Zane Grey (27 page)

"Wal, I'll be durned if I ever expected to see a redskin work," was
his only comment on the industries.

"We are greatly alarmed by the presence of Girty and his followers,"
said Edwards. "We have been warned to leave, but have not been
actually threatened. What do you infer from the appearance here of
these hostile savages?"

"It hardly 'pears to me they'll bother you preachers. They're agin
the Christian redskins, that's plain."

"Why have we been warned to go?"

"That's natural, seein' they're agin the preachin'."

"What will they do with the converted Indians?"

"Mighty onsartin. They might let them go back to the tribes, but
'pears to me these good Injuns won't go. Another thing, Girty is
afeered of the spread of Christianity."

"Then you think our Christians will be made prisoners?"

"'Pears likely."

"And you, also, think we'd do well to leave here."

"I do, sartin. We're startin' for Fort Henry soon. You'd better come
along with us."

"Captain Williamson, we're going to stick it out, Girty or no
Girty."

"You can't do no good stayin' here. Pipe and Half King won't stand
for the singin', prayin' redskins, especially when they've got all
these cattle and fields of grain."

"Wetzel said the same."

"Hev you seen Wetzel?"

"Yes; he rescued a girl from Jim Girty, and returned her to us."

"That so? I met Wetzel and Jack Zane back a few miles in the woods.
They're layin' for somebody, because when I asked them to come along
they refused, sayin' they had work as must be done. They looked like
it, too. I never hern tell of Wetzel advisin' any one before; but
I'll say if he told me to do a thing, by Gosh! I'd do it."

"As men, we might very well take the advice given us, but as
preachers we must stay here to do all we can for these Christian
Indians. One thing more: will you help us?"

"I reckon I'll stay here to see the thing out," answered Williamson.
Edwards made a mental note of the frontiersman's evasive answer.

Jim had, meanwhile, made the acquaintance of a young minister, John
Christy by name, who had lost his sweetheart in one of the Chippewa
raids, and had accompanied the Williamson expedition in the hope he
might rescue her.

"How long have you been out?" asked Jim.

"About four weeks now," answered Christy. "My betrothed was captured
five weeks ago yesterday. I joined Williamson's band, which made up
at Short Creek to take the trail of the flying Chippewas, in the
hope I might find her. But not a trace! The expedition fell upon a
band of redskins over on the Walhonding, and killed nearly all of
them. I learned from a wounded Indian that a renegade had made off
with a white girl about a week previous. Perhaps it was poor Lucy."

Jim related the circumstances of his own capture by Jim Girty, the
rescue of Nell, and Kate's sad fate.

"Could Jim Girty have gotten your girl?" inquired Jim, in
conclusion.

"It's fairly probable. The description doesn't tally with Girty's.
This renegade was short and heavy, and noted especially for his
strength. Of course, an Indian would first speak of some such
distinguishing feature. There are, however, ten or twelve renegades
on the border, and, excepting Jim Girty, one's as bad as another."

"Then it's a common occurrence, this abducting girls from the
settlements?"

"Yes, and the strange thing is that one never hears of such doings
until he gets out on the frontier."

"For that matter, you don't hear much of anything, except of the
wonderful richness and promise of the western country."

"You're right. Rumors of fat, fertile lands induce the colonist to
become a pioneer. He comes west with his family; two out of every
ten lose their scalps, and in some places the average is much
greater. The wives, daughters and children are carried off into
captivity. I have been on the border two years, and know that the
rescue of any captive, as Wetzel rescued your friend, is a
remarkable exception."

"If you have so little hope of recovering your sweetheart, what then
is your motive for accompanying this band of hunters?"

"Revenge!"

"And you are a preacher?" Jim's voice did not disguise his
astonishment.

"I was a preacher, and now I am thirsting for vengeance," answered
Christy, his face clouding darkly. "Wait until you learn what
frontier life means. You are young here yet; you are flushed with
the success of your teaching; you have lived a short time in this
quiet village, where, until the last few days, all has been serene.
You know nothing of the strife, of the necessity of fighting, of the
cruelty which makes up this border existence. Only two years have
hardened me so that I actually pant for the blood of the renegade
who has robbed me. A frontiersman must take his choice of succumbing
or cutting his way through flesh and bone. Blood will be spilled; if
not yours, then your foe's. The pioneers run from the plow to the
fight; they halt in the cutting of corn to defend themselves, and in
winter must battle against cold and hardship, which would be less
cruel if there was time in summer to prepare for winter, for the
savages leave them hardly an opportunity to plant crops. How many
pioneers have given up, and gone back east? Find me any who would
not return home to-morrow, if they could. All that brings them out
here is the chance for a home, and all that keeps them out here is
the poor hope of finally attaining their object. Always there is a
possibility of future prosperity. But this generation, if it
survives, will never see prosperity and happiness. What does this
border life engender in a pioneer who holds his own in it? Of all
things, not Christianity. He becomes a fighter, keen as the redskin
who steals through the coverts."

The serene days of the Village of Peace had passed into history.
Soon that depraved vagabond, the French trader, with cheap trinkets
and vile whisky, made his appearance. This was all that was needed
to inflame the visitors. Where they had been only bold and impudent,
they became insulting and abusive. They execrated the Christian
indians for their neutrality; scorned them for worshiping this
unknown God, and denounced a religion which made women of strong
men.

The slaughtering of cattle commenced; the despoiling of maize
fields, and robbing of corn-cribs began with the drunkenness.

All this time it was seen that Girty and Elliott consulted often
with Pipe and Half King. The latter was the only Huron chief opposed
to neutrality toward the Village of Peace, and he was, if possible,
more fierce in his hatred than Pipe. The future of the Christian
settlement rested with these two chiefs. Girty and Elliott,
evidently, were the designing schemers, and they worked diligently
on the passions of these simple-minded, but fierce, warlike chiefs.

Greatly to the relief of the distracted missionaries, Heckewelder
returned to the village. Jaded and haggard, he presented a
travel-worn appearance. He made the astonishing assertions that he
had been thrice waylaid and assaulted on his way to Goshocking; then
detained by a roving band of Chippewas, and soon after his arrival
at their camping ground a renegade had run off with a white woman
captive, while the Indians west of the village were in an uproar.
Zeisberger, however, was safe in the Moravian town of Salem, some
miles west of Goshocking. Heckewelder had expected to find the same
condition of affairs as existed in the Village of Peace; but he was
bewildered by the great array of hostile Indians. Chiefs who had
once extended friendly hands to him, now drew back coldly, as they
said:

"Washington is dead. The American armies are cut to pieces. The few
thousands who had escaped the British are collecting at Fort Pitt to
steal the Indian's land."

Heckewelder vigorously denied all these assertions, knowing they had
been invented by Girty and Elliott. He exhausted all his skill and
patience in the vain endeavor to show Pipe where he was wrong. Half
King had been so well coached by the renegades that he refused to
listen. The other chiefs maintained a cold reserve that was baffling
and exasperating. Wingenund took no active part in the councils; but
his presence apparently denoted that he had sided with the others.
The outlook was altogether discouraging.

"I'm completely fagged out," declared Heckewelder, that night when
he returned to Edwards' cabin. He dropped into a chair as one whose
strength is entirely spent, whose indomitable spirit has at last
been broken.

"Lie down to rest," said Edwards.

"Oh, I can't. Matters look so black."

"You're tired out and discouraged. You'll feel better to-morrow. The
situation is not, perhaps, so hopeless. The presence of these
frontiersmen should encourage us."

"What will they do? What can they do?" cried Heckewelder, bitterly.
"I tell you never before have I encountered such gloomy, stony
Indians. It seems to me that they are in no vacillating state. They
act like men whose course is already decided upon, and who are only
waiting."

"For what?" asked Jim, after a long silence.

"God only knows! Perhaps for a time; possibly for a final decision,
and, it may be, for a reason, the very thought of which makes me
faint."

"Tell us," said Edwards, speaking quietly, for he had ever been the
calmest of the missionaries.

"Never mind. Perhaps it's only my nerves. I'm all unstrung, and
could suspect anything to-night."

"Heckewelder, tell us?" Jim asked, earnestly.

"My friends, I pray I am wrong. God help us if my fears are correct.
I believe the Indians are waiting for Jim Girty."

Simon Girty lolled on a blanket in Half King's teepee. He was alone,
awaiting his allies. Rings of white smoke curled lazily from his
lips as he puffed on a long Indian pipe, and gazed out over the
clearing that contained the Village of Peace.

Still water has something in its placid surface significant of deep
channels, of hidden depths; the dim outline of the forest is dark
with meaning, suggestive of its wild internal character. So Simon
Girty's hard, bronzed face betrayed the man. His degenerate
brother's features were revolting; but his own were striking, and
fell short of being handsome only because of their craggy hardness.
Years of revolt, of bitterness, of consciousness of wasted life, had
graven their stern lines on that copper, masklike face. Yet despite
the cruelty there, the forbidding shade on it, as if a reflection
from a dark soul, it was not wholly a bad countenance. Traces still
lingered, faintly, of a man in whom kindlier feelings had once
predominated.

In a moment of pique Girty had deserted his military post at Fort
Pitt, and become an outlaw of his own volition. Previous to that
time he had been an able soldier, and a good fellow. When he
realized that his step was irrevocable, that even his best friends
condemned him, he plunged, with anger and despair in his heart, into
a war upon his own race. Both of his brothers had long been border
ruffians, whose only protection from the outraged pioneers lay in
the faraway camps of hostile tribes. George Girty had so sunk his
individuality into the savage's that he was no longer a white man.
Jim Girty stalked over the borderland with a bloody tomahawk, his
long arm outstretched to clutch some unfortunate white woman, and
with his hideous smile of death. Both of these men were far lower
than the worst savages, and it was almost wholly to their deeds of
darkness that Simon Girty owed his infamous name.

To-day White Chief, as Girty was called, awaited his men. A slight
tremor of the ground caused him to turn his gaze. The Huron chief,
Half King, resplendent in his magnificent array, had entered the
teepee. He squatted in a corner, rested the bowl of his great pipe
on his knee, and smoked in silence. The habitual frown of his black
brow, like a shaded, overhanging cliff; the fire flashing from his
eyes, as a shining light is reflected from a dark pool; his
closely-shut, bulging jaw, all bespoke a nature, lofty in its Indian
pride and arrogance, but more cruel than death.

Another chief stalked into the teepee and seated himself. It was
Pipe. His countenance denoted none of the intelligence that made
Wingenund's face so noble; it was even coarser than Half King's, and
his eyes, resembling live coals in the dark; the long, cruel lines
of his jaw; the thin, tightly-closed lips, which looked as if they
could relax only to utter a savage command, expressed fierce cunning
and brutality.

"White Chief is idle to-day," said Half King, speaking in the Indian
tongue.

"King, I am waiting. Girty is slow, but sure," answered the
renegade.

"The eagle sails slowly round and round, up and up," replied Half
King, with majestic gestures, "until his eye sees all, until he
knows his time; then he folds his wings and swoops down from the
blue sky like the forked fire. So does White Chief. But Half King is
impatient."

"To-day decides the fate of the Village of Peace," answered Girty,
imperturbably.

"Ugh!" grunted Pipe.

Half King vented his approval in the same meaning exclamation.

An hour passed; the renegade smoked in silence; the chiefs did
likewise.

A horseman rode up to the door of the teepee, dismounted, and came
in. It was Elliott. He had been absent twenty hours. His buckskin
suit showed the effect of hard riding through the thickets.

"Hullo, Bill, any sign of Jim?" was Girty's greeting to his
lieutenant.

"Nary. He's not been seen near the Delaware camp. He's after that
chap who married Winds."

"I thought so. Jim's roundin' up a tenderfoot who will be a bad man
to handle if he has half a chance. I saw as much the day he took his
horse away from Silver. He finally did fer the Shawnee, an' almost
put Jim out. My brother oughtn't to give rein to personal revenge at
a time like this." Girty's face did not change, but his tone was one
of annoyance.