Zane Grey (34 page)

"Come," said the chief once more. He gently put Nell aside before
Jim arose from his sad task.

"We can not leave him unburied," expostulated Jim.

Wingenund dragged aside a large stone which formed one wall of the
cavern. Then he grasped a log which was half covered by dirt, and,
exerting his great strength, pulled it from its place. There was a
crash, a rumble, the jar of a heavy weight striking the earth, then
the rattling of gravel, and, before Nell and Jim realized what had
happened, the great rock forming the roof of the cavern slipped down
the bank followed by a small avalanche. The cavern was completely
covered. Mr. Wells was buried. A mossy stone marked the old
missionary's grave.

Nell and Jim were lost in wonder and awe.

"Ugh!" cried the chief, looking toward the opening in the glade.

Fearfully Nell and Jim turned, to be appalled by four naked, painted
savages standing with leveled rifles. Behind them stood Deering and
Jim Girty.

"Oh, God! We are lost! Lost! Lost!" exclaimed Jim, unable to command
himself. Hope died in his heart.

No cry issued from Nell's white lips. She was dazed by this final
blow. Having endured so much, this last misfortune, apparently the
ruin of her life, brought no added suffering, only a strange, numb
feeling.

"Ah-huh! Thought you'd give me the slip, eh?" croaked Girty,
striding forward, and as he looked at Wingenund his little, yellow
eyes flared like flint. "Does a wolf befriend Girty's captives?
Chief you hev led me a hard chase."

Wingenund deigned no reply. He stood as he did so often, still and
silent, with folded arms, and a look that was haughty, unresponsive.

The Indians came forward into the glade, and one of them quickly
bound Jim's hands behind his back. The savages wore a wild, brutish
look. A feverish ferocity, very near akin to insanity, possessed
them. They were not quiet a moment, but ran here and there, for no
apparent reason, except, possibly, to keep in action with the raging
fire in their hearts. The cleanliness which characterized the normal
Indian was absent in them; their scant buckskin dress was bedraggled
and stained. They were still drunk with rum and the lust for blood.
Murder gleamed from the glance of their eyes.

"Jake, come over here," said Girty to his renegade friend. "Ain't
she a prize?"

Girty and Deering stood before the poor, stricken girl, and gloated
over her fair beauty. She stood as when first transfixed by the
horror from which she had been fleeing. Her pale face was lowered,
her hands clenched tightly in the folds of her skirt.

Never before had two such coarse, cruel fiends as Deering and Girty
encumbered the earth. Even on the border, where the best men were
bad, they were the worst. Deering was yet drunk, but Girty had
recovered somewhat from the effects of the rum he had absorbed. The
former rolled his big eyes and nodded his shaggy head. He was
passing judgment, from his point of view, on the fine points of the
girl.

"She cer'aintly is," he declared with a grin. "She's a little
beauty. Beats any I ever seen!"

Jim Girty stroked his sharp chin with dirty fingers. His yellow
eyes, his burnt saffron skin, his hooked nose, his thin lips—all
his evil face seemed to shine with an evil triumph. To look at him
was painful. To have him gaze at her was enough to drive any woman
mad.

Dark stains spotted the bright frills of his gaudy dress, his
buckskin coat and leggins, and dotted his white eagle plumes. Dark
stains, horribly suggestive, covered him from head to foot. Blood
stains! The innocent blood of Christians crimsoned his renegade's
body, and every dark red blotch cried murder.

"Girl, I burned the Village of Peace to git you," growled Girty.
"Come here!"

With a rude grasp that tore open her dress, exposing her beautiful
white shoulder and bosom, the ruffian pulled her toward him. His
face was transfixed with a fierce joy, a brutal passion.

Deering looked on with a drunken grin, while his renegade friend
hugged the almost dying girl. The Indians paced the glade with short
strides like leashed tigers. The young missionary lay on the moss
with closed eyes. He could not endure the sight of Nell in Girty's
arms.

No one noticed Wingenund. He stood back a little, half screened by
drooping branches. Once again the chief's dark eyes gleamed, his
head turned a trifle aside, and, standing in the statuesque position
habitual with him when resting, he listened, as one who hears
mysterious sounds. Suddenly his keen glance was riveted on the ferns
above the low cliff. He had seen their graceful heads quivering.
Then two blinding sheets of flame burst from the ferns.

Spang! Spang!

The two rifle reports thundered through the glade. Two Indians
staggered and fell in their tracks—dead without a cry.

A huge yellow body, spread out like a panther in his spring,
descended with a crash upon Deering and Girty. The girl fell away
from the renegade as he went down with a shrill screech, dragging
Deering with him. Instantly began a terrific, whirling, wrestling
struggle.

A few feet farther down the cliff another yellow body came crashing
down to alight with a thud, to bound erect, to rush forward swift as
a leaping deer. The two remaining Indians had only time to draw
their weapons before this lithe, threatening form whirled upon them.
Shrill cries, hoarse yells, the clash of steel and dull blows
mingled together. One savage went down, twisted over, writhed and
lay still. The other staggered, warded off lightninglike blows until
one passed under his guard, and crashed dully on his head. Then he
reeled, rose again, but only to have his skull cloven by a bloody
tomahawk.

The victor darted toward the whirling mass.

"Lew, shake him loose! Let him go!" yelled Jonathan Zane, swinging
his bloody weapon.

High above Zane's cry, Deering's shouts and curses, Girty's shrieks
of fear and fury, above the noise of wrestling bodies and dull
blows, rose a deep booming roar.

It was Wetzel's awful cry of vengeance.

"Shake him loose," yelled Jonathan.

Baffled, he ran wildly around the wrestlers. Time and time again his
gory tomahawk was raised only to be lowered. He found no opportunity
to strike. Girty's ghastly countenance gleamed at him from the whirl
of legs, and arms and bodies. Then Wetzel's dark face, lighted by
merciless eyes, took its place, and that gave way to Deering's broad
features. The men being clad alike in buckskin, and their motions so
rapid, prevented Zane from lending a helping hand.

Suddenly Deering was propelled from the mass as if by a catapult.
His body straightened as it came down with a heavy thud. Zane
pounced upon it with catlike quickness. Once more he swung aloft the
bloody hatchet; then once more he lowered it, for there was no need
to strike. The renegade's side was torn open from shoulder to hip. A
deluge of blood poured out upon the moss. Deering choked, a bloody
froth formed on his lips. His fingers clutched at nothing. His eyes
rolled violently and then were fixed in an awful stare.

The girl lying so quiet in the woods near the old hut was avenged!

Jonathan turned again to Wetzel and Girty, not with any intention to
aid the hunter, but simply to witness the end of the struggle.

Without the help of the powerful Deering, how pitifully weak was the
Deathshead of the frontier in the hands of the Avenger!

Jim Girty's tomahawk was thrown in one direction and his knife in
another. He struggled vainly in the iron grip that held him.

Wetzel rose to his feet clutching the renegade. With his left arm,
which had been bared in the fight, he held Girty by the front of his
buckskin shirt, and dragged him to that tree which stood alone in
the glade. He pushed him against it, and held him there.

The white dog leaped and snarled around the prisoner.

Girty's hands pulled and tore at the powerful arm which forced him
hard against the beech. It was a brown arm, and huge with its
bulging, knotted, rigid muscles. A mighty arm, strong as the justice
which ruled it.

"Girty, thy race is run!" Wetzel's voice cut the silence like a
steel whip.

The terrible, ruthless smile, the glittering eyes of doom seemed
literally to petrify the renegade.

The hunter's right arm rose slowly. The knife in his hand quivered
as if with eagerness. The long blade, dripping with Deering's blood,
pointed toward the hilltop.

"Look thar! See 'em! Thar's yer friends!" cried Wetzel.

On the dead branches of trees standing far above the hilltop, were
many great, dark birds. They sat motionless as if waiting.

"Buzzards! Buzzards!" hissed Wetzel.

Girty's ghastly face became an awful thing to look upon. No living
countenance ever before expressed such fear, such horror, such
agony. He foamed at the mouth, he struggled, he writhed. With a
terrible fascination he watched that quivering, dripping blade, now
poised high.

Wetzel's arm swung with the speed of a shooting star. He drove the
blade into Girty's groin, through flesh and bone, hard and fast into
the tree. He nailed the renegade to the beech, there to await his
lingering doom.

"Ah-h! Ah-h! Ah-h!" shrieked Girty, in cries of agony. He fumbled
and pulled at the haft of the knife, but could not loosen it. He
beat his breast, he tore his hair. His screams were echoed from the
hilltop as if in mockery.

The white dog stood near, his hair bristling, his teeth snapping.

The dark birds sat on the dead branches above the hilltop, as if
waiting for their feast.

Zane turned and cut the young missionary's bonds. Jim ran to where
Nell was lying on the ground, and tenderly raised her head, calling
to her that they were saved. Zane bathed the girl's pale face.
Presently she sighed and opened her eyes.

Then Zane looked from the statuelike form of Wingenund to the
motionless figure of Wetzel. The chief stood erect with his eyes on
the distant hills. Wetzel remained with folded arms, his cold eyes
fixed upon the writhing, moaning renegade.

"Lew, look here," said Zane, unhesitatingly, and pointed toward the
chief.

Wetzel quivered as if sharply stung; the cold glitter in his eyes
changed to lurid fire. With upraised tomahawk he bounded across the
brook.

"Lew, wait a minute!" yelled Zane.

"Wetzel! wait, wait!" cried Jim, grasping the hunter's arm; but the
latter flung him off, as the wind tosses a straw.

"Wetzel, wait, for God's sake, wait!" screamed Nell. She had risen
at Zane's call, and now saw the deadly resolve in the hunter's eyes.
Fearlessly she flung herself in front of him; bravely she risked her
life before his mad rush; frantically she threw her arms around him
and clung to his hands desperately.

Wetzel halted; frenzied as he was at the sight of his foe, he could
not hurt a woman.

"Girl, let go!" he panted, and his broad breast heaved.

"No, no, no! Listen, Wetzel, you must not kill the chief. He is a
friend."

"He is my great foe!"

"Listen, oh! please listen!" pleaded Nell. "He warned me to flee
from Girty; he offered to guide us to Fort Henry. He has saved my
life. For my sake, Wetzel, do not kill him! Don't let me be the
cause of his murder! Wetzel, Wetzel, lower your arm, drop your
hatchet. For pity's sake do not spill more blood. Wingenund is a
Christian!"

Wetzel stepped back breathing heavily. His white face resembled
chiseled marble. With those little hands at his breast he hesitated
in front of the chief he had hunted for so many long years.

"Would you kill a Christian?" pleaded Nell, her voice sweet and
earnest.

"I reckon not, but this Injun ain't one," replied Wetzel slowly.

"Put away your hatchet. Let me have it. Listen, and I will tell you,
after thanking you for this rescue. Do you know of my marriage?
Come, please listen! Forget for a moment your enmity. Oh! you must
be merciful! Brave men are always merciful!"

"Injun, are you a Christian?" hissed Wetzel.

"Oh! I know he is! I know he is!" cried Nell, still standing between
Wetzel and the chief.

Wingenund spoke no word. He did not move. His falcon eyes gazed
tranquilly at his white foe. Christian or pagan, he would not speak
one word to save his life.

"Oh! tell him you are a Christian," cried Nell, running to the
chief.

"Yellow-hair, the Delaware is true to his race."

As he spoke gently to Nell a noble dignity shone upon his dark face.

"Injun, my back bears the scars of your braves' whips," hissed
Wetzel, once more advancing.

"Deathwind, your scars are deep, but the Delaware's are deeper,"
came the calm reply. "Wingenund's heart bears two scars. His son
lies under the moss and ferns; Deathwind killed him; Deathwind alone
knows his grave. Wingenund's daughter, the delight of his waning
years, freed the Delaware's great foe, and betrayed her father. Can
the Christian God tell Wingenund of his child?"

Wetzel shook like a tree in a storm. Justice cried out in the
Indian's deep voice. Wetzel fought for mastery of himself.

"Delaware, your daughter lays there, with her lover," said Wetzel
firmly, and pointed into the spring.

"Ugh!" exclaimed the Indian, bending over the dark pool. He looked
long into its murky depths. Then he thrust his arm down into the
brown water.

"Deathwind tells no lie," said the chief, calmly, and pointed toward
Girty. The renegade had ceased struggling, his head was bowed upon
his breast. "The white serpent has stung the Delaware."

"What does it mean?" cried Jim.

"Your brother Joe and Whispering Winds lie in the spring," answered
Jonathan Zane. "Girty murdered them, and Wetzel buried the two
there."

"Oh, is it true?" cried Nell.

"True, lass," whispered Jim, brokenly, holding out his arms to her.
Indeed, he needed her strength as much as she needed his. The girl
gave one shuddering glance at the spring, and then hid her face on
her husband's shoulder.