Chapter 32 - The Scalp Hunters by Mayne Reid
Another “Coup”
A shot ringing in my ears caused me to withdraw my attention from the proceedings of the earless trapper. As I turned I saw a blue cloud floating away over the prairie, but I could not tell at what the shot had been fired. Thirty or forty of the hunters had surrounded the motte, and, halted, were sitting in their saddles in a kind of irregular circle. They were still at some distance from the timber, as if keeping out of arrow-range. They held their guns crosswise, and were shouting to one another.
It was improbable that the savage was alone; doubtless there were some of his companions in the thicket. There could not be many, however, for the underwood was not large enough to conceal more than a dozen bodies, and the keen eyes of the hunters were piercing it in every direction.
They reminded me of so many huntsmen in a gorse waiting the game to be sprung; but here, the game was human.
It was a terrible spectacle. I looked towards Seguin, thinking that he might interfere to prevent the barbarous battue. He noticed my inquiring glance, and turned his face from me. I fancied that he felt ashamed of the work in which his followers were engaged; but the killing, or capture, of whatever Indians might be in the motte had now become a necessary measure, and I knew that any remonstrance of mine would be disregarded. As for the men themselves, they would have laughed at it. This was their pastime, their profession, and I am certain that, at that moment, their feelings were not very different from those which would have actuated them had they been driving a bear from his den. They were, perhaps, a trifle more intense; certainly not more inclined towards mercy.
I reined up my horse, and awaited with painful emotions the dénouement of this savage drama.
“Vaya, Irlandes! What did you see?” inquired one of the Mexicans, appealing to Barney. I saw by this that it was the Irishman who had fired the shot.
“A rid-skin, by japers!” replied the latter.
“Warn’t it yer own shadder ye sighted in the water?” cried a hunter, jeeringly.
“Maybe it was the divil, Barney?”
“In trath, frinds, I saw a somethin’ that looked mighty like him, and I kilt it too.”
“Ha! ha! Barney has killed the devil. Ha! ha!”
“Wagh!” exclaimed a trapper, spurring his horse toward the thicket; “the fool saw nothin’. I’ll chance it, anyhow.”
“Stop, comrade!” cried the hunter Garey; “let’s take a safer plan. Redhead’s right. Thar’s Injuns in them bushes, whether he seen it or not; that skunk warn’t by himself, I reckin; try this a way!”
The young trapper dismounted, and turned his horse broadside to the bushes. Keeping on the outside, he commenced walking the animal in a spiral ring that gradually closed in upon the clump. In this way his body was screened; and his head only could be seen above the pommel of his saddle, over which he rested his rifle, cocked and ready.
Several others, observing this movement on the part of Garey, dismounted, and followed his example.
A deep silence prevailed as they narrowed the diameters of their circling courses.
In a short time they were close in to the motte, yet still no arrow whizzed out. Was there no one there? So it seemed; and the men pushed fearlessly into the thicket.
I watched all this with excited feelings. I began to hope there was no one in the bushes. I listened to every sound; I heard the snapping of the twigs and the muttering of the men. There was a moment’s silence as they pushed eagerly forward.
Then I heard a sudden exclamation, and a voice calling out—
“Dead red-skin! Hurrah for Barney!”
“Barney’s bullet through him, by the holies!” cried another. “Hollo, old sky-blue! Come hyar and see what ye’ve done!”
The rest of the hunters, along with the ci-devant soldier, now rode forward to the copse. I moved slowly after. On coming up, I saw them dragging the body of an Indian into the open ground: a naked savage, like the other. He was dead, and they were preparing to scalp him.
“Come now, Barney!” cried one of the men in a joking manner, “the har’s your’n. Why don’t ye off wid it, man?”
“It’s moine, dev yez say?” asked Barney, appealing to the speaker.
“Sartinly; you killed him. It’s your’n by right.”
“An’ it is raaly worth fifty dollars?”
“Good as wheat for that.”
“Would yez be so frindly, thin, as to cut it aff for me?”
“Oh! sartinly, wid all the plizyer of life,” replied the hunter, imitating Barney’s accent, at the same time severing the scalp, and handing it to him.
Barney took the hideous trophy, and I fancy that he did not feel very proud of it. Poor Celt! he may have been guilty of many a breach in the laws of garrison discipline, but it was evident that this was his first lesson in the letting of human blood.
The hunters now dismounted, and commenced trampling the thicket through and through. The search was most minute, for there was still a mystery. An extra bow—that is to say, a third—had been found, with its quiver of arrows. Where was the owner? Could he have escaped from the thicket while the men were engaged around the fallen buffaloes? He might, though it was barely probable; but the hunters knew that these savages run more like wild animals, like hares, than human beings, and he might have escaped to the chapparal.
“If that Injun has got clar,” said Garey, “we’ve no time to lose in skinnin’ them bufflers. Thar’s plenty o’ his tribe not twenty miles from hyar, I calc’late.”
“Look down among the willows there!” cried the voice of the chief; “close down to the water.”
There was a pool. It was turbid and trampled around the edges with buffalo tracks. On one side it was deep. Here willows dropped over and hung into the water. Several men pressed into this side, and commenced sounding the bottom with their lances and the butts of their rifles.
Old Rube had come up among the rest, and was drawing the stopper of his powder-horn with his teeth, apparently with the intention of reloading. His small dark eyes were scintillating every way at once: above, around him, and into the water.
A sudden thought seemed to enter his head. I saw him push back the plug, grasp the Irishman, who was nearest him, by the arm, and mutter, in a low and hurried voice, “Paddy! Barney! gi’ us yur gun; quick, man, quick!”
Barney, at this earnest solicitation, immediately surrendered his piece, taking the empty rifle that was thrust into his hand by the trapper.
Rube eagerly grasped the musket, and stood for a moment as if he was about to fire at some object in the pond. Suddenly he jerked his body round, and, poising the gun upward, fired into the thick foliage.
A shrill scream followed; a heavy body came crashing through the branches, and struck the ground at my feet. Warm drops sparkled into my eyes, causing me to wince. It was blood! I was blinded with it; I rubbed my eyes to clear them. I heard men rushing from all parts of the thicket. When I could see again, a naked savage was just disappearing through the leaves.
“Missed him!” cried the trapper. “Away wi’ yur sodger gun!” he added, flinging down the musket, and rushing after the savage with his drawn knife.
I followed among the rest. I heard several shots as we scrambled through the brushwood.
When I had got to the outer edge I could see the Indian still on his feet, and running with the speed of an antelope. He did not keep in a direct line, but zigzag, leaping from side to side, in order to baffle the aim of his pursuers, whose rifles were all the time ringing behind him. As yet none of their bullets had taken effect, at least so as to cripple him. There was a streak of blood visible on his brown body, but the wound, wherever it was did not seem to hinder him in his flight.
I thought there could be no chance of his escape, and I had no intention of emptying my gun at such a mark. I remained, therefore, among the bushes, screening myself behind the leaves and watching the chase.
Some of the hunters continued to follow him on foot, while the more cunning ones rushed back for their horses. These happened to be all on the opposite side of the thicket, with one exception, and that was the mare of the trapper Rube. She was browsing where Rube had dismounted, out among the slaughtered buffaloes, and directly in the line of the chase.
As the savage approached her, a sudden thought seemed to strike him, and diverging slightly from his course, he plucked up the picket-pin, coiled the lasso with the dexterity of a gaucho, and sprang upon the animal’s back.
It was a well-conceived idea, but unfortunate for the Indian. He had scarcely touched the saddle when a peculiar shout was heard above all other sounds. It was a call uttered in the voice of the earless trapper. The mustang recognised it; and instead of running forward, obedient to the guidance of her rider, she wheeled suddenly and came galloping back. At this moment a shot fired at the savage scorched her hip, and, setting back her ears, she commenced squealing and kicking so violently that all her feet seemed to be in the air at the same time.
The Indian now endeavoured to fling himself from the saddle; but the alternate plunging of the fore and hind quarters kept him for some moments tossing in a sort of balance. He was at length pitched outward, and fell to the ground upon his back. Before he could recover himself a Mexican had ridden up, and with his long lance pinned him to the earth.
A scene followed in which Rube played the principal character; in fact, had “the stage to himself.”
“Sodger guns” were sent to perdition; and as the old trapper was angry about the wound which his mare had received, “crook-eyed greenhorns” came in for a share of his anathemas. The mustang, however, had sustained no serious damage; and after this was ascertained, the emphatic ebullitions of her master’s anger subsided into a low growling, and then ceased altogether.
As there appeared no sign that there were other savages in the neighbourhood, the next concern of the hunters was to satisfy their hunger. Fires were soon kindled, and a plenteous repast of buffalo meat produced the desired effect.
After the meal was ended, a consultation was held. It was agreed that we should move forward to the old mission, which was known to be not over ten miles distant. We could there defend ourselves in case of an attack from the tribe of Coyoteros, to which the three savages belonged. It was feared by all that these might strike our trail, and come up with us before we could take our departure from the ruin.
The buffaloes were speedily skinned and packed, and taking a westerly course, we journeyed on to the mission.