Books: The Last Trail
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Zane Grey >> The Last Trail
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They increased their speed, and had almost come up to the curve in the
road, marked by dense undergrowth on both sides, when the branches in
the thicket swayed violently, a sturdy little man armed with a musket
appeared from among them.
"Avast! Heave to!" he commanded in a low, fierce voice, leveling his
weapon. "One breeze from ye, an' I let sail this broadside."
"What do you want? We have no valuables," said Will, speaking low.
Helen stared at the little man. She was speechless with terror. It
flashed into her mind as soon as she recognized the red, evil face of
the sailor, that he was the accomplice upon whom Brandt had told Metzar
he could rely.
"Shut up! It's not ye I want, nor valuables, but this wench," growled
Case. He pushed Will around with the muzzle of the musket, which
action caused the young man to turn a sickly white and shrink
involuntarily with fear. The hammer of the musket was raised, and
might fall at the slightest jar.
"For God's sake! Will, do as he says," cried Helen, who saw murder in
Case's eyes. Capture or anything was better than sacrifice of life.
"March!" ordered Case, with the musket against Will's back.
Will hurriedly started forward, jostling Helen, who had preceded him.
He was forced to hurry, because every few moments Case pressed the gun
to his back or side.
Without another word the sailor marched them swiftly along the road,
which now narrowed down to a trail. His intention, no doubt, was to
put as much distance between him and the fort as was possible. No
more than a mile had been thus traversed when two Indians stepped
into view.
"My God! My God!" cried Will as the savages proceeded first to bind
Helen's arms behind her, and then his in the same manner. After this
the journey was continued in silence, the Indians walking beside the
prisoners, and Case in the rear.
Helen was so terrified that for a long time she could not think
coherently. It seemed as if she had walked miles, yet did not feel
tired. Always in front wound the narrow, leaf-girt trail, and to the
left the broad river gleamed at intervals through open spaces in the
thickets. Flocks of birds rose in the line of march. They seemed tame,
and uttered plaintive notes as if in sympathy.
About noon the trail led to the river bank. One of the savages
disappeared in a copse of willows, and presently reappeared carrying a
birch-bark canoe. Case ordered Helen and Will into the boat, got in
himself, and the savages, taking stations at bow and stern, paddled
out into the stream. They shot over under the lee of an island, around
a rocky point, and across a strait to another island. Beyond this they
gained the Ohio shore, and beached the canoe.
"Ahoy! there, cap'n," cried Case, pushing Helen up the bank before
him, and she, gazing upward, was more than amazed to see Mordaunt
leaning against a tree.
"Mordaunt, had you anything to do with this?" cried Helen
breathlessly.
"I had all to do with it," answered the Englishman.
"What do you mean?"
He did not meet her gaze, nor make reply; but turned to address a few
words in a low tone to a white man sitting on a log.
Helen knew she had seen this person before, and doubted not he was
one of Metzar's men. She saw a rude, bark lean-to, the remains of a
camp-fire, and a pack tied in blankets. Evidently Mordaunt and his men
had tarried here awaiting such developments as had come to pass.
"You white-faced hound!" hissed Will, beside himself with rage when he
realized the situation. Bound though he was, he leaped up and tried to
get at Mordaunt. Case knocked him on the head with the handle of his
knife. Will fell with blood streaming from a cut over the temple.
The dastardly act aroused all Helen's fiery courage. She turned to the
Englishman with eyes ablaze.
"So you've at last found your level. Border-outlaw! Kill me at once.
I'd rather be dead than breathe the same air with such a coward!"
"I swore I'd have you, if not by fair means then by foul," he
answered, with dark and haggard face.
"What do you intend to do with me now that I am tied?" she demanded
scornfully.
"Keep you a prisoner in the woods till you consent to marry me."
Helen laughed in scorn. Desperate as was the plight, her natural
courage had arisen at the cruel blow dealt her cousin, and she faced
the Englishman with flashing eyes and undaunted mien. She saw he was
again unsteady, and had the cough and catching breath habitual to
certain men under the influence of liquor. She turned her attention to
Will. He lay as he had fallen, with blood streaming over his pale face
and fair hair. While she gazed at him Case whipped out his long knife,
and looked up at Mordaunt.
"Cap'n, I'd better loosen a hatch fer him," he said brutally. "He's
dead cargo fer us, an' in the way."
He lowered the gleaming point upon Will's chest.
"Oh-h-h!" breathed Helen in horror. She tried to close her eyes but
was so fascinated she could not.
"Get up. I'll have no murder," ordered Mordaunt. "Leave him here."
"He's not got a bad cut," said the man sitting on the log. "He'll come
to arter a spell, go back to ther fort, an' give an alarm."
"What's that to me?" asked Mordaunt sharply. "We shall be safe. I
won't have him with us because some Indian or another will kill him.
It's not my purpose to murder any one."
"Ugh!" grunted one of the savages, and pointed eastward with his hand.
"Hurry-long-way-go," he said in English. With the Indians in the lead
the party turned from the river into the forest.
Helen looked back into the sandy glade and saw Will lying as they had
left him, unconscious, with his hands still bound tightly behind him,
and blood running over his face. Painful as was the thought of leaving
him thus, it afforded her relief. She assured herself he had not been
badly hurt, would recover consciousness before long, and, even bound
as he was, could make his way back to the settlement.
Her own situation, now that she knew Mordaunt had instigated the
abduction, did not seem hopeless. Although dreading Brandt with
unspeakable horror, she did not in the least fear the Englishman. He
was mad to carry her off like this into the wilderness, but would
force her to do nothing. He could not keep her a prisoner long while
Jonathan Zane and Wetzel were free to take his trail. What were his
intentions? Where was he taking her? Such questions as these, however,
troubled Helen more than a little. They brought her thoughts back to
the Indians leading the way with lithe and stealthy step. How had
Mordaunt associated himself with these savages? Then, suddenly, it
dawned upon her that Brandt also might be in this scheme to carry her
off. She scouted the idea; but it returned. Perhaps Mordaunt was only
a tool; perhaps he himself was being deceived. Helen turned pale at
the very thought. She had never forgotten the strange, unreadable, yet
threatening, expression which Brandt had worn the day she had refused
to walk with him.
Meanwhile the party made rapid progress through the forest. Not a word
was spoken, nor did any noise of rustling leaves or crackling twigs
follow their footsteps. The savage in the lead chose the open and less
difficult ground; he took advantage of glades, mossy places, and rocky
ridges. This careful choosing was, evidently, to avoid noise, and make
the trail as difficult to follow as possible. Once he stopped
suddenly, and listened.
Helen had a good look at the savage while he was in this position. His
lean, athletic figure resembled, in its half-clothed condition, a
bronzed statue; his powerful visage was set, changeless like iron. His
dark eyes seemed to take in all points of the forest before him.
Whatever had caused the halt was an enigma to all save his red-skinned
companion.
The silence of the wood was the silence of the desert. No bird
chirped; no breath of wind sighed in the tree-tops; even the aspens
remained unagitated. Pale yellow leaves sailed slowly, reluctantly
down from above.
But some faint sound, something unusual had jarred upon the
exquisitely sensitive ears of the leader, for with a meaning shake of
the head to his followers, he resumed the march in a direction at
right angles with the original course.
This caution, and evident distrust of the forest ahead, made Helen
think again of Jonathan and Wetzel. Those great bordermen might
already be on the trail of her captors. The thought thrilled her.
Presently she realized, from another long, silent march through forest
thickets, glades, aisles, and groves, over rock-strewn ridges, and
down mossy-stoned ravines, that her strength was beginning to fail.
"I can go no further with my arms tied in this way," she declared,
stopping suddenly.
"Ugh!" uttered the savage before her, turning sharply. He brandished a
tomahawk before her eyes.
Mordaunt hurriedly set free her wrists. His pale face flushed a dark,
flaming red when she shrank from his touch as if he were a viper.
After they had traveled what seemed to Helen many miles, the vigilance
of the leaders relaxed.
On the banks of the willow-skirted stream the Indian guide halted
them, and proceeded on alone to disappear in a green thicket.
Presently he reappeared, and motioned for them to come on. He led the
way over smooth, sandy paths between clumps of willows, into a heavy
growth of alder bushes and prickly thorns, at length to emerge upon a
beautiful grassy plot enclosed by green and yellow shrubbery. Above
the stream, which cut the edge of the glade, rose a sloping, wooded
ridge, with huge rocks projecting here and there out of the
brown forest.
Several birch-bark huts could be seen; then two rough bearded men
lolling upon the grass, and beyond them a group of painted Indians.
A whoop so shrill, so savage, so exultant, that it seemingly froze her
blood, rent the silence. A man, unseen before, came crashing through
the willows on the side of the ridge. He leaped the stream with the
spring of a wild horse. He was big and broad, with disheveled hair,
keen, hard face, and wild, gray eyes.
Helen's sight almost failed her; her head whirled dizzily; it was as
if her heart had stopped beating and was become a cold, dead weight.
She recognized in this man the one whom she feared most of
all--Brandt.
He cast one glance full at her, the same threatening, cool, and
evil-meaning look she remembered so well, and then engaged the Indian
guide in low conversation.
Helen sank at the foot of a tree, leaning against it. Despite her
weariness she had retained some spirit until this direful revelation
broke her courage. What worse could have happened? Mordaunt had led
her, for some reason that she could not divine, into the clutches of
Brandt, into the power of Legget and his outlaws.
But Helen was not one to remain long dispirited or hopeless. As this
plot thickened, as every added misfortune weighed upon her, when just
ready to give up to despair she remembered the bordermen. Then Colonel
Zane's tales of their fearless, implacable pursuit when bent on rescue
or revenge, recurred to her, and fortitude returned. While she had
life she would hope.
The advent of the party with their prisoner enlivened Legget's gang. A
great giant of a man, blond-bearded, and handsome in a wild, rugged,
uncouth way, a man Helen instinctively knew to be Legget, slapped
Brandt on the shoulder.
"Damme, Roge, if she ain't a regular little daisy! Never seed such a
purty lass in my life."
Brandt spoke hurriedly, and Legget laughed.
All this time Case had been sitting on the grass, saying nothing, but
with his little eyes watchful. Mordaunt stood near him, his head
bowed, his face gloomy.
"Say, cap'n, I don't like this mess," whispered Case to his master.
"They ain't no crew fer us. I know men, fer I've sailed the seas, an'
you're goin' to get what Metz calls the double-cross."
Mordaunt seemed to arouse from his gloomy reverie. He looked at Brandt
and Legget who were now in earnest council. Then his eyes wandered
toward Helen. She beckoned him to come to her.
"Why did you bring me here?" she asked.
"Brandt understood my case. He planned this thing, and seemed to be a
good friend of mine. He said if I once got you out of the settlement,
he would give me protection until I crossed the border into Canada.
There we could be married," replied Mordaunt unsteadily.
"Then you meant marriage by me, if I could be made to consent?"
"Of course. I'm not utterly vile," he replied, with face lowered in
shame.
"Have you any idea what you've done?"
"Done? I don't understand."
"You have ruined yourself, lost your manhood, become an outlaw, a
fugitive, made yourself the worst thing on the border--a girl-thief,
and all for nothing."
"No, I have you. You are more to me than all."
"But can't you see? You've brought me out here for Brandt!"
"My God!" exclaimed Mordaunt. He rose slowly to his feet and gazed
around like a man suddenly wakened from a dream. "I see it all now!
Miserable, drunken wretch that I am!"
Helen saw his face change and lighten as if a cloud of darkness had
passed away from it. She understood that love of liquor had made him a
party to this plot. Brandt had cunningly worked upon his weakness,
proposed a daring scheme; and filled his befogged mind with hopes
that, in a moment of clear-sightedness, he would have seen to be vain
and impossible. And Helen understood also that the sudden shock of
surprise, pain, possible fury, had sobered Mordaunt, probably for the
first time in weeks.
The Englishman's face became exceedingly pale. Seating himself on a
stone near Case, he bowed his head, remaining silent and motionless.
The conference between Legget and Brandt lasted for some time. When it
ended the latter strode toward the motionless figure on the rock.
"Mordaunt, you and Case will do well to follow this Indian at once to
the river, where you can strike the Fort Pitt trail," said Brandt.
He spoke arrogantly and authoritatively. His keen, hard face, his
steely eyes, bespoke the iron will and purpose of the man.
Mordaunt rose with cold dignity. If he had been a dupe, he was one no
longer, as could be plainly read on his calm, pale face. The old
listlessness, the unsteadiness had vanished. He wore a manner of
extreme quietude; but his eyes were like balls of blazing blue steel.
"Mr. Brandt, I seem to have done you a service, and am no longer
required," he said in a courteous tone.
Brandt eyed his man; but judged him wrongly. An English gentleman was
new to the border-outlaw.
"I swore the girl should be mine," he hissed.
"Doomed men cannot be choosers!" cried Helen, who had heard him. Her
dark eyes burned with scorn and hatred.
All the party heard her passionate outburst. Case arose as if
unconcernedly, and stood by the side of his master. Legget and the
other two outlaws came up. The Indians turned their swarthy faces.
"Hah! ain't she sassy?" cried Legget.
Brandt looked at Helen, understood the meaning of her words, and
laughed. But his face paled, and involuntarily his shifty glance
sought the rocks and trees upon the ridge.
"You played me from the first?" asked Mordaunt quietly.
"I did," replied Brandt.
"You meant nothing of your promise to help me across the border?"
"No."
"You intended to let me shift for myself out here in this wilderness?"
"Yes, after this Indian guides you to the river-trail," said Brandt,
indicating with his finger the nearest savage.
"I get what you frontier men call the double-cross'?"
"That's it," replied Brandt with a hard laugh, in which Legget joined.
A short pause ensued.
"What will you do with the girl?"
"That's my affair."
"Marry her?" Mordaunt's voice was low and quiet.
"No!" cried Brandt. "She flaunted my love in my face, scorned me! She
saw that borderman strike me, and by God! I'll get even. I'll keep her
here in the woods until I'm tired of her, and when her beauty fades
I'll turn her over to Legget."
Scarcely had the words dropped from his vile lips when Mordaunt moved
with tigerish agility. He seized a knife from the belt of one of
the Indians.
"Die!" he screamed.
Brandt grasped his tomahawk. At the same instant the man who had acted
as Mordaunt's guide grasped the Englishman from behind.
Brandt struck ineffectually at the struggling man.
"Fair play!" roared Case, leaping at Mordaunt's second assailant. His
long knife sheathed its glittering length in the man's breast. Without
even a groan he dropped. "Clear the decks!" Case yelled, sweeping
round in a circle. All fell back before that whirling knife.
Several of the Indians started as if to raise their rifles; but
Legget's stern command caused them to desist.
The Englishman and the outlaw now engaged in a fearful encounter. The
practiced, rugged, frontier desperado apparently had found his match
in this pale-faced, slender man. His border skill with the hatchet
seemed offset by Mordaunt's terrible rage. Brandt whirled and swung
the weapon as he leaped around his antagonist. With his left arm the
Englishman sought only to protect his head, while with his right he
brandished the knife. Whirling here and there they struggled across
the cleared space, plunging out of sight among the willows. During a
moment there was a sound as of breaking branches; then a dull blow,
horrible to hear, followed by a low moan, and then deep silence.
CHAPTER XVIII
A black weight was seemingly lifted from Helen's weary eyelids. The
sun shone; the golden forest surrounded her; the brook babbled
merrily; but where were the struggling, panting men? She noticed
presently, when her vision had grown more clear, that the scene
differed entirely from the willow-glade where she had closed her eyes
upon the fight. Then came the knowledge that she had fainted, and,
during the time of unconsciousness, been moved.
She lay upon a mossy mound a few feet higher than a swiftly running
brook. A magnificent chestnut tree spread its leafy branches above
her. Directly opposite, about an hundred feet away, loomed a gray,
ragged, moss-stained cliff. She noted this particularly because the
dense forest encroaching to its very edge excited her admiration. Such
wonderful coloring seemed unreal. Dead gold and bright red foliage
flamed everywhere.
Two Indians stood near by silent, immovable. No other of Legget's band
was visible. Helen watched the red men.
Sinewy, muscular warriors they were, with bodies partially painted,
and long, straight hair, black as burnt wood, interwoven with bits of
white bone, and plaited around waving eagle plumes. At first glance
their dark faces and dark eyes were expressive of craft, cunning,
cruelty, courage, all attributes of the savage.
Yet wild as these savages appeared, Helen did not fear them as she did
the outlaws. Brandt's eyes, and Legget's, too, when turned on her,
emitted a flame that seemed to scorch and shrivel her soul. When the
savages met her gaze, which was but seldom, she imagined she saw
intelligence, even pity, in their dusky eyes. Certain it was she did
not shrink from them as from Brandt.
Suddenly, with a sensation of relief and joy, she remembered
Mordaunt's terrible onslaught upon Brandt. Although she could not
recollect the termination of that furious struggle, she did recall
Brandt's scream of mortal agony, and the death of the other at Case's
hands. This meant, whether Brandt was dead or not, that the fighting
strength of her captors had been diminished. Surely as the sun had
risen that morning, Helen believed Jonathan and Wetzel lurked on the
trail of these renegades. She prayed that her courage, hope, strength,
might be continued.
"Ugh!" exclaimed one of the savages, pointing across the open space.
A slight swaying of the bushes told that some living thing was moving
among them, and an instant later the huge frame of the leader came
into view. The other outlaw, and Case, followed closely. Farther down
the margin of the thicket the Indians appeared; but without the
slightest noise or disturbance of the shrubbery.
It required but a glance to show Helen that Case was in high spirits.
His repulsive face glowed with satisfaction. He carried a bundle,
which Helen saw, with a sickening sense of horror, was made up of
Mordaunt's clothing. Brandt had killed the Englishman. Legget also had
a package under his arm, which he threw down when he reached the
chestnut tree, to draw from his pocket a long, leather belt, such as
travelers use for the carrying of valuables. It was evidently heavy,
and the musical clink which accompanied his motion proclaimed the
contents to be gold.
Brandt appeared next; he was white and held his hand to his breast.
There were dark stains on his hunting coat, which he removed to expose
a shirt blotched with red.
"You ain't much hurt, I reckon?" inquired Legget solicitously.
"No; but I'm bleeding bad," replied Brandt coolly. He then called an
Indian and went among the willows skirting the stream.
"So I'm to be in this border crew?" asked Case, looking up at Legget.
"Sure," replied the big outlaw. "You're a handy fellar, Case, an'
after I break you into border ways you will fit in here tip-top. Now
you'd better stick by me. When Eb Zane, his brother Jack, an' Wetzel
find out this here day's work, hell will be a cool place compared with
their whereabouts. You'll be safe with me, an' this is the only place
on the border, I reckon, where you can say your life is your own."
"I'm yer mate, cap'n. I've sailed with soldiers, pirates, sailors, an'
I guess I can navigate this borderland. Do we mess here? You didn't
come far."
"Wal, I ain't pertikuler, but I don't like eatin' with buzzards," said
Legget, with a grin. "Thet's why we moved a bit."
"What's buzzards?"
"Ho! ho! Mebbe you'll hev 'em closer'n you'd like, some day, if you'd
only know it. Buzzards are fine birds, most particular birds, as won't
eat nothin' but flesh, an' white man or Injun is pie fer 'em."
"Cap'n, I've seed birds as wouldn't wait till a man was dead," said
Case.
"Haw! haw! you can't come no sailor yarns on this fellar. Wal, now,
we've got ther Englishman's gold. One or t'other of us might jest as
well hev it all."
"Right yer are, cap'n. Dice, cards, anyways, so long as I knows the
game."
"Here, Jenks, hand over yer clickers, an' bring us a flat stone," said
Legget, sitting on the moss and emptying the belt in front of him.
Case took a small bag from the dark blue jacket that had so lately
covered Mordaunt's shoulders, and poured out its bright contents.
"This coat ain't worth keepin'," he said, holding it up. The garment
was rent and slashed, and under the left sleeve was a small,
blood-stained hole where one of Brandt's blows had fallen. "Hullo,
what's this?" muttered the sailor, feeling in the pocket of the
jacket. "Blast my timbers, hooray!"
He held up a small, silver-mounted whiskey flask, unscrewed the lid,
and lifted the vessel to his mouth.
"I'm kinder thirsty myself," suggested Legget.
"Cap'n, a nip an' no more," Case replied, holding the flask to
Legget's lips.
The outlaw called Jenks now returned with a flat stone which he placed
between the two men. The Indians gathered around. With greedy eyes
they bent their heads over the gamblers, and watched every movement
with breathless interest. At each click of the dice, or clink of gold,
they uttered deep exclamations.
"Luck's again' ye, cap'n," said Case, skilfully shaking the ivory
cubes.
"Hain't I got eyes?" growled the outlaw.
Steadily his pile of gold diminished, and darker grew his face.
"Cap'n, I'm a bad wind to draw," Case rejoined, drinking again from
the flask. His naturally red face had become livid, his skin moist,
and his eyes wild with excitement.
"Hullo! If them dice wasn't Jenks's, an' I hadn't played afore with
him, I'd swear they's loaded."
"You ain't insinuatin' nothin', cap'n?" inquired Case softly,
hesitating with the dice in his hands, his evil eyes glinting
at Legget.
"No, you're fair enough," growled the leader. "It's my tough luck."
The game progressed with infrequent runs of fortune for the outlaw,
and presently every piece of gold lay in a shining heap before
the sailor.
"Clean busted!" exclaimed Legget in disgust.
"Can't you find nothin' more?" asked Case.
The outlaw's bold eyes wandered here and there until they rested upon
the prisoner.
"I'll play ther lass against yer pile of gold," he growled. "Best two
throws out 'en three. See here, she's as much mine as Brandt's."
"Make it half my pile an' I'll go you."
"Nary time. Bet, or give me back what yer win," replied Legget
gruffly.
"She's a trim little craft, no mistake," said Case, critically
surveying Helen. "All right, cap'n, I've sportin' blood, an' I'll bet.
Yer throw first."
Legget won the first cast, and Case the second. With deliberation the
outlaw shook the dice in his huge fist, and rattled them out upon the
stone. "Hah!" he cried in delight. He had come within one of the
highest score possible. Case nonchalantly flipped the little white
blocks. The Indians crowded forward, their dusky eyes shining.
Legget swore in a terrible voice which re-echoed from the stony cliff.
The sailor was victorious. The outlaw got up, kicked the stone and
dice in the brook, and walked away from the group. He strode to and
fro under one of the trees. Gruffly he gave an order to the Indians.
Several of them began at once to kindle a fire. Presently he called
Jenks, who was fishing the dice out of the brook, and began to
converse earnestly with him, making fierce gestures and casting
lowering glances at the sailor.
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