CHAPTER TWENTY TWO.
A FEAT A LA TAIL.
I had fallen into a sort of reverie. My mind was occupied with theincidents I had just witnessed, when a voice, which I recognised as thatof old Rube, roused me from my abstraction.
"Look'ee hyur, boyees! Tain't of'n as ole Rube wastes lead, but I'llbeat that Injun's shot, or 'ee may cut my ears off."
A loud laugh hailed this allusion of the trapper to his ears, which, aswe have observed, were already gone; and so closely had they beentrimmed that nothing remained for either knife or shears to accomplish.
"How will you do it, Rube?" cried one of the hunters; "shoot the markoff a yer own head?"
"I'll let 'ee see if 'ee wait," replied Rube, stalking up to a tree, andtaking from its rest a long, heavy rifle, which he proceeded to wipe outwith care.
The attention of all was now turned to the manoeuvres of the oldtrapper. Conjecture was busy as to his designs. What feat could heperform that would eclipse the one just witnessed? No one could guess.
"I'll beat it," continued he, muttering, as he loaded his piece, "or 'eemay chop the little finger off ole Rube's right paw."
Another peal of laughter followed, as all perceived that this was thefinger that was wanting.
"'Ee--es," continued he, looking at the faces that were around him, "'eemay scalp me if I don't."
This last remark elicited fresh roars of laughter; for although thecat-skin was closely drawn upon his head, all present knew that old Rubewas minus his scalp.
"But how are ye goin' to do it? Tell us that, old hoss!"
"'Ee see this, do 'ee?" asked the trapper, holding out a small fruit ofthe cactus pitahaya, which he had just plucked and cleaned of itsspikelets.
"Ay, ay," cried several voices, in reply.
"'Ee do, do 'ee? Wal; 'ee see 'tain't half as big as the Injun'ssquash. 'Ee see that, do 'ee?"
"Oh, sartinly! Any fool can see that."
"Wal; s'pose I plug it at sixty, plump centre?"
"Wagh!" cried several, with shrugs of disappointment.
"Stick it on a pole, and any o' us can do that," said the principalspeaker. "Here's Barney could knock it off wid his owld musket.Couldn't you, Barney?"
"In truth, an' I could thry," answered a very small man, leaning upon amusket, and who was dressed in a tattered uniform that had once beensky-blue. I had already noticed this individual with some curiosity,partly struck with his peculiar costume, but more particularly onaccount of the redness of his hair, which was the reddest I had everseen. It bore the marks of a severe barrack discipline--that is, it hadbeen shaved, and was now growing out of his little round head short andthick, and coarse in the grain, and of the colour of a scraped carrot.There was no possibility of mistaking Barney's nationality. In trapperphrase, any fool could have told that.
What had brought such an individual to such a place? I asked thisquestion, and was soon enlightened. He had been a soldier in a frontierpost, one of Uncle Sam's "Sky-blues." He had got tired of pork andpipe-clay, accompanied with a too liberal allowance of the hide. In aword, Barney was a deserter. What his name was, I know not, but he wentunder the appellation of O'Cork--Barney O'Cork.
A laugh greeted his answer to the hunter's question.
"Any o' us," continued the speaker, "could plug the persimmon that away. But thar's a mighty heap o' diff'rence when you squints thro'hind-sights at a girl like yon."
"Ye're right, Dick," said another hunter; "it makes a fellow feel queeryabout the jeints."
"Holy vistment! An' wasn't she a raal beauty?" exclaimed the littleIrishman, with an earnestness in his manner that set the trappersroaring again.
"Pish!" cried Rube, who had now finished loading, "yur a set o'channering fools; that's what 'ee ur. Who palavered about a post? I'vegot an ole squaw as well's the Injun. She'll hold the thing for thischild--she will."
"Squaw! You a squaw?"
"Yes, hoss; I has a squaw I wudn't swop for two o' his'n. I'll maketracks an' fetch the old 'oman. Shet up yur heads, an' wait, will ye?"
So saying, the smoky old sinner shouldered his rifle, and walked offinto the woods.
I, in common with others, late comers, who were strangers to Rube, beganto think that he had an "old 'oman." There were no females to be seenabout the encampment, but perhaps she was hid away in the woods. Thetrappers, however, who knew him, seemed to understand that the oldfellow had some trick in his brain; and that, it appeared, was no newthing for him.
We were not kept long in suspense. In a few minutes Rube was seenreturning, and by his side the "old 'oman," in the shape of a long,lank, bare-ribbed, high-boned mustang, that turned out on closeinspection to be a mare! This, then, was Rube's squaw, and she was notat all unlike him, excepting the ears. She was long-eared, in commonwith all her race: the same as that upon which Quixote charged thewindmill. The long ears caused her to look mulish, but it was only inappearance; she was a pure mustang when you examined her attentively.She seemed to have been at an earlier period of that dun-yellowishcolour known as "clay-bank," a common colour among Mexican horses; buttime and scars had somewhat metamorphosed her, and grey hairspredominated all over, particularly about the head and neck. Theseparts were covered with a dirty grizzle of mixed hues. She was badlywind-broken; and at stated intervals of several minutes each, her back,from the spasmodic action of the lungs, heaved up with a jerk, as thoughshe were trying to kick with her hind legs, and couldn't. She was asthin as a rail, and carried her head below the level of her shoulders;but there was something in the twinkle of her solitary eye (for she hadbut one), that told you she had no intention of giving up for a longtime to come. She was evidently game to the backbone.
Such was the "old 'oman" Rube had promised to fetch; and she was greetedby a loud laugh as he led her up.
"Now, look'ee hyur, boyees," said he, halting in front of the crowd."Ee may larf, an' gabble, an' grin till yur sick in the guts--yur may!but this child's a-gwine to take the shine out o' that Injun's shot--heis, or bust a-tryin'."
Several of the bystanders remarked that that was likely enough, and thatthey only waited to see in what manner it was to be done. No one whoknew him doubted old Rube to be, as in fact he was, one of the very bestmarksmen in the mountains--fully equal, perhaps, to the Indian; but itwas the style and circumstances which had given such _eclat_ to the shotof the latter. It was not every day that a beautiful girl could befound to stand fire as the squaw had done; and it was not every hunterwho would have ventured to fire at a mark so placed. The strength ofthe feat lay in its newness and peculiarity. The hunters had oftenfired at the mark held in one another's hands. There were few who wouldlike to carry it on their head. How, then, was Rube to "take the shineout o' that Injun's shot"? This was the question that each was askingthe other, and which was at length put directly to Rube himself.
"Shet up your meat-traps," answered he, "an I'll show 'ee. In the fustplace, then, 'ee all see that this hyur prickly ain't more'n hef size o'the squash?"
"Yes, sartainly," answered several voices. "That wur one sukumstance inhis favour. Wa'nt it?"
"It wur! it wur!"
"Wal, hyur's another. The Injun, 'ee see, shot his mark off o' thehead. Now, this child's a-gwine to knock his'n off o' the tail. Kudyur Injun do that? Eh, boyees?"
"No, no!"
"Do that beat him, or do it not, then?"
"It beats him!"
"It does!"
"Far better!"
"Hooray!" vociferated several voices, amidst yells of laughter. No onedissented, as the hunters, pleased with the joke, were anxious to see itcarried through.
Rube did not detain them long. Leaving his rifle in the hands of hisfriend Garey, he led the old mare up towards the spot that had beenoccupied by the Indian girl. Reaching this, he halted.
We all expected to see him turn the animal with her side towards us,thus leaving her body out of range. It soon became evident that thiswas not the old fellow's i
ntention. It would have spoiled the look ofthe thing, had he done so; and that idea was no doubt running in hismind.
Choosing a place where the ground chanced to be slightly hollowed out,he led the mustang forward, until her fore feet rested in the hollow.The tail was thus thrown above the body.
Having squared her hips to the camp, he whispered something at her head;and going round to the hind quarters, adjusted the pear upon the highestcurve of the stump. He then came walking back.
Would the mare stand? No fear of that. She had been trained to standin one place for a longer period than was now required of her.
The appearance which the old mare exhibited, nothing visible but herhind legs and buttocks, for the mules had stripped her tail of the hair,had by this time wound the spectators up to the risible point, and mostof them were yelling.
"Stop yur giggle-goggle, wull yur!" said Rube, clutching his rifle, andtaking his stand. The laughter was held in, no one wishing to disturbthe shot.
"Now, old Tar-guts, don't waste your fodder!" muttered the trapper,addressing his gun, which the next moment was raised and levelled.
No one doubted but that Rube would hit the object at which he wasaiming. It was a shot frequently made by western riflemen; that is, amark of the same size at sixty yards. And no doubt Rube would have doneit; but just at the moment of his pulling trigger the mare's back heavedup in one of its periodic jerks, and the pitahaya fell to the ground.
But the ball had sped; and grazing the animal's shoulder, passed throughone of her ears!
The direction of the bullet was not known until afterwards, but itseffect was visible at once; for the mare, stung in her tenderest part,uttered a sort of human-like scream, and wheeling about, came leapinginto camp, kicking over everything that happened to lie in her way.
The yells and loud laughing of the trappers, the odd ejaculations of theIndians, the "vayas" and "vivas" of the Mexicans, the wild oaths of oldRube himself, all formed a medley of sounds that fell strangely upon theear, and to give an idea of which is beyond the art of my pen.