The Lost Trail, Edward Sylvester Ellis [best classic literature TXT] 📗

waiting the appearance of some one.

While the father stood gazing at this, he saw his boy come to view about fifty feet the other side of the Indian, and, as if wearied with his unusual hunt, seat himself upon a log. As soon as the boy was visible, the savage--whom Richter recognized at once as the same man that he had felled to the floor of his cabin, four years before--called into use a little common sense, which, if it had been practised somewhat sooner, must have completely deluded the father and accomplished the design meditated. If, instead of giving the bell the monotonous tink, the Indian had shaken the clapper irregularly, it would have resulted in the certain capture of the child, beyond the father's power of aid or rescue.

The missionary, we say, penetrated the design of the Indian almost instantly. Although he saw nothing but the head and top of one shoulder, he recognized, with a quick instinct, the villain who had felt the weight of his hand years before, and who had now come in the fullness of time, to claim his revenge. Directly in front of the savage rose a small bush, which, while it gave him a view of the boy, concealed himself from the child's observation.

The object of the Indian seemed to be to lure the boy within his reach, so as to secure him without his making an outcry or noise. If he could draw him close to the logs, he would spring upon him in an instant, and prevent any scream, which assuredly must reach the father, who, with his unerring rifle would have been upon the ground in a few moments. It was an easy matter for the savage to slay the boy. It would not have done to shoot his rifle, but he could have tomahawked him in an instant; hence it was plain that he desired only to take him prisoner. He might have sprung upon his prey in the woods, but there he ran the risk of being seen by the child soon enough for him to make an outcry, which would not fail of bringing immediate assistance. His plan, therefore, was, to beguile the little fellow on until he had walked directly into the snare, as a fly is lured into the web of a spider.

This, we say, was the plan of the Indian. It had never entered into his calculations that the goat, after being robbed of her bell, might go home and tell a tale, or that there were other ways in which the boy could be secured, without incurring half the peril he already had incurred.

The moment the father comprehended what we have endeavored to make plain, he raised his rifle, with the resolve to shoot the savage through the head. As he did so, he recalled the fact that he had but a single charge, and that, as a consequence, a miss would be the death-warrant of himself as well as of his child. But he knew his eye and hand would never fail him. His finger already pressed the trigger, when he was restrained by an unforeseen impediment.

While the deadly rifle was poised, the boy stretched himself up at full length, a movement which made known to the father that his child was exactly in range with the Indian himself, and that a bullet passing through the head of the savage could not fail to bury itself in the little fellow's body. This startling circumstance arrested the pressure of the trigger at the very moment the ball was to be sped upon its errand of death.

The missionary sunk down upon one knee, with the intention of bringing the head of the savage so high as to carry the bullet over the body of his boy, but this he found could not be done without too seriously endangering his aim. He drew a bead from one side of the tree, and then from the other, but from both stand-points the same dreadful danger threatened. The ground behind the tree was somewhat elevated, and was the only spot from which he could secure a fair view of the bronze head of the relentless enemy.

Two resorts were at the command of Richter. He could leave the tree altogether, and pass around so as to come upon the savage from a different direction; but this involved delay during which his boy might fall into the Indian's power and be dispatched, as he would be sure to do when he found that the father was close at hand; and from the proximity of the two men, it could hardly fail to precipitate a collision between them. The Indian, finding himself at bay, could not fail to prove a most troublesome and dangerous customer, unarmed, as Richter was, with weapons for a close encounter.

The father might also wait until the boy should pass out of range. Still, there was the possibility of his proceeding directly up to the spot where the savage lurked, thus keeping in range all the while. Then the attempted rescue would have to be deferred until the child was in the hands of the savage. These considerations, passing through Richter's brain much more rapidly than we have narrated them, decided him to abandon both plans, and to resort to what, beyond question, was a most desperate expedient.

The Indian held the bell in his left hand. It was suspended by the string which had clasped the neck of the goat, and, as it swayed gently back and forth, this string slowly twisted and untwisted itself, the bell, of course, turning back and forth. The father determined to slay the Indian and save his son by _shooting this bell_!

It is not necessary to describe the shape and make of the common cow-bell in general use throughout our country; but it is necessary that the reader should bear them in mind in order to understand the manner in which the missionary proposed to accomplish this result. His plan was to strike the bell when in the proper position, and _glance the bullet into the head of the savage_!

The desperate nature of this expedient will be seen at once. Should the gun be discharged when the flat side of the bell was turned toward him, the ball would pass through, and most probably kill his child without endangering the life of the Indian. If it struck the narrow side, it accomplished neither harm nor good; while, if fired at the precise moment, and still aimed but an inch too low, the bell would most likely be perforated. Consequently, it was requisite that the rifle be discharged at the precise instant of time when the signal brass was in the correct position, and that the aim should be infallibly true.

All this Richter realized only too painfully; but, uttering an inward prayer, he raised his rifle with a nerve that knew no faltering or fear, holding it pointed until the critical moment should arrive. That moment would be when the string was wound up, and was turning, to unwind. Then, as it was almost stationary, he fired.

No sound or outcry betrayed the result; but, clubbing his rifle, the father bounded forward, over the trees, to the spot where the Indian was crouching. There he saw him in his death-struggle upon the ground the bell still held fast in his hand. In that critical moment, Harvey Richter could not forbear glancing at it. Its top was indented, and sprinkled with white by the glancing passage of the lead. The blood, oozing down the face of the savage, plainly showed how unerringly true had been the aim.

Something in the upward look of the dying man startled the missionary.

"Harvey Richter--don't you know me?" he gasped.

"I know you as a man who has sought to do me a wrong that only a fiend could have perpetrated. Great Heaven! Can it be? Is this you, Brazey Davis?"

"Yes; but you've finished me, so there isn't much left."

"Are you the man, Brazey, who has haunted me ever since we came in this country? Are you the person who carried away poor, dear Cora?"

"Yes--yes!" answered the man, with fainting weariness.

Such, indeed, was the case. The strange hunter and the Indian known as Mahogany were one and the same person.

"Brazey, why have you haunted me thus, and done me this great wrong?"

"I cannot tell. When I thought how you took her from me, it made me crazy when I thought about it. I wanted to take her from you, but I wouldn't have dared to do that if you hadn't struck me. I wanted revenge then."

"What have you done with her?"

"She is gone, I haven't seen her since the day after I seized her, when a band of Indians took her from me, and went up north with her. They have got her yet, I know, for I have kept watch over her, and she is safe, but is a close prisoner." This he said with great difficulty.

"Brazey, you are dying. I forgive you. But does your heart tell you you are at peace with Him whom you have offended so grievously?"

"It's too late to talk of that now. It might have done years ago, when I was an honest man like yourself, and before I became a vagabond, bent on injuring one who had never really injured me."

"It is never too late for God to forgive--"

"Too late--too late, I tell you! _There!_" He rose upon his elbow, his eyes burning with insane light and his hand extended. "I see her--she is coming, her white robes floating on the air. Oh, God, forgive me that I did her the great wrong! But, she smiles upon me--she forgives me! I thank thee, angel of good----"

He sunk slowly backward, and Harvey Richter eased the head softly down upon the turf. Brazey Davis was no more.


CHAPTER X.

CONCLUSION.

Heart leaps to heart--the sacred flood
That warms us is the same;
That good old man--his honest blood
Alike we frankly claim.--SPRAGUE.

The missionary gazed sadly upon the inanimate form before him. He saw the playmate of his childhood stricken down in death by his own hand, which never should have taken human life, and although the act was justifiable under the circumstances, the good man could but mourn the painful necessity that occasioned it. The story, although possessing tragic interest, was a brief one. Brazey Davis, as he had always been termed, was a few years older than himself, and a native of the same neighborhood. He was known in childhood as one possessing a vindictive spirit that could never forgive an injury--as a person who would not hesitate at any means to obtain revenge. It so happened that he became desperately enamored of the beautiful Cora Brandon, but becoming aware, at length, that she was the betrothed of Harvey Braisted, the young missionary in embryo, the disappointed lover left the country, and was never heard of by the missionary until he made himself known in the singular manner that we have related at the opening of our narrative. He had, in fact, come to be a sort of monomaniac, who delighted in annoying his former rival, and in haunting his footsteps as if he were his evil shadow. The abduction of his wife had not been definitely determined upon until that visit to the cabin, in the garb and paint of an Indian, when he received the tremendous blow that almost drove the life from his body. Davis then resolved to