Читать книгу The Shagganappi - E. Pauline Johnson - Страница 7

And all night long they slept the hours peacefully away, the strong, athletic, well-knit, muscular white boy, the slender, agile, adroit Indian side by side, their firm young cheeks pillowed on thousands and thousands of dollars' worth of yellow gold.

With the first hint of dawn, Fox-Foot was astir. Before he left the tent, however, he cautiously placed his sack under Larry's blanket, and within the turn of that gentleman's elbow. Once more good luck attended his efforts with rod and line, and he got a dozen trout in almost as many minutes. Larry's nose usually awakened him when it sniffed early cooking, so now he rolled over to pummel Jack, then up to sing and whistle through his morning toilet like a schoolboy. Breakfast over, they struck camp, Fox-Foot taking command in packing the canoe, giving most rigid instructions as to saving the sacks should there be an upset. Larry took one long, last look at the wild surroundings. The dense pine forest, the forbidding rocks, the silver upper reaches of the river where his fought-for treasure had lain hidden for two years from all human eyes, unknown to any living man save himself. Then the canoe swung into midstream for the return voyage, its narrow little bow facing the south at last.

For many days the taut little craft danced merrily, homeward bound. For many nights the three voyageurs camped, slept, and dreamed, with only the laughing loons, the calling herons, the plaintive owls, and distant fox bark to sweep across their slumbers. But as the days went on, the Indian boy grew more wary; his glance seemed keener, his ears forever on the alert; he appeared like a lithe, silent watchdog, holding itself ready to spring, and snap, and bury its fine white teeth in the throat of an enemy to its household. His paddle dipped noiselessly, his head turned rapidly, his eye narrowed dangerously. Larry and Jack saw it all, but they said nothing, only relieved the Chippewa of all the work they possibly could, so that, should necessity demand that Fox-Foot must lose rest and food, he would be well fortified for every tax placed upon him. Jack took to cooking the meals, as a wild duck takes to the water, insisting that Fox-Foot rest after paddling, and the Indian accepting it all without comment, and sleeping at a moment's notice—seemingly storing it up against future needs. But the evening came when the laughing river gurgled into Lake Nameless, and that night they camped below its frowning shores on a narrow strip of beach, where the driftwood of many years and many storms had stranded, seemingly forever. All three had rolled into blankets, with sleep hovering above and about them, when, noiselessly as the dawn, Fox-Foot slipped from his bed like an eel, dipped under the tent, and was gone.

"Larry," whispered Jack, fearfully.

"Yes, boy?" came the reply.

"Did you see that?"

"Yes, boy."

"But—Larry, oh, it's horrible! I hate myself for saying it—but, oh,

Larry, he's taken a sack with him. I saw it."

"Yes, boy."

"Listen! Oh, Larry, s-s-h—"

Matt Larson turned on his back, every nerve strung to snapping pitch. Two whispering voices assailed his ears. The horror of them seemed to grip his heart and stop its very beating. Fox-Foot was speaking.

"You's not a good man. I hate you. You's bad all over, but I have to trust you. You got me cornered. Here's the gold, same's I promised. You take half. I take half. You hide it. Bime-by when I get them out of this, I come back, then we divide. But you sure hide it now, hide it. Good. GOOD."

Then came the reply in English, good English. There was only one voice in all the world that had that hissing, snaky sound, and Larry knew it to his cost. It was the voice of the man in the mackinaw, and it was hissing:

"Bet your life I'll hide it, Fox-Foot, and you're a good, decent Indian boy. You shall have half, sure, but get both of those dogs out of here. Get 'em away, right off."

"I scairt," replied the Indian, "I clean scairt. When he finds out, maybe he kill me. I got no knife, no gun—nothing. I scairt."

"Here, take my revolver," replied the man. "And I tell you, Fox-Foot, if they kick up, you put a bullet clean through them, both of them."

"Sure. Give me it," said the Indian in a soft, oily voice. Then, "Now, now, I feel safer with that inside my shirt."

Matt Larson's face was white as a sheet. He did not care a dollar for his lost gold, but for this Indian boy to fail him—oh, it was heartbreaking! He buried his face in his hands. "Oh, Foxy!" he almost sobbed. "Foxy, my little Chippewa friend, I have tried so hard to treat you square—and—Foxy, you've failed me! You've failed me." And big, burly Jack Cornwall's tear-wet face was lying against Larry's hand, and poor, big, burly Jack Cornwall's voice was catching in his throat as he said:

"Oh, Fox-Foot! Fox-Foot! I'd rather have died than heard this—this from you!"

Then came a hurried good-bye between the two creatures outside, and Fox-Foot slipped back into the tent, slipped back noiselessly, snakily as an eel in its own slime.

For a full hour Larry and Jack lay there in the dark, hand gripping hand. One sack of gold had gone, stolen by their trusted friend, who lay near them, a loaded revolver inside his shirt, and a threat on his lips—a threat to kill them both.

At the end of the hour the Indian arose, struck a match, lighted a bit of candle, and taking the revolver from his shirt, examined it closely. Through narrowed lids Larry could see by even that faint light that it was fully loaded.

With a sweet, almost motherly movement, Matt Larson curled his arm around the boy at his side. They at least would face death together. But the Indian was crawling slowly, silently up towards them, closer, closer. At last the slim, brown fingers touched Larry's shoulder, and the soft Chippewa voice whispered:

"Larry, Jack, wake! See, see, the great thing I got. I got his revolver. He never harm us now."

Larry sat bolt upright.

"What do you mean, Foxy? What do you mean, I say? What have you done with my gold?"

"Gold? Your gold?" exclaimed the Indian boy in surprise. "Your gold? Why, she's all here"; and flinging back his cover blanket he displayed a gorgeous sight. There, in a thick, deep layer, piled on his under blanket, lay every single, blessed nugget belonging to the one sack he had slept on.

"But," stammered Larry, his eyes popping out of his head in amazement, "but, Foxy, I heard you bargain with him, I heard you give him the sack of gold."

"No," replied the Indian, smiling; "heard me give him the sack, the sack filled with stones and pebbles, not with gold. But I've got his gun, got it here, here in my shirt. He is now unarmed. He can't shoot you now!"

Matt Larson held out his arms. "Oh, Foxy, Foxy, forgive me, forgive me!

For the moment I mistrusted you, I doubted you, my boy."

"I love you just same as ever; no difference if you did suspect, I no change," said the Indian, as Larry's splendid arms closed about his lithe young shoulders.

Then Jack Cornwall's voice found utterance. "Fox-Foot! Oh, Fox-Foot!" was all he could say, but the Indian boy laid his slim finger across Jack's honest, boyish lips, saying:

"I know. Indian he always know. I love you just same as if you never doubt."

And Jack knew that Fox-Foot spoke the truth.

"But we must go, go at once," continued the Chippewa. "He maybe come back, if he find I cheat him. I bad fellow—me. Long ago, before you come on train, I think maybe he follow us, maybe steal your gold, so I find him, I speak to him with two tongues, one false tongue, one straight tongue. I bargain with him to come to Lake Nameless. I meet him here. We divide your gold, he and I. All the time I make bargain with him I have plan in my heart, just trick to get all his revolver from him, so he can't shoot you, Larry. I know he shoot you if I don't get that gun from him. So—I do all this to-night. I play my trick on him. We save our gold, we save our lives, maybe. So—you understand now? I bad fellow, me, but I am only bad to bad man like him. You understand now? You?"

"Understand?" cried Larry, leaping to his feet. "Understand? Why, Foxy, you're a prince! You're a king! You're the best boy that ever drew the breath of life. You are—"

"Don't stop now to tell me what I am," laughed Fox-Foot. "It is enough that I am your friend, Jack's friend, and the man may be back with his sack of pebbles." Here the Indian sat down in a fit of irresistible laughter. Then, controlling himself, he continued, "We must be away inside ten minutes—quick!"

The other two had long ago grasped the entire situation, and in a twinkling camp was struck, and they were heading for the far shore, Larry paddling bow, the Indian astern, and both working for dear life.

Before daybreak they had reached the outlet of the lake, and, wearied as they were with excitement, haste and continuous paddling, Larry still urged that they proceed. But the Indian would not listen to it. Larry and Jack must sleep, he insisted, or none of them would be fit to face the man should he follow, which he undoubtedly would, as soon as he discovered the trick which had been played on him. So the two palefaces once more rolled in their blankets, not waiting to pitch the tent, and the Indian crouched forward near the water's edge to watch, watch, watch, with sleepless, peering eyes, that nothing, living or dead, could hope to escape.