CHAPTER XXVII.
SHAW.
We have said that Dona Clara had disappeared.
At the moment when the struggle was most obstinate, Valentine, takingDona Clara in his arms, leaped from the top of the lodge on which he hadhitherto been fighting, intrusted the maiden to Shaw, and rushed backinto the fight at the head of the Comanches, who, recovering from theterror caused by the unforeseen attack of their implacable foes theApaches, gradually assembled to the powerful war cry of their chief,Pethonista.
"Watch over her," Valentine said to Red Cedar's son; "watch over her,and, whatever may happen, save her."
Shaw took the maiden in his powerful arms, threw her over his shoulder,and with flashing eye and quivering lip, he brandished his axe, thatfearful squatter's instrument he never laid aside, and rushed headforemost among the Apaches, resolved to die or break the human barrierthat rose menacingly before him.
Like a boar at bay, he dashed madly forward, felling and tramplingmercilessly on all who attempted to bar his progress. A living catapult,he advanced step by step over a pile of corpses, incessantly droppinghis axe, which he raised again dripping with blood. He had only onethought left--to save Dona Clara or die!
In vain did the Apaches collect around him; like an implacable reaper,he cut them down as ripe corn, while laughing that dry and hoarse grin,a nervous contraction which affects a man who has reached the laststage of rage or madness.
In fact, at this moment, Shaw was no longer a man, but a demon.Trampling over the quivering bodies that fell beneath the terrible blowsof his axe, feeling the body of her for whose safety he fought tremblingon his shoulder, he struggled without stopping in his impossible task,but resolved to cut a hole, at all risks, through the human wallconstantly arising before him.
Shaw was a man of tried courage, long habituated to fighting, andpitiless to the redskins. But alone, on this night, only illumined bythe blood-red hue of the fire, and confined in a fatal circle, he felt agreat fear involuntarily coming over him; he breathed with difficulty,his teeth were clenched, an icy perspiration ran down his body, and hefelt on the point of succumbing.
Falling would have been death. He would have immediately disappearedunder the avalanche of ferocious Indians yelling around him.
This discouragement did not last so long as a lightning flash. The youngman, sustained by that hope which springs eternal in the human breast,as well as by his love for Dona Clara, prepared to continue the unequalcontest.
Bounding like a jaguar, he hurled himself into the thick of the fight.This contest of a single man against a swarm of enemies had somethinggrand and startling about it. Shaw, as if under the influence of ahorrible nightmare, struggled in vain against the incessantly renewedcloud of foemen; in him every feeling of self had vanished, he no longerreflected, his life had become entirely physical, his movements wereautomatic, his arms rose and fell with the rigid regularity of apendulum.
He had managed, without knowing how, to clear the fortifications of thevillage; at a few paces from him the Gila flowed silently on, andappeared to him in the moonlight like an immense silver ribbon. Could hereach the river, he was saved; but there is a limit which humanstrength, however great it may be, cannot go beyond, and Shaw felt thathe was reaching this limit.
He took an anxious glance around; Apaches hemmed him in on all sides! Heuttered a sigh, for he thought that he was about to die. At this solemnmoment, when all was about to fail him, a final shriek burst from hischest. A cry of agony and despair, of terrifying meaning, and re-echoedfor a second far and wide, so that it drowned all the battle sounds; itwas the parting protest of a man who at length confesses himselfconquered by fatality, and who, before succumbing, summons his fellowmen to his aid, or implores the succour of Heaven.
A cry answered his! Shaw, astonished, unable to count on a miracle, ashis friends were too far off and themselves too busy to help him,fancied himself the victim of a dream or hallucination; still,collecting all his strength, feeling hope well up again in his heart, hegave vent to a more startling shout than the former.
"Courage!"
This time, it was not echo that answered him.
Courage! This word alone was borne on the wings of the wind, weak as asigh, and, in spite of the horrible yells of the Apaches, was distinctlyheard by Shaw.
In moments of frenzy, or when a man is at bay, the senses acquire aperfection for which it is impossible otherwise to account. Like thegiant Antaeus, Shaw drew himself up, and seemed restored to that lifewhich was on the point of leaving him. He redoubled his blows on hisinnumerable enemies, and at length succeeded in breaking through thebarrier they opposed to him.
Several horsemen appeared galloping over the plain; shots illumined thedarkness with their transient flash, and men, or rather demons, rushedsuddenly on the throng of the Apaches, and commenced a frightfulcarnage. The redskins, surprised by their unexpected attack, rushedtoward the village, uttering yells of terror: their prey had escapedthem.
Shaw had fought bravely and firm as a rock up to the last moment; butwhen his enemies disappeared, he sank to the ground in a state ofunconsciousness.
How long did he remain in this state? He could not say: but when herecovered his senses it was night. He fancied at first, that only a fewhours had elapsed since the terrible struggle he had undergone, and helooked inquiringly around him. He was lying by a fire in the centre of aclearing; Dona Clara was a few paces from him, weak and pale as aspectre.
Shaw uttered a cry of surprise and terror on recognising the men whosurrounded him, and who had probably saved him by answering his finalshout. They were his two brothers, Fray Ambrosio, Andres Garote, and adozen Gambusinos.
By what strange accident had he rejoined his comrades at the moment whenhe had so great interest in shunning them? What evil chance had broughtthem across his path?
The young man let his head sink on his chest, and fell into a sad andgloomy reverie. His comrades, lying like him by the fire, maintained themost obstinate silence, and did not seem at all eager to cross-questionhim.
We will take advantage of the momentary respite allowed Shaw, to explainwhat had taken place on the island since we quitted it to follow DonaClara, Ellen, and the two Canadian hunters.
Until sunrise no one perceived the flight of the girls. At breakfast,Nathan and Sutter, amazed at not seeing their sister appear, ventured onentering the hut of branches that served as shelter to the two females,and then all was explained. They went in a furious rage to Fray Ambrosioto tell him what had happened, and the monk completed the news they gavehim by announcing in his turn the flight of Eagle-wing, Dick, and Harry.
The fury of the two brothers was unbounded, and they proposed to raisethe camp at once, and go in pursuit of, the fugitives. Fray Ambrosio andhis worthy friend Garote had infinite difficulty in making themunderstand that this would lead to no result; that, moreover, they hadas guide an Indian thoroughly acquainted with the topography of thecountry, and the hiding places, and that it would be folly to supposethat the persons who had escaped had not so arranged their flight as tofoil all attempts made to seize them again.
Another and more powerful reason obliged them to remain on the island,to which the squatter's sons were compelled to yield. Red Cedar, ongoing away, ordered that under no pretext should they quit the post hehad selected; he had moreover promised to join his band again there, andif they left it, it would be impossible for him to find them, as hewould not know in what direction they had gone.
The young men were forced to allow that Fray Ambrosio was right; but, inorder to satisfy their conscience, they placed themselves at the head ofa few resolute men, crossed the river, and beat up the neighbourhood. Weneed scarcely say that they found nothing, for at about a league fromthe Gila the traces were finally lost.
The young men were in despair; but Fray Ambrosio, on the other hand, wasdelighted. He had only one desire, that of seeing the band quit of DonaClara, who, according to his views, impeded its progress and preventedit m
arching with the speed circumstances required; and now, instead ofone woman, two had gone!
The worthy monk could scarce contain himself for joy; he, listened with,a sympathising air and expressions of condolence to the advice andcomplaints of his comrades at this extraordinary flight; but in hisheart he was delighted.
Still, as there was no perfect happiness in this world, and wormwoodmust always be mixed with the honey of life, an unexpected incidentsuddenly troubled the beatitude of Fray Ambrosio.
At starting, Red Cedar, while concealing the object of his journey, haddropped hints to his comrades that he would bring them allies; moreover,he informed them, that his excursion would not last more than three orfour days at the most. In the desert, especially in the Far West, thereis no regular road; travellers are compelled, for the greater part ofthe time, to march axe in hand, and cut a path by force. The gambusinosknew this by experience, and hence were not surprised, because Red Cedardid not return at the period he had fixed.
They were patient, and as their provisions were beginning to give out,they scattered on either side the river, and organised great huntingexpeditions to renew their stock. But days had slipped away, and RedCedar did not return: a month had already passed, and no news or signarrived to tell the gambusinos that he would come soon. Anotherfortnight also passed, and produced no change in the position of thegold-seekers.
By degrees the band began to grow discouraged, and soon, without anyoneknowing how, the most sinister news circulated at first in a whisper,but then they acquired the almost certainty, that the squatter,surprised in an ambuscade by the redskins, had been massacred, and that,consequently, it was useless waiting for him any longer.
These rumours, to which Fray Ambrosio attached but slight importance atthe outset, became presently so strong that he grew anxious in his turn,and tried to dissipate them; but this was difficult, not to sayimpossible. Fray Ambrosio knew no more than the rest about Red Cedar'smovements; his fears were, at least, as great as those of his comrades;and whatever he might do, he was compelled to allow that he had no validreason to offer them, and was completely ignorant of the fate of theircommon chief.
One morning the gambusinos, instead of setting out to hunt as they diddaily, assembled tumultuously before the _jacal_, which served asheadquarters for the monk and the squatter's sons, and told them plainlythat they had waited long enough for Red Cedar: as he had given them nonews of his movements for upwards of two months, he must be dead: thatconsequently the expedition was a failure; and as they had noinclination to fall, some fine morning, into the power of their foes,the redskins, they were going to return at once to Santa Fe.
Fray Ambrosio in vain told them that, even supposing Red Cedar wasdead--which was not proved--although it was a misfortune, it did notcause the expedition to fail, as he alone held the secret of the placer,and promised to lead them to it. The gambusinos, who placed noconfidence in his talents as guide, or in his courage as a partisan,would not listen to anything; and, whatever he might do to check them,they mounted their horses, and rode off from the island, where heremained with the squatter's sons, Andres Garote, and five or six othermen still faithful to him. Fray Ambrosio saw them land, and spur theirhorses into the tall grass, where they speedily disappeared. The monkfell to the ground in despair; he saw his plans for a fortuneirredeemably ruined; plans which he had fostered so long, and which werecrushed at the very moment when they seemed on the point of realisation.
Any other man than Fray Ambrosio, after such a disaster, would haveyielded to despair; but he was gifted with one of those energeticnatures which difficulties arouse instead of crushing; and, in lieu ofrenouncing his schemes, he resolved, as Red Cedar did not return, to goin search of him, and leave the island at once. An hour later, thelittle party set out on its march.
By an extraordinary coincidence, they set out on the very day when theApaches started to attack the Comanche village; and as when accidentinterposes it does not do things by halves, it led them to the vicinityof the village at the moment when the desperate contest was going onwhich we have described in a previous chapter.
Their predacious instincts invited them to draw nearer the villageunder the protection of the darkness, in the hope of obtaining someIndian scalps, which were very valuable to them. It was then that thegambusinos heard Shaw's cry for help, to which they responded byhurrying up at full speed.
They rushed boldly into the medley, and saved the young man and theprecious burthen he still held enclasped; then, after cutting thethroats of several Indians, whom they conscientiously scalped, as theyconsidered it imprudent to venture further, they started off again asquickly as they had come, and reached a forest where they concealedthemselves, intending to ask Shaw, when he regained his senses, how hehappened to be at the entrance of this village, holding Dona Clara inhis arms, and fighting alone against a swarm of Indians.
The young man remained unconscious the whole day. Although the wounds hehad received were not dangerous, the great quantity of blood he hadlost, and the extraordinary efforts he had been obliged to make, plungedhim into such a state of prostration, that several hours still elapsedafter he had regained his senses before he seemed to have restoredsufficient order in his ideas to be able to give an account of theevents in which he had played so important a part.
It was, therefore, Fray Ambrosio's advice to grant time to recall histhoughts before beginning to cross-question him, and hence the affectedindifference of the gambusinos toward him, an indifference which heprofited by, to seek in his mind the means to part company with them,carrying off for the second time Dona Clara, who had so unhappily falleninto their hands again.