The Wild Huntress: Love in the Wilderness

While I was yet quivering under the surprise produced by the silvery tones, the speaker appeared before my eyes – a girl majestically beautiful. A face smooth-skinned, with a tinge of golden-brown – cheeks of purplish red – a nose slightly aquiline, with nostrils of spiral curve – eyes like those of the Egyptian antelope – a forehead white and high, above bounded by a band of shining black hair, and surmounted by a coronet of scarlet plumes – such was the head that I saw rising above the green frondage of the cotton-woods! The body was yet hidden behind the leaves; but the girl just then stepped from out the bushes, and her whole form was exhibited to my view – equally striking and picturesque. I need not say that it was of perfect shape – bust, body, and limbs all symmetrical. A face like that described, could not belong to an ungainly form. When nature designs beauty, it is rare that she does her work by halves. Unlike the artists of the anatomic school, she makes the model for herself – hence the perfect correspondence of its parts. And perhaps fairer form had nature never conceived. The dullest sculptor might have been inspired by its contemplation.

The costume of the girl corresponded to the cast of her features. About both there was that air of wild picturesqueness, which we observe in art paintings of the gipsy, and sometimes in the gipsy herself – for those sirens of the green lanes have not all disappeared; and, but that saw the snowy cone of Pike’s Peak rising over the crest of the cliff, I might have fancied myself in the Sierra Asturias, with a beautiful gitana standing before me. The soft fawn-skin tilma, with its gaudy broidering of beads and stained quills – the fringed skirt and buskined ankles – the striped Navajo blanket slung scarf-like over her shoulders – all presented a true gipsy appearance. The plumed circlet upon the head was more typical of Transatlantic costume; and the rifle carried by a female hand was still another idiosyncracy of America. It was from that rifle the report had proceeded, as also the bullet, that had laid low the bighorn! It was not a hunter then who had killed the game; but she who stood before me – a huntress – the Wild Huntress.

Chapter Seventy

The Wild Huntress

No longer was it from fear that I held back; but a hesitancy springing from surprise mingled with admiration. The sight of so much beauty – grand as unexpected – was enough to unnerve one, especially in such a place – and one to whose eye the female form had so long been a stranger. Su-wa-nee’s I had seen only at a distance; and hers, to my sight, was no longer beautiful. I hesitated to show myself – lest the sight of me should alarm this lovely apparition, and cause her to take flight. The thought was not unnatural – since the tricoloured pigments of black, red, and white were still upon my skin; and I must have presented the picture of a chimney-sweep with a dining-plate glued upon his breast. In such a guise I knew that I must cut a ludicrous figure, and would have slipped back to the pool, and washed myself; but I dreaded to take my eyes from that beautiful vision, lest I might never look upon it again! In my absence, she would be gone? I feared even then, that on seeing me she might take flight: and I was too faint to follow her. For this reason, I stood silently gazing through my leafy covert, like one who watches the movements of some shy and beautiful bird. I almost dreaded to breathe lest the sound might alarm her. I was planning, at the same time, how I should initiate an interview.

Her voice again reached me, as she recommenced scolding the dog: even its chiding tones were sweet. She had approached, and stooped for a moment over the bighorn, as if to satisfy herself that the animal was dead. Her canine companion did not appear to be quite sure of the fact: for he continued to spring repeatedly upon the carcass with open mouth, as if eager to devour it.

“Off, off!” cried she, threatening the dog with the butt of her rifle. “You wicked Wolf! what has got into you? Have I not told you that the thing is dead – what more do you want? Mind, sirrah!” continued she, shaking her finger significantly at the dog – “mind, my good fellow! you had no part in the killing of it; and if you spoil the skin, you shall have no share in the flesh. You hear me? Not a morsel!”

Wolf appeared to understand the hint and retired. Impelled by hunger, I accepted the cue:

“You will not refuse a morsel to one who is starving?”

“Aha! who speaks?” cried the huntress, turning round with a glance rather of inquiry than alarm. “Down, Wolf!” commanded she, as the dog bounded forward with a growl. “Down, you savage brute! Don’t you hear that some one is starving? Ha! a negro! Poor devil! where can he have come from, I wonder?”

Only my head was visible – a thick bush in front of me concealing my body. The coat of char upon my face was deceiving her.

“No, not a negro,” said I, stepping out and discovering my person – “not a negro, though I have been submitted to the treatment of one.”

“Ho! white, red, and black! Mercy on me, what a frightful harlequin! Ha, ha, ha!”

“My toilet appears to amuse you, fair huntress? I might apologise for it – since I can assure you it is not my own conception, nor is it to my taste any more than – ”

“You are a white man, then?” said she, interrupting me – at the same time stepping nearer to examine me.

“I was, yesterday,” I replied, turning half round, to give her a sight of my shoulders, which the Indian artist had left untouched. “To-day, I am as you see.”

“O heavens!” she exclaimed, suddenly changing her manner, “this red? It is blood! You are wounded, sir? Where is your wound?”

“In several places I am wounded; but not dangerously. They are only scratches: I have no fear of them.”

“Who gave you these wounds?”

“Indians. I have just escaped from them.”

“Indians! What Indians?”

“Arapahoes.”

“Arapahoes! Where did you encounter them?”

The question was put in a hurried manner, and in a tone that betrayed excitement.

“On the Huerfano,” I replied – “by the Orphan butte. It was the band of a chief known as the Red-Hand.”

“Ha! The Red-Hand on the Huerfano! Stranger! are you sure of this?”

The earnest voice in which the interrogatory was again put somewhat surprised me. I answered by giving a brief and rapid detail of our capture, and subsequent treatment – without mentioning the names of my travelling companions, or stating the object of our expedition. Indeed, I was not allowed to enter into particulars. I was hurried on by interpellations from my listener – who, before I could finish the narrative of my escape, again interrupted me, exclaiming in an excited manner:

“Red-Hand in the valley of the Huerfano! news for Wa-ka-ra!” After a pause she hastily inquired: “How many warriors has the Red-Hand with him?”

“Nearly two hundred.”

“Not more than two hundred?”

“No – rather less, I should say.”

“It is well – You say you have a horse?”

“My horse is at hand.”

“Bring him up, then, and come along with me!”

“But my comrades? I must follow the train, that I may be able to return and rescue them?”

“You need not, for such a purpose. There is one not far off who can aid you in that – better than the escort you speak of. If too late to save their lives, he may avenge their deaths for you. You say the caravan passed yesterday?”

“Yesterday about noon.”

“You could not overtake it, and return in time. The Red-Hand would be gone. Besides, you cannot get from this place to the trail taken by the caravan, without going back by the cañon; and there you might meet those from whom you have escaped. You cannot cross that way: the ridge is impassable.”

As she said this, she pointed to the left – the direction which I had intended to take. I could see through a break in the bluff a precipitous mountain spur running north and south – parallel with the ravine I had been threading. It certainly appeared impassable – trending along the sky like the escarpment of some gigantic fortress. If this was true, there would be but little chance of my overtaking the escort in time. I had no longer a hope of being able to effect the rescue of my comrades. The delay, no doubt, would be fatal. In all likelihood, both Wingrove and Sure-shot had ere this been sacrificed to the vengeance of the Arapahoes, freshly excited by my escape. Only from a sense of duty did I purpose returning: rather with the idea of being able to avenge their deaths.

What meant this mysterious maiden? Who possessed the power to rescue my comrades from two hundred savages – the most warlike upon the plains? Who was he that could aid me in avenging them?

“Follow me, and you shall see!” replied the huntress, in answer to my interrogatory. “Your horse! your horse! Hasten, or we shall be too late. The Red-Hand in the valley of the Huerfano! Wa-ka-ra will rejoice at the news. Your horse! your horse!” I hastened back for my Arab, and hurriedly led him up to the spot.

“A beautiful creature!” exclaimed she, on seeing the horse; “no wonder you were able to ride off from your captors. Mount!”

“And you?”

“I shall go afoot. But stay! time is precious. Can your steed carry us both?”

“Undoubtedly he can.”

“Then it is better we should both ride. Half an hour is everything; and if the Red-Hand should escape – You mount first – be quick!”

It was not the time to be squeamish – even under the glance of the loveliest eyes. Taking the robe from my shoulders, I spread it over the back of my horse; and employing a piece of the laryette as a surcingle, I bound it fast. Into the improvised saddle I mounted – the girl, from a rock, leaping upon the croup behind me. “You, Wolf!” cried she, apostrophising the dog; “you stay here by the game, and guard it from the coyotes. Remember! rascal! not a mouthful till I return. Now, stranger!” she continued, shifting closer to me, and clasping me round the waist, “I am ready. Give your steed to the road; and spare him not, as you value the lives of your comrades. Up the ravine lies our way. Ho! onward!”

The brave horse needed no spur. He seemed to understand that speed was required of him; and, stretching at once into a gallop, carried us gaily up the gorge.

Chapter Seventy One

A queer Conversation

Is other days, and under other circumstances, the touch of that round arm, softly encircling my waist, might have caused the current of my veins to flow fast and fevered. Not so then. My blood was thin and chill. My soul recoiled from amatory emotions, or indulged in them only as a remembrance. Even in that hour of trial and temptation, my heart was true to thee, Lilian! Had it been thy arm thus wound around my waist – had those eyes that glanced over my shoulder been blue, and the tresses that swept it gold – I might for the moment have forgotten the peril of my companions, and indulged only in the ecstasy of a selfish love. But not with her – that strange being with whom chance had brought me into such close companionship. For her I had no love-yearnings. Even under the entwining of that beautiful arm, my sense was as cold, as if I had been in the embrace of a statue. My thoughts were not there.

My captive comrades were uppermost in my mind. Her promise had given me hope that they might yet be rescued. How? and by whom? Whither were we going? and whose was the powerful hand from which help was to come? I would have asked; but our rapid movement precluded all chance of conversation. I could only form conjectures. These pointed to white men – to some rendezvous of trappers that might be near. I knew there were such. How else in such a place could her presence be accounted for? Even that would scarce explain an apparition so peculiar as that of this huntress-maiden! Other circumstances contradicted the idea that white men were to be my allies. There could be no band of trappers strong enough to attack the dark host of Red-Hand – at least with the chance of destroying it? She knew the strength of the Arapahoes. I had told her their number, as I had myself estimated it – nearly two hundred warriors. It was rare that a party of white hunters mustered above a dozen men. Moreover, she had mentioned a name – twice mentioned it – “Wa-ka-ra.” No white was likely to bear such an appellation. The word was undoubtedly Indian – especially as the huntress had pronounced it.

I waited for an opportunity to interrogate her. It offered at length – where the path ran circuitously among loose rocks, and it was impossible to proceed at a rapid pace I was about initiating a dialogue, when I was forestalled in my intention.

“You are an officer in the army!” said my companion, half interrogatively. “How should you have known that?” answered I in some surprise – perceiving that her speech was rather an assertion than a question. “Oh! easily enough; your uniform tells me.”

“My uniform?”

“Yes. Have you not still a portion of it left?” inquired she, with a striking simplicity. “I see a mark here where lace stripes have been. That denotes an officer – does it not? The Arapahoes have stripped them off, I suppose?”

“There was lace – true – you have guessed correctly. I have been in the army.”

“And what was bringing you out here? On your way to the gold countries, I dare say?”

“No, indeed, not that.”

“What, then, may I ask?”

“Only a foolish freak. It was a mere tour without much purpose. I intended soon to return to the States.”

“Ah! you intend returning? But you say you were following the caravan – you and your three fellow-travellers! Why were you not with it? Would it not have been safer?” I hesitated to make reply. My interrogator continued:

“It is not usual for so small a party to pass over the prairies alone. There is always danger from the Indians. Sometimes from whites too! Ah me! there are white savages – worse savages than red – far worse – far worse!”

These strange speeches, with the sigh that accompanied them, caused me to turn my head, and steal a glance at the countenance of my companion. It was tinged with melancholy, or rather deeply impressed with it. She, too, suffering from the past? In this glance I again remarked what had already attracted my notice – a resemblance to Lilian Holt! It was of the slightest, and so vague, that I could not tell in what it lay. Certainly not in the features – which were signally unlike those of Lilian; and equally dissimilar was the complexion. Were I to place the resemblance, I should say that I saw it in the cast of the eye, and heard it in the voice. The similitude of tone was striking. Like Lilian’s, it was a voice of that rich clarion sound with which beautiful women are gifted – those having the full round throat so proudly possessed by the damsels of Andalusia. Of course, reflected I, the likeness must be accidental. There was no possibility of its being otherwise; and I had not a thought that it was so. I was simply reminded of looks and tones that needed not that to recall them. The souvenirs so excited hindered me from making an immediate reply.

“Your observations are somewhat singular?” I remarked at length. “Surely you have not verified them by your own experience?”

“I have. Yes – and too sadly, ever to think them otherwise than just. I have had little reason to love those of my own colour – that is, if I am to consider myself a white.”

“But you are so, are you not?”

“Not altogether. I have Indian blood in my veins.”

“Not much, I should fancy?”

“Enough to give me Indian inclinings – and, I fear, also a dislike to those of my own complexion.”

“Indeed?”

“Perhaps less from instinct than experience. Ah! stranger! I have reason. Is it not enough that all have proved false – father, lover, husband?”

“Husband! You are married, then?”

“No.”

“You have been?”

“No.”

“Why did you say husband!”

“A husband only in name. I have been married, but never a wife; wedded, but never – ”

The speaker paused. I could feel her arm quivering around my waist. She was under the influence of some terrible emotion!

“Yours must be a strange story?” I remarked, with a view of inducing her to reveal it. “You have greatly excited my curiosity; but I know that I have no claim to your confidence.”

“You may yet win it.”

“Tell me how.”

“You say you intend returning to the States. I may have a commission for you; and you shall then hear my story. It is not much. Only a simple maiden, whose lover has been faithless – her father untrue to his paternal trust – her husband a cheat, a perjured villain.”

“Your relationships have been singularly unfortunate; but your words only mystify me the more. I should give much to know who you are, and what strange chance has led you hither?”

“Not now – time presses. Your comrades, if still alive, are in peril. That is your affair; but mine is that the Red-Hand may not escape. If he do, there’s one will grieve at it – one to whom I owe life and protection.”

“Of whom do you speak?”

“Of the mortal enemy of Red-Hand and his Arapahoes – of Wa-ka-ra.”

“Wa-ka-ra?”

“Head chief of the Utahs – you shall see him presently. Put your horse to his speed! We are close to the camp. Yonder are the smokes rising above the cliff! On stranger! on!”

As directed, I once more urged my Arab into a gallop. It was not for long. After the horse had made about a hundred stretches, the cañon suddenly opened into a small but beautiful vallon– treeless and turfed with grass. The white cones, appearing in serried rows near its upper end, were easily identified as an encampment of Indians. “Behold!” exclaimed my companion, “the tents of the Utahs!”

Chapter Seventy Two

Wa-Ka-Ra

The lodges were aligned in double row, with a wide avenue between them. At its head stood one of superior dimensions – the wigwam of the chief. They were all of conical shape; a circle of poles converging at their tops, and covered with skins of the buffalo, grained and bleached to the whiteness of wash-leather. A slit in the front of each tent formed the entrance, closed by a list of the hide that hung loosely over it. Near the top of each appeared a triangular piece of skin, projecting outward from the slope of the side, and braced, so as to resemble an inverted sail of the kind known as lateen. It was a wind-guard to aid the smoke in its ascent. On the outer surface of each tent was exhibited the biography of its owner – expressed in picture-writing. More especially were his deeds of prowess thus recorded – encounters with the couguar and grizzly bear – with Crows, Cheyennes, Pawnees, and Arapahoes – each under its suitable symbol. The great marquee of the chief was particularly distinguished with this kind of emblematical emblazonment – being literally covered with signs and figures, like the patterns upon a carpet. No doubt, one skilled in the interpretation of these Transatlantic hieroglyphs, might have read from that copious cipher many a tale of terrible interest. In front of the tents stood tall spears, with shields of parflèche leaning against them; also long bows of bois d’arc (Maclura aurantica), and shorter ones of horn – the horns of the mountain-ram. Skin-quivers filled with arrows, hung suspended from the shafts; and I observed that, in almost every grouping of these weapons, there was a gun – a rifle. This did not much astonish me. I knew that, to the Utah, the medicine weapon is no longer a mystery. Here and there, hides freshly flayed were pegged out upon the grass, with squaws kneeling around them, engaged in the operation of graining. Girls, with water-tight baskets, poised upon the crown of the head, were coming from or going towards the stream. Men stood in groups, idly chatting, or squatted upon the turf, playing at games of chance. Boys were busy at their bow-practice; and still younger children rolled their naked bodies over the grass, hugging half-grown puppies – the companions of their infant play. Troops of dogs trotted among the tents; while a mixed herd of horses, mules, sheep, goats, and asses browsed the plain at a little distance from the camp. Such was the coup d’oeil that presented itself to my gaze, as we rode up to the Utah encampment.

As might be expected, our arrival caused a change in the occupation of everybody. The dicers leaped to their feet – the squaws discontinued their work, and flung their scrapers upon the skins. “Ti-ya!” was the exclamation of astonishment that burst from hundreds of lips. Children screamed, and ran hiding behind their dusky mothers; dogs growled and barked; horses neighed; mules hinnied; asses brayed; while the sheep and goats joined their bleating to the universal chorus. “On to the chief’s tent!” counselled my companion, gliding to the ground, and preceding me on foot, “Yonder! the chief himself – Wa-ka-ra!”

An Indian of medium size and perfect form, habited in a tunic of embroidered buckskin, leggings of scarlet cloth, head-dress of coloured plumes, with crest that swept backward and drooped down to his heels. A gaily striped serapé, suspended scarf-like over the left shoulder, with a sash of red China crape wound loosely around the waist, completed a costume more picturesque than savage. A face of noble type, with an eye strongly glancing, like that of an eagle; an expression of features in no way fierce, but, like the dress, more gentle than savage; a countenance, in repose mild – almost to meekness. Such saw I.

Had I known the man who stood before me, I might have remarked how little this latter expression corresponded with his real character. Not that he was cruel, but only famed for warlike prowess. I was face to face with the most noted war-chief of America: whose name, though new to me, was at that moment dreaded from Oregon to Arispe, from the banks of the Rio Bravo to the sierras of Alta California. It was Walker– the war-chief of the Utahs – the friend of the celebrated trapper, whose name he had adopted; and which, by the modification of Utah orthoëpy, had become Wa-ka-ra.

An odd individual – a very odd one – was standing beside the chief as I rode up. He appeared to be a Mexican, to judge by his costume and the colour of his skin. The former consisted of jaqueta and calzoneros of dark-coloured velveteen, surmounted by a broad-brimmed sombrero of black glaze; while the complexion, although swarthy, was several shades lighter than that of the Indian. He was a man of diminutive stature, and with a countenance of a serio-comical cast. An expression of this kind pervaded his whole person – features and figure included – and was heightened by the presence of a singular accoutrement that hung suspended from his leathern waist-belt. It was a piece of timber some eighteen inches in length, and looking like the section of a boot-tree, or the half of a wooden milk-yoke. At the thick end was a concavity or socket, with straps, by which it was attached to the belt; and this singular apparatus, hanging down over his thigh, added to the grotesque appearance of its owner. The little Mexican had all the cut of a “character;” and he was one, as I afterwards ascertained. He was no other than the famous Pedro Archilete – or “Peg-leg,” as his comrades called him – a trapper of Taos, and one of the most expert and fearless of that fearless fraternity.

The odd accoutrement which had puzzled me was nothing more than an artificial leg! It was an implement, however, he only used upon occasions – whenever the natural one – the ankle of which had been damaged by some accident – gave out through the fatigue of a march. At other times he carried the wooden leg, as I first saw it, suspended from his belt!

His presence in the Indian encampment was easily accounted for. He was in alliance with their chief: for the Utahs were at that time en paz with the settlements of the Taos Valley; and the Spanish trappers and traders went freely among them. Peg-leg had been on a trapping expedition to the Parks; and having fallen in with the Utahs, had become the guest of Wa-ka-ra.

Chapter Seventy Three

Peg-Leg

“The huntress has returned soon?” said the chief, interrogatively, as the girl glided up to him. “She brings strange game!” added he, with a smile. “Who is the young warrior with the white circle upon his breast? He is a pale-face. It is not the custom of our white brothers to adorn themselves in such fashion?”