作者：Ellis, Edward Sylvester, 1840-1916
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The Phantom of the River试读：
CHAPTER I.
LONGING FOR NIGHT."I think there's trouble ahead, Dan'l."
"There isn't any doubt of it, Simon."
The first remark was made by the famous pioneer ranger, Simon Kenton, and the second fell from the lips of the more famous Daniel Boone.
It was at the close of a warm day in August, more than a century ago, that these veterans of the woods came together for the purpose of consultation. They had threaded their way along parallel lines, separated by hardly a furlong, for a mile from their starting-point, when the above interchange of views took place.
Boone had kept close to the Ohio while stealthily moving eastward, while Kenton took the same course, gliding more deeply among the shadows of the Kentucky forest until, disturbed by the evidence of danger, he trended to the left and met Boone near the river.
The two sat down on a fallen tree, side by side, and, while talking in low tones, did not for a moment forget their surroundings. They had lived too long in the perilous wilderness to forget that there was never a moment when a pioneer was absolutely safe from the fierce or stealthy red man.
"Dan'l," said Kenton, in that low, musical voice which was one of his most marked characteristics, "this 'ere bus'ness has took the qu'arest shape of anything that you or me have been mixed up in."
"I haven't been mixed up in it, Simon," corrected Boone, turning his somewhat narrow, but clean-shaven face upon the other, and smiling gently in a way that brought the wrinkles around a pair of eyes as blue as those of Kenton himself.
"Not yet, but you're powerful sartin to be afore them folks reach the block-house."
Boone nodded his head to signify that he agreed with his friend.
"You wasn't at the block-house, Dan'l, when the flatboat stopped there?"
"No."
"Neither was I; I was tramping through the woods on my way to make a call on Mr. Ashbridge."
"That's the man who put up the cabin a mile back down the river?"
"Yes; you see Norman Ashbridge or his son George—and the same is a powerful likely younker—come down the Ohio last spring in their flatboat, and stopped at the clearing a mile below us, where they put up a tidy cabin. A few weeks ago the father started east to bring down his family in another flatboat. George, the younker, got tired of waiting and set out to meet 'em; him and me come together in the woods, and had a scrimmage with the varmints afore we got on the boat with 'em. Things were purty warm on the way down the river, for The Panther made matters warm for us."
"The Panther!" repeated Boone, turning toward his friend; "I was afraid he was mixed up in this."
"I should say he was—ruther," replied Kenton, with a grin over the surprise of his older companion. "That chap sneaked onto the boat last night, believing he had a chance to clean us all out. Of course, I knowed what was up, but The Panther made a powerful big mistake. He got mixed up with that darkey you seed—his name is Jethro Juggens—and you may shoot me if the darkey didn't throw him down and hold him fast till we made him prisoner."
Boone had heard something of this extraordinary exploit, but he looked questioningly at Kenton, as though he could hardly credit the fact.
"It's all as true as Gospel. We kept Wa-on-mon, which the same is The Panther, till late that night, when Mr. Ashbridge and Altman and me went over in a canoe to the other flatboat, which the Shawanoes had cleaned out, to even up accounts with 'em. Sime Girty was with 'em, but they left afore we got to the craft, and we sot it afire and come back."
"I seed the light last night, but didn't know what it was."
"While we was gone, Mr. Altman's darter, Agnes (she ain't much more than a child), felt so sorry for The Panther, thinking, too, that I meant to shove him under, that she cut the cords that bound him—"
"What a fool of a gal!"
"Dan'l," sternly interrupted Kenton, laying his hand on the arm of his friend, "you mustn't speak that way of Tom Altman's child. There ain't a finer, smarter, purtier, sweeter gal in all Ohio or Kaintuck than little Agnes Altman. She made a powerful big mistake, but she done it in the kindness of her heart, and, Dan'l, you and me knows there ain't many such mistakes made. But that little gal showed her pluck when she follered up Wa-on-mon, snatched the knife from his hand when he warn't looking, and warned young Ashbridge in time to save him. Wal, The Panther made a rush to jump overboard, but he happened to step onto that darkey again, so he was nabbed."
"But what's become of The Panther?" asked Boone, hoping to hear that the career of this terrible scourge of the border was ended.
Kenton rested his long, formidable flintlock rifle on the log at his side, clasped his thin iron fingers over one knee, the foot of which was raised from the ground, and looked thoughtfully among the trees in front. His coonskin cap was shoved back from his forehead, and a frown settled on it, and his thin lips were compressed for a few moments before he spoke.
"Dan'l, things haven't turned out altogether to suit me. As you know, the flatboat kept on down the river till it reached the clearing this morning. Afore we went ashore, I diskivered that Girty and several varmints was in the cabin. They knowed we was going there, and they meant to wait until we got inside, when they'd clean us all out. While we was man[oe]uvring round like, so as to trade places with 'em, a powerful qu'ar thing happened."
"There's a good many queer things happening in this part of the world, Simon," curtly remarked Boone.
"Two of them Shawanoes was shot—one killed or the other hit hard—and in both cases it was done by that darkey, Jethro Juggens. He's a big, strong, simple chap, that hates work worse nor pizen, but he knows how to shoot that gun of his in a way that'll open your eyes."
"But what about The Panther?" asked Boone, feeling more interest in him than in Jethro Juggens. Kenton's brow clouded again as he made answer:
"Consarn The Panther! I forgot about him. It was agreed that him and me would meet, all by ourselves, in the woods near the clearing, and settle that account between us. If I come back all right, Girty and the varmints was to leave the cabin. I come back and they left."
"And you evened up matters with The Panther?" exclaimed Boone, with a glow of satisfaction, in strong contrast to the scornful disgust on the rugged countenance of his friend.
"No; I went to the spot, but The Panther didn't show himself."
The readers of "Shod with Silence" will recall the circumstances. Simon Kenton hurried to the appointed place of meeting, eager for the encounter with Wa-on-mon, the famous war chief of the Shawanoes, but the crafty miscreant had vanished, and nothing was seen of him.
"I never thought Wa-on-mon was a coward," bitterly repeated Kenton.
"And, Simon," said Boone, impressively, "don't make the mistake of thinking so now; the reason why he didn't meet you wasn't that he was afraid of you."
"What was it?"
"You know as well as me."
And so he did. The savage leader of the Shawanoes merely deferred his furious meeting with the ranger in order to strike a more fearful blow against the pioneers.
The moment Wa-on-mon plunged into the woods near the clearing, with the avowed purpose of meeting Kenton, he was off like a deer in search of a large war party that he knew was somewhere in the neighborhood. With them he meant to return and "wipe out" every man, woman and child of the settlers.
Meanwhile, the Altmans and Ashbridges, assisted by their companions, removed all their goods from the flatboat against the bank and placed them in the cabin, prepared some time before for the occupancy of the Ashbridges. This was hardly done when Daniel Boone appeared at the clearing with disquieting news. He advised them, however, to stay, since their means of defence was good, but hardly was the decision reached when a runner came in with the news that an uprising among the surrounding tribes had already begun, and it would not do for the pioneers to remain another day. Nothing could save the lonely cabins and exposed dwellings except immediate flight to the nearest settlement or block-house.
Ten miles from the clearing, and standing on the northern bank of the Ohio, was the block-house in charge of Captain Bushwick. The Altmans and Ashbridges made the sad mistake of not fastening the flatboat to the bank and taking up their quarters at this frontier post until the full truth was learned about the dangers confronting them.
The first intention of Boone and his party was to escort the settlers back to the block-house. They had a brush with a company of Shawanoes, and defeated them. It was not the main body, however, under the leadership of The Panther. That remained to be heard from, and its whereabouts was unknown.
Mr. Altman, his wife, and daughter Agnes, and his negro servant, Jethro Juggens, Mr. Ashbridge and his wife, daughter Mabel, and their son George set out for the block-house on the Ohio side of the river.
Their plan was to keep along the Kentucky bank until opposite the post, when the means would be readily found for crossing. The two families were in charge of the rangers that Boone had brought with him for the purpose of acting as their escort. They were forced to leave behind them all their earthly possessions in the solitary cabin, with not the remotest prospect of ever seeing them or it again.
Although the day was well along when the start was made, yet the situation was so critical, because of the part The Panther was certain to play in the coming events, that Boone and Kenton took the advance, proceeding by parallel but separated lines, and on the guard against any stealthy approach from the Indians.
It was the hope that by preventing or, rather, averting any attack until nightfall, the prospects of the pioneers would be vastly improved. Though the forest possessed no available trail that could be used even in the daytime, the rangers, and especially Kenton and Boone, were so familiar with it, that they could guide their friends with unerring accuracy when the darkness was so profound that it was almost worthy of the old remark that a person could not see his hand before his face.
Accordingly, all yearned or prayed for the coming of darkness.
"Hark," whispered Kenton, turning to Boone, and raising his hand as a gesture for silence.
No need of that, for the elder had caught the sound—a faint and apparently distant cawing of a crow from some lofty tree-top.
Both had heard the same cry more than once that afternoon, and instead of its being the call of a crow, they knew it came from the throat of an Indian warrior, and therefore a relentless enemy.
CHAPTER II.
THE CAWING OF A CROW.Three separate times previous to this that faint cawing signal had been heard, as it seemed, from the distant tree-tops. The most sensitive ear could not say of a certainty it was not made by one of those black-coated birds calling to its mate or the flock from which it had strayed. Neither Boone nor Kenton distinguished any difference between the tone and what they had heard times without number, and yet neither held a doubt that it was emitted by a dusky spy stealing through the woods, and that it bore a momentous message to others of his kith and kin.
The keen sense of hearing enabled the rangers to locate the signal at less than a quarter of a mile in front and quite close to the Ohio. From the first time it was heard, no more than half an hour before, it held the same relative distance from the river, but advanced at a pace so nearly equal to that of Boone and Kenton that it was impossible to decide whether it was further off or nearer than before.
There was no reply to the call, and it was uttered only three times in each instance. The oppressive stillness that held reign throughout the forest on that sultry summer afternoon enabled the two men to hear the cawing with unmistakable distinctness.
In short, our friends interpreted it as a notice from the dusky scout to his comrades that he was following the progress of the pioneers, which was therefore fully understood by the war party that was seeking to encompass their destruction.
When the signal sounded for the fourth time, the rangers seated on the fallen tree looked in each other's faces without speaking. Then Kenton asked, in his guarded undertone:
"What do you make of it, Dan'l?"
"There's only one thing to make of it; them Shawanoes are keeping track of every movement of the folks behind us, and we can't hinder' em."
"How many of the varmints are playing the spy?"
"There may be one, and there may be a dozen."
This answer, of necessity, was guess-work, for there was no possible means of determining the number, since the hostiles in front so regulated their progress that not a glimpse had been caught of the almost invisible trail left by them.
And yet the matter was not wholly conjecture, after all.
"Dan'l," said Kenton, with a significant smile, "there's more than one of 'em, and you and me know it."
The older smiled in turn and nodded his head.
"You're right; there's two, and may be more—but we know there's two."
Nothing could show more strikingly the marvelous woodcraft of these remarkable men than their agreement in this declaration, which was founded upon this fact.
There was a shade of difference between the tone of the last signal and those that preceded it. You and I would have shaken our heads and smiled, had we been asked to distinguish it, but to those two past masters in woodcraft it was as absolute as between the notes of a flute and the throbbing of a drum.
It was as if, after a Shawanoe had cawed three times, he permitted a companion to try his hand, or rather his throat, at it, and he who made the attempt acquitted himself right well.
"Now, Simon," remarked the elder, "as I make it, it's this way—they mean to ambush the party at Rattlesnake Gulch."
"You're right! that's it," remarked Kenton, with an approving nod of his head, "and if we don't sarcumvent 'em the varmints will have every scalp, including ours."
"Rattlesnake Gulch" was a name given to a deep depression on the Kentucky side of the river, and within one hundred yards of the stream. It was less than a half a mile in advance of where the two rangers were seated on the fallen tree, as the summer day was drawing to a close.
A trail made by buffaloes, deer, and other wild animals led through the middle of this densely-wooded section. No doubt this path had been in existence at least one hundred years. Beyond the gulch it trended to the right and deeper into the woods, terminating at a noted salt lick, always a favorite resort of quadrupeds whether wild or domestic.
The forest was so deep and matted with undergrowth, both to the right and left of this depression, that nothing but the most pressing necessity could prevent a person from using the trail when journeying to the eastward or westward through that section. Evidently, the Shawanoes counted upon the settlers following the path, and such they would assuredly do unless prevented by the advance scouts.
"Captain Bushwick was out on a little scout himself last summer," remarked Kenton, who, despite their alarming surroundings, seemed to be in somewhat of a reminiscent mood, "when, on his way back, he started through that holler. The fust thing he did was to step into a rattler, which burried his fangs in his leggins, just missing his skin. Afore the sarpent could strike again, the captain made a sweep with his gun bar'l that knocked off his head. He was a whopper, and the captain pulled out his knife to cut off his rattles to bring to the block-house, when he catched the whir of another rattler just behind him, and if he hadn't jumped powerful lively he would have catched it that time sartin. Howsumever, the sarpint couldn't reach him, and the captain shot the mate, and brought the music box of each home with him."
"It was Captain Bushwick who gave the name Rattlesnake Gulch to the place, I 'spose," was the inquiring remark of Boone.
"Yes, he seemed to think that name was not only purty, but desarving, though I've been through the holler a good many times and never seed a sarpent."
"I have."
"When was that?"
"Less than two weeks ago, I was just entering from the other side when I caught sight of a buck that was on his way to the lick. He would have seed me if he hadn't seed just then something else in the path in front of him that interested him more. It was a rattler as big as them of the captain's. The buck was a fool, for instead of backing out, as you know animals are quick to do at sight of a rattler, he began to snuff and cavort about the snake, and finally brought his front hoofs down on it. Of course, he cut the serpent all to ribbons, but afore he done it the buck was stung once or twice, and inside of half an hour he jined the rattler he had sent on afore. Rattlers are as bad as Injins!" muttered Boone, with an expression of disgust.
"They may be in some partic'lars, but in some they ain't, Dan'l; f'r instance, they don't caw like a crow, and don't try to ambuscade folks, and they give you warning afore they strike, which is more than the two-legged varmints do."
"Talk about the rattler giving warning afore he strikes," repeated Boone, who had a poor opinion of the genus crotalus, "he'd be a much more decent sarpint if he didn't strike at all. The black snake doesn't sting you, and yet he'll kill the rattler every time. Howsumever," added the elder ranger, "what's snakes got to do with the bus'ness afore us?"
"That's what I was thinking. Now, Dan'l, we've got to make the varmints think we're going to try to pass through Rattlesnake Gulch to-night, so they'll all gather there to welcome us."
"And then what will our folks do?"
"Take some other route."
"But which one? The woods are so thick on the right and left that they, especially the women, can't go ten feet without making a noise that'll be sartin to be heard by the varmints."
"There are several things they can do," replied Kenton, thoughtfully, proving that, like his companion, he had speculated much on the matter. "In the first place, they must move so slow that they won't reach the neighborhood of the gulch till after dark, and yet if they move too slow the Shawanoes will be suspicious. I wish night was near at hand."
"What good does wishing do?"
"None, and never did; but when night does come we can turn about—that is, some of the boys can, with the women—and cross the river further down stream, strike the trail on the other side of the Ohio, and go straight to the block-house."
Boone shook his head. The scheme did not impress him favorably.
"How are you going to get them women and two children across the river? It isn't likely that any one of 'em knows how to swim a stroke."
"What trouble would it be to tote 'em over?"
Boone again shook his head; he was not pleased with the suggestion.
"I didn't mean to do anything of the kind, but," added Kenton, more seriously, "there's a canoe of mine hid under the bushes just this side of the gulch, purvided the varmints haven't tumbled over it."
"More'n likely they've took it away or smashed it, but if I ain't mistook, there's a craft alongside the flatboat that you left at the clearing."
"You are right."
"Why not go back for that?"
"It ain't a bad idee," remarked Kenton, thoughtfully. "If I can manage to fetch the boat up the river without any of the varmints 'specting it, it'll be just the thing."
"It won't carry all the women and children and rest of the folks at once."
"Then we can make two v'yages or more, if it's necessary."
"It's risky bus'ness, but it's the best thing that can be done. If you are lucky 'nough to find tother boat where you left it, seems to me things will look up."
Kenton glanced around among the tree-tops, as if searching for something. So he was, though not for any special object.
"'Cording to the way things look it'll be a good two hours afore it'll be dark 'nough to set to work to sarcumvent the varmints. Them two hours are long 'nough for the folks to make the trip to Rattlesnake Gulch twice over. Some plan has got to be fixed up not to git thar till after two hours is gone, and yet not to have the Shawanoes 'spect that we 'spect anything. Can you tell me how the thing is to be done, Dan'l?"
"There ought to be a good many ways," replied the elder, after a brief pause; "some accident might happen, such, f'r 'nstance, as getting bit by a rattler."
Kenton saw the twinkle in the eyes of his friend, who spoke with the utmost gravity. "Remember," said the younger, "I never seed any rattler near the gulch; you have; you're the one, therefore, to see some of 'em agin. You're the one to let a big rattler sting you. After he's made sartin he's done his work well, why I'll happen 'long and smash the rattler, and then look after you—helloa!"
Both instinctively grasped their rifles, for they heard the rustling of leaves, which showed that some one was approaching. Had the noise been less pronounced the two rangers would have darted behind the nearest sheltering trees; but the noise was too distinct for either Boone or Kenton to suspect that an enemy was at hand. They knew it was a friend—at least one from whom they had nothing to fear.
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