The War Trail: The Hunt of the Wild Horse

“The chapparil ain’t afire,” answered Rube, somewhat mollified by the apology: “so don’t be skeeart, Frenchy yur safe enuf.”

This assurance seemed to gratify not only the timid Canadian, but others, who, up to this moment, were apprehensive that it was the thicket that was on fire.

For myself, I had no such fears; I perceived that the chapparal could not burn. Here and there, patches of dry mezquite-trees would have caught like tinder; but in most places, a succulent endogenous vegetation formed three parts of the jungle, and rendered it “fire-proof.” This was especially the case around the glade where the trappers had taken their stand, and which was completely enclosed by a wall of the great organ cactus, with aloes, opuntias, and other juicy-leaved plants. In the opening, we were as safe from the fire as though it was a hundred miles off; we suffered only from the smoke, that now quite filled the atmosphere, causing a darkness that rivalled night itself.

I had no apprehension for our safety; it was not of that I was thinking.

To the hasty dialogue between Rube and the Canadian I had scarcely given heed; Garey had advanced to meet me, and I listened with anxious ear to the tale of the tracker.

It was soon told. Rube and he had followed the trail, until it emerged from the chapparal, and struck out into a wide grass-prairie. The edge of the thicket was close by; but they had gone a considerable distance beyond it and across the plain. They were still advancing, when, to their consternation, they perceived that the prairie was on fire directly ahead of them! The wind was rolling both smoke and flames before it with the rapidity of a running horse; and it was with difficulty they had escaped from it by galloping back to the chapparal.

And the steed – what had become of him? Had they seen nothing?

I did not put these questions in words – only in thought did I ask them; and in thought only were they answered. Both the trackers were silent, and that was an answer in the negative; yes, I read an ominous negative in their looks of gloom.

We were compelled to halt; even the smoke rendered further progress impossible; but we could hear the fire at no great distance – the culms of the coarse reed-grass cracking like volleys of musketry.

Now and then, a scared deer broke through the bushes, passing us at full speed. A band of antelopes dashed into the glade, and halted close beside us – the frightened creatures not knowing where to run. At their heels came a pack of prairie-wolves, but not in pursuit of them: these also stopped near. A black bear and a cougar arrived next; and fierce beasts of prey and gentle ruminants stood side by side, both terrified out of their natural habits. Birds shrieked among the branches, eagles screamed in the air, and black vultures could be seen hovering through the smoke, with no thought of stooping upon a quarry!

The hunter man alone preserved his instincts. My followers were hungry. Rifles were levelled – and the bear and one of the antelopes fell victims to the deadly aim.

Both were soon stripped of their skins, and butchered. A fire was kindled in the glade, and upon sword-blades and sapling spits the choice morsels of venison and “bear-meat” were roasted, and eaten, with many a jest about the “smoky kitchen.”

I was myself hungered. I shared the repast, but not the merriment. At that moment, no wit could have won from me a smile; the most luxurious table could not have furnished me with cheer.

A worse appetite than hunger assailed my companions, and I felt it with the rest – it was thirst: for hours all had been suffering from it; the long hard ride had brought it on, and now the smoke and the dry hot atmosphere increased the appetite till it had grown agonising, almost unendurable. No water had been passed since the stream we had crossed before day; there was none in the chapparal; the trackers saw none so far as they had gone: we were in a waterless desert; and the very thought itself renders the pang of thirst keener and harder to endure.

Some chewed their leaden bullets, or pebbles of chalcedony which they had picked up; others obtained relief by drinking the blood of the slaughtered animals – the bear and the antelope – but we found a better source of assuagement in the succulent stems of the cactus and agave.

The relief was but temporary: the juice cooled our lips and tongues, but there is an acrid principle in some of these plants that soon acted, and our thirst became more intense than ever.

Some talked of returning on the trail in search of water – of going back even to the stream – more than twenty miles distant.

Under such circumstances, even military command loses its authority. Nature is stronger than martial law.

I cared not if they did return; I cared not who left me, so long as the trappers remained true. I had no fear that they would forsake me; and my disapprobation of it checked the cheerless proposal, and once more all declared their willingness to go on.

Fortunately, at that crisis the smoke began to clear away, and the atmosphere to lighten up. The fire had burnt on to the edge of the chapparal, where it was now opposed by the sap-bearing trees. The grass had been all consumed – the conflagration was at an end.

Mounting our horses, we rode out from the glade; and following the trail a few hundred yards farther, we emerged from the thicket, and stood upon the edge of the desolated plain.

Chapter Seventy.

A Burnt Prairie

The earth offers no aspect more drear and desolate than that of a burnt prairie. The ocean when its waves are grey – a blighted heath – a flat fenny country under a rapid thaw – all these impress the beholder with a feeling of chill monotony; but the water has motion, the heath, colour, and the half-thawed flat exhibits variety in its mottling of white and ground.

Not so the steppe that has been fired and burned. In this, the eye perceives neither colour, nor form, nor motion. It roams over the limitless level in search of one or other, but in vain; and in the absence of all three, it tires, and the heart grows cheerless and sick. Even the sky scarcely offers relief. It, too, by refraction from the black surface beneath, wears a dull livid aspect; or perhaps the eye, jaundiced by the reflection of the earth, beholds not the brightness of the heavens.

A prairie, when green, does not always glad the eye, – not even when enamelled with fairest flowers. I have crossed such plains, verdant or blooming to the utmost verge of vision, and longed for something to appear in sight– a rock, tree, a living creature – anything to relieve the universal sameness; just as the voyager on the ample ocean longs for ships, for cetaceae, or the sight of land, and is delighted with a nautilus, polypi, phosphorescence, or a floating weed.

Colour alone does not satisfy the sense. What hue more charming than the fresh verdure of the grassy plain? what more exquisite than the deep blue of the ocean? and yet the eye grows aweary of both! Even the “flower-prairie,” with its thousands of gay corollas of every tint and shade – with its golden helianthus, its white argemone, its purple cleome, its pink malvaceae, its blue lupin – its poppy worts of red and orange – even these fair tints grow tiresome to the sight, and the eye yearns for form and motion.

If so, what must be the prairie when divested of all these verdant and flowery charms – when burned to black ashes? It is difficult to conceive the aspect of dreary monotony it then presents – more difficult to describe it. Words will not paint such a scene.

And such presented itself to our eyes as we rode out from the chapparal. The fire was past – even the smoke had ceased to ascend – except in spots where the damp earth still reeked under the heat – but right and left, and far ahead, on to the very hem of the horizon, the surface was of one uniform hue, as if covered with a vast crape. There was nought of form to be seen, living or lifeless; there was neither life nor motion, even in the elements; all sounds had ceased: an awful stillness reigned above and around – the world seemed dead and shrouded in a vast sable pall!

Under other circumstances, I might have stayed to regard such a scene, though not to admire it. On that interminable waste, there was nought to be admired, not even sublimity; but no spectacle, however sublime, however beautiful, could have won from me a thought at that moment.

The trackers had already ridden far out, and were advancing, half concealed by the cloud of black “stoor” flung up from the heels of their horses.

For some distance, they moved straight on, without looking for the tracks of the steed. Before meeting the fire, they had traced them beyond the edge of the chapparal, and therefore knew the direction.

After a while, I observed them moving more slowly, with their eyes upon the ground as if they had lost it, I had doubts of their being able either to find or follow it now. The shallow hoof-prints would be filled with the débris of the burnt herbage – surely they could no longer be traced?

By myself, they could not, nor by a common man; but it seemed that to the eyes of those keen hunters, the trail was as conspicuous as ever. I saw that, after searching a few seconds, they had taken it up, and were once more moving along, guided by the tracks.

Some slight hollows I could perceive, distributed here and there over the ground, and scarcely distinguishable from the surrounding level. Certainly, without having been told what they were, I should not have known them to be the tracks of a horse.

It proved a wide prairie, and we seemed to be crossing its central part. The fire had spread far.

At one place, nearly midway, where the trail was faint, and difficult to make out, we stopped for a short while to give the trackers time. A momentary curiosity induced me to gaze around. Awful was the scene – awful without sublimity. Even the thorny chapparal no longer relieved the eye; the outline of its low shrubbery had sunk below the horizon; and on all sides stretched the charred plain up to the rim of the leaden canopy, black – black – illimitable. Had I been alone, I might easily have yielded to the fancy, that the world was dead.

Gazing over this vast opacity, I for a moment forgot my companions, and fell into a sort of lethargic stupor. I fancied that I too was dead or dreaming – I fancied that I was in hell – the Avernus of the ancients. In my youth, I had the misfortune to be well schooled in classic lore – to the neglect of studies more useful – and often in life have the poetical absurdities of Greek and Latin mythology intruded themselves upon my spirit – both asleep and awake. I fancied, therefore, that some well-meaning Anchises had introduced me to the regions below; and that the black plain before me was some landscape in the kingdom of Pluto. Reflection – had I been capable of that – would have convinced me of my error. No part of that monarch’s dominions can be so thinly peopled.

I was summoned to reason again by the voices of my followers. The lost trail had been found, and they were moving on.

Chapter Seventy One.

The Talk of the Trackers

I spurred after, and soon overtook them. Regardless of the dust, I rode close in the rear of the trackers, and listened to what they were saying.

These “men of the mountains” – as they prided to call themselves – were peculiar in everything. While engaged in a duty, such as the present, they would scarce disclose their thoughts, even to me; much less were they communicative with the rest of my following, whom they were accustomed to regard as “greenhorns” – their favourite appellation for all men who have not made the tour of the grand prairies.

Notwithstanding that Stanfield and Black were backwoodsmen and hunters by profession, Quackenboss a splendid shot, Le Blanc a regular voyageur, and the others more or less skilled in woodcraft, all were greenhorns in the opinion of the trappers. To be otherwise a man must have starved upon a “sage-prairie” – “run” buffalo by the Yellowstone or Platte – fought “Injun,” and shot Indian – have well-nigh lost scalp or ears – spent a winter in Pierre’s Hole upon Green River – or camped amid the snows of the Rocky Mountains! Some one of all these feats must needs have been performed, ere the “greenhorn” can matriculate and take rank as a “mountain man.”

I of all my party was the only one who, in the eyes of Rube and Garey, was not a greenhorn; and even I – gentleman-amateur that I was – was hardly up either in their confidence or their “craft.” It is indeed true – with all my classic accomplishments – with my fine words, my fine horse, and fine clothes – so long as we were within the limits of prairie-land, I acknowledged these men as my superiors. They were my guides, my instructors, my masters.

Since overtaking them on the trail, I had not asked them to give any opinion. I dreaded a direct answer – for I had noticed something like a despairing look in the eyes of both.

As I followed them over the black plain, however, I thought that their faces brightened a little, and appeared once more lit up by a faint ray of hope. For that reason, I rode close upon their heels, and eagerly caught up every word that was passing between them. Rube was speaking when I first drew near.

“Wagh! I don’t b’lieve it, Bill: ’taint possyble no-howso-ever. The paraira wur sot afire – must ’a been – thur’s no other ways for it. It cudn’t ’a tuk to bleezing o’ itself – eh?”

“Sartinly not; I agree wi’ you, Rube.”

“Wal – thur wur a fellur as I met oncest at Bent’s Fort on the Arkinsaw – a odd sort o’ a critter he wur, an no mistake; he us’t to go pokin about, gatherin’ weeds an’ all sorts o’ green garbitch, an’ spreadin’ ’em out atween sheets o’ paper – whet he called button-eyesin – jest like thet ur Dutch doctur as wur rubbed out when we went into the Navagh country, t’other side o’ the Grand.”

“I remembers him.”

“Wal, this hyur fellur I tell ’ee about, he us’t to talk mighty big o’ this, thet, an t’ other; an he palavered a heap ’bout a thing thet, ef I don’t disremember, wur called spuntainyus kumbuxshun.”

“I’ve heerd o’ ’t; that are the name.”

“Wal, the button-eyeser, he sayed thet a paraira mout take afire o’ itself, ’ithout anybody whatsomdiver heving sot it. Now, thet ur’s what this child don’t b’lieve, nohow. In coorse, I knows thet lightnin’ sometimes may sot a paraira a bleezin’, but lightnin’s a natral fire o’ itself; an it’s only reezunible to expect thet the dry grass wud catch from it like punk; but I shed like to know how fire kud kindle ’ithout somethin to kindle it – thet’s whet I shed like to know.”

“I don’t believe it can,” rejoined Garey.

“Ne’er a bit o’ it. I never seed a burnin’ paraira yit, thet thur wa’n’t eyther a camp-fire or a Injun at the bottom o’ it – thet ur ’ceptin whur lightnin hed did the bizness.”

“And you think, Rube, thar’s been Injun at the bottom o’ this?”

“Putty nigh sure; an I’ll gie you my reezuns. Fust, do ’ee see thur’s been no lightnin this mornin to ’a made the fire? Seconds, it’s too fur west hyur for any settlement o’ whites – in coorse I speak o’ Texans – thur might be Mexikins; them I don’t call white, nohow-nosomediver. An then, agin, it kin scace be Mexikins neyther. It ur too fur no’th for any o’ the yellur-bellies to be a straying jest now, seein as it’s the Mexikin moon wi’ the kimanchees, an both them an the Leepans ur on the war-trail. Wal, then, it’s clur thur’s no Mexikin ’bout hyur to hev sot the paraira afire, an thur’s been no lightnin to do it; thurfor, it must ’a been did eyther by a Injun, or thet ur dodrotted spuntainyus kumbuxshun.”

“One or t’other.”

“Wal, being as this child don’t b’lieve in the kumbuxshun nohow, thurfore it’s my opeenyun thet red Injuns did the bizness —they did sartint.”

“No doubt of it,” assented Garey.

“An ef they did,” continued the old trapper, “thur about yit some whur not fur off, an we’ve got to keep a sharp look-out for our har – thet’s what we hev.”

“Safe, we have,” assented Garey.

“I tell ’ee, Bill,” continued Rube in a new strain, “the Injuns is mighty riled jest now. I never knowd ’em so savagerous an fighty. The war hez gin ’em a fresh start, an thur dander’s up agin us, by reezun thet the gin’ral didn’t take thur offer to help us agin the yellur-bellies. Ef we meet wi’ eyther Kimanch or Leepan on these hyur plains, thu’ll scalp us, or we’ll scalp ’em – thet ’ll be it. Wagh!”

“But what for could they ’a sot the parairy on fire?” inquired Garey.

“Thet ere,” replied Rube, – “thet ere wur what puzzled me at fust. I thort it mout ’a been done by accydent – preehaps by the scattering o’ a camp-fire – for Injuns is careless enuf ’bout thet. Now, howsowever, I’ve got a different idee. Thet story thet Dutch an Frenchy hev fetched from the rancherie, gies me a insight inter the hull bizness.”

I knew the “story” to which Rube had reference. Lige and Le Blanc, when at the village, had heard some rumour of an Indian foray that had just been made against one of the Mexican towns, not far from the rancheria. It had occurred on the same day that we marched out. The Indians – supposed to be Lipans or Comanches – had sacked the place, and carried off both plunder and captives. A party of them had passed near the rancheria after we ourselves had left it. This party had “called” at the hacienda de Vargas and completed the pillage, left unfinished by the guerilla. This was the substance of what the messengers had heard.

“You mean about the Injuns?” said Garey, half interrogatively.

“In coorse,” rejoined Rube. “Belike enuf, ’em Injuns ur the same niggurs we gin sich a rib-roastin’ to by the moun. Wagh! they hain’t gone back to thur mountains, as ’twur b’lieved: they dassent ’a gone back in sich disgrace, ’ithout takin’ eyther har or hosses. The squaws ud ’a hooted ’em out o’ thur wigwams.”

“Sure enough.”

“Sure, sartint. Wal, Billee, ’ee see now what I mean: thet party’s been a skulketin’ ’bout hyur ever since, till they got a fust-rate chance at the Mexikin town, an thur they’ve struck a blow.”

“It’s mighty like as you say, Rube; but why have they sot fire to the parairy?”

“Wagh! Bill, kin ye not see why? it ur plain as Pike’s Peak on a summery day.”

“I don’t see,” responded Garey, in a thoughtful tone.

“Well, this child do; an this ur the reezun: as I tell ’ee, the Injuns hain’t forgot the lambaystin they hed by the moun; an preehaps bein’ now a weak party, an thinkin’ thet we as wolloped ’em wur still i’ the rancherie, they wur afeerd thet on hearing o’ thur pilledgin’, we mout be arter ’em.”

“An they’ve burnt the parairy to kiver thur trail?”

“Preezactly so.”

“By Gosh, you’re right, Rube! – it’s uncommon like. But whar do you think this trail’s goin? Surely the hoss hain’t been caught in the fire?”

I bent forward in the saddle, and listened with acute eagerness. To my great relief, the answer of the old trapper was in the negative.

“He hain’t,” said he; “ne’er a bit o’ it. His trail, do ee see, runs in a bee-line, or clost on a bee-line: now, ef the fire hed ’a begun afore he wur acrosst this paraira, he wud long since ’a doubled ’bout, an tuk the back track; but ’ee see he hain’t did so; thurfor, I conclude he’s safe through it, an the grass must ’a been sot afire ahint ’im.”

I breathed freely after listening to these words. A load seemed lifted from my breast – for up to this moment I had been vainly endeavouring to combat the fearful apprehension that had shaped itself in my imagination. From the moment that we had entered the burning prairie, my eyes constantly, and almost mechanically, had sought the ground in front of our course, had wandered over it, with uneasy glance, in dread of beholding forms – lifeless – burned and charred —

The words of the trapper gave relief – almost an assurance that the steed and his rider were still safe – and under the inspiration of renewed hope, I rode forward with lighter heart.

Chapter Seventy Two.

“Injun Sign.”

After a pause, the guides resumed their conversation, and I continued to listen.

I had a reason for not mingling in it. If I joined them in their counsels, they might not express their convictions so freely, and I was desirous of knowing what they truly thought. By keeping close behind them, I could hear all – myself unnoticed under the cloud of dust that ascended around us. On the soft ashes, the hoof-stroke was scarcely audible – our horses gliding along in a sweeping silent walk.

“By Gosh! then,” said Garey, “if Injuns fired the parairy, they must ’a done it to wind’ard, an we’re travellin’ right in the teeth o’ the wind; we’re goin in a ugly direction, Rube; what do you think o’ ’t, old hoss?”

“Jest what you sez, boyee – a cussed ugly direckshun – durnation’d ugly.”

“It ain’t many hours since the fire begun, an the redskins won’t be far from t’other side, I reckon. If the hoss-trail leads us right on them, we’ll be in a fix, old boy.”

“Ay,” replied Rube, in a low but significant drawl; “ef it do, an ef this niggur don’t a miskalkerlate, it will lead right on ’em, plum straight custrut into thur camp.”

I started on hearing this. I could no longer remain silent; but brushing rapidly forward to the side of the trapper, in hasty phrase demanded his meaning.

“Jest what ’ee’ve heern me say, young fellur,” was his reply.

“You think that there are Indians ahead? that the horse has gone to their camp?”

“No, not gone thur; nor kin I say for sartint thur ur Injuns ahead; though it looks mighty like. Thur’s nuthin else to guv reezun for the fire – nuthin as Bill or me kin think o’; an ef thur be Injuns, then I don’t think the hoss hez gone to thur camp, but I do kalkerlate it’s mighty like he’s been tuk thur: thet’s what I thinks, young fellur.”

“You mean that the Indians have captured him?”

“Thet’s preezactly what this child means.”

“But how? What reason have you for thinking so?”

“Wal – jest because I think so.”

“Pray explain, Rube!” I said in an appealing tone. I feared that his secretive instincts would get the better of him, and he would delay giving his reasons, out of the pure love of mystification that was inherent in the old fellow’s nature. I was too anxious to be patient; but my appeal proved successful.

“Wal, ’ee see, young fellur, the hoss must ’a crosst hyur jest afore this paraira wur sot afire; an it’s mighty reezunible to s’pose thet whosomediver did the bizness, Injun or no Injun, must ’a been to win’ard o’ hyur. It ur also likely enuf, I reckun, thet the party must ’a seed the hoss; an it ur likely agin thet nobody wa’nt a gwine to see thet hoss, wi’ the gurl stropped down ’long his hump-ribs, ’ithout bein’ kewrious enuf to take arter ’im. Injuns ’ud be safe to go arter ’im, yellin’ like blazes; an arter ’im they’ve gone, an roped ’im, I reckun – thet they’ve done.”

“You think they could have caught him?”

“Sartint. The hoss by then must ’a been dead beat – thet ur, unless he’s got the divvel in ’im; an by Geehorum! I gin to surspect – Gehu – Gehosophat! jest as I said; lookee, thur – thur!”

“What is it?” I inquired, seeing the speaker suddenly halt and point to the ground, upon which his eyes also were fixed. “What is it, Rube? I can perceive nothing strange.”

“Don’t ’ee see ’em hoss-tracks? – thur! – thick as sheep-feet – hundreds o’ ’em!”

I certainly noticed some slight hollows in the surface, nearly levelled up by the black ashes. I should not have known them to be horse-tracks.

“They ur,” said Rube, “every one o’ ’em – an Injun hoss-tracks too – sartint they ur.”

“They may be the wild-hosses, Rube?” said one of the rangers, riding up and surveying the sign.

“Wild jackasses!” angrily retorted the old trapper. “Whur did you ever see a wild-hoss? Do ’ee s’pose I’ve turned stone-blind, do ’ee? Stan thur, my mar!” he cried, talking to his mare, flinging his lean carcass out of the saddle at the same time: “stan thur! ’ee knows better than thet fellur, I kin tell by the way yur sniftin’. Keep yur ground a minnit, ole gurl, till Rube Rawlins shew these hyur greenhorns how a mountain man kin read sign – wild-hosses! wagh!”

After thus delivering himself, the trapper dropped upon his knees, placed his lips close to the ground, and commenced blowing at the black ashes.