Twice Bought, Robert Michael Ballantyne [the false prince series .TXT] 📗

upon myself to do it."

"Well, I'll jine ye," said Paul, "for of course ye'll have to make up a party."

"Not at all," returned the trapper, with decision. "I'll do it best alone; leastwise I'll take only little Tolly Trevor an' Leapin' Buck with me, for they're both smart an' safe lads, and are burnin' keen to learn somethin' o' woodcraft."

In accordance with this determination, Mahoghany Drake, Leaping Buck, and little Trevor set off next day and followed Tom Brixton's trail into the mountains. It was a broad trail and very perceptible, at least to an Indian or a trapper, for Tom had a natural swagger, which he could not shake off, even in the hour of his humiliation, and, besides, he had never been an adept at treading the western wilderness with the care which the red man finds needful in order to escape from, or baffle, his foes.

"'Tis as well marked, a'most" said Drake, pausing to survey the trail, "as if he'd bin draggin' a toboggan behind him."

"Yet a settlement man wouldn't see much of it," remarked little Trevor; "eh! Buckie?"

The Indian boy nodded gravely. He emulated his father in this respect, and would have been ashamed to have given way to childish levity on what he was pleased to consider the war-path, but he had enough of the humorous in his nature to render the struggle to keep grave in Tolly's presence a pretty severe one. Not that Tolly aimed at being either witty or funny, but he had a peculiarly droll expression of face, which added much point to whatever he said.

"Ho!" exclaimed the trapper, after they had gone a little farther; "here's a trail that even a settlement man could hardly fail to see. There's bin fifty men or more. D'ye see it Tolly?"

"See it? I should think so. D'you suppose I carry my eyes in my pocket?"

"Come now, lad," said Drake, turning to Leaping Buck, "you want to walk in your father's tracks, no doubt. Read me this trail if ye can."

The boy stepped forward with an air of dignity that Drake regarded as sublime and Tolly thought ludicrous, but the latter was too fond of his red friend to allow his feelings to betray themselves.

"As the white trapper has truly said," he began, "fifty men or more have passed this way. They are most of them white men, but three or four are Indians."

"Good!" said Drake, with an approving nod; "I thought ye'd notice that. Well, go on."

"They were making straight for my father's camp," continued the lad, bending a stern look on the trail, "but they turned sharp round, like the swallow, on coming to the trail of the white man Brixton, and followed it."

"How d'ye know that, lad?" asked the trapper.

"Because I see it" returned the boy, promptly, pointing at the same time to a spot on the hill-side considerably above them, where the conformation of the land at a certain spot revealed enough of the trail of the "fifty men or more," to show the change of direction.

"Good again, lad. A worthy son of your father. I didn't give 'e credit for sharpness enough to perceive that. Can you read anything more?"

"One man was a horseman, but he left his horse behind on getting to the rough places of the hills and walked with the rest. He is Paul Bevan's enemy."

"And how d'ye know all _that_?" said Drake, regarding the little fellow with a look of pride.

"By the footprints," returned Leaping Buck. "He wears boots and spurs."

"Just so," returned the trapper, "and we've bin told by Paul that Stalker was the only man of his band who wouldn't fall in wi' the ways o' the country, but sticks to the clumsy Jack-boots and spurs of old England. Yes, the scoundrel has followed you up, Tolly, as Paul Bevan said he would, and, havin' come across Brixton's track, has gone after him, from all which I now come to the conclusion that your friend Mister Tom is a prisoner, an' stands in need of our sarvices. What say you, Tolly?"

"Go at 'em at once," replied the warlike Trevor, "an' set him free."

"What! us three attack fifty men?"

"Why not?" responded Tolly, "We're more than a match for 'em. Paul Bevan has told me oftentimes that honest men are, as a rule, ten times more plucky than dishonest ones. Well, you are one honest man, that's equal to ten; an' Buckie and I are two honest boys, equal, say, to five each, that's ten more, making twenty among three of us. Three times twenty's sixty, isn't it? so, surely that's more than enough to fight fifty."

"Ah, boy," answered the trapper, with a slightly puzzled expression, "I never could make nothin' o' 'rithmetic, though my mother put me to school one winter with a sort o' half-mad parson that came to the head waters o' the Yellowstone river, an' took to teachin'--dear me, how long ago was it now? Well, I forget, but somehow you seem to add up the figgurs raither faster than I was made to do. Howsever, we'll go an' see what's to be done for Tom Brixton."

The trapper, who had been leaning on his gun, looking down at his bold little comrades during the foregoing conversation, once more took the lead, and, closely following the trail of the robber-band, continued the ascent of the mountains.

The Indian village was by that time far out of sight behind them, and the scenery in the midst of which they were travelling was marked by more than the average grandeur and ruggedness of the surrounding region.

On their right arose frowning precipices which were fringed and crowned with forests of pine, intermingled with poplar, birch, maple, and other trees. On their left a series of smaller precipices, or terraces, descended to successive levels, like giant steps, till they reached the bottom of the valley up which our adventurers were moving, where a brawling river appeared in the distance like a silver thread. The view both behind and in advance was extremely wild, embracing almost every variety of hill scenery, and in each case was shut in by snow-capped mountains. These, however, were so distant and so soft in texture as to give the impression of clouds rather than solid earth.

Standing on one of the many jutting crags from which could be had a wide view of the vale lying a thousand feet below, Tolly Trevor threw up his arms and waved them to and fro as if in an ecstasy, exclaiming--"Oh, if I had only wings, _what_ a swoop I'd make--down there!"

"Ah, boy, you ain't the first that's wished for wings in the like circumstances. But we've bin denied these advantages. P'r'aps we'd have made a bad use of 'em. Sartinly we've made a bad use o' sich powers as we do possess. Just think, now, if men could go about through the air as easy as the crows, what a row they'd kick up all over the 'arth! As it is, when we want to fight we've got to crawl slowly from place to place, an' make roads for our wagins, an' big guns, an' supplies, to go along with us; but if we'd got wings--why, the first fire eatin' great man that could lead his fellows by the nose would only have to give the word, when up would start a whole army o' men, like some thousand Jack-in-the-boxes, an' away they'd go to some place they'd took a fancy to, an' down they'd come, all of a heap, quite onexpected-- take their enemy by surprise, sweep him off the face o' the 'arth, and enter into possession."

"Well, it would be a blue lookout," remarked Tolly, "if that was to be the way of it. There wouldn't be many men left in the world before long."

"That's true, lad, an' sitch as was left would be the worst o' the race. No, on the whole I think we're better without wings."

While he was talking to little Trevor, the trapper had been watching the countenance of the Indian boy with unusual interest. At last he turned to him and asked--

"Has Leaping Buck nothin' to say?"

"When the white trapper speaks, the Indian's tongue should be silent," replied the youth.

"A good sentiment and does you credit, lad. But I am silent now. Has Leaping Buck no remark to make on what he sees?"

"He sees the smoke of the robber's camp far up the heights," replied the boy, pointing as he spoke.

"Clever lad!" exclaimed the trapper, "I know'd he was his father's son."

"Where? I can see nothing," cried Tolly, who understood the Indian tongue sufficiently to make out the drift of the conversation.

"Of course ye can't; the smoke is too far off an' too thin for eyes not well practised in the signs o' the wilderness. But come; we shall go and pay the robbers a visit; mayhap disturb their rest a little--who knows!"

With a quiet laugh, Mahoghany Drake withdrew from the rocky ledge, and, followed by his eager satellites, continued to wend his way up the rugged mountain-sides, taking care, however, that he did not again expose himself to view, for well did he know that sharp eyes and ears would be on the _qui vive_ that night.


CHAPTER NINETEEN.

When Tom Brixton sternly set his face like a flint to what he believed to be his duty, he wandered, as we have said, into the mountains, with a heavy heart and without any definite intentions as to what he intended to do.

If his thoughts had taken the form of words they would probably have run somewhat as follows:--

"Farewell for ever, sweet Rose of Oregon! Dear Betty! You have been the means, in God's hand, of saving at least one soul from death, and it would be requiting you ill indeed were I to persuade you to unite yourself to a man whose name is disgraced even among rough men, whose estimate of character is not very high. No! henceforth our lives diverge wider and wider apart. May God bless you and give you a good hus--give you happiness in His own way! And now I have the world before me where to choose. It is a wide world, and there is much work to be done. Surely I shall be led in the right way to fill the niche which has been set apart for me. I wonder what it is to be! Am I to hunt for gold, or to become a fur-trader, or go down to the plains and turn cattle-dealer, or to the coast and become a sailor, or try farming? One thing is certain, I must not be an idler; must not join the ranks of those who merely hunt that they may eat and sleep, and who eat and sleep that they may hunt. I have a work to do for Him who bought me with His precious blood, and my first step must be to commit my way to Him."

Tom Brixton took that step at once. He knelt down on a mossy bank, and there, with the glorious prospect of the beautiful wilderness before him, and the setting sun irradiating his still haggard countenance,