The Lost Trail by Edward Sylvester Ellis (best romantic novels to read .TXT) 📗
- Author: Edward Sylvester Ellis
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"It's a quaar being he is entirely, when it's meself that could barely git into the thicket, and he might have saved his hide by making a short thramp around, rather than plunging through in this shtyle."
Teddy pressed on for two hours more, when he began to believe that he was close upon the hunter, who must have traveled without intermission to have eluded him thus far. He therefore maintained a strict watch, and advanced with more caution.
The woods began to thicken, and the Hibernian was brought to a stand-still by the sound of a rustling in the bushes. Proceeding some distance further, he came upon the edge of a bank or declivity, where he believed the strange hunter had laid down to rest. The footprints were visible upon the edge of the bank, and at the bottom of the latter was a mass of heavy undergrowth, so dense as effectually to preclude all observation of what might be concealed within it.
It was in the shrubbery, directly beneath him, that Teddy believed the hunter lay. He must be wearied and exhausted, and no doubt was in a deep sleep. Teddy was sure, in his enthusiasm, that he had obtained a glimpse of the hunter's clothes through the interstices of the leaves, so that he could determine precisely the spot where he lay, and even the position of his body—so eagerly did the faithful fellow's wishes keep in advance of his senses.
And now arose the all-important question as to what he should do. He might shoot him dead as he slept, and there is little question but what Teddy would have done it had he not been restrained by the simple question of expediency. The hunter was alone, and, if slain, all clue to the whereabouts of Mrs. Richter would be irrecoverably lost. What tidings that might ever be received regarding her, must come from the lips of him who had abducted her. If he could desperately wound the man, he might frighten him into a confession, but then Teddy feared instead of wounding him merely with his rifle, he would kill him altogether if he attempted to shoot.
After a full half-hour's deliberation, Teddy decided upon his course of action. It was to spring knife in hand directly upon the face of the hunter, pin him to the ground and then force the confession from his lips, under a threat of his life, the Irishman mercifully resolving to slay him at any rate, after he had obtained all that was possible from him.
Teddy did not forget his experience of a few months before when the hunter gave him an involuntary bath in the river. He therefore held his knife firmly in his right hand. Now that he had concluded what to do, he lost no time in carrying his plan into execution.
He took a crouching position, such as is assumed by the panther when about to spring upon its prey, and then drawing his breath, he leaped downward.
A yelping howl, an impetuous scratching and struggling of the furious mass that he attempted to inclose in his arms, told Teddy that instead of the hunter, he had pounced down upon an innocent, sleeping bear!
It was well for the Irishman that the bear was peaceably inclined, else his search for the lost trail might have terminated then and there. The brute, after freeing itself from its incubus, sprung off and made all haste into the woods, leaving Teddy gazing after it in stupefied amazement. He rose to his feet, stared at the spot where it had last appeared and then drew a deep sigh, and sadly shook his head.
"I say nothing! Be jabers! it's meself that can't do justice to the thame!"
Harvey Richter stood in his cabin-door, about five months after his great loss, gazing off toward the path which led to the Indian village, and which he had traveled so many, many times. Sad and weary was his countenance, as he stood, at the close of the day, looking into the forest, as if he expected that it would speak and reveal what it knew of his beloved partner, who was somewhere concealed within its gloomy depths. Ah, how many an hour had he looked, but in vain. The forest refused to give back the lost, nor did it breathe one word of her, to ease the gloom which hung so heavily upon his soul.
A footfall caught his ear, and turning, he saw Teddy standing before him. The face of the Irishman was as dejected as his own, and the widowed man knew there was scarce need of the question:
"Have you heard anything, Teddy?"
"Nothing, sir, saving that nothing is to be learnt."
"Not my will, but thine, oh God, be done!" exclaimed the missionary, reverently, and yet with a wailing sadness, that proved how unutterable was his woe.
CHAPTER VIII.THE TRAIL OF DEATH.
Therefore, I pray you, stay not to discourse,
But mount you presently.—SHAKESPEARE.
The trapper, after separating from the Irishman, pursued his way through the woods with a slow tread, as if he were deliberating some matter with himself. Occasionally he muttered and shook his head, in a manner that showed his conscience was getting the better of the debate, whatever it might be. Finally he paused.
"Yas, sir; it's a mean piece of business in me. 'Cause I want to cotch a few beavers I must let this gal be, when she has been lost to her husband already for three months. It's ongenerous, and can't be done!" he exclaimed, emphatically. "What if I does lose a few peltries when they're bringing such a good price down in St. Louey? Can't I afford to do it, when there's a gal in the matter?"
He resumed his walk as slowly and thoughtfully as before, muttering to himself.
"If I go, I goes alone; least I don't go with that Teddy, for he'd be sartin to lose my ha'r as sure as we got onto a trail. There's no calc'latin' the blunders of such a man. How he has saved his own scalp to this time is more nor I can tell, or himself neither, for that matter, I guess. I've been on many a trail-hunt alone, and if I goes—if I goes, why, in course I does!" he added, impetuously.
The resolution once taken seemed to afford him unusual pleasure, as it does with us all when the voice of conscience is a monitor that is heeded. He was tramping toward the west, and now that the matter was decided in his own mind, he paused again, as if he could better debate other matters that must in the circumstances necessarily present themselves.
"In the first place, there's no use of going any further on this track, for I ain't gettin' any nigher the gal, that's pretty sartin. From what that Teddy told me of his travels, it can't be that she's anywhere in these parts, for if she war, he couldn't have helped l'arning something of her in all this time. There's a tribe up north that I've heard was great on gettin' hold of white gals, and I think I'll make a s'arch in that direction afore I does anything else."
Nothing more remained for Tim but to carry out the resolution he had made, and it was characteristic of the man that he did it at once. Five minutes after the above words had been muttered, he was walking rapidly along in a northern direction, his rifle thrown over his arm, and a beaming expression of countenance that showed there were no regrets at the part he was acting. He had a habit of talking with himself, especially when some weighty or unusual matter obtruded itself. It is scarcely to be wondered, therefore, that he became quite talkative at the present time.
"I allers admire such adventur's as this, if they don't bring in anything more nor thanks. The style in which I've received them is allers worth more money nor I ever made trapping beavers. The time I cotched that little gal down on the Osage, that had been lost all summer, I thought her mother would eat me up afore she'd let me go. I believe I grinned all day and all night for a week after that, it made me think I was such a nice feller. Maybe it'll be the same way with this. Hello!"
The trapper paused abruptly, for on the ground before him he saw the unmistakable imprint of a moccasin. A single glance of his experienced eye assured him upon that point.
"That there are Injins in these parts is a settled p'int with me, and that red and white blood don't agree is another p'int that is settled. That track wasn't made there more nor two hours ago, and it's pretty sartin the one that made it ain't fur away at this time. It happens it leads to the north'ard, and it'll be a little divarsion to foller it, minding at the same time that there's an Injin in it."
For the present the trapper was on a trail, and he kept it with the skill and certainty of a hound. Over the dry leaves, the pebbly earth, the fresh grass, the swampy hollow—everywhere, he followed it with unerring skill.
"That Injin has been on a hunt," he muttered, "and is going back home agin. If it keeps in this direction much longer, I'll believe he's from the very village I'm hunting after. Heigh! there's something else up!"
He suddenly checked himself and began snuffing the air, as though it was tainted with something suspicious.
"I hope I may be shot if there ain't a camp-fire within two hundred yards of where I am standing."
He looked sharply around in every direction, but saw nothing of the camp, although positive that his olfactories could not have deceived him.
"Whether it belongs to white or red can't be said, sartin; but it's a great deal most likely that it's red, and it's just about as sartin that that Injin ahead of me has gone pretty close to the camp, so I'll keep on follering him."
A short distance further he became assured that he was in close proximity to the fire, and he began to use extreme caution in his movements. He knew very well how slight an inadvertence would betray his approach, and a betrayal was almost fatal. Advancing some distance further, he suddenly came in full view of the camp-fire. He saw three Indians seated around it, smoking, and appearing as if they had just finished their morning meal. It seemed, also, as if they were discussing some matter that deeply interested all. The mumbling of their voices could be heard, and one of them gesticulated quite freely, as though he were excited over the conference. There was not even the most remote possibility that what they were saying was of the least concern to the trapper; and so, after watching them a few moments, he moved cautiously by.
It was rarely that Tim ever had a mishap at such perilous times as these, but to his dismay something caught his foot so dextrously, that in spite of himself he was thrown flat upon his face. There was a dull thump, not very loud, it is true, but he feared it had reached the ears of the savages. He lay motionless, listening for a while, but hearing nothing of their voices or footsteps, he judged that either they had no suspicion of the true cause, or else had not heard him at all. He therefore rose to his feet and moved on, occasionally glancing back, to be sure he was not pursued.
The trapper proceeded in this manner until noon. Had the case been urgent, he would not have paused until nightfall, as his indurated muscles demanded no rest; he could go a couple of days without nourishment, and experience little inconvenience. But there was no call for haste. He therefore paused at noon, on the banks of a small stream, in quest of some water-fowl.
Tim gazed up and down-stream, but saw nothing that would serve as a dinner. He could have enticed a fish or two from their element, but he had set his heart upon partaking of a bird, and was not willing to accept anything else. Accordingly, he began walking down the bank of the creek in search of one.
In such a country as was Minnesota forty years ago, the difficult matter would have been to avoid game rather than to find it. The trapper had searched but a short distance, when he caught sight of a single ptarmigan under the opposite bank. In a twinkling Tim's rifle was raised, and, as it flashed forth its deadly messenger, the bird made a single struggle, and then floated, a dead object, down the current.
Although rather anxious for his prize, the trapper, like many a hunter since
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