The Trapper's Daughter Part 65

"That is true; our retreat is still cut off."

"We must not despair yet; for the present we have nothing to fear here; rest a little while, while I go on the search."

"Hum!" Fray Ambrosio muttered; "why not go all together? That would be more prudent, I think."

Red Cedar laughed bitterly. "Listen, gossip," he said to the monk, as he seized his arm, which he pressed like a vice: "you distrust me, and you are wrong. I wished once to leave you, I allow, but I no longer wish it.

We will perish or escape together."

"Oh, oh! Are you speaking seriously, gossip?"

"Yes; for, trusting to the foolish promises of a priest, I resolved to reform; I altered my life, and led a painful existence; not injuring anybody, and toiling honestly. The men I wished to forget remembered me in their thirst for revenge. Paying no heed to my wish to repent, they fired my wretched jacal and killed my son. Now they track me like a wild beast, the old instincts are aroused in me, and the evil leaven that slept in my heart is fermenting afresh. They have declared a war to the death. Well, by heaven, I accept it, and will wage it without pity, truce, or mercy, not asking of them, if they captured me, less than I would give them if they fell into my hands. Let them take care, for I am Red Cedar! He whom the Indians call the _Man-eater_ (Witchasta Joute) and I will devour their hearts. So, at present, be at your ease, monk, we shall not part again: you are my conscience--we are inseparable."

The squatter uttered those atrocious words with such an accent of rage and hatred, that the monk saw he really spoke the truth, and his evil instincts had definitively gained the upper hand. A hideous smile of joy curled his lips. "Well, gossip," he said, "go and look out, we will await you here."

During the squatter's absence not a word was uttered. Sutter was asleep, the monk thinking, and Ellen weeping. The poor girl had heard with sorrow mingled with horror her father's atrocious sentiments. She then measured the fearful depth of the abyss into which she was suddenly hurled, for Red Cedar's determination cut her off eternally from society, and condemned her to a life of grief and tears. After about an hour's absence Red Cedar re-appeared, and the expression of his face was joyous.

"Well?" the monk anxiously asked him.

"Good news," he replied; "I have discovered a refuge where I defy the cleverest bloodhounds of the prairies to track me."

"Is it far from here?"

"A very little distance; but that will prove our security. Our enemies will never suppose we had the impudence to hide so close to them."

"That is true; we will go there, then."

"When you please."

"At once."

Red Cedar told the truth. He had really discovered a refuge, which offered a very desirable guarantee of security. Had we not ourselves witnessed a similar thing in the Far West, we should not put faith in the possibility of such a hiding place. After going about one hundred and fifty yards, the squatter stopped before an enormous oak that had died of old age, and whose interior was hollow.

"It is here," he said, cautiously parting the ma.s.s of leaves, branches, and creepers that completely concealed the cavity.

"Hum!" the monk said, as he peered down into the hole, which was dark as pitch; "Have we got to go down there?"

"Yes," Red Cedar replied; "but rea.s.sure yourself, it is not very deep."

In spite of this a.s.surance the monk still hesitated.

"Take it or leave it," the squatter went on; "do you prefer being captured?"

"But we shall not be able to stir down there?"

"Look around you."

"I am looking."

"Do you perceive that the mountain is perpendicular here?"

"Yes, I do."

"Good; we are on the edge of the precipice which poor Nathan told us of."

"Ah!"

"Yes; you see that this dead tree seems, as it were, welded to the mountain?"

"That is true. I did not notice it at first."

"Well; going down that cavity, for fifteen feet at the most, you will find another which pa.s.ses the back of the tree, and communicates with a cavern."

"Oh!" the monk exclaimed gleefully, "How did you discover this hiding place?"

The squatter sighed. "It was long ago," he said.

"Stay," Fray Ambrosio objected; "others may know it beside yourself."

"No," he answered, shaking his head; "only one man knows it beside myself, and his discovery cost him his life."

"That is rea.s.suring."

"No hunter or trapper ever comes this way, for it is a precipice; if we were to take a few steps further in that direction, we should find ourselves suspended over an abyss of unknown depth, one of the sides of which this mountain forms. However, to quiet your fears, I will go down first."

Red Cedar threw into the gaping hollow a few pieces of candlewood he had procured; he put his rifle on his back, and, hanging by his hands, let himself down to the bottom of the tree, Sutter and the monk curiously watching him. The squatter struck a light, lit one of the torches, and waved it about his head; the monk then perceived that the old scalp hunter had spoken the truth. Red Cedar entered the cavern, in the floor of which he stuck his torch, so that the hollow was illumined, then came out and rejoined his friends by the aid of his la.s.so.

"Well," he said to them, "what do you think of that?"

"We shall be famous there," the monk answered.

Without further hesitation he slipped into the tree and disappeared in the grotto. Sutter followed his example, but remained at the bottom of the tree to help his sister down. The maiden appeared no longer conscious of what was going on around her. Kind and docile as ever, she acted with automatic precision, not trying to understand why she did one thing more than another; her father's words had struck her heart, and broken every spring of her will. When her father let her down the tree, she mechanically followed her brother into the cave.

When left alone, the squatter removed with minute care any traces which might have revealed to his enemies' sharp eyes the direction in which he had gone; and when he felt certain that nothing would denounce him, he entered the cave in his turn.

The bandits' first care was to inspect their domain, and they found it was immense. The cavern ran for a considerable distance under the mountain; it was divided into several branches and floors, some of which ran up to the top of the mountain, while others buried themselves in the ground; a subterranean lake, the reservoir of some nameless river, extended for an immense distance under a low arch, all black with bats.

The cavern had several issues in diametrically opposite directions; and they were so well hidden, that it was impossible to notice them outside.

Only one thing alarmed the adventurers, and that was the chances of procuring food; but to that Red Cedar replied that nothing was easier than to set traps, or even hunt on the mountain.

Ellen had fallen into a broken sleep on a bed of furs her father had hastily prepared for her. The wretched girl had so suffered and endured such fatigue during the last few days, that she literally could not stand on her feet. When the three men had inspected the cave, they returned and sat down by her side; Red Cedar looked at her sleeping with an expression of infinite tenderness; he was too fond of his daughter not to pity her, and think with grief of the fearful destiny that awaited her by his side; unhappily, any remedy was impossible. Fray Ambrosio, whose mind was always busy, drew the squatter from his reverie.

"Well, gossip," he said, "I suppose we are condemned to spend some time here?"

"Until our pursuers, tired of seeking us in vain, at length determine to go off."

"They may be long; hence, for the greater secrecy, I propose one thing."

"What is it?"