So he went on.
He told them he had decided, if they would follow him, to die fighting, or reach the open with whatever chances the winter trail might afford them. He told them he was a white man who was not accustomed to bend to the will of the northern Indian. They might break him, but he would not bend. He reminded them they were Sioux, children of the great Sitting Bull. He reminded them that death in battle was the glory of the Indian. That no real Sioux would submit to starvation.
This time his words were received with definite acclamation. So he proceeded to his plans.
Half an hour later the last of the stores was being consumed by men who had not had an adequate meal for many days.
The aurora lit the night sky. The northern night had set in to the fantastic measure of the ghostly dance of the polar spirits. The air was still, and the temperature had fallen headlong. The pitiless cold was searching all the warm life left vulnerable to its attack. The shadowed eyes of night looked down upon the world through a gray twilight of calculated melancholy.
The cold peace of the elements was unshared by the striving human creatures peopling the great white wilderness over which it brooded.
War to the death was being fought out under the eyes of the dancing lights, and the twinkling contentment of the pallid world of stars.
A small bluff of lank trees reared its tousled snow-crowned head above the white heart of a wide valley. It was where the gorge of the Bell River opened out upon low banks. It was where the only trail of the region headed westwards. The bowels of the bluff were defended by a meagre undergrowth, which served little better purpose than to partially conceal them. About this bluff a ring of savages had formed.
Low-type savages of smallish stature, and of little better intelligence than the predatory creatures who roamed the wild.
With every pa.s.sing moment the ring drew closer, foot by foot, yard by yard.
Inside the bluff p.r.o.ne forms lay hidden under the scrub. And only the flash of rifle, and the biting echoes of its report, told of the epic defence that was being put up. But for all the effort the movement of the defenders, before the closing ring, was retrograde, always retrograde towards the centre.
Slowly but inevitably the ring grew smaller about the bluff. Numbers of its ranks dropped out, and still forms littered the ground over which it had pa.s.sed. But each and every gap thus made was automatically closed as the human ring drew in.
The last phase began. The ring was no longer visible outside the bluff. It had pa.s.sed the outer limits, and entered the scrub. In the centre, in the very heart of it, six Indians and a white man crouched back to back--always facing the advancing enemy. Volley after volley was flung wildly at them from every side, regardless of comrade, regardless of everything but the l.u.s.t to kill. The tumult of battle rose high. The demoniac yells filled the air to the accompaniment of an incessant rattle of rifle fire. The Bell River horde knew that at last their l.u.s.t was to be satisfied. So their triumph rose in a vicious chorus upon the still air, and added its terror to the night.
The defenders were further reduced to four. The white man had abandoned his rifle. Now he stood erect, a revolver in each hand, in the midst of the remainder of his faithful band. He was wounded in many places. Nor had the Indians with him fared better. Warm blood streamed from gaping wounds which were left unheeded. For the fight was to the finish, and not one of them but would have it so.
Nor was the end far off. It came swiftly, ruthlessly. It came with a ferocious chorus from throats hoa.r.s.e with their song of battle. It came with a wild headlong rush, that recked nothing of the storm of fire with which it was met. A dozen lifeless bodies piled themselves before the staunch resistance. It made no difference. The avalanche swept on, and over the human barricade, till it reached striking distance for its crude native weapons.
Allan Mowbray saw each of his last three men go down in a welter of blood. His pistols were empty and useless. There was a moment of wild physical struggle. Then, the next, he was borne down under the rush, and life was literally hacked out of him.
CHAPTER V
IN THE NIGHT
The living-room in Ailsa Mowbray"s home was full of that comfort which makes life something more than a mere existence in places where the elements are wholly antagonistic. The big square wood-stove was tinted ruddily by the fierce heat of the blazing logs within. Carefully trimmed oil lamps shed a mellow, but ample, light upon furnishings of unusual quality. The polished red pine walls reflected the warmth of atmosphere prevailing. And thick furs, spread over the well-laid green block flooring, suggested a luxury hardly to be expected.
The furniture was stout, and heavy, and angular, possessing that air of strength, as well as comfort, which the modern mission type always presents. The ample central table, too, was significant of the open hospitality the mistress of it all loved to extend to the whole post, and even to those chance travelers who might be pa.s.sing through on the bitter northern trail.
Ailsa Mowbray had had her wish since the pa.s.sing of the days when it had been necessary to share in the labors of her husband. The simple goal of her life had been a home of comfort for her growing children, and a wealth of hospitality for those who cared to taste of it.
The long winter night had already set in, and she was seated before the stove in a heavy rocking-chair. Her busy fingers were plying her needle, a work she loved in spite of the hard training of her early days in the north. At the other side of the glowing stove Jessie was reading one of the books with which Father Jose kept her supplied. The wind was moaning desolately about the house. The early snowfall was being drifted into great banks in the hollows. Up on the hilltop, where the stockade of the Fort frowned out upon the world, the moaning was probably translated into a tense, steady howl.
The mother glanced at the clock which stood on the bureau near by. It was nearly seven. Alec would be in soon from his work up at the store, that hour of work which he faced so reluctantly after the evening meal had been disposed of. In half an hour, too, Father Jose would be coming up from the Mission. She was glad. It would help to keep her from thinking.
She sighed and glanced quickly over at her daughter. Jessie was poring over her book. The sight of such absorption raised a certain feeling of irritation in the mother. It seemed to her that Jessie could too easily throw off the trouble besetting them all. She did not know that the girl was fighting her own battle in her own way. She did not know that her interest in her book was partly feigned. Nor was she aware that the girl"s effort was not only for herself, but to help the mother she was unconsciously offending.
The anxious waiting for Murray"s return had been well-nigh unbearable.
These people, all the folk on Snake River, knew the dangers and chances of the expedition. Confidence in Murray was absolute, but still it left a wide margin for disaster. They had calculated to the finest fraction the time that must elapse before his return. Three weeks was the minimum, and the three weeks had already terminated three nights ago. It was this which had set the mother"s nerves on edge. It was this knowledge which kept Jessie"s eyes glued to the pages of her book.
It was this which made the contemplation of the later gathering of the men in that living-room a matter for comparative satisfaction to Ailsa Mowbray.
Her needle pa.s.sed to and fro under her skilful hands. There was almost feverish haste in its movements. So, too, the pages of Jessie"s book seemed to be turned all too frequently.
At last the mother"s voice broke the silence.
"It"s storming," she said.
"Yes, mother." Jessie had glanced up. But her eyes fell to her book at once.
"But it--won"t stop them any." The mother"s words lacked conviction.
Then, as if she realized that this was so, she went on more firmly.
"But Murray drives hard on the trail. And Allan--it would need a bigger storm than this to stop him. If the river had kept open they"d have made better time." She sighed her regret for the ice.
"Yes, mother." Jessie again glanced up. This time her pretty eyes observed her mother more closely. She noted the drawn lines about the soft mouth, the deep indentation between the usually serene brows. She sighed, and the pain at her own heart grew sharper.
Quite suddenly the mother raised her head and dropped her sewing in her lap.
"Oh, child, child, I--I could cry at this--waiting," she cried in desperate distress. "I"m scared! Oh, I"m scared to death. Scared as I"ve never been before. But things--things can"t have happened. I tell you I won"t believe that way. No--no! I won"t. I won"t. Oh, why don"t they get around? Why doesn"t he come?"
The girl laid her book aside. Her movement was markedly calm. Then she steadily regarded her troubled mother.
"Don"t, mother, dear," she cried. "You mustn"t. "Deed you mustn"t."
Her tone was a gentle but decided reproof. "We"ve figured it clear out. All of us together. Father Jose and Alec, too. They"re men, and cleverer at that sort of thing than we are. Father Jose reckons the least time Murray needs to get back in is three weeks. It"s only three days over. There"s no sort of need to get scared for a week yet."
The reproof was well calculated. It was needed. So Jessie understood.
Jessie possessed all her mother"s strength of character, and had in addition the advantage of her youth.
Her mother was abashed at her own display of weakness. She was abashed that it should be necessary for her own child to reprove her. She hastily picked up her work again.
But Jessie had abandoned her reading for good. She leaned forward in her chair, gazing meditatively at a glowing, red-hot spot on the side of the stove.
Suddenly she voiced the train of thought which had held her occupied so long.
"Why does our daddy make Bell River, mother?" she demanded. "It"s a question I"m always asking myself. He"s told me it"s not a place for man, devil, or trader. Yet he goes there. Say, he makes Bell River every year. Why? He doesn"t get pelts there. He once said he"d hate to send his worst enemy up there. Yet he goes. Why? That"s how I"m always asking. Say, mother, you ran this trade with our daddy before Murray came. You know why he goes there. You never say. Nor does daddy. Nor Murray. Is--it a secret?"
Ailsa replied without raising her eyes.
"It"s not for you to ask me," she said almost coldly.
But Jessie was in no mood to be easily put off.
"Maybe not, mother," she replied readily. "But you know, I guess. I wonder. Well, I"m not going to ask for daddy"s secrets. I just know there is a secret to Bell River. And that secret is between you, and him, and Murray. That"s why Alec had to stop right here at the Fort.
Maybe it"s a dangerous secret, since you keep it so close. But it doesn"t matter. All I know our daddy is risking his life every time he hits the Bell River trail, and, secret or no secret, I ask is it right?
Is it worth while? If anything happened to our daddy you"d never, never forgive yourself letting him risk his life where he wouldn"t send his worst enemy.""
The mother laid her work aside. Nor did she speak while she folded the material deliberately, carefully.