The Fatal Cord.
by Mayne Reid.
STORY ONE.
CHAPTER ONE.
A BIVOUAC OF BOY HUNTERS.
A Hunters" bivouac under the shadows of a Mississippian forest, in a spot where the trees stand unthinned by the axe of the woodman.
It is upon the Arkansas side of the great river, not far from the town of Helena, and in the direction of Little Rock, the capital of that State.
The scene is a small glade, surrounded by tall cottonwood trees, one of which on each side, conspicuously "blazed," indicates a "trace" of travel. It is that leading from Helena to a settlement on the forks of the White River and Cache.
The time is a quarter of a century ago, when this district of country contained a heterogeneous population, comprising some of the wildest and wickedest spirits to be found in all the length and breadth of the backwoods border. It was then the chosen home for men of fallen fortunes, lawyers and land speculators, slave-traders and swindlers, hunters, who lived by the pursuit of game, and sportsmen, whose game was cards, and whose quarry consisted of such dissolute cotton planters as, forsaking their homes in Mississippi and Tennessee, had re-established themselves on the fertile bottoms of the Saint Francis, the White and the Arkansas.
A glance at the individuals comprising the bivouac in question forbids the supposition that they belong to any of the above. There are six of them; all are boys, the oldest not over twenty, while the youngest may be under sixteen. And though at the same glance you are satisfied that they are but amateur hunters, the game they have succeeded in bringing down shows them gifted not only with skill but courage in the chase.
The carcase of a large bear lies beside them on the sward, his skin hanging from a tree, while several steaks cut from his fat rump, and impaled upon sapling spits, sing pleasantly over the camp fire, sending a savoury odour far into the forest around.
About a dozen huge bear-hounds, several showing scars of recent conflict, lie panting upon the gra.s.s, while just half this number of saddled horses stand "hitched" to the trees.
The young hunters are in high glee. They have made a creditable day"s work of it, and as most of them have to go a good way before reaching home, they have halted in the glade to refresh themselves, their hounds, and their horses.
The chase has provided them with meat of which all are fond; most of them carry a "pine" of corn bread in their saddle-bags, and not a few a flask of corn-whiskey. They would not be the youth of Arkansas if found unprovided with tobacco. Thus furnished with all the requisites of a backwoods bivouac they are sucking it in gleesome style.
Scanning these young fellows from a social point of view you can see they are not all of equal rank. A difference in dress and equipments bespeaks a distinct standing, even in backwoods society, and this inequality is evident among the six individuals seated around the camp fire. He whom we have taken for the oldest, and whose name is Brandon, is the son of a cotton planter of some position in the neighbourhood.
And there is wealth too, as indicated by the coat of fine white linen, the white Panama hat, and the diamond pin sparkling among the ruffles in his shirt-bosom.
It is not this, however, that gives him a tone of authority among his hunting companions, but rather an a.s.sumption of superior age, combined with perhaps superior strength, and certainly a dash of _bullyism_ that exhibits itself, and somewhat offensively, in both word and action.
Most of the dogs are his, as also the fine sorrel horse that stands proudly pawing the ground not far from the fire.
Next to Master Brandon in degree of social standing is a youth, who is also two years his junior, by name Randall. He is the son of a certain lawyer, lately promoted to be judge of the district--an office that cannot be called a sinecure, supposing its duties to be faithfully performed.
After Randall may be ranked young Spence, the hopeful scion of an Episcopal clergyman, whose cure lies in one of the river-side towns, several miles from the scene of the bivouac.
Of lower grade is Ned Slaughter, son of the Helena hotel-keeper, and Jeff Grubbs, the heir apparent to Jeff Grubbs, senior, the princ.i.p.al dry goods merchant of the same respectable city.
At the bottom of the scale may be placed Bill Buck, whose father, half horse trader, half corn planter, squats on a tract of poor land near the Cache, of which no one cares to dispute his proprietorship.
Notwithstanding these social distinctions, there is none apparent around the camp fire. In a hunter"s bivouac--especially in the South-Western States, still more notably within the limits of Arkansas--superiority does not belong either to fine clothes or far stretching lineage. The scion of the "poor white hack" is as proud of his position as the descendant of the aristocratic cotton planter; and over the camp fire in question Bill Buck talked as loudly, ate as choice steaks, and drank as much corn whisky as Alf Brandon, the owner of the hounds and the splendid sorrel horse.
In their smoking there might be noted a difference, Bill indulging in a council pipe, while the son of the planter puffs his principe that has come through the custom-house from Havanna. Luncheon over, it still seems too early to separate for return home, and too late to set the dogs on a fresh bear trail. The corn juice inspires to rouse a kind of diversion, suggesting trials of death or skill. Among these sons of Arkansas cards would have come in; but to their chagrin no one is provided with a pack. Bill Buck regrets this, and also Alf Brandon, and so, too, the son of the Episcopal preacher. They are too far from any settlement to send for such things. Pitch and toss is not sufficiently scientific; "hokey in the hole" is too childish, and it ends in a trial of strength and activity. There is wrestling, jumping over a string, and the leap horizontal. In all of these Alf Brandon proves superior, though closely tackled by the son of the squatter. Their superiority is actually owing to age, for these two are the oldest of the party.
The ordinary sports exhausted, something else is sought for. A new kind of gymnastics suggest itself or is suggested, by the stout branch of a cottonwood, stretching horizontally into the glade. It is nearly nine feet from the ground. Who can spring up, seize hold of it, and hang on longest?
Alf Brandon pulls out his gold repeater, formed with a moment hand, and the trial is attempted.
All six succeeded in reaching the limb, and clutching it. All can hang for a time; but in this Bill Buck beats his companions, Brandon showing chagrin. Who can hang longest with one hand? The trial is made, and the planter"s son is triumphant.
"Bah!" cries the defeated Buck. "Who can hang longest by the neck?
Dare any of you try that?"
A yell of laughter responds to this _jeu d"esprit_ of the young jean-clad squatter.
STORY ONE, CHAPTER TWO.
TWO TRAVELLERS.
The silence succeeding is so profound that the slightest sound may be heard to a considerable distance. Though not professional hunters, these young Nimrods of the backwoods are accustomed to keep open ears.
It is a rustling among the reeds that now hinders them from resuming conversation--the canes that hang over the trace of travel. There are footsteps upon it, coming from the direction of Helena. They are soft as the fall of moccasined or female foot. For all this, they are heard distinctly in the glade--hunters, horses, and hounds having p.r.i.c.ked up their ears to listen.
Who comes from Helena?
The question has scarce shaped itself when the answer also a.s.sumes shape. There are two upon the trace--the foremost, a youth of about eighteen, the other, a girl, at least two years younger.
They are not like enough to be brother and sister. They may be of the same mother, but not father. If their father be the same, they must have come from two mothers.
Both are of interesting personal appearance, strikingly so. The youth is tall, tersely and elegantly formed, with features cast in a mould that reminds one of the Romagna; the same facial outline, the prominent nose and chin, the eagle eye, that in childhood has glanced across the Teverino, or the Tiber, and a complexion equally suggestive of Italian origin, a tinge of olive in the skin, slightly damasked upon the cheeks, with, above all, a thick _chevelure_, black as the plumage of a buzzard.
While different in mien, this youth is dressed altogether unlike any of the young hunters who regard him from the glade. He is in true hunter costume, slightly partaking of the garb more especially affected by the Indian. His feet are in moca.s.sins, his limbs encased in leggings of green-baize cloth, a calico hunting shirt covers his shoulders; while, instead of cap or hat, he wears the "toque," or turban, long since adopted by the semi-civilised tribes of the frontier. He is equipped with powder-horn and bullet-pouch, slung crossways under his arm, armed with a long pea-rifle resting negligently over his left shoulder.
His companion has been spoken off as a girl. The designation stands good; but to describe her will require less minuteness of detail.
Sixteen in countenance; older to judge by the budding promise of her beauty; clad in a gown of common homespun, copperas-dyed, ill st.i.tched, and loosely adjusted; a skin soft as velvet, and ruddy as rude health can make it; hair to all appearance unacquainted with combs; yet spreading as the sun through a southern window; eyes like stars clipped from the blue canopy of the sky. Such was she who followed, or rather accompanied, the youth in the calico hunting shirt.
A sudden fire flashes into the eyes of Alf Brandon. It is the expression of a spirit not friendly to one of the new comers, which may be easily guessed, for the girl is too young and too fair to have excited hostility in the breast of any one. It is her companion against whom the son of the planter feels some secret resentment.
He shows it more conspicuously on a remark made by Bill Buck.
"That skunk is always sneaking about with old Rook"s gal. Wonder her dad don"t show more sense than let her keep company wi" a n.i.g.g.e.r. She ain"t a goslin any more--_she_ ain"t."
Buck"s observation displays an animus ill concealed. He, too, has not failed to note the hidden beauty of this forest maiden, who is the daughter of an old hunter of rude habits, living in a cabin close by.
But the sentiments of the horse-dealer"s son, less refined, are also less keenly felt. His remarks add fuel to the fire already kindled in the breast of Brandon.
"The n.i.g.g.e.r thinks entirely too much of himself. I propose, boys, we take the shine out of him," said Brandon, who makes the malicious challenge.
"Do the n.i.g.g.e.r good," chimes in Slaughter.
"But is he a n.i.g.g.e.r?" asks Spence, to whom the strange youth has been hitherto unknown. "I should have taken him for a white."
"Three-quarters white--the rest Indian. His mother was a half-bred Choctaw. I"ve often seen the lot at our store."
It is Grubbs who gives this information.