Little Oskaloo Part 11

"And saved the worst life in G.o.d's world, didn't you, girl?" interrupted the renegade, displaying more feeling as he drew the speaker to him than he had ever been credited with.

"Areotha did what she could," was the reply. "One night, when the wolves went howling down the forest after the fawn which Areotha's rifle had failed to kill, the White Whirlwind said something that made his child wonder. He made her know that he took her one night when she was a little girl; took her from a burning wigwam beyond the big river. She asked him then to tell her all, but he said: 'Wait till the sickness leaves me,' and she waited. Now she is here; now she says, 'my father, tell me all, for in this war the bullet may find your heart, and Areotha will never know. Old Madgitwa did not bring me into the world; no, my father!"

The face and voice were so full of pleading that none but a Girty could resist.

His arm left the pliant waist, and his eyes resumed their old look.

"You are too inquisitive!" he said. "It doesn't matter where I got you.

You are mine, and the man--"

He paused as if he was about to reveal something, which he would rather keep back.

"My father, the Manitou, may send for Areotha, and the leaves will fall upon her before she can know who her real father is. Tell her. This may be the last time that she----"

"Tell you? No!" was the harsh interruption, and all the revenge in Girty's nature seemed in his voice. "There are secrets which the stake could not force from me; this is one of them. There lives one man whom I wouldn't make happy to save my own life, and sooner than see you in his arms, I would drive this knife to your heart."

With a cry Little Moccasin started from the blade that flashed in the starlight, and threw herself on the defensive, with rifle half raised and eyes flas.h.i.+ng angrily.

"You will not tell?" she cried.

"Never!"

The next instant she stepped toward the gnarled tree, and her rifle covered the renegade of the Maumee.

"You've got me!" he said, looking into Areotha's face without a tremor of fear; "but I did not think that you would ever lift a rifle against the man who has been so kind to you. Kill me here, now, and the secret will be kept from you forever!"

There was a spark of hope in his voice, and all at once the girl lowered the weapon. The outlaw was spared to scourge the region of the Maumee a while longer.

Areotha put herself into his power when she lowered the rifle. With one of those panther-like bounds for which he was famous, Girty could have sprung upon her and removed her forever from his path. But he restrained himself; he even put up the knife, and did not seek to detain her when he heard her say:

"My father, I am going!"

With a look that spoke volumes, Little Moccasin turned on her heel, and plunged into the forest, leaving the renegade to his own reflections.

"I think a mighty sight of her!" was all he said.

He might have killed her, but he would not.

CHAPTER XI.

KATE MERRIWEATHER'S PROGRESS.

Girty, the renegade, remained in his cabin door until the footsteps of Little Moccasin died away in the forest, and silence again pervaded the spot.

There was a cloud on the outlaw's brow, and the longer he listened the more impatient and perplexed he became.

The minutes resolved themselves into hours, and when he believed that the ghostly hour of one had arrived, an oath fell from his lips, and he turned into the cabin. But he soon reappeared with a short-barreled rifle, and left the hut as if bent upon hunting for some one whom he had been expecting.

"Something unlooked for may have transpired," he murmured. "Wolf Cap and that young fellow may have disarranged my plans by appearing suddenly at the camp; but I am sure that Wells will never get the message which they left in the tree."

Girty smiled as he recalled the theft of Harvey Catlett's message from the forest letter box, and congratulated himself that Wells and Hummingbird (a famous chief and spy in Wayne's employ) would find the tree empty when they should reach it. The self-congratulations still lingered in his heart when the report of a distant rifle, faint, but clear enough, nevertheless, struck his practiced ear.

He stopped suddenly and listened.

"A rifle, but no death cry," he said, addressing himself. "But too far off for that, perhaps."

Then he stooped and put his ear to the ground, in which att.i.tude he remained for several moments. But the stillness of death brooded over the vicinity. When Girty rose it was with a perplexed look; the shot seemed to revolve itself into a mystery, to which he attached the utmost importance.

"There is one person in these parts whose bullets never make a death cry," he said; "but if she shot _him_, I don't see why, for she knows that we are friends. However, I'm going down to see what the matter is."

He started toward the river at a brisk walk. It was ten miles distant, but he knew that the mysterious shot had been fired not far away.

By and by his walk resolved itself into the dog-trot of the Indian, and he hastened through the woods as if a regular path stretched before him.

The dew lay on the gra.s.s pressed by his dingy moccasin, and, save now and then the snapping of a twig, his progress sent forth no noise.

All at once, as he reached the summit of a wooded knoll, he was brought to a stand.

At his feet, as it were, was a s.p.a.ce of ground over which a hurricane had at some time swept with relentless fury. The results of its work, broken trees and fallen ones, were apparent to the eye. Into this place the starlight fell, and the rays of the moon, soon to bathe herself in the waters of the Maumee, penetrated like shafts of silver.

The scene that presented itself to the outlaw was enough to startle him.

He saw two figures in the light--two living ones, we mean--but not far remote, with face upturned to the stars, lay a giant form, motionless as the earth itself.

A second look told the renegade the author of the midnight shot. She stood beside a young girl, and these words in a well known voice greeted his ears:

"White girl tired, but Areotha will save her if she will go."

"Go?" cried the one addressed, and her voice sent a thrill of pleasure to the heart beating wildly on the top of the knoll. "Go, Areotha? You cannot name a place whither I will not fly with you at this hour. I wonder if they do not believe me dead already. My G.o.d! I see through the treachery of that man," and she glanced at the body on the ground.

"Girl, is every one in these parts like him? He came to our home and persuaded father to fly to Wayne, offering to guide us; but he meditated treachery all the time. I see it now."

"He makes no more b.l.o.o.d.y boats on the big river," Little Moccasin said with triumph. "He was bold to steal white girl alone."

"No, no, girl. An Indian called Oskaloo a.s.sisted, but he was killed in the boat by some one on the sh.o.r.e--Mr. Catlett, perhaps. He was on guard."

Little Moccasin's eyes gleamed with pride at the mention of the young scout's name.

"He good hunter," she said with growing enthusiasm. "Areotha will take the white girl back to him."

"Yes, yes, and then I will find all of them. Let us go now. Some person may find us here if we tarry."

Some person? Yes; that "person" was already near, and as Kate Merriweather and her protector started to fly, Jim Girty, with a single bound, reached the foot of the hillock, and stood before them.

The twain started back with a cry of terror; but Kate's retreat was quickly checked by the renegade's hand.