''Bring Me His Ears'' - Clarence E. Mulford (good books to read for women txt) 📗

the cabin again and letting his eyes rest for a moment on Ephriam Schoolcraft, he wheeled and started for the door, but paused as he reached it. "If there's any further trouble I'll be on the hurricane deck, for'rd. We're going to run all night if we can. I don't want any more disturbance on this packet."

As the captain left, Uncle Joe thanked Tom and the trappers and joined them at their table, providing the refreshment most liked by the plainsmen, and the reminiscences became so interesting that the little group scarcely noticed Tom arise and leave it. He was too restless to stay indoors and soon found a place to his liking on the deck below, near the bow, where he paced to and fro in the darkness, wrestling with a tumult of hopes and fears. Reaching one end of his beat, he wheeled and started back again, and as he passed the cabin door he suddenly stopped and peered at the figure framed in the opening, and tore off his hat, too surprised to speak.

"Mr. Boyd?" came a soft, inquiring, and anxious voice.

"Yes, Miss Cooper; but I thought you were fast asleep long ago!"

"I was," she replied; "but something that sounded like a shot awakened me, and thinking that it seemed to come from the card tables, I became fearful and dressed as hurriedly as I could in the dark. Is—is Uncle Joe—all right?"

"In good health, good company, and in the best of spirits," replied Tom, smiling at how the last word might be interpreted. "I left him only a moment ago, swapping tales with some trappers."

"But the shot. Surely it was a shot that awakened me?"

Tom chuckled. "Sleeve pistol fell to the floor and went off accidentally," he explained. "Luckily no one was hurt, for the ball passed out of a window and went over the river. Are you warm enough? This wind is cutting." At her assent he took a step forward. "I'll see you to your room if you wish."

"I'm too wide awake now to sleep for awhile," she replied, joining him. "Didn't the boat stop?"

"Yes; two passengers went ashore in the yawl," he answered. "These packets are certainly accommodating and deserve patronage. Why, Miss Cooper, you're shivering! Are you sure you are warm enough?"

"Yes," she answered. "Something is bothering me. I don't know what it is. I wish we were at Independence though. Day and night this river fascinates me and almost frightens me. It is so swift, so treacherous, so changeful. It reminds me of some great cat, slipping through a jungle; and I can't throw the feeling off. If you don't mind, I'll join you in your sentry-go, you seem to give me the assurance I lack; but perhaps I'll interfere with your thoughts?"

"Hardly that," he laughed, thrilling as she took his arm for safety against stumbles in the dark. "You stimulate them, instead. I really was pacing off a fit of restlessness; but it's gone now. Look here; I wonder if you fully realize the certain hardships and probable dangers of the overland journey you are about to make?"

"Perfectly, Mr. Boyd," she answered, quietly. "You'll find me a different person on land. I underestimate nothing, but hope for the best. From little things I've picked up here and there I really believe that the dangers of the trail will be incidental when compared with those at the other end—at Santa Fe. I have reason to believe that father has had a great deal of trouble, along with other Americans, with Governor Armijo. Why is it that American citizens are insulted with impunity by Mexican officials? I understand that an Englishman may safely travel from one end of Mexico to the other, secure from annoyance, unless it be at the hands of Indians over whom the government exercises but little control."

"It's a universal complaint along the frontier," he replied. "It seems to be the policy of this country to avoid hurting the sensibilities of any vicious officialdom or ignorant populace. We seem to prefer to have our citizens harassed, insulted, and denied justice, rather than assert unequivocally that the flag goes in spirit with every one of us so long as we obey the laws of any country we are in. If it were not for the banding together of the American traders and merchants in Santa Fe, it would be very hazardous for an American to remain there. Armijo has had a few clashes with our people and is beginning to have a little respect for their determination and ability to defend their rights. Since the sufferings of the Texans have become known, there are any number of Americans in frontier garb who would cheerfully choke him to death. It would be a godsend to the New Mexican people if——"

There came a terrific crash, the boat stopped suddenly and the deck arose under their feet as a huge log smashed up through it. They were torn apart and thrown down, and as Tom scrambled to his feet, calling his companion's name, he felt a great relief surge through him as he heard her answer.

CHAPTER VII

THE WRECKING OF THE MISSOURI BELLE

Tom grasped his companion's arm and hurried her toward the place where the yawl was tied as shouts, curses, tearing wood and a panic-stricken crowd of passengers pouring out of the cabins and rooms turned the night into a pandemonium, over which the hysterical blasts of the whistle bellowed its raucous calls for help far and wide across water and land. There came a rush of feet and several groups of passengers dashed toward the yawl, but stopped abruptly and hesitated as the Colt in Tom's hand glinted coldly in the soft light of a cabin window.

"Women first!" he snarled, savage as an animal at bay. "I'll kill th' first man that comes any closer! Get those bullboats overside, an' somebody round up th' other women an' bring 'em here! Keep cool, an' everybody'll be saved—lose yore heads an' we'll all die, some quicker'n others! Not another step forward!"

"Right ye air, friend," said a voice, and Zack, pistol in hand, dropped from the deck above and alighted at Tom's side like a fighting bobcat. "Put over them bullboats—an' be shore ye get hold o' th' ropes when ye do. Lady!" he shouted, catching sight of an emigrant and his wife. "Come hyar! An' you," he commanded her husband, "stan' by us—shoot ter kill if ye pulls trigger. Fine bunch o' cattle!" he sneered, and the rapidly growing crowd, finding that the guns facing them did not waver, turned and stampeded for the bullboats, every man of it bellowing orders and getting in the way of everyone else. There came a splash, a chorus of curses as a bullboat, thrown overboard upside down, slipped away in the darkness.

"Right side up, ye tarnation fools!" roared a voice, accompanied by a solid smash as a hunter near the boats knocked down a frantic freighter and took charge of the mob. "I'm fixin' fer to kill somebody!" he yelled. "Hang onter that rope or I'll spatter yer brains all over creation! Right side up, damn ye! Hold her! Thar! Now then, put over another—if ye git in that boat till I says so ye won't have no need fer it!"

Friends coming to his aid helped him hold the milling mob, and their coolness and determination, tried in many ticklish situations, stood them in good stead.

"Ask th' captain how bad she is!" shouted Tom as he caught sight of Joe Cooper tearing through the crowd like a madman. "I got Patience an' another woman here!"

"I might 'a' known it," yelled Uncle Joe, fighting back the way he had come. In a moment he returned and shouted until the frantic crowd gave him heed. "Cap'n says she can't sink! Cap'n says she can't sink! Listen, damn ye! Cap'n says she can't sink. He's groundin' her on a bar! Keep 'em out of them boats, boys! Don't let them fools get in th' boats! Not till th' very last thing! They'll only swamp 'em."

"Good fer you, St. Louis!" roared a mountaineer, playing with a skinning knife in most suggestive manner.

"Th' boilers'll blow up! Th' boilers'll blow up! Look out for th' boilers!" yelled a tenderfoot, fighting to get to the boats. "They'll blow up! They'll blow——"

Zack took one swift step sideways and brought the butt of his pistol down on the jumping jack's head. "Let 'em blow, sister!" he shouted. "You won't hear 'em! Any more scared o' th' boilers?" he yelled, facing the crowd menacingly. "They won't blow up till th' water gits to 'em, an' when it does we'll all be knee-deep in it. Thar on this hyar deck, ye sheep!"

One man was running around in a circle not five feet across, moaning and blubbering. Tom glanced at him as he came around and stepped quickly forward, his foot streaking out and up. It caught the human pinwheel on the chest and he turned a beautiful back flip into the crowd. Zack's booming laugh roared out over the water and he slapped Tom resoundingly on the shoulder.

"More fun right hyar than in a free-fer-all at a winter rendyvoo, pardner. You kick wuss nor a mule. An' whar you goin'?" he asked a tin-horn gambler who took advantage of his lapse of alertness to dart past him. Zack swung his stiff arm and the gambler bounced back as though he had been struck with a club. "Thar's plenty o' it hyar if yer lookin' fer it," he shouted, raising his pistol.

Uncle Joe clawed his way back again, Tom's double-barreled rifle in his hands, and grimly took his place at his friend's side. Suddenly he cocked his head and then heard Tom's voice bellow past his ear.

"Listen, you fools! Th' fur boat! Th' fur boat!" he yelled at the top of his lungs. His companions and the other little group of resolute men took up the cry, and as the furor of the crowd died down, the answering blasts rolled up the river. Suddenly a light, and then an orderly series of them pushed out from behind the last bend downstream, and showers of sparks from the belching stacks of the oncoming fur company boat danced and whirled high into the night, the splashing tattoo of her churning paddles sounding like music between the reassuring blasts of her whistle. The two stokers hanging from the levers of her safety valves kicked their feet in time with her whistle, not knowing which kick would usher them on an upward journey ending at St. Peter's eager gate. Their skins were as black as the rods they swung from, but their souls were as white as their rolling eyes.

"Thank God!" screamed a woman who was fighting her way through the crowd toward Tom's post, her clothing nearly torn from her; and at the words she sagged to the deck, inert, unresisting. Tom leaped forward and hauled her back with him, passed her on to Patience and resumed his grim guard.

A great shout, still tinged with horror and edged with fear, arose from the decks of the Belle and thundered across the river, the answering roar chopped up by the insistent whistle. Several red, stringy, rapier-like flashes pierced the night and the heavy reports barked across the hurrying water, to be juggled by a great cliff on the north bank.

Captain Newell had been busy. Learning that cool minds were dominating the panicky crowd, and that the bullboats were being properly launched and were ready for use if the worst came, he gave his undivided attention to the saving of the Belle. Her paddle still thrashed, but at a speed just great enough to overcome the current and to hold the snag in the wound it had made. Experience