"Good lads!" he whispered when he left them and crawled back within the barricade.

"How're they behavin'?" asked the Little Giant.

"Fine," responded Will. "Human beings couldn't do better. They're standing well under fire, when they're not able to fire back."

"Which gives more credit to them than to us, because we can and do fire back."

"Will," said Boyd, "you resume your watch of that band in front while we devote all our attention to the cottonwoods. It's a good thing we've got this creek with the high banks back of us. Now, we're in for a long wait. When warriors are besieging, they always try to wear out the patience of those they besiege and tempt 'em into some rash act."

"Those in front are riding beyond the swell and out of sight," said Will.

The Little Giant laughed with the most intense satisfaction.

"They're skeered o' our rifles," he said. "We've got lightnin' that strikes at pretty long range, an' they ain't so sh.o.r.e that it ain't a lot longer than it is."

Will had learned the philosophy of making himself comfortable whenever he could, and lying with his hand on one arm he watched the cottonwoods, trusting meanwhile more to ear than to eye. Since the Indians in front, disappearing over the swell, had ceased to shout, the night became quiet. The wind was light and the cottonwoods did not catch enough of it to give back a song, while the creek was too sluggish to murmur as it flowed. His comrades also were moveless, although he knew that they were watching.

He looked up at the heavens, and the moon and the stars were so bright that they seemed to be surcharged with silver. The whole world, in such misty glow, was supremely beautiful, and it was hard to realize, as he lay there in silence and peace, that they were surrounded by savage foes, seeking their lives, men who, whatever their primitive virtues, knew little of mercy. He understood and respected the wish of the Sioux and the other tribes to preserve for themselves the great buffalo ranges and the mountains, but he was not able to feel very friendly toward them when they lay in the cottonwoods not far away, seeking his scalp and his life, or, if taken alive, to subject him to all the hideous tortures that primeval man has invented. The distant view of the Indian as a wronged individual often came into violent contact with another view of him near at hand, seeking to inflict a death with hideous pain.

The night did not darken as it wore on, still starred brilliantly and lighted by a full, silver moon, which seemed to Will on these lone plains of the great West to have a size and splendor that he had never noticed in the East. He and the Little Giant now faced the north, while Boyd and Brady, of the Biblical voice and speech, looked toward the south. All of them, when they gazed that way, could see the plain from which the force, intending to attract their attention by shouting and yelling, had retreated. But they knew the danger was still to be apprehended from the cottonwoods, and despite the long stillness they never ceased to watch with every faculty they could bring to bear.

The dip in which the horses and mules stood was only a short distance from the little fortification and unless the Sioux in attacking came very near their bullets were likely to pa.s.s over the heads of the animals. The four, resolved not to abandon the horses and mules under any circ.u.mstances, nevertheless felt rather easy on that score.

About three o'clock in the morning some shots were fired from the cottonwoods in the south, but they flew wild and the four did not reply.

"They came from a distance," said Boyd. "They're probably intended to provoke our fire and tell just where we're lying."

After a while more shots were fired, now from the north, but as they were obviously intended for the same purpose the four still remained quiet. A little later Will heard a movement, a stamping of hoofs among the animals, indicating alarm, and once more he crawled out of the breastwork to soothe them.

The horses and mules responded as always to his whispered words of encouragement and strokings of manes and noses, and he was about to return when his attention was attracted by a slight noise in the bushes on the farther side of the animals. Every motive of frontier caution and thoroughness inclined him to see what it was. It might be and most probably was a coyote hiding there in fear, but that did not prevent him from stooping low and entering the bushes.

The growth of scrub, watered by seepage from the stream, was rather dense, and he pushed his way in gently, lest a rustling of twigs and leaves reach the Sioux, lurking among the cottonwoods. He did not hear the noise again, and he went a little farther. Then he heard a sound by his side almost as light as that of a leaf that falls, and he whirled about, but it was too late. A war club descended upon his head and he fell unconscious to the ground.

CHAPTER XI

THE YOUNG SLAVE

Will's first sign of returning consciousness was a frightful headache, and he did not open his eyes, but, instead, moved his hand toward the pain as one is tempted to bite down on a sore tooth. It was in the top of his head, and his fingers touched a bandage. Without thinking he pulled at it, and the pain, so far from being confined to one spot, shot through his whole body. Then he lay still, with his eyes yet shut, and the agony decreased until it was confined to a dull throbbing in the original spot.

He tried to gather together his scattered and wandering faculties and coordinate them to such an extent that he could produce thought. It required a severe effort, and made his head ache worse than ever, but he persisted until he remembered that he had been creeping through bushes in search of a sound, or the cause of a sound. But memory stopped there and presently faded quite away. Another effort and he lifted his mind back on the track. Then he remembered the slight sound in the bushes near him, the shadow of a figure and a stunning blow. Beyond that his memory despite all his whipping and driving, would not go, because there was nothing on which to build.

He opened his eyes which were heavy-lidded and painful for the time, and saw the figures of Indians that seemed to be standing far above him.

Then he knew that he was lying flat upon his back, and that his sick brain was exaggerating their height, because they truly appeared to him in the guise of giants. He tried to move his feet but found that they were bound tightly together, and the effort gave him much pain. Then he was in truth a captive, the captive of those who cared little for his sufferings. It was true they had bound up his head, but Indians often gave temporary relief to the wounds of their prisoners in order that they might have more strength to make the torture long.

His vision cleared gradually, and he saw that he was lying on a small gra.s.sy knoll. A fire was burning a little distance to his left, and besides the warriors who stood up others were lying down, or sitting in Turkish fashion, gnawing the meat off buffalo bones that they roasted at the fire. The whole scene was wild and barbaric to the last degree and Will shuddered at the fate which he was sure awaited him.

Beyond the Indians he saw trees, but they were not cottonwoods. Instead he noted oak and pine and aspen and he knew he was not lying where he had fallen, or in any region very near it. Straining his eyes he saw a dim line of foothills and forest. He must have been brought there on a pony and dreadful thoughts about his comrades a.s.sailed him. Since the Sioux had come away with him as a prisoner they might have fallen in a general ma.s.sacre. In truth, that was the most likely theory, by far, and he shuddered violently again and again.

Those three had been true and loyal friends of his, the finest of comrades, hearts of steel, and yet as gentle and kindly as women.

Hardships and dangers in common had bound the four together, and the difference in years did not matter. It seemed that he had known them and been a.s.sociated with them always. He could hear now the joyous whistling of the Little Giant, the terse, intelligent talk of Boyd, and the firm Biblical allusions of the beaver hunter. They could not be dead! It could not be so! And yet in his heart he believed that it _was_ so.

He turned painfully on his side, groaned, shut his eyes, and opened them again to see a tall warrior standing over him, gazing down at him with a cynical look. He was instantly ashamed that he had groaned and said in apology:

"It was pain of the spirit and not of the body that caused me to make lament."

"It must be so," replied the warrior in English, "because you have come back to the world much quicker than we believed possible. The vital forces in you are strong."

He spoke like an educated Indian, but his face, his manner and his whole appearance were those of the typical wild man.

"I see that I'm at least alive," said Will with a faint touch of humor, "though I can scarcely describe my condition as cheerful. Who are you?"

"I am Heraka, a Sioux chief. Heraka in your language means the Elk, and I am proud of the name."

Will looked again at him, and much more closely now, because, despite his condition, he was impressed by the manner and appearance. Heraka was a man of middle years, of uncommon height and of a broad, full countenance, the width between the eyes being great. It was a countenance at once dignified, serene and penetrating. He wore brilliantly embroidered moccasins, leggings and waist band, and a long green blanket, harmonizing with the foliage at that period of the year, hung from his shoulders. He carried a rifle and there were other weapons in his belt.

Will felt with increasing force that he was in the presence of a great Sioux chief. The Sioux, who were to the West what the Iroquois were to the East, sometimes produced men of high intellectual rank, their development being hampered by time and place. The famous chief, Gall, who planned Custer's defeat, and who led the forces upon the field, had the head of a Jupiter, and Will felt now as he stared up at Heraka that he had never beheld a more imposing figure. The gaze of the man that met his own was stern and denunciatory. The lad felt that he was about to be charged with a great crime, and that the charge would be true.

"Why have you come here?" asked the stern warrior.

In spite of himself, in spite of his terrible situation, the youth's sense of humor sparkled up a moment.

"I don't know why I came here," he replied, "nor do I know how, nor do I know where I am."

The chief's gaze flickered a moment, but he replied with little modification of his sternness:

"You were brought here on the back of a pony. You are miles from where you were taken, and you are the prisoner of these warriors of the Dakota whom I lead."

Will knew well enough that the Sioux called themselves in their own language the Dakota, and that the chief would take a pride in so naming them to him.

"The Dakotas are a great nation," he said.

Heraka nodded, not as if it were a compliment, but as a mere statement of fact. Will considered. Would it be wise to ask about his friends?

Might he not in doing so give some hint that could be used against them?

The fierce gaze of the chief seemed actually to penetrate his physical body and read his mind.

"You are thinking of those who were with you," he said.

"My thoughts had turned to them."

"Call them back. It is a waste."

"Why do you say that, Heraka?"

"Because they are all dead. Their scalps are drying at the belts of the warriors. You alone live as we had to strike you down in silence before we slew the others."