Hammond Times, Volume 2, Number 139, Hammond, Lake County, 29 November 1907 — Page 3

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Friday, Nov. 2D, 1907. THE LAKE COUNTY TIMES

PSw

Sj ELEAJVOH GATES, Author of "The Biography of a Prairie Girl."

1 Continued.) He nodded again. She had never heard a scoffing white declare that the red man is above all u beggar, bo fche did not delay answering his mute petition. She stooped to examine again the cuts and bruises on his feet. Then, "Wait till I come back," she bade him, and his vigorous nod assured her that he understood what she said. She hurried away to the shack. She tarried only long enough to tell her father of the straggler and to hear his objections at her "fussin " with a "no 'count Injun." Returning, she found her charge patiently waiting for her. As she came up he was facing the ford, where, amid cursing, shouting and trumpet blares, some troopers were trying to induce the balky ambulance mules to go aboard the boat. Rut tv-hen she handed him a crockery plate heaped with boiled potatoes, cold meat and pancakes and a piece of suet wound In a soft white cloth he became indifferent to the lively doings at the landing and began to eat as If famished. He made such rapid headway that

before Dallas realized it the food was gone, the plate scraped clean and thi suet direly threatened. He gave her a puzzled look as she put forth a hand objectingly. "No, no," she said, and while shi tore the soft cloth into strips she put the fat out of reach by slipping it into a skirt pocket. The bandages ready, she knelt before him and tenderly swathed hi wounds. "There," she said as she finished, "now you'd better hurry. The soldiers are almost over, and you'll be too late to get across dry." He scrambled up, but, ignoring her advice, put one hand through a rent in his squaw's waist and began to search for something. Tresently he brought forth a package done up In dirty muslin and slowly unfastened it. A folded paper as soiled as its wrapper fell out. It was worn through much handling and covered with penciled words. He handed it to Dallas. At first she could not decipher it, but after studying It carefully and placing together several detached bits

she was able to make it out. It was written scrawllngly and in a trembling

hand. The bearer of this it read, the good chief Red Moon, I commend to the pentleness and mercy of every God fearing man and woman. Once, out of the weakness of the flesh, he wept under the tortures of a sun dance. Since then he haa been abused, starved and spat upon. Yet, hearing from me or Christ, his suffering and his command to forgive, he has put down his desire to revenge his wrongs in blood and gees on his way, laboring and enduring In silence. May God be gracious to whomsoever aids this least one among us. , Here the letter ended, but underneath were the signature, so fingered, however, that Dallas could spell out only the word "David," and a blurred postscript, which said: I have christened him Charles and taujrht him English, but since his punishment he has never The remainder of the paper was illegible. When Dallas gave It back to the Indian he wrapped it up carefully and returned it to his bosom; then he gathered up the scattered chips, lifted his double load to his shoulders, drew his somler blanket close about him and shambled slowly away. "Poor thing!" said Dallas, In compassion. II stopped to look back. "Goodby," she said as he went on "goodby." When he reached the river bank he turned again. The frost blighted cottonwoods that bordered the Missouri were behind him, gleaming as yellowly as if during the short, hot summer their leafy branches had caught and imprisoned all the sunshine. Against that belt of brilliant color stood out his ppare. burdened frame. Watching, she saw his gaunt face slowly relax in a friendly grin.

CHAPTER IV. NOW fell on the very heels of the cavalry. Scarcely w re the Indians safe in the stockade and the troopers once

more in barracks when some lirst flakes, like down plucked by the wind from the breasts of the southward hastening wild fowl, came floating out of the sky. Soon the long sumac leaves on the coulee edge were drooping under a crystalline weight, the black plowed strip was blending with the unplowed prairie, and the shock head of the Cottonwood shack was donning a spotless nightcap, and so heavy and ceaseless was the downfall that at supper time the sweet trumpet notes of retreat" were wafted out from Uranium across a covered plain. When morning dawned the heavens were cloudless, and the laggard sun as it rose shone with blinding glory upon peaceful miles. Nowhere was a sign of wallow, path or road, and the coulee yawned, white lipped. Even the Missouri was not unchanged, for away to the northwest there had been a mighty rainstorm, and the murky river tumbled by in waves that were angry and swollen. Since his early boyhood the section boss had not known snow. Before the previous day Dallas and Marylyn had never seen it. It was with exclamations of delight, therefore, that, crowding together in the doorway, the three first caught sight of the glistening drifts. 'Ta, it's like a Christmas card'" cried the younger girl, and, bareheaded, she ran out to frolic before the shack. To Dallas the scene had a deeper meaning. Here was what would discourage and block any one who had put off necessary Improvements! And

this would last long after the expiration of that sis months! "I guess there'll be no building or plowing now." she said to her father happily. He, fully as relieved, returned a confident assent. A little later old Michael, the ferryman, drove by, breaking a track along

the blotted road. His ancient corduroys, known to every river man from Bismarck to Baton Rouge, were hidden leneath layers of overcoats. Through the wool cap, pulled down to his collar, two wide holes gave him outlook; a third alsmaller aperture was filled by the stem of a corncob pipe. He was headed for the cattle camp, the lines over a four-in-hand hitched to three empty wagons, a third team tied to the tailboard of the hindmost box'. On the arrival of the saloon gang the pilot had left his steamboat in the hands of his two helpers and made his way to Slianty Town. There in a shingle hut, perched atop a wtiisny cask and kicking its rotund le.ly complacently with his heels, he had wet a throat, long dry, from the amber depths beneath him. With each succeeding glass his obligations had grown apace. Nevertheless, for a lifetime of rough service had brought about an immunity that belied his Celtic blood, his brain remained clear, his step steady and his eye uubleared. Thus it happened that when, cut off from grazing, it was necessary for the Shanty Town teams to be returned at once to Clark's old Michael was on hand and in condition to take them and by so doing wipe out his drinking account. As he came opposite the shack Marylyn was still running about in the snow, while Dallas was sweeping out some long, narrow drifts that had sifted in through window and door

cracks. Squinting across at them, he recalled all at once a heated conversation that had taken place at Shanty Town the afternoon of the southward departure of a Dodge City courier. And he shook his head sorrowfully. "Ye'll have yer ban's fule before long," he advised aloud, "or it's me that's not good at guessin'." And, lift-

talked for a half hour, the one relating his story, the other putting la quick questions. At the end of their conversation Lounsbury held out h'.3 hand. ;lf their letter brings him, Mike, ho said, "don"t you fail to let me know." "Aye, aye," promised the pilot ear

nestly.

ing the front of his cap, he sympathet- j Tfcev partoJ OM Miohacl continued ically blew the purple bump that his wav witb nn easv Khi, but Ii0uns. served him for a nose till it rang j bury troub!,a instead of carrvthrough the crisp air like a throaty j as nn hls firmr vUir ,.,-,

bugle. Farther on as he sat pondering deeply and letting the leaders choose their course a horseman came cantering toward him and drew rein beside his wheel. It was Louusbury, buried to the ears in a buffalo coat. "Sure, it's somethin' important, John,

to the little family on the bead be ! must now be the bearer of evil. And when, having stalled his hore i with Ben and Betty, he entered tho j Cottonwood shack his heart smote L5ni i still more, for secretly he had hoped ' that he was to tell them what they al

ready knew, but it seemed preeisely

that's a-bringin' ye out t'day," cried j the reverse. There was nothing In tho

old Michael roguishly, his brogue dis

closing his identity. "It's ayther tiilegrams or 1-a-a-ydies." The storekeeper colored under his visor. "It's uayther," he mocked laughingly. "None o yer shillyshallln'," warned the ferryman, giving the other a playful whack with his gad. "Oi kin rade ye loike a buke." "You can't read a book," declared Louusbury. "But I'll tell you. I'm going to the Lancasters'." Old Michael nodded, with a sly wink through the portholes of his mask. "Ol knowed It!" he said. Then, after fishing out a tobacco bag from under his many coats and lighting the corncob in the protecting bowl of his palms, "In that case, man, Ol got somethin' t' say t ye." He leaned over the wheel confidentially, and Lounsbury bent toward him, so that the smoke of the pipe fed the storekeeper's nostrils. They

appearance and actions of the Lancasters that suggested anxiety. The tectum boss, thotiiui his manner was not without a certain reserve (as if he half believed something whs about to be wormed out of hiiu. greeted Lounsbury good natureUIy enough. Marylyn hurried up in a timid flutter to take hU cap and coat, while facing him from the hearthside, her hair colled upon her head like a crown, her gray eyes bright, her cheeks glow lug. was a new Dallas. "Well, how've yo all been?" asked Lounsbury, accepting a bench. "Oh, spright 'nough." answered the section boss, "but it's cold; it's cold. Keeps me tremblin' like a guilty nigger." "You'll get over that." assured thm other, rubbing the blood into his hands. "It's natural for you to be soft as chalk rock the first winter, l'ou've been lit ing south." (To be Continued.)

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