the Young Lion Hunter (1998) (4 page)

With that I led off into the forest, and, what with finding the seldom-used trail, and keeping the pack-horses in it, I had no time to see how the boys fared or what they did. I knew that both were finding riding most painful, and yet were enjoying themselves hugely. It was a long roundabout way to get to the Saddle. For the most part the trail led up and down the heads of many hollows. So steep were the slopes that we had to zigzag down and up. Then the thickets of prickly-thorn and scrub-oak and black-sage were obstacles to swift traveling. One thing I discovered, and it was that the stallion Marc was the best horse I had ever seen on a trail. He would not carry the Indian, but he led the way for us and made a path through the thickets. The sun was yet an hour above the southwest rim when I reached the head of the hollow where the trail turned down to the Saddle. From a shallow ravine with grassy and thicketed slopes it deepened and widened till it was a ca+-on itself with looming yellow walls. It became deeper and deeper and then turning to the left it opened out into a wide space under the magnificent wall of the plateau. Here I smelled fire and presently saw the gleam of a white tent and then a column of blue smoke. The short, sharp bark of a hound rang out. I stopped and waited for Ken to catch up with me. He came along on foot, limping and leading his mustang.

"Cheer up, Ken," I said, "we're almost there."

"I'm cheerful, Dick. I'm supremely happy, but I'm all in. And as for Hal, why, Jim and I had to lift him in his saddle more times than I can remember. Dick, what're you doing to us, anyway?"

"You'll be fine in a couple of days. I wanted to get on the ground. There's Hal. Come along, Hal, you're doing well. We're almost there."

"Dick, I hear a hound," said Ken, eagerly. "Hurry up! There's smoke, too...Ah! I see Hiram!"

The first sight of the old bear hunter feeding his hounds under a tree was a joy to Ken Ward. I saw it in his sparkling eyes and heard it in his exultant voice. Soon we rode through the last thicket of brush into camp. The hounds barked furiously until quieted by Hiram.

Ken, despite his crippled condition, got to the hunter in quick time, and there was a warm greeting between them.

"Youngster, the Lord is good. I hevn't been so glad about anythin' in years as I am about seein' you...Wal, you have improved a heap."

Hal came forward with the same searching, luminous gaze which he had turned upon the Navajo. This time, however, the boy did not meet with disappointment. Any lad would have been fascinated with the splendid presence of the old hunter. And Hal was more than fascinated. Plain it was that Hiram's great stature, the flashing gray eyes, and the stern, weather-beaten face, his buckskin shirt, and all about him, realized the idea Hal had formed in his boyish thoughts.

"Wal, dog-gone my buttons!" said Hiram, offering an enormous hand to Hal. "Ken's brother! I've heard of you, now don't you forget thet. I'm mighty glad to meet you."

The shadow of the plateau crept out to us and shaded the camp. The sun was setting. We were down a thousand feet under the rim, so that we looked up at the plateau, and also at the peaks and towers and escarpments to the west. These were capped with pink and gold and red, and every moment the colors changed. While I was unpacking I heard Hiram ask Jim why on earth we had fetched that "tarnal redskin" with us, and Jim's reply was one that left no doubt about his idea of Indians. Both Hiram and Jim carried somewhere about in their anatomies leaden bullets which sometimes painfully reminded them that they had a grudge against Indians.

After sunset darkness settled quickly below the Ca+-on rim, and it was night long before we were through with supper. Then came the quiet, cheerful hour around the camp-fire, which I foresaw was to be a source of unalloyed bliss to Ken and Hal.

Hiram did not appear to be in any hurry to talk about cougars, but he was keenly interested in Ken's year at college, and especially in Ken's making the 'varsity baseball team. He asked innumerable questions, and he was delighted to learn of Ken's success and that he had been elected captain. Then he went off into reminiscences and talked of Ken's adventures in Penetier the summer before. Finally when he had satisfied his fancy he called up the hounds, one by one, and playfully, though seriously, he introduced them to the boys.

"Hyar's Prince, the best lion-hound I ever trained, bar none. He has a nose thet's perfect; he's fast an' savage, an' if ever a dog had brains it's Prince."

The great hound looked the truth of Hiram's claim. He was powerful in build, lean of loin, and long of limb, tawny-colored, and he had a noble head with great, somber eyes.

"Hyar's Curley, who's a slow trailer, an' he always bays, both fine qualities in a hound. Prince goes too swift an' saves his breath, but then it's not his fault if I don't keep close to him in a chase."

"An' hyar's Mux-Mux, who's no good."

The ugly black-and-white hound so designated wagged a stumpy tail and pawed his master, and appeared to want to make it plain that he was not so bad as all that.

"Wal, Mux, I'll take a leetle of thet back. You're good at eatin', an' then I never seen the cougar you was afraid of. An' thet's bad, fer you'll be killed some day."

"Hyar's Queen, the mother of the pups, an' she's reliable, though slow because of her lame leg. Hyar's Tan, a good hound, an' this big black feller, he's Ringer. He'll be as good as Prince some day, if I can only save him."

Hiram chained each hound to near-by saplings; then lighting his pipe at the camp-fire he found a comfortable seat.

"Wal, youngsters, it's dog-gone good to see you sittin' by my camp-fire. To-morrow we'll go up on the plateau an' make a permanent camp. Thar's grass an' snow in the hollers, an' deer, an' wild hosses an' mustangs."

"Any mountain-lions, cougars?" asked Ken, intensely.

"I was comin' to them. Wal, I never in my born days seen such a network of cougars' tracks as is on thet plateau. An' at thet I've only been on one end. I'm reckonin' we'll round up the biggest den of cougars in the West. You see, no one ever hunted thet plateau but Navajos, an' they wouldn't kill a cougar. Why, a cougar is one of their gods. Wal, as I was sayin', mebbe we'll strike a whole cat tribe up thar. An', youngsters, what do you say to ketchin' 'em alive?"

"Great!" exclaimed Ken.

Hiram switched his look of inquiry to Hal. The lad's large eyes, startlingly bright, dilated and burned.

"How?" he asked, and his voice rang like a bell.

"Lasso 'em, tie 'em up," replied Hiram. Deceit could not have lived in his kindly, clear glance.

"Then Ken didn't lie--after all?" blurted out Hal.

"My brother never believed I helped you lasso a bear and that we intended to do the same with cougars out here," exclaimed Ken.

"It's straight goods, youngster," added Hiram. "Now, whar do you stand? Most youngsters like to shoot things. Mebbe you'd find it fun to chase cougars up trees an' then shoot 'em, but thar's a leetle more chance fer excitement when you pull 'em out with a rope. It keeps a feller movin' around tolerable lively. Which would you like best, then--shootin' or ketchin'?"

"I'd like best--to catch them alive," replied Hal, his voice very low.

"Wal, now, I'm glad. You see it's not the excitement I'm lookin' fer, though I ain't sayin' I don't like to rope things, but the fact is I get ten dollars for cougar skins, an' three hundred dollars for live cougars. So, you youngsters will have the fun an' I'll be makin' money, an' at the same time we'll be riddin' Coconina Preserve of bad critters. Let's roll in now, fer you're tired, an' we must be stirrin' early."

Chapter
V - THE PLATEAU

Hiram routed us all in the morning while the shadows were still gray. There was a bustling about camp. When we were packed and mounted ready for the ascent of the plateau the pines and slopes were still shrouded in the gray gloom. Hiram led us along a trail overgrown by brush. Presently we began climbing such a steep slope that we had to hang to the pommels.

The Saddle was a narrow ridge sloping up to the plateau, and the trail zigzagged its crest. To the right a sweep of thicketed hollow led out into wide space where peaks and mesas began to show. To the left was the great abyss, filled with creamy mist. It was not possible to see a rod down toward the depths, still I had a sure sense of the presence of the Ca+-on. The climb was a hard task for the horses, the trail being one made by deer, but in less than an hour we were up on the rim. At that moment the sun burst out showing through rifts in rolling clouds of mist. Then we saw behind and above us the long, bold, black line of Buckskin.

Hiram took a course straight back from the rim through a magnificent forest of pines. Perhaps a couple of miles back the old hunter circled and appeared to be searching for a particular place. Presently he halted in a beautiful glade above a hollow where lay a heavy bank of snow. On the slopes the grass was yet thin, but in the glade it was thick. Here, with the snow and the grass, our problem was solved as to water and feed for the horses.

"Hyar we are," called out Hiram, cheerily. "We'll throw our camp in this glade jest out of reach of them pines on the northwest side. Sometimes a heavy wind blows one over."

We had all gotten busy at our tasks of unpacking when suddenly we were attracted by a heavy pounding on the turf.

"Hold the hosses!" yelled Hiram. "Everybody grab a hoss!"

We all made a dive among our snorting and plunging steeds.

"Youngsters, look sharp! Don't miss nothin'! Thar's a sight!" called Hiram.

The sound of pounding hoofs appeared to be coming right into camp. I saw a string of wild horses thundering by. A black stallion led them, and as he ran with splendid stride he curved his fine head backward to look at us, and whistled a wild challenge. Soon he and his band were lost in the blackness of the forest.

"The finest sight I ever saw in my life!" ejaculated Ken. "Hal, wasn't that simply grand?"

"No matter what comes off now, I'm paid for the trouble of getting here," replied Hal.

It was only a few minutes afterward that the Indian manifested excitement and pointed up the hollow. A herd of large, white-tailed deer trooped down toward us, and stopped within a hundred yards. Then they stood motionless with long ears erect.

"Shoot! Shoot!" exclaimed Navvy.

"Nary a shoot, Navvy," replied Hiram.

The Indian looked dumbfounded, and gazed from the rifles to us and then to the deer.

"Oh!" cried Hal. "They're tame deer! What beautiful, large creatures! I couldn't shoot them."

"No, youngster, they're not tame deer. They're so wild thet they aren't afraid. They've never been shot at, thet bunch. An', youngster, these deer here are mule deer an' must hey some elk in them. Thet accounts fer their big size. Now ain't they jest pretty?"

The hounds saw the herd and burst into wild clamor. That frightened the deer and they bounded off with the long, springy leaps characteristic of them.

"Look like they jump on rubber stilts," commented Hal.

"All hands now to throw camp. Fust thing, we'll pitch my tent. I tell you, youngsters, thet tent may come in right useful, if we hey a storm. An' at this altitude--we're up over seven thousand feet--we may git a snow-squall any day."

It was not long before we had a comfortable and attractive camp. At the far side of the glade stood a clump of small sapling pines in regard to which Ken said he would have to practice a little forestry. The saplings were meager and had foliage only at the top. Ken declared he would thin out that clump.

"Wal, thet's a fine idee," remarked Hiram. "Thin 'em out an' leave about a dozen saplin's each ten feet apart. They'll be jest what I want to chain our cougars to."

At that speech the faces of both boys were studies in expression. Hal, especially, looked as if he were dreaming a most wild and real adventure.

When work was finished the boys threw themselves down upon the brown pine-needle mats and indulged in rest. Hiram did not allow them much indulgence.

"Saddle up, youngsters," he called out, "On-less you're too tired to go with us."

Thereupon the boys became as animated as their aching bones and sore muscles would permit.

"Leslie, leave the Injun in camp to look after things an' we'll git the lay of the land."

"He'll eat us outen house an' home," growled Jim Williams. "I shore don't see why we fetched him, anyhow."

All the afternoon we were riding the plateau. We were completely bewildered with its impressiveness and surprised at the abundance of wild horses and mustangs, deer, coyotes, foxes, grouse and birds, and overjoyed to find innumerable lion trails. When we returned to camp I drew a rough map, which Hiram laid flat on the ground and called us around him.

"Now, youngsters, let's get our heads together."

In shape the plateau resembled the ace of clubs. The center and side wings were high and well wooded with heavy pine; the middle wing was longest, sloped west, had no pine, but a dense growth of cedar. Numerous ridges and ca+-ons cut up this central wing. Middle Ca+-on, the longest and deepest, bisected the plateau, headed near camp, and ran parallel with two smaller ones, which we named Right and Left Ca+-ons. These three were lion runways, and hundreds of deer carcasses lined the thickets. North Hollow was the only depression, as well as runway, on the northwest rim. West Point formed the extreme western cape of the plateau. To the left of West Point was a deep cut-in of the rim-wall, called the Bay. The three important ca+-ons opened into it. From the Bay the south rim was regular and impassable all the way round to the narrow Saddle, which connected it to the mainland.