Lone Pine: The Story of a Lost Mine

"That's where you got off wrong," said Stephens eagerly, "for there's a few families here in New Mexico that's just as good as anybody, if it comes to that – Bacas and Armijos and – and Sanchez – " he hesitated a little.

"Say," cut in Rocky, "look at yonder! Who are them ducks a-coming up the road? They 're riding as if all blazes was loose. Some of the First Families of New Mexico, eh?" Rocky was sarcastic. He knew Indians when he saw them.

"By George!" exclaimed Stephens in considerable excitement, "it's those accursed Navajos back here again."

Out of a whirling cloud of red dust and flying horsehoofs emerged the well-known figures of Mahletonkwa, Notalinkwa, and the rest of the gang. They reined up before the shut door of the store, and most of them sprang off their horses.

"They've not gone back to their reservation," said Stephens indignantly. "We'd ought to have had the soldiers here by now, and put them right back. I'm all for doing things by law and order, me, and it's the soldiers' business anyway. But it's getting to be time something was done. It's an infamous shame they should be allowed to fly around like this and bulldoze everybody; and, what's more, I'm getting tired of it."

The Indians were talking and laughing in a loud, excited manner, and Mahletonkwa began to pound on the closed door of the store with his fist.

"That's a sockdologer," said Rocky, "him knocking at the door I mean, with the eagle-feathers in his head-dress." Mahletonkwa was a big man physically; his stature would have been remarkable even in a crowd of Western men, perhaps the tallest men, on an average, of any on the face of the globe. "Say, do you mean to tell me that these are wild Indians, and you leave 'em around here loose?"

"They're worse than wild Indians just now," said Stephens, whose eyes were beginning to glow like hot coals; "they're Indians with liquor enough in them to make 'em crazy for more, and ready for any devilment."

"Say, Mahletonkwa," he called out, raising his voice and advancing a step, "quit that hammering, will you! There's trouble in the house, and you mustn't disturb them."

The Indian took no more notice of him than a striking clock might have done, but went on pounding with loud, continuous blows on the resounding wood.

"Stop it, will you!" cried Stephens, springing forward; "don't you hear me? There's a dead man in there, I tell you, and a poor woman mourning."

"I want more whiskey," said Mahletonkwa excitedly, and he beat the door with both hands.

The next moment Stephens had him by the shoulders and whirled him around, and with a push sent him staggering half a dozen yards from the house.

The Indian recovered himself, wheeled sharp round, and with a yell of rage drew his knife and bounded upon Stephens. He, too, drew his to defend himself, but as he did so Rocky sprang between them, pulling his Derringer. Alas! the Indian's knife was quicker than the pistol; he grappled Rocky instead of Stephens, and stabbed him in the breast. Down went Rocky with a crash upon the ground, the pistol dropping unfired from his nerveless fingers, and the blood poured from his mouth.

CHAPTER XXVIII

ELEVEN TO ONE

At sight of Rocky bleeding at his feet, something seemed suddenly to snap in Stephens's brain, and the secret rage that had been consuming him for days blazed out. This was open war at last, and the Navajos themselves had begun it. It was their own choice.

"So now then," said he, "they shall have it."

Almost before Mahletonkwa could draw his dripping blade from his victim's body, the American's strong grasp seized him and swung him violently round. Stephens's right hand gripped the hilt of his great hunting-knife, and with it he dealt the red man one terrible stroke as with a sword. All the strength of his arm and all the wrath of his soul went into that mighty sweep of the blade, and he felt the keen edge shear right through bone and muscle as it clove the doomed man's breast asunder and split his heart in twain. The dying yell of the Indian rent the air with so piercing a sound that the women in the Sanchez house, three furlongs off, heard it, and sprang trembling to their feet. With both his hands the American raised his stricken foe aloft and flung him clear away, a corpse before he touched ground.

It was all over in five seconds; but Stephens knew it could not end there. This was no final blow in a single combat, it was rather the first in one where the odds were still ten to one against him. Mahletonkwa's followers were swiftly unslinging their guns, save four who had sprung to their horses, whether to fight or fly he could not tell. Like a flash the American's ready six-shooter was out from his belt. Notalinkwa was nearest him, his gun already at his shoulder; but the too careful Indian paused a moment on his aim to make sure, and that pause was fatal. As the American's pistol came up level the hammer fell, and Notalinkwa, shot through the heart, pitched heavily forward, and lay there prone on the brown earth, biting it convulsively in the strong death-agony.

With the rapidity of lightning the deadly weapon spoke again, and again, and again, and as each jet of smoke and flame leapt from the muzzle, each bullet, true to its mark, laid an enemy low. If Stephens thought at all during those breathless seconds in which he sent foe after foe to his last account, it was but to say to himself, "Quick, now, quick! Be quick, but sure!"

Navajo rifle-balls whistled by him, but he felt no fear; there was no room for that, for his whole soul now was bent upon one passionate purpose, – to kill, kill, kill.

As the fourth Navajo dropped to his fourth shot, he saw the rest run, and gave one wild shout of triumph, and even as his voice rang out his fifth barrel went off, and down dropped yet another of the gang. It seemed as though he could not miss a single shot to-day.

"Oh, Doctor," he cried, "oh, Doctor! quick here, Rocky's hurt!" but he did not turn his head as he shouted to him to help his wounded friend.

The four Indians who had already mounted were off and away, and Kaniache, the last of those who had turned to fight when Mahletonkwa was slain, had now lost heart and was springing to horse to follow them. What chance was there to fight against a man like this, on whom no Navajo rifle-balls seemed to have any effect, but whose own unerring bullets slew a victim at each shot? He was no mere man, but an avenging fury.

Alas for Kaniache! the resolve to fly came too late. As he reached the saddle Stephens raised his six-shooter for the last time, and the foresight came into the V-notch of the hammer just below the red man's shoulder blade as he turned to flee. The last of the six cartridges spoke, once more the jet of flame and smoke leaped from the muzzle, and Kaniache dropped forward on the neck of his steed, clutching blindly and desperately at the mane. The horse bounded forward after the others that had fled before him, his rider's hot blood pouring down his withers, and dropping on to his knees at every stride. Then the desperate clutch relaxed, and the death-stricken Kaniache pitched heavily to the ground, and with loose rein the riderless steed galloped wildly across the plain.

"Hurrah," shouted Stephens again as he darted to his mare, "hurrah! Run, you dogs, run!"

The sweetest moment in a man's life is when he looks in the eyes of his mistress and knows that his love is returned; the proudest is when he sees in front of him his foes, but sees nothing but their backs. And to Stephens both these things came in one hour.

He raised the rein, and Morgana bounded forward in pursuit. His eye glancing around fell upon the figure of Doctor Benton just leaping from the stage waggon, pistol in hand. He had heard the rapid shots before he heard Stephens's shout, and his first impulse had been to catch up his weapon and take his share in the fighting. But so quick had been the deadly work that there was no one for him to turn loose on save the dead or dying redskins who bestrewed the ground, and he paused as if undecided what to do.

Stephens settled the question for him.

"Hurry up, there, Doc," he shouted over his shoulder to him, "hurry up, or Rocky'll be dead." And looking back he saw the army surgeon run across to where the prostrate white man lay.

Seeing this, he was satisfied skilled hands would do all that was possible to save his old partner. For himself there was only one course, to go on right to the bitter end as he had begun, and avenge on the whole murderous gang the wanton knife-stroke of their chief, – ay, and more, to avenge upon them, too, the terrors of Manuelita, and the murder of that lonely wanderer in the mountains whom he and the whole lot of them had so foully done to death beside the Lone Pine. For all that long account, vengeance should be taken to the very last drop.

He looked ahead: the four fugitives were galloping a quarter of a mile in front of him, making not for the sierra, but for the more open valley of the Agua Negra. He was clearing the last of the San Remo houses now, and as he did so he heard the thunder of horsehoofs on his right, and two well-mounted Mexicans dashed forth from the corrals to join in the pursuit. They were the same young men who the day before had ridden in ahead of Don Nepomuceno's party to rejoin their sweethearts. They had heard the firing begin, had seen the fray, and mounted in hot haste to play their part.

"Bueno!" he shouted when he saw them, "bueno, boys! Wade in. We'll give 'em a dose of it between us."

The Mexicans cheered back to him, and plied their quirts; Morgana was going at three quarters racing speed, but they sent their horses along from the start as if they were running a quarter-mile dash. The house from which they came was a little to one side of the Indians' line of flight, and they made for their line at such an angle that they gained a decided advantage both on them and on the American, and were enabled to cut ahead of the latter. The fugitives, hearing the shouts, and looking back and becoming aware of these new pursuers, at once began to flog, but the rearmost Navajo's horse could not answer to the whip, and the tremendous pace at which the Mexicans had started carried them right up to within fifty yards of him.

Out came their revolvers, bang, bang, bang! they went at him, and again, bang, bang, bang! But such wild firing as this over the heads of galloping horses is random work at best, and the Navajo went on scathless.

"Esperate! Esperate!" sang out Stephens from behind. "You're wasting your ammunition. Wait till you're closer, boys." But in spite of his wiser counsels he still heard them firing away, bang, bang, bang!

Young blood soon gets hot in the chase; and then Stephens saw a curious sight. Bang went the leading Mexican's revolver once more, and this time the bullet, better aimed or more lucky, found its mark. The Navajo's horse was seen to stagger and stumble and then come down, the rider leaping nimbly off over its head; he lit on his feet like a cat, and he held his bow and some arrows in his left hand; in the twinkling of an eye he was ready for them, and as the Mexicans rode headlong at him he slapped an arrow into the first and brought him heavily to the ground; like lightning a second arrow was fitted to the string, and he let fly again, and the arrow buried itself to the feather in the breast of the second man's horse, and horse and rider both fell almost on top of him. The Navajo caught the rein of the first man's horse with which to resume his flight, while the second Mexican was still struggling with his fallen steed; and so marvellously quick and adroit was he that he must have succeeded in getting away but for the American. The moment Stephens saw the arrow-stricken horse roll over, he drew rein, and in half a dozen strides brought his mare to a standstill. He would not jerk her on to her haunches, for he was saving her strength for what promised to be a long chase. Before she had actually stopped he was on the ground, rifle in hand, and ready to shoot. Then, as the Indian was bounding to the saddle of the captured horse, the deadly rifle came up, and the momentary poise of the bent body, as he threw his leg over, gave to the marksman the fatal opportunity. The rifle cracked, and the conical bullet tore clean through the Navajo's vitals and passed out at his right breast. His dexterous manœuvre had been all in vain, and he fell forward under the horse's feet, and his spirit took flight to join that of his slain chief who had gone so little before him.

Stephens leaped into the saddle again, and galloped up. The unwounded Mexican had freed himself unhurt from his prostrate mount, and was now trying to draw the arrow from his friend.

"Go on, you," he cried to Stephens as the latter checked his speed, "go on, you, and kill los demonios, kill them all." The American took him at his word, and away darted Morgana again in her stretching gallop. There were only three redskins left now, and they were some distance ahead, but the gallant little Morgan mare pressed steadily after them. The foam flakes began to fly from her bit, but she was full of spirit and going strong. He glanced down at his waist and saw the bright copper tops of the row of unused cartridges that encircled it. Stephens was one of those men who grow cold as they grow hot. His brain was like molten metal under a crust of ice. Shifting reins and rifle into one hand, he composedly felt the belt all round with the other; there was but one vacant loop, and this assured him that there were thirty-nine more there in reserve.

"Seven Indians in seven shots," said he cynically; "that must come pretty near making a record. Well, if I can only keep up that lick now!" His relentless eye measured the gap between him and his flying foes. With joy he noted that it was decreasing, for his whole soul longed to close with them and slay, slay, slay.

This blood thirst in him was a new thing. He had been in battles before, but he had never felt like this. The strained nerve, the hot fever of strife, the passionate will to win, none of these sensations were new to him, though he had not known them since the day of Apache Cañon. But when Coloradans and Texans met in conflict he had not felt as he did now. He had had no race feeling against foes whom he looked upon as Western men like himself. He had no personal wrongs to avenge upon them; all he wanted was to send them back to where they came from; to stop them from conquering the Rocky Mountain country and breaking up the Union; in short, he only wanted to hammer them back into brotherhood. This was a different thing; now there was a fire burning in his veins that would not be satisfied till the last one of his enemies lay dead at his feet. It was not merely victory he wanted, but vengeance. The shedders of the innocent blood, that cried against them from the ground, should be utterly wiped out from the face of the earth. He would not leave one of them alive.

And ever the game little Morgan mare strode bravely along, and now his heart leaped to perceive that the Indians were losing more and more rapidly the advantage they had gained at the start. By this time there was distinctly less than a quarter of a mile between him and them.

"Good for you, Pedro," he cried, as he noted the gain the mare was making; "you didn't stint her feed last night. Don Nepomuceno's corn sticks by your ribs, little lady"; and at the sound of her master's voice Morgana pricked her ears and strode out more bravely than ever. He had not touched her yet with the spur.

Overnight Mahletonkwa and his gang had betaken themselves some little distance down the Santiago River to enjoy themselves in their own way with the illicit whiskey they had procured from the storekeeper, and there they had turned their ponies loose to graze. There was rich green grass in the moist swales along the river-bed, and their steeds had feasted on it. The young April grass tells its tale in a long gallop, and Stephens began to see that their horses were already in distress. He gave his bridle-rein a shake, and touched Morgana with the spur; right gallantly she responded, and the gap now diminished fast. He was overhauling them hand over hand. He turned his head and looked back; he could see for miles behind him, but there was no one in sight. No doubt as soon as they could get together there would be many Mexican friends who would take up his trail and follow it, eager to help, but that could not be for some time yet. Once more it was his lot to play a lone hand.

And still the gap grew less; the Indians looked back oftener and oftener, and their whips were plied mercilessly all the time. Only a bare hundred yards separated him from them now.

Stephens kept his eye glued to them, expecting them every instant to jump off and receive him with a volley. That certainly seemed to be the best game for them to play, as their horses were so nearly done. The question was, would they try it? If they did, he too must leap off and shoot as quick as they. The Winchester, he thought, would give the three of them shot for shot and something over.

But to stand up to it and give and take shot for shot was not the Indians' style of doing business. They had no spirit left in them to face this terrible man in the open; just here, however, the trail approached a spot more suitable to their methods of fighting. A bold and lofty butte, a landmark known far and wide as the Cerro Chato, rose abruptly a little to one side of the trail, and the Navajos suddenly swung off to the right and made for it, hoping to gain the shelter of the broken masses of rock that were strewn about its base, and from that vantage-ground defy their merciless pursuer.

Stephens divined their object the moment they turned for the butte; he also changed his course, and he now spurred freely and spoke to the mare and encouraged her with his voice. The staunch Morgan blood answered to the call; there was a spurt still left in her, and she fairly raced them for the rocks. But though she was doing all she knew, the Indians got there first. They sprang to earth, and as they did so Stephens did the same, scarce fifty yards behind them. They darted for hiding to the cleft of rocks; two got there, but one was too late; just as he reached his goal the leaden messenger outwent him, and he felt the crippling blow; it caught him in the thigh as he ran, and the broken limb gave way under him; still, on his hands and knees, he dragged himself desperately forward almost into the longed-for haven of refuge, but another bullet, pumped up from the magazine, followed all too swiftly on the first, and broke his spine, and a third gave the merciful coup-de-grâce and put him out of his pain.

"There's something mighty persuasive about a Winchester," jeered Stephens, hastily throwing in another cartridge as he rushed forward, and casting just one glance at the body as he passed. The persuasive repeating rifle had pumped lead to some purpose into White Antelope. Never again would he see the rich valleys of the Chusca Mountains where so often he had roamed with his tribe; no more would he tend his flock, like the patriarch of old, and lead from pasture to water, and from water to pasture the spotted and ringstreaked herd of many-horned sheep whose innocent faces he knew so well. Here, under the Cerro Chato, coyotes and eagle-hawks would pick his bones, and the little booth of boughs where his squaw and his papooses waited for him – the little booth that to each wandering son of the desert stands for home – would never see him more.

War is cruel work. The renegade Navajo band had brought this on themselves, and richly deserved what they got, yet, take it all round, retribution, however just, is a butcherly job.

"Two more left, and I'm bound to rub it in," said Stephens, plunging in amongst the rocks lest the pair who had already found cover should take advantage of his exposed position outside.

Above them the butte rose abruptly to a height of two or three hundred feet, but the face of it was so much broken down that the fallen fragments had made a slope half way up it, while the largest detached blocks had rolled in numbers to the very bottom and lay confusedly heaped together or loosely scattered around.

"It's pretty near as good a place for these sons of guns as the Lava Beds," he said; "only, thank my stars, there aren't so many of them now. Yet, I've got to go to work mighty cautious here, or else I'll give myself away for good and all." He wiped his streaming face as he crouched behind a rock for a minute or two to recover his breath and decide on the next move.

"Git 'em!" he went on, "I've got to git 'em, as the boy said; and there's no two ways about it. But how am I going to git 'em? that's the next question. If I stand straight up and try to walk right on to them, they're simply bound to have the deadwood on me. There'd be no show at all for me in that game. I've got to try and play it more their own style."

Very cautiously, foot by foot, surveying the ground on every side at each change of position, he began to move around. Dead silence reigned, broken here by no war-whoops as in the Lava Beds; the desperate red men were biding their time; hid in the rocks they knew their advantage, and reckoned at last to turn the tables on their pursuer with a vengeance.

The hot sun blazed down on him as the American patiently crept from the shelter of one rock to another, but neither sign nor sound of his enemies could he detect. Out on the plain he could see that his mare had joined the horses abandoned by the Indians, and was making friends with them. They were getting over the effects of their gallop already, and were beginning to try a nibble at the grass.

"Make friends with them as much as you like, little lady," said he, apostrophising the mare; "it's all right for you, though I can't – at least not yet. There's eleven thousand peaceable Navajos living on their reservation that I'm quite ready to be friends with, but this band of cutthroats has got to be wiped clean out. 'Hit hard when you do hit,' was old Grant's motto every time, and I reckon he knew pretty well what he was about."

On he moved again, warily searching each hole and cranny where the great rocks had fallen against each other and formed shelters.

Suddenly, as he paused a moment in his advance, listening, there came to his ears from far away a welcome, well-known sound. It was the voice of a dog giving tongue on the trail.

"Faro, by all the powers!" he cried. "Why, he must have heard the shooting at the store and come a-running to see what was up, and then not finding me there he's taken the trail of the mare."

Straining his eyes he discerned a dark spot advancing over the plain; nearer it came and nearer, and then was heard a joyful bark of recognition as the dog rushed up to the head of the grazing mare and greeted her vociferously. But soon, not finding with her the master whom he loved best of all, he left her, and questing round he came upon his trail where Stephens had dismounted to shoot, and again he eagerly gave tongue and came running towards the rocks. But at the body of White Antelope he checked.

"Now," said Stephens, standing with his back against a rock, with his rifle cocked and ready, "if those sons of guns lay themselves out to shoot him they're bound to give me a chance to spot where they are, and I'll see if I can't give them what for."

Keeping his eye on the alert for any move of theirs, he gave a sharp whistle. But the hidden red men, though they both heard him and saw the dog, would not take the risk of exposing themselves to his deadly aim, and in another minute the excited bulldog was leaping up and fawning on the master to whom he was devoted, as if to reproach him for having left his most faithful ally behind.

Stephens patted and encouraged him, making him understand that there was game afoot, and, warily as if stalking a deer, took him back to where White Antelope lay stiff and stark. As he smelt the blood again Faro growled and his bristles rose; his master encouraged him till the dog knew what he meant; the game they were after was not deer – it was men. He took up the scent of the two Navajos who had escaped into the rocks, and followed it with his hackles erect. In and out among the labyrinth of tumbled rocks he led the way, and Stephens kept up with him as best he could without exposing himself too recklessly. The trail grew hotter and hotter, till on a sudden Faro turned sharply aside and dashed out of sight behind a huge boulder; instantly there followed his loud, angry bark, and a half-stifled cry of human rage.