LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume VIII, Issue 861, 28 March 1877, Page 3

LITERATURE.

A NIGHT OF DANGER

(From the Argosy.)

Riding hard and fast, almost as for dear life, along the wilds of the vast and lone American prairie, I found myself, to my intense astonishment, entering upon a straggling settlement, and pulled up to reconnoitre and consider. That I had missed my way was all too plain ; for, on the course that I ought to have come, there was not a cabin or a single settler. Somewhere or other I had got out of the right track and into the wrong one. Almost any traveller in the border sections would have been rejoiced to thus stumble unexpectedly upon a place where food and shelter might be obtained. At another time I should have been so myself. Not now. In the breast-pocket of my closely-buttoned coat I carried five thousand four hundred and ninety odd dollars, United States money. It was during our time of war. This money had been given into my charge to carry it without stopping, and by the most unfrequented route, to Fort , and place it in the hands of Colonel Southard ; who was waiting for it. ‘ Get through at your best speed,’ said the Major-General to me, when I was on the point of starting. ‘The money has been long due, and Colonel Southard is showing some irascible temper over it, Should you scent danger en route, ride in a careless manner, as though you had nothing about you. Be very cautious.’ ‘ Is it known that this money is going to him ?’ I asked.

*lt is not generally known. Some few, of course, ineyitably know it—the mail agent and a clerk or two. Still, I don’t see that we need fear treachery from them; I think you will he all safe.’ But here I was, having lost my route, and not knowing whether I was safe or not—at least, whether the money would be. And, now that I had blundered on the verge of this scanty settlement, what must be my best course ? Should I halt for refreshment, as any ordinary traveller would; or should I ride straight through without stopping ? The latter course might of itself excite suspicion. So, pushing on to the house of entertainment with the most careless air I could assume, I got off my horse. If trea chery had been at work, I was no doubt being watched for, on this route as on others, and should need all my cunning to escape if escape were indeed possible. There were only two men in the bar-room when I entered ; the landlord and the ostler. I ordered supper, and sat down. Two travellers next rode up, and ordered drinks. One of them went with the ostler, the other threw himself on a bench outside and began filling a huge pipe. Strolling carelessly about the room, I managed to glance from the window. My heart leaped into my throat, for in the man seated there T recognised Bill Wolf: one of the most desperate characters that ever figured in the annals of border ruffianism. Yes, it was certainly he, and no other. There was the huge red moustache, the thick, hairy throat, and the shoulders hunched up around his head, suggesting the shape of a mammoth clam —and there was the voice with a deepdown intonation, like the plop, plop, plop of water hurriedly leaving a jug. I sat down again and went through the form of eating my supper; but whatever appetite I might have felt, on my entrance into the inn, had vanished now. The discovery that this dangerous man, Bill Wolf, was at my elbow, filled me with suspicion and dire apprehension. His being there might be all chance; but—l did not believe it to be. Presently the men came in together, and ordered supper. Mine was finished, and now was my chance to leave. Paying my score, and saying a general good evening, 1 crossed the dim. smoky barroom. They took no notice of me whatever, not even returning my good night; only the landlord looked furtively at me. My spirits rose; I hoj)ed my fears had misled me, and that I should get safe away. It was quite duskish outside, but the ostler was hitting about the stable with his lantern, which emitted but a little more effulgent light than a white bean would have done; he brought out my steed, and I trotted away. The moon —a little past the full—would soon rise; and I pushed along at a smart trot, so as to get well out upon the plains and into the right trail be fore that time. I was feeling infinitely relieved at my providential escape from contact with the desperate characters whom I had left at the settlement, when my acute, trained, ever' alert ears detected the sound of swift riding. In which direction ? From behind me? Yes, for the mildly-floating breeze blew from that quarter. The face of the prairie in this section was a little rolling, but not so as to afford any shelter, and not a shrub or bush dotted the expanse for miles.

I drew my horse one moment to listen. On, they came. No chanco travellers ever rode like that. It meant pursuit.

I gave my steed a lash, and lie bioke into a convulsive gait, hove his body up with one or two plunges, stumbled, going down from his knees to his nose, and pitched me literally heels over head. For an instant I was paralyzed with astonishment, wondering what could have taken my trusty and good horse ; the next, I seized the bit to fetch up the fallen animal, for there was no time to lose.

But what was the matter with the horse ? He had a white spot on his face, and this white seemed to come off on my hand as I touched him. A wet, slimy, sticky substance, bearing a remarkable resemblance to whitewash. With my heart in my mouth I stooped to feel his white legs and feet. Yes, they were whitewashed too. The trappings had been taken oil' my own horse at the inn, and transferred to this worthless animal, which had been whitewashed over to imitate mine.

This discovery brought an appalling interpretation of oncoming horsemen. 1 gave the horse the whip as soon as his unstable legs were well under him, and sent him scouring on ahead, while I ran oil on foot to the right, making Cor a little hollow that I discerned in the distance. It proved to be a shallow, dry ravine; and here, to my pro found astonishment, I discovered a low cabin, or hut, about the dimensions of an ordinary country log house. Dashing up to this, for it was my only hope of shelter, 1 gave a rapid succession of knocks. A shrinking, pale, and cowering woman opened the door.

‘What is it?’ was her first question, noticing pay breathless haste.

Had I taken a moment’s reflection. I might not have given the true explanation as 1 pushed in by her. In all probability this secret hut belonged to my enemies. The moon was coming up dry and red in the east. ‘ I there any chance to hide here ? My horse has thrown me, and I believe a party of deperadoes is close up with me.’ She mechanically closed the door behind me, before I had finished my explanation. ‘No, no; there is no place,’ she gasped, her ear catching the sound of coming horsemen. ‘ This is all there is; this one room. ’

My eyes had been seeking for a piece of furniture, or else, that I might lie concealed in—all in vain. Suddenly they rested on a dark object in the far corner. ‘But this?—what’s this?’ I exclaimed, making a rush for it. ‘ It’s a coffin,’ was her quick response. ‘ But there’s no other chance —they are turning up to the door. Get in. I Bad barely time to place myself in this receptacle for the dead, when a hoarse voice that I had now too good cause to know, that of Bill Wolf, was heard outside. His heavy whip struck the door. ‘ Here, you Dick !—ls Dick here?’ The woman threw her apron over her head and opened the door.

‘Where’s Dick?’ ‘He has not come back yet! ’ returned the woman.

‘Oh, not yet ! Jenny, have ye heard a horse go by yonder? ’ ‘Yes, just but now. I looked out, thinking one of ye might be coming. Seemed to have a small man on it.’

‘ Driving on like the devil—eh ? ’ * Going fast,’ she answered. ‘ You might perhaps hear its tracks still,’ she added, passing out and pulling the door to. ‘ Listen ! ’

But Bill Wolf must have been of a suspicious nature. I heard him leap from his horse. For the life of me 1 could not help pushing up the coffin lid by a hair’s breadth, and looking through the chink. A fire was burning on the stone hearth. Bill Wolf had a hand on each doox’-post. His brutal head was thrust inside the room, peering about. ‘ What’s that ? ’ he questioned. And my heart stood still, for I knew he spoke of xxxy retreat.

*lt is Staffer’s coffin,’ she answered. ‘ Blue Rex left it here for Dick to take over to-night.’ ‘ Stxxff !’ ejaculated Wolf, coxxtcmptuously. ‘ A coffin for the likes of him ! As Staffer made his own bed, so let him lie on it.’

‘ The boys wished it,’ said she, and Dick promised. ‘ Dick be shot ! He ought to be here. Are you sure he is not in? You’ve not got him in hiding anywhere ?’ Wolf, all suspicion, went up to the rain barrel, and I heard him shake it. I suppose he thought ‘ Dick’ might have taken refuge in the water ; then he came to the door and looked in again. Satisfied, he turned away, and mounted his horse.

‘ Are you in pursuit of the man gone by ?’ asked the woman in a timid, careless tone. ‘ Ay, But what’s it to you if we are ? He can’t have gone far either, on that animal.’ Riding away in search of me and of what I carried, Wolf clattered off'. The woman watched him join two comrades, who had waited at a little distance ; then she came in and barred the door. I was out of the coffin in a trice.

‘ What shall I do ? what shall I do ?’ gx’asped the woman. * They will be back in twenty minutes ; for I believe that your horse is yet in sight; and my husband is also liable to come at any moment.’ ‘ Your husband might perhaps shelter me. hie ’

‘ Him !’ she emphasized it in despairing tones, ‘He is Dill Wolf’s brother. 1 suppose you have managed to affront some of them. And they give no quarter.’ I looked around in despair. To go out, was to meet this Dick ; to stay in, meant discovery, probably death. The coffin was no longer available, for Dick was coming for it. ‘ It is death for you, anyway,’ she moaned, ‘ I hear the rattle of Hick’s axle-wheels already. ’ ‘ Stay, there’s the rain barrel outside,’ said I, in desperation. ‘ They’ve tried that once, they may not look in it again.’ And before you would be able to speak a sentence, the water was dashed out of the cask, stealing down into the arid soil, and I was in the barrel, and the woman dropping a tub half filled with water in at the top as a cover.

She had barely time to re-enter the house, the door of which fortunately opened on the side away from the moon, when a rattling vehicle drew up at at the door, and 1 heard a hoarse voice raving and swearing at the woman for something done, or undone ; and then from the bunghole, the plug having been dislodged in the upsetting of the cask, I saw the furious return of the three other renegades. Hearing Dick’s wheels they must have turned back. As to the steed they supposed I was on, they knew they could catch that up at any time, whatever the delay. There ensued a good deal of loud talking, explanations, and oaths. A jorum of hot nectar was prepared, and they went in to partake of it. Dick refused to join in the hunt after me, on account of having to take the coffin to its destination.

‘ Anyway, we are bound on the same track,’ cried Wolf, * so you may have the pleasure of seeing us wing the turkey. Five or six thousand dollars ! It’s a prize we don’t get the chance of every day.’ * AVon’t old Southard swear when he finds the money dosn’t reach him, and he dosn’t know why !’ A shouting laugh. Dick’s voice was heard as it died away. ‘ls there water enough out there, Jenny, to drink my horse ?’ ‘ I’ll see,’ she returned, moving slowly over the door-sil. And then, leaping to the cask, she lifted out the |tub and tipped my barrel over a little, so that I could spring out.

‘ Hid where you best can,’ she whispered. The best place, the only place, seemed to be the dark corner between the cabin wall and the barrel. Dick came out, and led his horse up to the tub to drink. Then, turning the waggon endways, he went indoors, brought out the coffin with the help of one of the others, and slid it into' the vehicle. Bill Wolf came out next.

‘ I’ve made another jug of nectar,’called out the woman. And at the tempting words they ail went back to the cabin. I believe the woman did it to give me time. At that moment a wild and desperate plan entered my brain; but, feeling for my knife, I found that it was missing, along

with the belt to which it was attached. In

the sudden jostle which the falling steed had given me, the girdle had been snapped | and lost without my knowledge. The 1 horses of the three renegades -my own, which had been retained by the ostler at the inn, among them - were hitched on the farther side or the door, where the moonlight, striking by the end of the cabin, rested fully upon them. It was suicide to attempt seizing one of them—my own, as I had hoped to do—and riding off; so I embraced the only alternative. Creeping into the waggon, I lifted the coffin lid, and again lay down in the long, narrow prison. There was no choice. The flood of moonlight had swept so far towards my hiding place that only a part of my body was con cealed by the barrel, and I knew that discovery was inevitable, for the man’s horse stood in such a position that, in order to recover the reins, he must have trodden on me ; and there was no earthly thing, as far as the eye could reach over the plain, behind which a man could hide. Ah, but what if he should re-ajust his freight? Can you think how my heart beat away at the thought ? You wonder what my plan could be ? I had none ; other than the hope of having only one man to deal with, if Dick parted with the rest and went on alone. He had said he would go with them as far as the ‘ Forksafter which, as I comprehended, his way would lie one road and theirs another.

The three others mounted, and all were about to start, when the woman ran out with a sort of a blanket, and muttered something about covering the coffin. Dick yelled out to her to mind her own business, and let the thing alone. But she succeeded in accomplishing her purpose. Disposing the blanket across the coffin, as he was beginning to drive away, she contrived to lift its lid and drop inside a bowie-knife. You may be sure I seized it heartily, and gave her a blessing, too, poor thing; and the first use I made of it was to lodge the lid up just a fraction. So that my breathing was easy, though my position was cramped. ‘ We’ll beat up the game speedily now, said the horsemen one to another, the quantity of whisky they had imbibed, in the shape of ‘nectar,’ somewhat impeding their utterancs. ‘He can’t by any miracle have got yet into the wooded belt by Burford Springs.’ ‘Horse couldn’t take him there.’

‘ Dick,’ they called back, as they were riding on; ‘ a cool twelve hundred apiece ! Throw out your old shell and join the hunt.’ The driver mumbled some foreign answer, as if the nectar were clouding his understanding, and whipped up his horse. If he did attempt to move the coffin, I was lost. They kept with hailing distance for the length of some three or more miles, Dick smashing the heavy waggon along at a steam ing pace ; and I expected that the coffin would be jostled out. By-and-bye, there was a sudden shout; a loud ‘tally-ho,’ as if the huntsmen had sighted the quarry. It came from the right. Nothing but an unwarrantable amount of liquor could have influenced them to conduct themselves as they did and to make this noise. The probability was that not a soul (save the one they fancied they were pursuing) was within miles and miles, but men bound on these raids are cautious. No sooner was the noise heard than my driver came to a halt. Listening for a moment, he threw the reins across the horse, leaped down, and started off towards his friends. Perhaps the temptation of the money (that they might be then dividing) was too much for him.

For one instant my heart stopped beating at thought of the hazard which 1 was about to run. The next moment I sprang from the coffin to the ground. A few lightninglike stroke?, and I had severed the traces and the rude bands of the harness.

The whole scene is vividly pictured in my mind now. The moon-lighted prairie, the sloping ravine towards which the renegades had been dashing, and the waggon standing in the trail. I mounted one of the horses and urged him onwards. All might have been well, had not the quick ears of the men caught the echo of his footsteps. Looking round, they saw me making off—and I think must have known me, for I was lighted up by the bright moonlight. With a wild shout, they came on in pursuit. There was the sharp report of two rifles. I felt a sting in my foot, another in my shoulder ; but the horse was unharmed, and the race for life began. There was one disheartening disadvantage for me: I had no saddle; but I was riding for my life, and I held ray steed between my knees, and took the broad trail with the fury of a tornado. The issue would rest chiefly with the horses. I knew nothing of the one which I rode; I knew nothing of those that were pursuing me, except my own whitefaced horse. He could run like an antelope, and out-wind a hurricane.

On, and on, and on, my steed, desperately spurred with the point of the knife, bore ahead, actually causing me to gasp for breath; and not two hundred yards in the rear rode those would-be assassins.

On the rolling prairie now, and my animal took the declivities with a plunge, and the elevations with a sure, fierce stride. Across the brawling ford now—but crack came another rifle echo, and again a stream of fire seemed to strike my shoulder. They were closing in, closing up. I could now make out only two horsemen following. One of these had discharged his rifle at me; the other I supposed was keeping his in reserve until he should be a few yards nearer. 1 knew not where I was, how far I had come, or how far I had to go; but I did think and hope I must be nearing civilisation and Colonel Southard’s camp.

Could I keep up this pace? Would the horse fail mo ? Away and away went we; I iu front, they behind. A momentary dizziness threw me forward on my horse’s neck. Whether I should have yielded to the faintness, I know not; but a distant sound struck on my ear, and brought me up. Oh, it was good, that sound !—but I was not quite sure yet. I broke into the wild, long, tierce yell of the border rangers, and sped on again; but my horse had that peculiar twist now and then in his gait that told me he was faltering. Again that echo reached me, swelling out on the rising wind, and my heart leaped up. It was the shrill music of the fife, and the rumbles of the drums of the infantry ; who were probably returning to camp from some expedition to Fort L . Again I sent out that long, wild, border cry, and I knew by the quicker breathing of the life, and the rapid pulsing of the drum, that the soldiers had heard, and were coming to my rescue.

A parting sh >t fired at random, and my two pursuers turned: they could not face the soldiers. But one of them, at least, was not done with. I called my horse with a peculiar whistle that he knew. I repeated and repeated it; and then I heard him come crashing again in pursuit, while his rider siiouted and lashed him, and tried to pull him round the other way. For a brief space of time, Wolf, for he it was, wrestled with the animal, lashed, goaded, and roared at him ; but my incessant, jerky Av r histle-call kept his mind and head towards me. Wolf only gave up the fruitless struggle and leaped from his back, when a squad of infantry dashed over a billowy swell of the prairie.

‘ It is Wolf,’ 1 panted, as they bore down. ‘ Go in pursuit of him : I am all right now. ’ No need to urge them. A price was set on Wolf’s head, as they knew, for he was the most dangerous and desperate outlaw of the time. I just saw one of them fiy off—while the plain seemed to be rising and falling about me, and then quietly fainted ; partly with fatigue and excitement, chiefly with loss of blood.

And when my eyes opened again, they fell on Mr Wolf - a prisoner. Our men had brought him to receive his deserts. As for myself, I was saved, and the money also.

‘lt %vas a near touch, captain,’ observed one of the men to me, ‘ and I should not have liked the coffin at all.”

But it was the coffin that saved my life.