soon came to a conviction that he must be mad. He cast upon him a look of commiseration; shaking his head, and shouldering his rifle, he prepared to go on his way.

"Well! well!" he said, in the tone usually employed towards children, and idiots; "you are right, my good sir; pull away! pull away! you do nobody any harm, and there will always be plenty left. I wish you good sport; such as it is. I shall see you again."

And, whistling his dogs, he proceeded a few steps, but almost immediately returned.

"One word more," he said, addressing the doctor, who had already forgotten him, and was again busied in the employment which the arrival of the hunter had forced him to interrupt.

"Speak!" he replied, raising his head.

"I hope that the young lady who came to visit my hatto yesterday, in company with her uncle, is well? Poor dear child, you cannot imagine how much I am interested in her, my good sir!"

The doctor rose up suddenly, striking his forehead.

"Fool that I am!" he cried, "I had completely forgotten it."

"Forgotten what?" the astonished hunter asked.

"This is always my way!" the savant muttered; "fortunately the mischief is not great; as you are here, it can easily be repaired."

"What mischief are you talking about?" said the trapper, beginning to feel uneasy.

"You may imagine," the doctor continued, quietly, "that if science absorbs me so completely as to make me often forget to eat and drink, I am likely sometimes not to remember the commissions I am charged with."

"To the point! to the point!" said the hunter impatiently.

"Oh! good Lord, it's very simple. I left the camp at daybreak to come to your hatto; but when I arrived here, I was so charmed with the innumerable rare plants that my horse trod under foot, that without thinking of pursuing my route, I stopped at first to pull up one plant, then I perceived another that was not in my herbal, and another after that, and so on. – In short, I thought no more of coming to you, and was, indeed, so absorbed by my researches, that even your unexpected presence, just now, did not recall to my mind the commission I had to you."

"And did you leave the camp at daybreak?"

"Good Heavens, yes!"

"And do you know what o'clock it is now?"

The savant looked at the sun.

"Almost three!" he said, "but I repeat that it is of little consequence. You being here, I can report to you what Doña Luz charged me to tell you, and all will be right, no doubt."

"God grant that your negligence may not prove the cause of a great misfortune," said the hunter, with a sigh.

"What do you mean by that?"

"You will soon know. I hope I may be deceived. Speak, I am listening to you."

"This is what Doña Luz begged me to repeat to you – "

"Was it Doña Luz that sent you to me?"

"Herself!"

"Has anything serious taken place at the camp, then?"

"Ah! why, yes; and that, perhaps, may make it more important than I at first imagined. This is what has happened: Last night one of our guides – "

"The Babbler?"

"The same. Do you know him?"

"Yes. Go on."

"Well! It appears that the man was plotting with another bandit of his own sort, to deliver up the camp to the Indians. Doña Luz, most probably by chance, overheard the conversation of these fellows, and, at the moment they were passing her, she fired two pistols at them, quite close."

"Did she kill them?"

"Unfortunately, no. One of them, although no doubt grievously wounded, was able to escape."

"Which of them?"

"The Babbler."

"Well, and then?"

"Why, then Doña Luz made me swear to come to you, and say stop a bit," said the savant, trying to recollect the words.

"Black Elk, the hour is come!" the hunter, impetuously interrupted.

"That's it! that's it!" said the savant, rubbing his hands for joy, "I had it at the tip of my tongue. I must confess it appeared rather obscure to me, I could not fancy what it meant; but you will explain it, will you not?"

The hunter seized him vigorously by the arm, and drawing his face close to his own, he said, with an inflamed look and features contracted by anger, —

"Wretched madman! why do you not come to me as quickly as possible, instead of wasting your time like an idiot? Your delay will, perhaps, cause the death of all your friends!"

"Is it possible!" cried the chapfallen doctor, without noticing the somewhat rough manner in which the hunter shook him.

"You were charged with a message of life and death, fool that you are! Now, what is to be done? Perhaps it is too late!"

"Oh! do not say so," said the savant, in great agitation, "I should die with despair if it were so."

The poor man burst into tears, and gave unequivocal proofs of the greatest grief.

Black Elk was obliged to console him.

"Come, come, courage, my good sir!" he said, softening a little. "What the devil, perhaps all is not lost?"

"Oh! if I were the cause of such a misfortune, I should never survive it!"

"Well, what is done, is done; we must act accordingly," said the trapper philosophically. "I will think how they are to be assisted. Thanks be to God, I am not so much alone as might be supposed – I hope within two hours to have got together thirty of the best rifles in the prairies."

"You will save them, will you not?"

"At least, I will do all that can be done, and, if it please God, I shall succeed."

"May Heaven hear you!"

"Amen!" said the hunter, crossing himself devoutly. "Now, listen to me; you must return to the camp."

"Immediately!"

"But no more gathering of flowers, or pulling up of grass, if you please."

"Oh, I swear I will not. Cursed be the hour in which I set myself to herbalize!" said the doctor, with comic despair.

"Very well, that's agreed. You must comfort the young lady as well as her uncle; you must recommend them to keep good guard, and, in case of an attack, to make a vigorous resistance; and tell them they shall soon see friends come to their assistance."

"I will tell them all that."

"To horse, then, and gallop all the way to the camp."

"Be satisfied, I will; but you, what are you going to do?"

"Oh! don't trouble yourself about me. I shall not be idle; all you have to do is to rejoin your friends as soon as possible."

"Within an hour I shall be with them."

"Courage and good luck, then! Above all, don't despair."

Black Elk let go the bridle which he had seized, and the doctor set off at a gallop, a pace to which the good man was so little accustomed, that he had great trouble to preserve his equilibrium.

The trapper watched his departure for an instant, then, turning round, he strode with hasty steps into the forest.

He had scarcely walked ten minutes when he met Nô Eusebio, who was conveying the mother of Loyal Heart across his saddle, in a fainting state.

This meeting was for the trapper a piece of good fortune, of which he took advantage to obtain from the old Spaniard some positive information about the hunter – information which Eusebio hastened to give him.

The two men then repaired to the hatto of the trapper, from which they were but a short distance, and in which they wished to place the mother of their friend for the present.

CHAPTER V.

THE ALLIANCE

We must now return to Loyal Heart.

After walking straight forward about ten minutes, without giving himself the trouble to follow one of those innumerable paths that intersect the prairie in all directions, the hunter stopped, put the butt end of his gun to the ground, looked round carefully on all sides, lent his ear to those thousands of noises of the desert which all have a meaning for the man accustomed to a prairie life; and, probably satisfied with the result of his observations, he imitated, at three different equal intervals the cry of the pie, with such perfection, that several of those birds, concealed among the thickest of the trees, replied to him immediately.

The third cry had scarcely ceased to vibrate in the air, ere the forest, mute till that moment, and apparently plunged in complete solitude, became animated as if by enchantment.

On all sides arose, from the midst of bushes and grass, in which they had been concealed, a crowd of hunters with energetic countenances and picturesque costumes, who formed, in an instant, a dense crowd round the trapper.

It chanced that the two first faces that caught the eye of Loyal Heart were those of Black Elk and Nô Eusebio, both posted at a few paces from him.

"Oh!" he said, holding out his hand eagerly; "I understand it all, my friends. Thanks! a thousand thanks for your cordial coming; but, praise be to God! your succour is not necessary."

"So much the better!" said Black Elk.

"But how did you get out of the hands of those devilish redskins?" the old servant asked, eagerly.

"Don't speak ill of the Comanches," Loyal Heart replied, with a smile; "they are now my brothers."

"Do you speak seriously?" cried Black Elk, with warmth; "can you really be on good terms with the Indians?"

"You shall judge for yourself. Peace is made between them and me, my friends. If agreeable to you, I will introduce you to each other."

"By Heaven! at the present moment nothing could fall out more fortunately," said Black Elk; "and as you are free, we shall be able to concern ourselves for other people, who are, at this moment, in great peril, and stand in need of our immediate assistance."

"What do you mean?" Loyal Heart asked, with a curiosity mingled with interest.

"I mean, that some people to whom you have already rendered great services, on the occasion of the last fire in the prairie, are at this moment surrounded by a band of pirates, who will soon attack them, if they have not already done so.

"We must fly to their assistance!" cried Loyal Heart, with an emotion he could not control.

"Well, that was our intention; but we wished to deliver you first, Loyal Heart. You are the soul of our association; without you we should have done no good."

"Thanks! my friends. But now, you see, I am free, so there is nothing to stop us; let us set forward immediately."

"I crave your pardon," Black Elk replied; "but we have to deal with a strong body. The pirates, who know they have no pity to look for, fight like so many tigers. The more numerous we are, the better will be our chance of success."

"That is true; but what do you aim at?"

"At this – since you have made, in our name, peace with the Indians, it could be so managed that they – "

"By Heavens! you are right, Black Elk," Loyal Heart interrupted him, eagerly. "I did not think of that. The Indian warriors will be delighted at the opportunity we shall offer them of showing their valour. They will joyfully assist us in our expedition. I take upon myself to persuade them. Follow me, all of you. I will present you to my new friends."

The trappers drew together, and formed a compact band of forty men.

Arms were reversed, in sign of peace, and all, following the steps of the hunter, directed their course towards the camp of the Comanches.

"And my mother?" Loyal Heart asked Eusebio, with a broken voice.

"She is in safety in the hatto of Black Elk."

"And how is she?"

"As well as you could expect, though suffering from great uneasiness," the old man replied. "Your mother is a woman who only lives by the heart. She is endowed with immense courage, the greatest physical pains glide over her. She now feels but slightly the effects of the atrocious tortures she had begun to undergo."

"God be praised! But she must no longer be left in these mortal doubts; where is your horse?"

"Hidden, close by."

"Mount, and return to my mother. Assure her of my safety, and then both of you retire to the grotto of Verdigris, where she will be out of all danger. You will remain with her. That grotto is easily found; it is situated at a small distance from the rock of the Dead Buffalo. When you get there, you have nothing to do but to let loose my rastreros, which I will leave you, and they will lead you straight to it. Do you clearly understand me?"

"Perfectly."

"Begone then. Here we are at the camp; your presence is useless here, whilst yonder it is indispensable."

"I am gone!"

"Adieu! we'll meet again."

Nô Eusebio whistled the bloodhounds, which he leashed together; he then, after another shake of the hand with his young master, left the troop, turned to the right, and resumed the way to the forest. The hunters, in the meantime, arrived at the entrance of the glade in which the camp of the Indians was established.

The Comanches formed, a few paces behind the first lines of their camp, a vast semicircle, in the centre of which stood their chiefs.

To do honour to their newly-arrived friends, they had put on their handsomest costumes. They were painted and armed for war.

Loyal Heart halted his troop, and continuing to march on alone, he unfolded a buffalo robe, which he waved before him.

Eagle Head then quitted the other chiefs, and advanced on his part to meet the hunter, also waving a buffalo robe in sign of peace.

When the two men were within three paces of each other they stopped. Loyal Heart spoke the first.

"The Master of Life," he said, "sees into our hearts. He knows that among us the road is good and open, and that the words which our lungs breathe and our mouths pronounce are sincere. The white hunters come to visit their red friends."

"They are welcome!" Eagle Head replied cordially, bowing with the grace and majestic nobleness which characterize Indians.

After these words the Comanches and the hunters discharged their pieces into the air, amidst long and loud cries of joy. Then all ceremony was banished; the two bands mingled, and were confounded so thoroughly that, at the end of a few minutes, they only formed one.

Loyal Heart, however, who knew from what Black Elk had told him how precious the moments were, took Eagle Head aside, and explained to him frankly what he expected from his tribe.

The chief smiled at this request.

"My brother shall be satisfied," he said, "let him but wait a little."

Leaving the hunter, he joined the other chiefs. The crier quickly mounted upon the roof of a hut, and convoked with loud cries the most renowned warriors to a meeting in the hut of council.

The demand of Loyal Heart met with general approbation. Ninety chosen warriors, commanded by Eagle Head, were selected to accompany the hunters, and co-operate with all their power to secure the success of the expedition.

When the decision of the chiefs was made known, it created a general joy throughout the tribe.

The allies were to set forward at sunset, in order to surprise the enemy.

The great war-dance, with all the ceremonies usual upon such occasions, was danced, the warriors the while continually repeating in chorus: —

"Master of Life, look upon me with a favourable eye, thou hast given me the courage to open my veins."

When they were on the point of setting out, Eagle Head, who knew what dangerous enemies they were going to attack, selected twenty warriors upon whom he could depend, and sent them forward as scouts, after having given them some scotte wigwas, or bark wood, in order that they might immediately light a fire as a warning in case of alarm.

He then examined the arms of his warriors, and, satisfied with the inspection, he gave the orders for departure.

The Comanches and the trappers took the Indian file, and, preceded by their respective chiefs, they quitted the camp, amidst the good wishes and exhortations of their friends, who accompanied them to the first trees of the forest.

The little army consisted of a hundred and thirty resolute men, perfectly armed, and commanded by chiefs whom no obstacle could stop, no peril could make recede.

The darkness was dense; the moon, veiled by large black clouds, which floated heavily in space, only shed at intervals a dull, rayless light, which, when it disappeared, gave objects a fantastic appearance.

The wind blew in gusts, and filled the ravines with dull, plaintive moans.

In short, this night was one of those which in the history of humanity seemed destined to witness the accomplishment of dismal tragedies.

The warriors marched in silence; they looked in the darkness like a crowd of phantoms escaped from a sepulchre, hastening to accomplish a work without a name, accursed of God, which night alone could veil with its shadow.

At midnight the word "halt" was pronounced in a low voice.

They encamped to await news of the scouts.

That is to say, everyone, whether well or ill placed, laid himself down exactly where he happened to be, in order to be ready at the first signal.

No fire was lighted.

The Indians, who depend upon their scouts, never post sentinels when they are upon the warpath.

Two hours passed away.

The camp of the Mexicans was not more than three miles distant at most; but, before venturing nearer, the chief wished to ascertain whether the route were free or not; in case it should not be so, what were the numbers of the enemy who barred the passage, and what plan of attack they had adopted.

At the moment when Loyal Heart, a prey to impatience, was preparing to go himself to ascertain what was going on, a rustling, almost imperceptible at first, but which by degrees increased in enormous proportions, was heard in the bushes, and two men appeared.

The first was one of the Comanche scouts, the other was the doctor.

The state of the poor savant was truly pitiable.

He had lost his wig; his clothes were in rags; his face was convulsed with terror; in short, his whole person bore evident traces of struggle and combat.

When he was brought before Loyal Heart and Eagle Head, he fell head-foremost to the ground and fainted.

Earnest endeavours were immediately made to restore him to life.

CHAPTER VI.

THE LAST ASSAULT

The lanceros posted behind the entrenchments had received the pirates warmly.

The general, exasperated by the death of Captain Aguilar, and perceiving that with such enemies there was no quarter to be expected, had resolved to resist to the last, and to kill himself rather than fall into their hands.