Читать книгу Hardscrabble; or, the fall of Chicago: a tale of Indian warfare - Major Richardson - Страница 3

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It was on a beautiful day in the early part of the month of April, 1812, that four persons were met in a rude farm-house, situated on the Southern Branch of the Chicago river, and about four miles distant from the fort of that name. They had just risen from their humble mid-day meal, and three of them were now lingering near the fire-place, filled with blazing logs, which, at that early season, diffused a warmth by no means disagreeable, and gave an air of cheerfulness to the interior of the smoke-discolored building.

He who appeared to be master of the establishment was a tall, good looking man of about forty-five, who had, evidently, been long a denizen of the forest, for his bronzed countenance bore traces of care and toil, while his rugged, yet well-formed hands conveyed the impression of the unceasing war he had waged against the gigantic trees of this Western land. He was habited in a hunting-frock of grey homespun, reaching about half way down to his knee, and trimmed with a full fringe of a somewhat darker hue. His trowsers were of the same material, and both were girt around his loins by a common belt of black leather, fastened by a plain white buckle, into which was thrust a sheath of black leather also, containing a large knife peculiar to the backwoodsmen of that day. His feet were encased in moccasins, and on his head, covered with strong dark hair, was carelessly donned a slouched hat of common black felt, with several plaited folds of the sweet grass, of the adjoining prairie for a band. He was seemingly a man of strong muscular power, while his stern dark eye denoted firmness and daring.

The elder of the two men, to whom this individual stood, evidently, in the character of a superior, was a short thick-set person of about fifty, with huge whiskers that, originally black, had been slightly grizzled by time. His eyebrows were bushy and overhanging, and almost concealed the small, and twinkling eyes, which it required the beholder to encounter more than once before he could decide their true color to be a dark gray. A blanket coat that had once been white, but which the action of some half dozen winters had changed into a dirty yellow, enveloped his rather full form, around which it was confined by a coarse worsted sash of mingled blue and red, thickly studded with minute white beads. His trowsers, with broad seams, after the fashion of the Indian legging, were of a dark crimson, approaching to a brick-dust color, and on his feet he wore the stiff shoe-pack, which, with the bonnet bleu on his grizzled head, and the other parts of his dress already described, attested him to be what he was—a French Canadian. Close at his heels, and moving as he moved, or squatted on his haunches, gazing into the face of his master when stationary, was a large dog of the mongrel breed peculiar to the country—evidently with wolf blood in his veins.

His companion was of a different style of figure and costume. He was a thin, weak-looking man, of middle height, with a complexion that denoted his Saxon origin. Very thin brows, retrousse nose, and a light gray eye in which might be traced an expression half simple, half cunning, completed the picture of this personage, whose lank body was encased in an old American uniform of faded blue, so scanty in its proportions that the wrists of the wearer wholly exposed themselves beneath the short, narrow sleeves, while the skirts only “shadowed not concealed,” that part of the body they had been originally intended to cover. A pair of blue pantaloons, perfectly in keeping, on the score of scantiness and age, with the coat, covered the attenuated lower limbs of the wearer, on whose head, moreover, was stuck a conical cap that had all the appearance of having been once a portion of the same uniform, and had only undergone change in the loss of its peak. A small black leather, narrow ridged stock was clasped around his thin, and scare-crow neck, and that so tightly that it was the wonder of his companions how strangulation had so long been avoided. A dirty, and very coarse linen shirt, showed itself partially between the bottom of the stock, and the uppermost button of the coat, which was carefully closed, while his feet were protected from the friction of the stiff, though nearly worn out, military shoes, by wisps of hay, that supplied the absence of the sock. This man was about five and thirty.

The last of the little party was a boy. He was a raw-boned lad of about fourteen years of age, and of fair complexion, with blue eyes, and an immense head of bushy hair, of the same hue, which seemed never to have known the use of the comb. His feet were naked, and his trowsers and shirt, the only articles of dress upon him at the moment, were of a homespun somewhat resembling in color the hunting frock of his master. A thick black leather strap was also around his loins—evidently part of an old bridle rein.

The two men first described, drew near the fire and lighted their pipes. The ex-militaire thrust a quid of tobacco into his cheek, and taking up a small piece of pine board that rested against the chimney corner, split a portion off this with his jack-knife, and commenced whittling. The boy busied himself in clearing the table, throwing occasionally scraps of bread and dried venison, which had constituted the chief portion of the meal, to the dog, which, however, contrary to custom, paid little attention to these marks of favor, but moved impatiently, at intervals, to the door, then returning, squatted himself again on his haunches, at a short distance from his master, and uttering a low sound betwixt a whine and a growl, looked piteously up into his face.

“Vat the devil is de matter wid you, Loup Garou?” remarked the Canadian at length, as, removing the pipe from his lips, he stretched his legs, and poised himself in his low wood-bottomed chair, putting forth his right hand at the same time to his canine follower. “You not eat, and you make noise as if you wish me to see one racoon in de tree.”

“Loup Garou don't prate about coons I guess,” drawled the man in the faded uniform, without, however, removing his eyes from the very interesting occupation in which he was engaged. “That dog I take it, Le Noir, means something else—something more than we human critters know. By gosh, boss,” looking for the first time at him who stood in that position to the rest of the party—“If WE can't smell the varmint, I take it Loup Garou does.”

At this early period of civilization, in these remote countries, there was little distinction of rank between the master and the man—the employer and the employed. Indeed the one was distinguished from the other only by the instructions given and received, in regard to certain services to be performed. They labored together—took their meals together—generally smoked together—drank together—conversed together, and if they did not absolutely sleep together, often reposed in the same room. There was, therefore, nothing extraordinary in the familiar tone in which the ci-devant soldier now addressed him whose hired help he was. The latter, however, was in an irritable mood, and he answered sharply.

“What have you got into your foolish head now, Ephraim Giles? You do nothing but prophesy evil. What varmint do you talk of, and what has Loup Garou to do with it? Speak, what do you mean?—if you mean anything at all.”

As he uttered this half rebuke, he rose abruptly from his chair, shook the ashes from his pipe, and drew himself to his full height, with his back to the fire. There had been nothing very remarkable in the observation made by the man to whom he had addressed himself, but he was in a peculiar state of mind, that gave undue importance to every word, sounding, as it did, a vague presentiment of some coming evil, which the very singular manner of the dog had created, although he would scarcely acknowledge this to himself.

The man made no reply, but continued whittling, humming, at the same time, the air of “Yankee Doodle.”

“Answer me, Ephraim Giles,” peremptorily resumed his master; “leave off that eternal whittling of yours, if you can, and explain to me your meaning.”

“Etarnal whittling! do you call it, Boss? I guess it's no such thing. No man knows better nor you, that, if I can whittle the smallest stick in creation, I can bring down the stoutest tree as well as ere a fellow in Michigan. Work is work—play is play. It's only the difference, I reckon, of the axe and the knife.”

“Will you answer my question like a man, and not like a fool, as you are?” shouted the other, stooping, and extending his left hand, the fingers of which he insinuated into the stock already described, while, with a powerful jerk, he both brought the man to his feet, and the blood into his usually cadaverous cheek.

Ephraim Giles, half-throttled, and writhing with pain, made a movement as if he would have used the knife in a much less innocent manner than whittling, but the quick, stern eye of his master, detected the involuntary act, and his hand, suddenly relinquishing its hold of the collar, grasped the wrist of the soldier with such a vice-like pressure, that the fingers immediately opened, and the knife fell upon the hearth.

The violence of his own act, brought Mr. Heywood at once to a sense of the undue severity he had exercised towards his servant, and he immediately said, taking his hand:

“Ephraim Giles, forgive me, but it was not intended. Yet, I know not how it is, the few words you spoke just now made me anxious to know what you meant, and I could not repress my impatience to hear your explanation.”

The soldier had never before remarked so much dignity of manner about his Boss, as he termed Mr. Heywood, and this fact, added to the recollection of the severe handling he had just met with, caused him to be a little more respectful in his address.

“Well, I reckon,” he said, picking up his knife, and resuming his whittling, but in a less absorbed manner, “I meant no harm, but merely that Loup Garou can nose an Injin better than ere a one of us.”

“Nose an Indian better than any one of us! Well, perhaps he can—he sees them every day, but what has that to do with his whining and growling just now?”

“Well, I'll tell you, Boss, what I mean, more plain-like. You know that patch of wood borderin' on the prairie, where you set me to cut, t'other day?”

“I do. What of that?”

“Well, then, this mornin' I was cuttin' down as big an oak as ever grew in Michigan, when, as it went thunderin' through the branches, with noise enough to scare every buffalo within a day's hunt, up started, not twenty yards from it's tip, ten or a dozen or so of Injins, all gruntin' like pigs, and looking as fierce as so many red devils. They didn't look quite pleasant, I calcilate.”

“Indeed,” remarked Mr. Heywood, musingly; “a party of Pottawattamies I presume, from the Fort. We all know there is a large encampment of them in the neighborhood, but they are our friends.”

“May-be so,” continued Ephraim Giles, “but these varmint didn't look over friendly, and then I guess the Pottawattamies don't dress in war paint, 'cept when they dance for liquor.”

“And are you quite sure these Indians were in their war paint?” asked his master, with an ill-concealed look of anxiety.

“No mistake about it,” replied Giles, still whittling, “and I could almost swear, short as the squint was I got of 'em, that they were part of those who fought us on the Wabash, two years ago.”

“How so, den, you are here, Gile. If dey wicked Injin, how you keep your funny little cap, an' your scalp under de cap?”

This question was asked by the Canadian, who had hitherto, while puffing his pipe, listened indifferently to the conversation, but whose attention had now become arrested, from the moment that his fellow-laborer had spoken of the savages, so strangely disturbed by him.

“Well, I don't exactly know about that, myself,” returned the soldier, slightly raising his cap and scratching his crown, as if in recollection of some narrowly escaped danger. “I reckon, tho', when I see them slope up like a covey of red-legged pattridges, my heart was in my mouth, for I looked for nothin' else but that same operation: but I wur just as well pleased, when, after talkin' their gibberish, and makin' all sorts of signs among themselves, they made tracks towards the open prairie.”

“And why did you not name this, the instant you got home?” somewhat sternly questioned Mr. Heywood.

“Where's the use of spilin' a good dinner?” returned the soldier. “It was all smokin' hot when I came in from choppin', and I thought it best for every man to tuck it in before I said a word about it. Besides, I reckon I don't know as they meant any harm, seein' as how they never carried off my top-knot;—only it was a little queer they were hid in that way in the woods, and looked so fierce when they first jumped up in their nasty paint.”

“Who knows,” remarked Mr. Heywood, taking down his rifle from the side of the hut opposite to the chimney, and examining the priming, “but these fellows may have tracked you back, and are even now, lurking near us. Ephraim Giles, you should have told me of this before.”

“And so,” replied the soldier, “I was goin' to, when Loup Garou began with his capers. Then it was I gave a parable like, about his scentin' the varmint better nor we human critters could.”

“Ephraim Giles,” said Mr. Heywood, sharply, while he fixed his dark eye upon him, as if he would have read his inmost soul, “you say that you have been a soldier, and fought with our army on the Wabash. Why did you leave the service?”

“Because,” drawled the ex-militaire, with a leering expression of his eye, “my captin was a bad judge of good men when he had 'em, and reckoned I was shammin' when I fell down rale sick, and was left behind in a charge made on the Injins at Tippecanoe. I couldn't stand the abuse he gave me for this, and so I left him.”

“Cool, indeed,” sneered Mr. Heywood; “now then, Ephraim Giles, hear my opinion. Your captain thought you were a coward, for he judged you from your conduct. I, too, judge you from your conduct, and have no hesitation in pronouncing you to be a rogue or a fool.”

“Well, I want to know!” was the only rejoinder of the man, as he went on unconcernedly with his whittling.

“Le Noir,” said his master to the Canadian, who, imitating his example, had taken down a long duck gun from the same side of the hut, “take your dog with you and reconnoitre in the neighborhood. You speak Indian, and if any of these people are to be seen, ascertain who they are and why—”

Here he was interrupted by the gradually approaching sounds of rattling deer hoofs, so well known as composing one of the lower ornaments of the Indian war-dress, while, at the same moment, the wild moaning of Loup Garou, then standing at the front door-way, was renewed even more plaintively than before.

Mr. Heywood's cheek blanched. It was not with fear, for he was a man incapable of fear in the common acceptation of the word, but independently of certain vague apprehensions for others, his mind had been in a great degree unhinged by an unaccountable presentiment of evil, which instinctively had come over it that day. It was this, that, inducing a certain irresoluteness of thought and action, had led him into a manifestation of peevish contradiction in his address to Ephraim Giles. There are moments, when, without knowing why, the nerves of the strongest—the purposes of the wisest, are unstrung—and when it requires all our tact and self-possession to conceal from others, the momentary weakness we almost blush to admit to ourselves.

But there was no time for reflection. The approach to the door was suddenly shaded, and in the next instant the dark forms of three or four savages, speedily followed by others, amounting in all to twelve, besides their chief, who was in the advance, crossed the threshold, and, without uttering a word, either of anger or salutation, squatted themselves upon the floor. They were stout, athletic warriors, the perfect symmetry of whose persons could not be concealed even by the hideous war-paint with which they were thickly streaked—inspiring anything but confidence in the honesty or friendliness of their intentions. The head of each was shaved and painted as well as his person, and only on the extreme crown had been left a tuft of hair, to which were attached feathers, and small bones, and other fantastic ornaments peculiar to their race—a few of them carried American rifles—the majority, the common gun periodically dealt out to the several tribes, as presents from the British Government, while all had in addition to their pipe-tomahawks the formidable and polished war-club.

Such visitors, and so armed, were not of a description to remove the apprehensions of the little party in the farm-house. Their very silence, added to their dark and threatening looks, created more than mere suspicion—a certainty of evil design—and deeply did Mr. Heywood deplore the folly of Ephraim Giles in failing to apprise him of his meeting with these people, at the earliest moment after his return. Had he done so, there might have been a chance, nay, every assurance of relief, for he knew that a party from the fort, consisting of a non-commissioned officer and six men, were even now fishing not more than two miles higher up the river. He was aware that the boy, Wilton, was an excellent runner, and that within an hour, at least, he could have reached and brought down that party, who, as was their wont, when absenting themselves on these fishing excursions, were provided with their arms. However, it might not yet be too late, and he determined to make the attempt. To call and speak to the boy aside, would, he was well aware, excite the suspicions of his unwelcome guests, while it was possible that, as they did not understand English, (so at least he took it for granted) a communication made to him boldly in their presence, would be construed into some domestic order.

“Wilton,” he said calmly to the boy, who stood near the doorway with alarm visibly depicted on his countenance, and looking as if he would eagerly seize a favorable opportunity of escape, “make all haste to the fishing party, and tell Corporal Nixon who commands it, to lose no time in pulling down the stream. You will come back with them. Quick, lose not a moment.”

Delighted at the order, the boy made no answer, but hatless—shoeless as he was, disappeared round the corner of the house. Strange to say, the Indians, although they had seemingly listened with attention to Mr. Heywood while issuing these directions, did not make the slightest movement to arrest the departure of the boy, or even to remark upon it—merely turning to their chief, who uttered a sharp and satisfied “ugh.”

During all this time, Mr. Heywood and Le Noir stood at some little distance from the Indians, and nearly on the spot they had occupied at their entrance, the one holding his rifle, the other his duck-gun, the butts of both, resting on the floor. At each moment their anxiety increased, and it seemed an age before the succor they had sent for could arrive. How long, moreover, would these taciturn and forbidding-mannered savages wait before they gave some indication of overt hostility, and even if nothing were done prior to the arrival of the fishing party, would these latter be in sufficient force to awe them into a pacific departure? The Indians were twelve in number, exclusive of their chief, all fierce and determined. They, with the soldiers, nine; for neither Mr. Heywood nor Le Noir seemed disposed to count upon any efficient aid from Ephraim Giles, who, during this dumb scene, continued whittling before the Indians, apparently as cool and indifferent to their presence, as if he had conceived them to be the most peaceably disposed persons in the world. He had, however, listened attentively to the order given to Wilton by his master, and had not failed to remark that the Indians had not, in any way, attempted to impede his departure.

“What do you think of these people, Le Noir,” at length asked Mr. Heywood, without, however removing his gaze from his visitors. “Can they be friendly Pottawattamies?”

“Friendly Pottawattamies! no, sare,” returned the Canadian seriously, and shrugging up his shoulders. “Dey no dress, no paint like de Pottawattamie, and I not like der black look—no, sare, dey Winnebago.”

He laid a strong emphasis on the last word, and as he expected, a general “ugh” among the party attested that he had correctly named their tribe.

While they were thus expressing their conjectures in regard to the character and intentions of their guests, and inwardly determining to sell their lives as dearly as possible if attacked. Ephraim Giles had risen from his seat in the corner of the chimney, and with his eyes fixed on the stick he was whittling, walked coolly out of the door, and sauntered down the pathway leading to the river. But if he had calculated on the same indifference to his actions that the Indians had manifested towards the boy, he was mistaken. They all watched him keenly as he slowly sauntered towards the water, and then, when he had got about half way, the chief suddenly springing to his feet, and brandishing his tomahawk demanded in broken, but perfectly intelligible English, where he was going.

“Well, I want to know,” exclaimed the soldier, turning round, and in a tone indicating surprise that he had thus been questioned—“only goin over thar,” he continued, pointing to the haystacks on the opposite side of the river, around which stood many cattle, “goin I guess to give out some grub to the beasts, and I'll he back in no time, to give you out some whisky.” Then, resuming his course, he went on whittling as unconcernedly as before.

The chief turned to his followers, and a low, yet eager conversation ensued. Whether it was that the seeming indifference of the man, or his promise of the whisky on his return, or that some other motive influenced them, they contented themselves with keeping a vigilant watch upon his movements.

Mr. Heywood and the Frenchman exchanged looks of surprise; they could not account for the action of Ephraim Giles, for although it was his office to cross the river daily for the purpose he had named, it had never been at that period of the day. How the Indians could suffer his departure, if their intentions were really hostile, it was moreover impossible for them to comprehend; and in proportion as the hopes of the one were raised by this circumstance, so were those of the other depressed.

Mr. Heywood began to think that the suspicions of the Canadian were unfounded, and that their guests were, after all, but a party of warriors on their way to the Fort, either for purposes of traffic with the only merchant residing in its vicinity, or of business with the officer commanding. It was not likely, he reasoned, that men coming with hostile designs, would have suffered first the boy to be despatched on a mission which, obscurely as he had worded his directions, must in some measure have been understood by the chief; and, secondly, permitted Ephraim Giles to leave the house in the manner just seen—particularly when the suspicion entertained by him as well as by Le Noir and himself, must have been apparent.

But the Canadian drew no such inference from these facts. Although he could not speak the Winnebago language, he was too conversant with the customs of the Indians, to perceive, in what they permitted in this seeming confidence, anything but guile. He felt assured they had allowed the boy to depart on his errand SOLELY that they might have a greater number of victims in their power. Nothing was more easy, numerous as they were, than to despatch THEM, and then, lying in ambush among the trees that skirted the banks, to shoot down every one in the fishing boat before a landing could be effected, and preparations made for defence; while, in the indifference of their conduct in regard to the departure of Ephraim Giles, he saw but a design to disarm suspicion, and thus induce them to lay by their arms, the reports of which would necessarily alarm the party expected, and so far put them on their guard as to defeat their plans. The very appearance of Giles, moreover, crossing the water, if seen by the descending boat would, he thought they imagined, be a means of lulling the party into security, and thus rendering them a more easy prey.

While the master and the servant were thus indulging their opposite reflections, without, however, making any intercommunication of them, Ephraim Giles, who had now thrust his knife and stick into the pocket of his short skirt, shoved off the only canoe that was to be seen, and stepping into it, and seizing the paddle, urged it slowly, and without the slightest appearance of hurry, to the opposite bank, where, within less than ten minutes, he had again hauled it up. Then, as coolly ascending the bank, he approached one of the haystacks, and drew from it a few handfuls of fodder which he spread upon the ground, continuing to do so, as the cattle assembled around, until he had gained the outermost haystack bordering immediately upon the wood. This reached, he gave a loud yell, which was promptly answered by the Indians, who had continued to watch his movements up to the very moment of his disappearance; and darting along a narrow path which skirted the wood, ran with all his speed towards the Fort. His flight had not lasted five minutes, when the reports of several guns, fired from the direction he had just quitted, met his ear, and urged him to even greater exertion, until at length, haggard and breathless, he gained his destination, and made his way to the commanding officer, to whom he briefly detailed the startling occurrences he had witnessed.