CHAPTER XIV
THE GRIZZLY AND THE INDIANS
For a moment Dorothy sat still in bed, afraid to move or cry out whilethe great animal at the window remained equally motionless. Then she wasable to shriek:
"Alf! Helena! Somebody--help--help! HELP!"
Alfy leapt from her little bed with an answering cry, frightened byDorothy's screech, and hurriedly demanding: "Why--why--what?" thenrubbed her eyes and stood transfixed with horror.
A moment later the whole house was in an uproar. The lads came runningfrom their rooms, yelling in sympathy with the cries of the girls, thedoctor rushed from his office-bedroom clad only in pajamas; the nurseforsook her sick bed--which she had not left before since first strickenwith a chest attack; Anita--Wun Sing--kitchen boy--all the householdgathered in the great corridor upon which the girls' rooms opened.
Such an uproar had never been heard at peaceful San Leon since itsfoundation stone was laid; and the sounds carrying clearly in that nightair, out from the Barracks rushed a horde of cowboys and workmen withCaptain Lem in lead.
"A bear!"
"The Grizzly! The Grizzly!"
A grizzly it was sure enough. All the feminine portion of the householdretreated to the empty chamber of Miss Milliken, slammed down its windowand locked themselves within; then from curiosity opened the door alittle way, to peek through the crack.
"Oh! Oh! It's coming this way--why doesn't somebody shoot it!" criedHelena, running back to look through the window panes.
The great animal had now dropped from its upright position at Dolly'swindow and was crawling on all fours back along the wide porch. Itcertainly was coming that way but--it couldn't get in!
"Could it? Can bears--open--open--things?" gasped Molly, retreating to awardrobe and hiding within it, whence she demanded in a torrent ofquestions information of all sorts concerning bears and why nobodykilled it before it killed them!
Oddly enough, nobody had interfered with the creature's movements thusfar, though some of the men had run back to the Barracks for firearms,and just then unlucky Wun Sing came round the corner of the building andmet it face to face. He had run at top speed in the opposite directionfrom that the beast seemed taking when he had first espied it, issuingfrom his room beyond the kitchen. Seeing it headed that way he hadinstinctively chosen the other, not reckoning that even bears can changeroutes.
Then the yell that rose belittled all which had gone before.
Grizzly uprose on his hind feet and rushed to meet poor Wunny, squeezinghim in a terrible embrace that checked the Chinaman's yell instantly.Until a touch of Bruin's teeth upon his thinly clad shoulder and a biteof sharp teeth awoke it again. A clutch of his queue from the great pawbrought forth greater shrieks and seemed to give the victim anextraordinary strength. By some means he wrenched himself free andescaped, the grizzly pursuing on all fours again--and both headed towardthe lake.
Whether Wun Sing's purpose was to throw himself within it he didn't knowhimself, but the road toward it was the clearest and offered his bestchance. Half way to the water his feet caught in his long night blouseand he tripped. Instantly the grizzly was upon him. The great furrycreature sprawled over the prostrate cook, growling and snapping histeeth but as yet inflicting no further injury, and the man underneath nolonger knowing anything, for his terrified senses had taken leave of hisquivering body.
Slowly the bear got upright again and, for a moment towered above hishelpless victim. Then seeming to have satisfied his rage in thatdirection, he resumed his natural position and moved back toward thehouse. He kept his great head well lowered, wagging it from side to sideand, altogether, conducting himself like a half-blind or greatlybewildered bear.
By this time the men from the Barracks had reappeared, well armed; butas the grizzly climbed upon the veranda floor again they hesitated tofire because the low windows opening upon it were full of peeping faces.Silent Pete, alone, dared approach the creature as near as the other endof the veranda. This man had been a mighty hunter in his youth, whenColorado was an almost unknown country with few settlers and big gameplentiful. His old blood had warmed to the conflict now, though he wassilent as ever and paid no heed to the warnings called to him by hisranch mates. Creeping stealthily forward toward the encounter he watchedhis grizzly enemy with exultation, his thought being:
"He's tough! He's an old one! His hide's thick--I must make no mistake.When I get nigh enough to hit him through the heart--wish he'd rise upagain--queerest actin' grizzly I ever met--likely my last one--soanxious to meet me he come a-visitin'--he, he, he! Ah! he'srisin'--I'll--"
Out on the electric lighted grounds the men were grouped with theirrifles, all anxious to fire and all eager to delay till the last moment,watching this wild beast so uncommonly near at hand. Why, from itsmovements it might almost have been a tame animal escaped from somemenagerie. Besides, the trophy belonged to Silent Pete. He was first andhardiest to face the brute and only if his famously sure shot failedwould they fire to the rescue. Yes, the bear was the old hunter'slegitimate prize--they'd wait, guns ready--
"Don't shoot! Oh! men, don't shoot! DON'T SHOOT!"
To the utter amazement of everyone, up flew Dorothy's window and out sheleaped, so close behind the creeping grizzly that she almost touchedhim: she was gesticulating wildly and her repeated cries of "Don'tshoot!" startled old Captain Lem almost to numbness.
What was that she was saying?
"He isn't a bear! I see his feet! Bears don't wear--SHOES!"
Alas! Her cry came too late. As bruin reared himself old Peter's shotrang out. An instant later, with such a cry as never issued from thethroat of any bear, he dropped to the veranda floor and lay theremotionless. The great bear hunt was over.
Five minutes later the grizzly rug was back on the floor of Leslie'sroom and the lad who had masqueraded in it to frighten a few girls,the over-zealous Mateo, lay on his own little bed with Doctor Jonesprobing for the bullet which had entered his shoulder.
Fortunately, it had not lodged there but passed straight through leavinga clean flesh wound which would promptly heal, the doctor said, but thatwould keep unhappy Mateo in bed for a few days. He had feigned sicknesswhen there was none, dreading to act the part he had just sounfortunately done. But the young master's will had been too strong andthe suggestion had been Mateo's own.
"The punishment, for once, has fallen upon the guilty person. You'llhave time to reflect, Mateo, that frightening timid people is scarcely amanly pastime. I trust there'll be no more skylarking till Mr. Ford ishome. You will be kept upon a rigid diet till I order otherwise, andgood night."
So said the doctor, leaving his patient to his own thoughts and assuringhimself that all the young folks had retired to their rooms again. Hehad administered no further reproofs--nor needed to do so. It was anexceedingly crest-fallen trio of lads who disappeared from view, whenonce the extent of Mateo's injury was learned, and a very quiet one.
But the excited girls were not so quiet. They had to talk it over,simply had to!
"I thought it was queer all the boys were in their day clothes," saidHelena, with her arm about Molly, who was still shaking with fright, nowand then, despite the fact that the affair was all over.
"I noticed, too, but I thought they'd just dressed awful quick. Butsuppose it _had_ been a real one--would it have eaten us up?" she beggedto know.
To which Alfy replied from her own room:
"No, Molly Breckenridge, don't be a goose. _We'd_ have eaten _him_up, course. We'd have had bear steak for breakfast--Some say it'sgood. Don't s'pose with all them men around they'd have let it livevery long? No, indeedy. But Matty did it real cute, after all, didn'the? Must ha' been terrible hot, trampin' around under all that skin.Well, we ought to go to sleep, but seems if I'd never catch anotherwink. I wonder what became of Wunny! Last I saw him he was lyin' flaton the ground--thinkin' he was et up, I guess. Dolly--My heart! DollyDoodles is asleep a'ready. Did you ever see such a sleepy head, Nell?"
There was no
answer from the room across the hall, so Alfy curled downamong her pillows and composed herself to sleep. But her mind wasn't atrest. She kept seeing, in her fancy, the prostrate figure of Wun Sing,and hoped some of the men from the Barracks had looked after him. Shefelt as if she must get up again and go to see for herself. But--out ofdoors at night didn't seem quite the same, even to this sensible girl,as it had done before the bear scare. Besides--something really was thematter with her eyes. They felt as if they were full of sand--she'd justshut them a minute to--
She was asleep at once. A body simply could not stay awake afterbedtime, in that Colorado air! And it was well she could not. Else, thewarm-hearted girl would have suffered fresh alarm.
It was a belated household which struggled out of heavy slumber the nextday, and as Dorothy lazily yawned and stretched her arms above her headit seemed as if all the exciting events of the night must be part of herdreams. Alfy woke, too, as reluctantly as her mate and just as Helenaappeared from her own room, looking a little heavy-eyed but fullydressed. She bade them good morning, but waited for no response beforeshe added:
"The house seems unusually still, and I don't smell coffee. I generallydo, the first thing. I sometimes think it's the odor of that wakes me. Iwonder if Wun Sing's fright and his worry about his poor hen has madehim ill! I'll go and see; and if the boys aren't up I'll call them."
The lads answered sleepily to Helena's summons, yet were not long inappearing on the porch, where the other girls promptly joined them. Asif by common consent nobody mentioned the escapade of the night, thoughit was in the minds of all and all were really longing to discuss it.The boys because they wished to "explain," and the girls thinking thatto treat the "joke" with silent contempt would be their severestpunishment. Nobody even mentioned unlucky Mateo, who had lent himself tothe furtherance of the affair, only to be the one to suffer most fromit.
"Hmm. Isn't it past breakfast time?" asked Monty, at last.
Herbert looked at his watch, and exclaimed:
"Ten minutes to nine! Who'd have believed it? Horses to be groomedbefore drill, and time up already. I wonder--But here's Nell. She'scoming from the kitchen and looks important. What's up, Sis?"
"Several things. First, the hen of Wun Sing lies dead in her coop."
"O-oh!" "Ah!" "Unwise, ambitious hen!" were the exclamations whichresponded; and Molly added:
"That isn't all. There's something worse on Helena's mind than the deathof a bewitched hen! Out with it, child! After--I mean--my nerves won'tstand any more."
"Didn't know you had nerves," laughed Alfy. "What's happened, Helena?"
"Wun Sing has disappeared."
"W-h-a-t?"
"It is true. He has gone, nobody knows where. There's a man from theBarracks, the one who does the cooking over there, getting breakfast.Captain Lem is flying around in a terrible state of mind. He's angrywith you boys, says there'll be neither drill nor rifle practice to-day,but the horses _must_ be groomed just as soon as we get our breakfasts.He's sent a half-dozen men looking for the cook, now, and they expect tofind him soon."
"So they did Jim! Seems if there wasn't anything doing on this ranch butjust getting lost," wailed Alfaretta, turning a little pale; while Mollynervously begged:
"Somebody tie me fast! Tie me fast! It'll break my father's heart if Iget lost, too!"
Captain Lem came up at that moment. He looked so stern and unlikehimself that the young folks were all of them awed by his manner. Evenlight hearted Monty slunk back, "shaking in his shoes," while Lesliedropped his eyes and lost all his bravado.
"Hark to me, Squad! Every mortal son an' gal of ye! I'm riled--I'm mad.Here am I left in charge, so to speak, of your doin's, and of the workon the ranch, anyways. Your smart-aleck work has turned everythingtopsy-turvy. Men took from their reg'lar jobs to go hunt worthlessChinamen, and take his place a-cookin'. Hens dyin' to right an'left--pizened by some your doses, likely--"
"Oh, no! Captain, I'm sure nobody would do such a cruel thing as poisonhelpless creatures!" protested Dorothy, running to clasp his hand.
He had on his "specs," which they had already learned he used mostlywhen he was angry, and they were very glittering just then. But Dorothywould not be put aside. She clung to him till his mood softened andremoving the menacing "specs," dropped them in his blouse pocket. Thenhe smiled upon her, rather shamefacedly, though he felt that he stillhad good cause for offence.
"Well, Little One, you've got ways to win a feller, 'spite of himself.If they was all as good as you--"
"Oh! they are, and even lots better! 'Twas just lads' foolishness thatthey mistook for smartness. And they, we, all of us will do all we canto help. Where can we look for Wunny? He's the first one to be thoughtof. And I'm sorry he was so scared. Also, he'll be sorry himself overthe poor hen. What can I do?"
"Go along an' eat what breakfast you can get. Then tend to your horses.Likely, they're hungrier 'n you are and I'll go see 't they're fed. Buthear me! Not another mite o' foolin' with serious things till Dan Fordgets back an' takes the reins into his own hands. 'Twas the mercy ofProvidence--nothin' else--that that jabberin' shallow-pate Mateo wasn'tkilled plumb out. Silent Pete's used to grizzlies. He's used to_killin'_ 'em. It's his trade, a deal more 'n 'tis to tend horseflesh. Iwouldn't like to stand as nigh hand to his gun as that Greaser did lastnight. Now, hurry up and eat. Then report for duty. I'm off to mine."
"Where do you suppose Wun Sing is?" asked Helena, of anybody who choseto answer.
Nobody did: it may be stated right here that he was never again seen atSan Leon. The "bewitched dead fowl" was duly buried in her owncourtyard, the little gate to this locked, and its key hung up in thecook's wall-cupboard. But Wun Sing came no more. Everything belonging tohim was left as if he meant to return at any minute, but he did notcome.
They searched the pebbly bottom of the lake, thinking he might havedrowned himself in his superstitious fear, but he was not there: andafter days had been wasted in the fruitless search, Captain Lem had hisbelongings packed together and sent to his relative, Der Doo, in SanDiego. Whence, at the very end of the summer word came back that he hadreappeared in that city, a wreck of himself, but it was hoped that withtime and good Chinese cooking he would recover his scattered wits andhis own culinary skill.
Meanwhile, many messages came from the travellers in the east. Theexpected old aunt had duly arrived but in no fit condition to travelfurther for the present. Gray Lady sent dearest love and hoped all herbig, new family would find San Leon the happiest place in the world,and the most peaceful. She had lived long enough to understand thatpeace and harmony were the most precious things in life. She longed tobe with them and would be as soon as it was right. Meanwhile, let all bepatient as possible over her enforced absence and just feel that she waswith them in spirit all the time.
"Odd, isn't it? That she who so longed to have this home and so enjoyedit should have to leave it to us, a lot of strange youngsters, to useinstead?" said Helena, one evening some time later, as they all hadgathered about the fountain in the soft sunset light, to talk overhappenings and plan things for the coming day.
Since the escapade of the false bear hunt there had been a notableabsence of pranks. An ominous peace had settled over the whole youngcompany, remarked by the astute Captain Lem as the "'ca'm before astorm.' 'Tain't in natur' for 'em to be so demure an' tractable. Nosiree. They've 'tended to their groomin' like reg'lar saints, an'they've learned to drill amazin' well. They don't shoot none to hurt,yet, 'ceptin' that Leslie himself. Sence he's waked up an' took aninterest he's done fine. He's the best o' the lot and his knowin' thatis what inspires him to do better yet. That, an' hopin' to please theBoss. But--I hope the storm'll blow over--the one they're brewin'. And Iwonder what in creation ever did become o' that first boy, or ofWunny."
For as yet no news had come of the latter and the former had almostdropped out of thought--save now and then in Alfy's, and always infaithful Dorothy's.
Now that they were better riders and had bec
ome what their teachercalled "pals" with their horses, they were daily given larger liberty.In company with him, and sometimes without him, they rode long distancesover the roads, the narrow trails, and the almost imperceptible pathswhich led over the mountains and through the forests.
The wild flowers of Colorado are innumerable, almost, and most of themwere new to Dorothy, the flower-lover. In search of these she wastireless and many hours were spent after her return from her rides, inpressing her "specimens" and preparing herbariums. In this delightfulwork she had the company and help of Dr. Jones, himself a well-read andenthusiastic botanist.
Helena spent hours over her journal: "taking notes" for future literarylabors. Alfy and Molly were content to do nothing save be happy. As Alfyexpressed it:
"I never was so lazy and I likely never will have a chance to be again.I can work when I have to and I can play just as hard."
The lads fished, rode, hunted small game, and tried various feats ofhorsemanship, lariat casting, and even--when they were especiallyenergetic, played ball. There was a fairly good team among the ranchmenand they entered into the sport with vim. Only Leslie found the exercisetoo violent and was content to lounge and watch the rest.
This evening, sitting together so cosily, the peace of the beautifulscene gradually soothed them all to quiet. They had settled the plansfor the morrow and were as happy as such care-free children could be.Helena picked up her guitar and played soft melodies upon it, the othershumming them under their breaths--not to disturb the player, only Alfypresuming to fit real words to the music but not interfering with it.
Suddenly Dorothy raised her eyes from the playing fountain, on which shehad been dreamily gazing and thinking of lost Jim. A sound, faint, ofhorses' footfalls had entered her dream. With a silent gesture of alarmshe sprang to her feet, staring with wide eyes at a company of Indiansascending the hill. They avoided the hard driveway, their horsestreading with velvety softness upon the shaven lawn. They were many innumber, twenty perhaps, and they were in gala dress. Head-dresses ofeagles' feathers, gaily colored, hung from their crowns over the sidesof their mounts, to the length of a man's height. They uttered nosounds, looked neither to the right nor left, but like a dreadful,phantom procession moved straight forward toward the fountain.