The Mountain Divide - Frank H. Spearman (english reading book .txt) 📗

Stirred by the increasing boldness of the Indians, Stanley returned with his party to Medicine Bend to take further measures for the defence of the railroad men.

Bucks, when he reported to Baxter, the train despatcher, found new orders waiting for him. He was directed to take charge of the station at Goose Creek. The train did not leave till night, and Bucks took advantage of the interval to go uptown to make some necessary purchases of linen and clothing. On his way back to the station, with his package under his arm, he saw, on the edge of the broad sidewalk, Harvey Levake. Levake was standing near a wooden-Indian cigar-store sign, looking directly at Bucks as the latter walked toward him. The operator, nodding as he came up, asked Levake, without parley, whether he would give him the money for the express charges on the cartridges.

If Bucks had exploded a keg of powder on the sidewalk there could not have been a greater change in the outlaw’s manner. He stared at Bucks with contempt enough to pierce the feelings of the wooden Indian beside which he stood.

“What’s that?” he demanded, throwing his head menacingly forward.

Bucks repeated his request, but so mildly that Levake took additional umbrage at his diffidence.

“See here,” he muttered in a voice beginning like a distant roll of thunder and gathering force and volume as he continued, “don’t insult me.”

Bucks ventured to urge that he intended no insult.

“Don’t insult me!” bellowed Levake in violent tones.

Again Bucks attempted to protest. It was useless. Levake insisted with increasing wrath upon hugging the insult to himself, while Bucks struggled manfully to get it away from him. And as Levake’s loud words did not attract as much attention up and down the street as he sought, he 129 stamped about on the sidewalk. Bucks’s efforts to pacify him made matters momentarily worse.

Meantime a crowd such as Levake desired had gathered and Bucks found himself a target for the outlaw’s continued abuse, with nobody to take his part. Moreover, the expressions on the faces about him now made him realize his peril quite as much as anything in Levake’s words. It was becoming painfully evident that the onlookers were merely waiting to see Levake shoot him down.

“No man in Medicine Bend can insult me and live,” cried Levake, winding up a tirade of abuse. “I’m known from one end of this street to the other. Nobody can spread lies in it about me.”

He drew and flourished a revolver as he spoke. None in the crowd interfered with so much as a word. But even before the outlaw had finished what he was saying, a man of medium size and easy manner elbowed his way quietly through the circle of spectators, and, taking Bucks by the arm, drew him back and faced Levake himself. It was Bob Scott.

“What’s all this about, Levake?” demanded Scott gently.

Levake had no alternative but to turn his wrath upon the Indian scout. Yet those who knew him perceived that it was done without much stomach for the job. Instead of growing momentarily greater the violence of his abuse now grew steadily less, and the thunder in his tones rolled further and further from the subject.

Half-turning to Bucks, Scott laid his hand on his arm again. “Excuse me,” said he, deliberately and quietly, “but you are wanted quick at the station. They are waiting for you. Go right along, will you?”

Only too glad to get away and comprehending Scott’s ruse, Bucks exclaimed, “Why, of course, certainly,” and stepping quickly into the crowd walked away.

Turning again to Levake, Scott made no effort to check the torrent of his words. In consequence, the gambler found himself embarrassed by the prospect of talking himself out. This would not have been so bad except that his circle 131 of admirers would, when he stopped talking, expect him to do something and he was now at a loss to decide just what to do. To shoot down Bucks was rather a different matter from a pistol duel with Scott.

None of the street loafers about the two men knew Scott, nor did any of them know that Levake had a prudent respect for Scott’s trigger. As for Scott himself, a smile of contempt gradually covered his face as he listened to Levake’s outbreak. He only waited patiently for the moment, which he knew must come, when Levake should cease talking.

“Your tongue, Levake,” returned Scott at last, “is longer than a coyote’s. Why do you stand here and bellow about being insulted? What is all this noise about, anyway? These fellows,” a contemptuous nod indicated the men standing around, “all know, if you don’t. You’ve been talking loud so you could get a crowd together and advertise yourself by shooting an unarmed boy, haven’t you?”

The desperado broke out in fresh denials and 132 curses, but he feared the ridicule of the Indian would bring the laughter of his admirers down on him. Nor was he keen to try a pistol duel. He remembered too well the attack he had once headed on an emigrant train that Scott was guarding, and from which the outlaws with Levake had carried away some unexpected and unwelcome bullets.

Scott, now taunting Levake openly, stepped directly in front of him. But the latter waved him away. “I’ll settle my differences with you when I’m ready,” he muttered. “If that fellow,” he added, indicating Bucks, who was making record time across the square, “behaves himself, I’ll let this go. If he doesn’t, I’ll fill him full of lead.”

“When you do,” retorted Scott, “remember just one thing––that I’m going to fill you full, Levake. Don’t forget that.”

Scott stepped backward. The crowd parted to let him through and Levake walked sullenly toward the cigar store.

Bucks wiped the perspiration from his forehead 133 when he reached the station and drew a long breath. He waited until Scott crossed the square and joined him. The Indian only laughed when Bucks tried to thank him. “It is nothing,” he said, “you are getting experience. Only don’t tackle that man again till you give me notice beforehand.”

The next morning Bucks installed himself at Goose Creek.

Goose Creek was a mere operating point and besides the rough wooden station, with an attic sleeping-room for the operator, boasted only a house for the section crew––six men taken care of by a China boy cook. East of the station stood an old road ranch belonging to Leon Sublette. For this, freight was at times unloaded and an Indian trail to the south led through the sand-hills as far as the Arickaree country. North of the river greater sand-hills stretched as far as the eye could reach. The long, marshy stretches of the Nebraska River lost themselves on the eastern and the western horizon and at times clouds of wild fowl obscured the sun in their flight across the sky.

Dancing came down to the new station to complete the instalment of the instruments and this broke for a day or two the loneliness of the new surroundings. Indeed, there was hardly time to be lonely. The constant round of interest attending the arrival of trains with their long halts, visits from trappers living at the ranch who were always ready to talk, and occasional calls from friendly Pawnees from the south, together with abundance of time for hunting the geese and ducks, made the days go.

But one early summer morning Bucks woke to an adventure not upon his daily programme. He walked downstairs after dressing, and as he stepped out on the platform the sand-hills touched by the rising sun shone in the northwest like mountains of gold. Looking at them he saw to his surprise they were covered with black objects that appeared to be moving.

Indians were first in his mind, and in his alarm he ran all the way to the section-house where the foreman, after a hasty study of the hills, explained that the suspicious-looking objects were buffaloes.

This information only added to Bucks’s excitement. The China boy cook, Lee Ong, at the section-house appeared equally stirred at the situation and, after running in and out of the kitchen with much fluttering of cue and clattering of wooden shoes, promised Bucks a buffalo steak for dinner if he would bring in a hindquarter.

By the time Bucks had finished breakfast the whole country to the north was black with buffaloes. For hours they poured over the divide to the delight of the astonished boy, and after a time he wired Baxter at Medicine Bend that a herd of at least one million buffaloes was crossing the railroad at Goose Creek. As the grave despatcher seemed not greatly excited by this intelligence, Bucks followed up the story at intervals with vivid details. A wag on the wire in Medicine Bend played upon his enthusiasm by demanding frequent bulletins, even going so far as to ask the names of the leading buffaloes in the herd. When he had got all the laughs possible for the office out of the youthful operator, he wired Bucks that if 136 the herd should linger too long on the right-of-way he must notify them that they would be held as trespassers.

This message had hardly reached Goose Creek when the China boy came running into the telegraph office. His eyes were staring, and his face was greenish-white with fright. “Indians!” he exclaimed, running to Bucks’s side and dashing back again to the west window.

Bucks sprang to his feet. “Where?”

Lee Ong pointed to the northern sand-hills. Riding the broad slopes that led toward the river, Bucks saw a long string of braves, evidently a hunting party. The cook, beside himself with fear, ran out of the station before Bucks could stop him.

“Hi there, Lee,” cried the operator, running after him. “Where are the section men?”

“Gone,” cried Lee Ong, not ceasing to run, “all gone!” He pointed, with the words, to the east.

“Tell them to bring the hand-car down here!”

“Too much gone,” shouted Ong. “Omaha!”

“Lee!