"Bring Me His Ears"

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[Illustration: Tom pushed on ahead to reconnoiter the Upper Spring

[_Page 262_]]

"Bring Me His Ears"

By CLARENCE E. MULFORD

Author Of

"Bar 20," "Bar 20 Days," "Bar 20-Three," "Buck Peters, Ranchman," "The Coming of Cassidy," "Hopalong Cassidy," "Johnny Nelson," "The Man from Bar 20," "Tex," etc.

A.L. Burt Company

Publishers New York

Published by arrangement with A.C. McClurg & Co.

Printed in U.S.A.

Copyright A.C. McClurg & Co. 1922

Published October, 1922

_Copyrighted in Great Britain_

_Printed in the United States of America_

"Bring Me His Ears"

Chapter I

Hawkens' Gun Store

The tall, lanky Missourian leaning against the corner of a ramshackle saloon on Locust Street, St. Louis, Missouri--the St. Louis of the early forties--turned his whiskey-marked face toward his companion, a short and slender Mexican trader, sullenly listening to the latter's torrent of words, which was accompanied by many and excitable gesticulations. The Missourian shook his head in reply to the accusations of his companion.

"But he was on thee boat weeth us!" exclaimed the other. "An' you lose heem--lak theese!" the sharp snap of his fingers denoted magic.

"Thar ain't no use o' gittin' riled," replied Schoolcraft. "How in tarnation kin a man keep th' trail o' a slippery critter like him in these yere crowds? I'll git sight o' him, right yere."

"That ees w'at you say," rejoined the Mexican, shrugging his shoulders. "But w'at weel _I_ say to _le Gobernador_? Theese _hombre_ Tomaz Boyd--he know vera many t'eengs--too vera many t'eengs--an' he ensult _le Gobernador_. _Madre de Dios_--sooch ensult!" He shivered at the thought. "W'en I get thee message, I tr-remble! It say 'Br-ring heem to me--or breeng me his ears!' I am tol' to go to Senor Schoolcr-raft at Eendependence--he ees thee man. I go; an' then you lose heem! Bah! You do not know theese Manuel Armijo, _le Gobernador de Santa Fe_, my fren'--I tr-remble!"

"You need a good swig, that's what _you_ need," growled Schoolcraft. "An' if ye warn't a chuckle-head," he said with a flash of anger, "we wouldn't 'a' come yere at all; I told ye he's got th' prairie fever an' shore would come back to Independence, whar I got friends; but no--we had ter foller him!" He spat emphatically. "Thar warn't no sense to it, nohow!"

The other waved his arms. "But w'y we stan' here, lak theese? W'y you do no'teeng?"

"Now you look a-here, Pedro," growled the Missourian, his sullen gaze passing up and down the slender Mexican. "Ye don't want ter use no spurs on _this_ critter. I ain't no greaser! If ye'll hold them arms still fer a minute I'll tell ye somethin'. Thar's three ways o' gittin' a deer: one is trailin'--which we've found ain't no good; another is layin' low near a runway--which is _yer_ job; th' third is watchin' th' salt lick--which is _my_ job. You go down ter th' levee, git cached among them piles o' freight an' keep a lookout on th' landin' stage o' th' _Belle_. I'll stick right yere on this corner an' watch th' lick, which is Hawkens' gun store. He lost his pistol overboard, comin' down th' river, didn't he? An' th' _Belle_ ain't sailin' till arter ten o'clock, is she? One o' us is bound ter git sight o' him, fer he'll shore go back by th' river; an' if thar's any place in this town whar a plainsman'll go, it's that gun store, down th' street. You do what I say, or you an' Armijo kin go plumb ter hell! An' don't ye wave yer fists under my nose no more, Pedro; I might misunderstand ye."

The Mexican's face brightened. "Eet ees good, vera good, Senor Schoolcraft. Hah! You have thee br-rains, my fren'. Armijo, he say: 'Pedro, get heem to Santa Fe, if you can. If you can't, then keel heem, an' breeng me hees ears.' _Bueno!_ I go, senor. I go _pronto_. _Buena dia!_"

"Then git," growled Schoolcraft. "Thar's that long-faced clerk o' Hawkens' openin' th' shop. Now remember: this side o' th' junction o' th' Oregon trail I'm only ter watch him. If he goes southwest from th' junction, yer job begins; if he heads up fer th' Platte, my job starts. I ain't got no love fer him, but I'm hopin' he heads fer Oregon an' gets killed quick! I hate ter think o' a white man in Armijo's paws. An' if he hangs 'round th' settlements, we toss up fer th' job. If that's right, _vamoose_."

"Eet ees r-right to thee vera letter," whispered the Mexican, rubbing his hands. "Eef only I can get heem to Santa Fe--ah, my fren'!"

"Yer wuss nor a weasel," grunted the Missourian, slight prickles playing up and down his spine. "Better git down to them freight piles!"

Schoolcraft watched his scurrying friend until he slipped around a corner and was lost to sight; then he turned and looked up the street at the gun shop of Jake and Samuel Hawken, whose weapons were renowned all over that far-stretching western wilderness. Shrugging his shoulders, he glanced in disgust at the heavy, patented repeating rifle in his hand and, letting his personal affairs take precedence over those of the distant Mexican tyrant, he swung down the street, crossed it, and entered the famous gun shop. He risked nothing by the move, for the store was the Mecca of frontiersmen, and a trip to St. Louis was hardly complete without a visit to the shop.

The Hawkens were established, so much so that they were to be singled out by one of the famous Colt family with a partnership proposition. The fame of their rifles had rolled westward to the Rockies and beyond. They were to be found across the Canadian and Mexican boundaries and wherever hunters and trappers congregated, who scorned the Northwest fusil as fit only for trading purposes, laughed in their sleeves at the preposterous length and general inefficiency of the Hudson Bay muskets, and contentedly patted the stocks of their Hawkens'. There is a tradition that the length of the Hudson Bay muskets, which often rose over the head of a tall man while the butt rested on the ground, was due to the fact that the ignorant Indians could obtain a white man's gun only by stacking up beaver skins until the pile was as high as the musket. Even worse than the flintlock trade guns were the _escopetas_ of the south, matchlocks of prodigious bore and no accuracy or power, which were used by many of the Mexicans. That swarthy-skinned race which suffered under the tyranny of Armijo seemed to believe that anything which used powder was a weapon. The rank and file of the Mexicans were courageous and usually fought bravely until deserted by their officers, or until they were fully convinced that the miscellaneous junk with which they were armed was worse than useless. It can hardly be expected that men shooting pebbles, nails, and what-not out of nearly useless blunderbusses; or using bows, arrows, and lances will stand up very long against straight-shooting troops armed with the best rifles; add to this the great difference in morale, and the ever-present distrust of the officers, and a fair and honest understanding may be arrived at.

Hawkens' clerk took down one of the great rifles to go over it with an oiled rag, which was another example of painting the lily. The weapon was stocked to the muzzle and shot a bullet weighing thirty-two to the pound, each thus being an honest half-ounce of lead. It was brass mounted and had a poorly done engraving of a buffalo on the trap in its stock. He turned to replace it and take down another when the sound of the opening door made him pause and face the incoming customer.

The newcomer was neither hunter nor trapper, gambler nor merchant, to judge from his nondescript and mixed attire. His left hand had an ugly welt running across the base of the palm and it had not been healed long enough to have lost its distinctive color. In his right hand he carried a rifle which was new to that part of the country, and he slid it onto the counter.

"Swap ye," he gruffly said, stepping back and leering at the clerk. "Too ak'ard fer me. Can't git used ter it, nohow. I like a stock with a big drop--this un makes me hump my head down like a bull buffaler. That's th' wuss o' havin' a long neck."

The clerk glanced at the repeating Colt and then at the injured hand. The faintest possible suggestion of a knowing smile flitted across his face, and he shook his head.

"Those are too dangerous," he replied. "We don't handle them."

"W'y, that's a fine rifle!" growled the customer, a heavy frown settling on his coarse face. "Six shots, with them newfangled caps, without re-loadin'. She's a plumb fine weapon!"

"Looks good," laughed the clerk; "but we don't care to handle them."

"They've sorta put yer nose outer j'int, ain't they?" sneered the customer. "Wall, ye kin bet yer peltries I wouldn't be givin' ye th' chanct to handle _this_ un," he angrily declared, "if it had a bigger drop an' warn't so ak'ard fer a man like me. Ye can't find a rifle in yer danged store as kin hold a candle ter it. I bet ye ain't never seen one afore!"

"It's our business to keep informed," responded the clerk, still smiling. "We heard all about that rifle as soon as it was patented."

"But ye allus could sell a gun like this un," persisted the scowling owner. "Ye must have a hull passel o' tenderfeet a-comin' in yere."

The clerk frowned and his voice became slightly edged. "The reputation of Hawkens' is a valuable asset. It was acquired in two ways: honest goods and fair dealing. Most tenderfeet ask us for a gun that we can recommend; we cannot recommend that rifle. Do you care to look at one that will not shoot through the palm of your extended hand after it gets hot from rapid shooting?"

"I got ye thar, pardner!" retorted the customer. "I done that with a poker. Ye don't seem anxious ter do no business."

"Our stock and my time are at your disposal," replied the clerk; "but we cannot take that Colt in part payment."

"Wall, ye don't have ter: I know a man as will; an' he ain't all swelled up, neither. You an' yer rifles kin go ter h--l together!" He jerked the Colt from the counter and stamped out, cursing at every step, and slammed the door behind him so hard that it shook the shop. Thoroughly angered, he strode down the street and had gone a block before he remembered that he was to keep watch on the shop. Cursing anew, he wheeled and went back on the other side of the street and stopped at the corner of a ramshackle saloon.

The clerk was taking down another rifle when the door opened again and he wheeled aggressively, but his frown was swiftly wiped out by a smile.

The newcomer was somewhere in the twenties, stood six feet two in his moccasins, and had the broad, sloping shoulders that tell of great strength. He was narrow waisted and sinewy and walked with a step light and springy. Dressed in buckskin from the soles of his feet to the top of his head, he had around his waist a broad belt, from which hung powder horn, bullet pouch, a container for caps, a buckskin bag for spare patches, a bullet mold, and a heavy, honest skinning knife. Slung from a strap over one shoulder hung his "possible" bag, containing various small articles necessary to his calling. In his hand was a double-barreled rifle which he seemed to be excited about.

"Mr. Jarvis!" he exclaimed, offering the weapon for inspection. "Tell me what you think of this?"

The clerk chuckled and his eyes lighted with pleasure. "I've seen it, or its twin, before. English, fine sights, shooting about thirty-six balls to the pound. They're pointed, aren't they? Ah-ha! I thought so." He took the gun and examined it carefully. "Just what I've been trying to tell Mr. Jacob Hawken. Look at those nipples: large diameter across the threaded end, making it much easier to worry out wet powder by removing them and working with a bent wire from that end. We have to work at the ball with a screw, and that is no easy task after the patch paper becomes swollen. With this rifle you can replace the wet powder with dry and fire the ball out in much less time. Where did you get it, Mr. Boyd?"

The plainsman laughed exultingly. "Won it on the boat coming down, from an English sportsman who was returning home. He said it was a fine weapon, and I thought so; but I wanted your opinion."

"Take it out on the Grand Prairie and try it out. From what I can see here it is a remarkably fine rifle; but handsome is, you know."

"I've tried it out already," laughed the other. "It's the best rifle in this country, always excepting, of course, the Hawken!"

"As long as you put it that way I shall have to agree with you. Did you see the man who left a few moments before you came in?"

Boyd nodded shortly. "Yes; but I don't care to discuss him beyond warning you to look out for him. He deals in draft animals in Independence, has the name of being slippery, and is known as Ephriam Schoolcraft. However, I'm not an unprejudiced critic, for there is not the best of feelings between us, due to an unprincipled trick he tried to play on my partner." His face clouded for a moment. His partner had joined the ill-fated Texan Santa Fe Expedition and had lost his life at the hands of one of Armijo's brutal officers, for whom Tom Boyd had an abiding hatred. On his last visit to Santa Fe he had shown it so actively that only his wits and forthright courage had let him get out of the city with his life. "Well, to change the subject, I lost my pistol in the river, and I've heard a great deal about a revolving Colt pistol from some Texans I met. It shoots six times without re-loading and is fitted for caps. Got one?"

"Two," chuckled Jarvis. "A large bore and a smaller. They are fine weapons, but never rest the barrel on your other hand when you shoot."

"I'll remember that. Which size would you recommend for me?"

"The larger, by all means. We are expecting a shipment by express down the Ohio and it should reach us almost any day now. It took the Texans to prove their worth and give them their reputation."

"Fit it with caps, mold and whatever it needs. I need caps and powder for the rifle, too. First quality Kentucky, or Dupont, of course."

The purchase completed Jarvis watched his friend and customer distribute them over his person and then asked a question.

"Where to now, Mr. Boyd?"

"Independence and westward," answered the other. "Spring is upon us, the prairie grass is getting longer all the time, and Independence is as busy and crowded as an ant hill. All kinds of people are coming in by train and river, bound for the trade to Santa Fe and Chihuahua, and for far away Oregon." His eyes shone with enthusiasm. "The homesteaders interest me the most, for it is to them that we will owe our western empire. The trappers, hunters, and traders have prepared the way, but they are only a passing phase. The first two will vanish and in their places the homesteaders will take root and multiply. Think of it, Mr. Jarvis, now our frontiers are only halfway across the continent; what an empire that will some day become!"

Jarvis nodded thoughtfully and looked up. "What does your father say to all this, especially after the news last fall about your narrow escape in Santa Fe?"

Boyd shrugged his shoulders. "Father set his heart on me becoming his junior partner, and to passing his work over to me when he was ready to retire. Two generations of surgeons, is his boast; and in me he hoped to make it three. Against that, the West needs men! Those Oregon-bound wagons bring tears to my eyes. They have cast my die for me. I am on my way to Fort Bridger and Fort Hall and the valley of the Columbia, to lend my strength and little knowledge of the open to those who need it most."

Jarvis nodded his head in sympathy, for he had heard many speak nearly the same thoughts; indeed, at times, the yearning to leave behind him the dim old shop and the noisy, bustling city beset him strongly, despite his years of a life unfitting him for the hardships of the prairies and mountains. Being able to read Greek and Latin was no asset on the open trail; although schoolmasters would be needed in that new country.

"I know how you feel, Mr. Boyd. Have you seen your father since you landed?"

Tom reluctantly shook his head. "It would only reopen the old bitterness and lead to further estrangement. No man shall ever speak to me again as he did--not even him. If you should see him, Jarvis, tell him I asked you to assure him of my affection."

"I shall be glad to do that," replied the clerk. "You missed him by only two days. He asked for you and wished you success, and said your home was open to you when you returned to resume your studies. I think, in his heart, he is proud of you, but too stubborn to admit it." As he spoke he chanced to glance through the window of the store. "Don't look around," he warned. "I want to tell you that Schoolcraft and a Mexican just passed the shop, peered in at you with more than passing interest and went on. I suppose it's nothing, though."

"It's enough to make me keep my eyes open," replied Tom, sighting his new rifle at the great clock on the wall, which seemed to move a little faster under the threat. "I thought they were watching me on the boat. Armijo's vindictive enough to go to almost any length. He isn't accustomed to having his beast face slapped."

Jarvis' jaw dropped in sheer amazement. "You mean--do I understand--eh, you mean--you slapped _his_ face?"

"So hard that it hurt my hand; I'll wager his teeth are loose," replied Tom, his interest on his new weapon.

"Er--slapped _Governor_ Armijo's face?" persisted Jarvis from the momentum of his amazement.

"The Governor of the Department of New Mexico," replied the hunter.

Jarvis drew a sleeve across his forehead and carefully felt for the high stool behind him. Automatically climbing upon it he seated himself with great care and then, remembering that his customer was standing, slid off it apologetically. He was gazing at his companion as though he were some strange, curious animal.

"Eh--would you mind telling me _why_?" he asked.

"He offended me; and if I'd known then what I found out later I would have broken every bone in his pompous carcass and thrown him to the dogs!" His face had reddened a little and the veins on his forehead were beginning to stand out.

Jarvis examined the clock with almost hypnotic interest. "And how did he offend you, Mr. Boyd, if I may inquire?"

"Oh, the beast came swaggering along the street, followed at a respectful distance by a crowd of his boot-lickers, and pushed me out of his way. I asked him who in hell he thought he was, in choice Spanish, and the conceited turkey-gobbler reached for his saber. The more I see of this gun, Jarvis, the more I like it."

"Yes, indeed; and then what, Mr. Boyd?"

"Huh?"

"He reached for his saber--and then?"

"Oh," laughed Tom. "I helped him draw it, and broke it across his own knee. He called me a choice name and I slapped his face. You should have seen the boot-lickers! Before they could get their senses back and make up their minds about rushing my pistol I had slipped through a store, out of the back and into a place I know well, where I waited till dark. I understand there was quite a lot of excitement for a day or so."

"I dare say--I dare say there might have been," admitted Jarvis. "In fact, I am sure there would be. _Damn it_, Tom, would you mind shaking hands with me?"

Chapter II

Aboard The _Missouri Belle_

Tom wended his way to the levee and as he passed the last line of buildings and faced the great slope leading to the water's edge his eyes kindled. Two graceful stern-wheel packets were moving on the river, the smaller close to the nearer bank on her way home from the treacherous Missouri; the larger, curving well over toward the Illinois shore, was heading downstream for New Orleans. Their graceful lines, open bow decks with the great derricks supporting the huge landing stages, and the thick, powerful masts on each edge of the lower deck toward the bow, each holding up the great spar so necessary for Mississippi river navigation; the tall stacks with the initials of the boat against a lattice work between; the regular spacing of windows and doors in the cabins, and the clean white of their hulls and superstructure, rendered more vivid by contrast with the tawny flood on all sides of them, made a striking and picturesque sight. Each had a curving tail of boiling brown water behind, and a bone in its teeth. These river boats were modeled on trim and beautiful lines and were far from being crude, frontier makeshifts.

Several Mackinaw boats moved anglingly across the current from the other shore, and a keelboat glided down the river for New Orleans, or to turn up the Ohio for Pittsburg, helped in the current by a dirty, square sail. The little twin-hulled ferry was just coming in from the Illinois shore, its catamaran construction giving it a safety which a casual observation would have withheld. The passengers clung to its rails as it pitched and bobbed in the rolling wake of the south-bound packet, a wake dreaded by all small craft unfortunate enough to pass the slapping paddle at too close a distance, for the following billows were high, sharp, and close together.

On the great levee wagons and carts rattled and rumbled; drivers shouted and swore as they picked their impatient and erratic way through the traffic; lazy negroes, momentarily spurred into energetic activity, moved all kinds of merchandise between the boats and the great piles on the sloping river bank, two long lines of them passing each other on the bridging gangplanks reaching far ashore. Opposed to this scene of labor and turmoil was a canoe well offshore, whose two occupants, drifting with the current, lazily fished for the great channel catfish which the negro population loved so much.

On a packet, which we will call the _Missouri Belle_, a whistle blew sharply and as the sound died away several groups of passengers hurried across the levee, scurrying about like panicky bugs when a log is rolled over, darting this way and that amid the careless bustle of the traffic, as eager to reach a place of safety as are chickens affrighted by the shadow of a drifting hawk. The crowd was cosmopolitan enough to suit the most exacting critic. Freighters, merchants, hunters, trappers, and Indians returning to the upper trading posts or to their own country; gamblers; a frock-coated minister who suspiciously regarded every box and barrel and bale that he saw rolled up the freight gangplank, and who was a person of great interest to many pairs of eyes on and off the boat; a priest; a voluble, chattering group of _coureurs des bois_; a small crowd of soldiers going up to Fort Leavenworth; emigrants, boatmen, and travelers made up the hurrying procession or stood at the rails and watched the confusion on the levee.

Tom joined the animated stream, swinging in behind an elderly gentleman who escorted a young lady of unflurried demeanor through the maelstrom of wagons, carts, mules, horses, passengers, and heavily laden negroes. Caught in a jam and forced to make a quick decision and to follow it instantly, the young lady dropped her glove in picking up her skirts and a nervous horse was about to stamp it into the dirt and dust when Tom leaped forward. Grasping the bridle with one hand, he bent swiftly and reached for the glove with the other. As he was about to grasp it, a man dressed in nondescript clothes left his Mexican companion and bent forward on the other side of the horse, his lean, brown fingers eagerly outstretched.

Tom's surprise at this unexpected interference acted galvanically and his hand, turning up from the glove, grasped the thrusting fingers of the other in a grip which not only was powerful but doubly effective by its unexpectedness. He swiftly straightened the wrist and forearm of his rival into perfect alignment with the rest of the arm and then, with a sudden dropping of his own elbow, he turned the other's arm throwing all his strength and weight into the motion. The result was ludicrous. The rival, bent forward, his other hand on the ground, had to give way in a hurry or have his arm dislocated. His right foot arose swiftly into the air and described a short arc as his whole body followed it; and quicker than it takes to tell it he was bridged much the same as a wrestler, his arched back to the ground. Tom grinned sardonically and with a swift jerk yanked his adversary off his balance, and as the other sprawled grotesquely in the dust, the victor of the little tilt picked up the glove, leaped nimbly aside and looked eagerly around for its owner. He no sooner stood erect than he saw her with a handkerchief stuffed in her mouth and, bowing stiffly and with sober face he gravely presented the glove to her. She had waited, despite all her escort could do, somewhat breathlessly watching the rescue and the short, quick comedy incidental to it; and now, with reddened cheeks and mischievous eyes, she took the glove and murmured her thanks. The elderly gentleman, grinning from ear to ear, raised his high beaver, thanked the plainsman, and then hurried his charge onto the boat, fearful of the time lost.

Tom stood in his tracks staring after them, hypnotized by the beauty of the face and the timbre of the voice of the woman whose eyes had challenged him as she had turned away.

The profane remarks of the wagon driver, the more picturesque remarks of other drivers, and the vociferous, white-toothed delight of the negroes did not soothe Ephriam Schoolcraft's outraged dignity nor help to cool his anger, and he arose from his dust bath seeking whom he might devour. He did not have to seek far, for a negro's shouted warning reached Tom in time to spin him around to await his adversary. The plainsman was cool, imperturbable, and smiling slightly with amusement.

Schoolcraft leaped for him and was sent spinning against a pile of freight. As he recovered his balance his hand streaked for his belt, but stopped in the air as he gazed down the barrel of the new Colt snuggling against the hip of the younger man. It must have looked especially vicious to a man accustomed to a single-shot pistol, or a double-barreled Derringer, at best.

"That was no killing matter," said Tom quietly. "Don't make it so, and don't make us both miss that packet, and get locked up in a St. Louis jail. I'll get out again quicker than you, but that hardly matters. If you're going aboard, go ahead; I'm in no great hurry." Out of the corner of his eye he was watching the Mexican, but found nothing threatening.

Schoolcraft glared at him, allowed a hypocritical smile to mask his feelings, bowed politely, and walked down the levee, the Mexican following him, and Tom bringing up the rear. They were quickly separated by the bustle on the boat, each giving his immediate attention to the preparations necessary for his comfort during the voyage.

A second blast of the whistle was followed by the groaning of the great derrick as it lifted the landing stage and swung it aboard; lines were hauled in and the passengers along the rails waved their adieus and called last minute messages to those they were leaving behind. It would be many years before some of them saw their friends again, and for a few the reunion would not be on this earth. A bell rang aft and the great stern paddle slapped and thrashed noisily as it bit and tore at the yellow water beneath it. Showers of sparks, incandescent as they left the towering stacks, fell in gray flakes on the decks and the river, the bluish smoke of the wood fires trailing straighter and straighter astern as the packet rounded into the boiling current and pushed upstream at a constantly increasing speed, leaving behind her the western metropolis on the left-hand bank and a straggling hamlet on the other.

Here the Mississippi is a mighty river, approaching half a mile in width between its limestone banks; deep, swift, its current boiling up the muddy contribution of the great Missouri, as if eager to expose the infamy of its pollution to the world. But whatever it lost in purity by the addition of the muddy water, pouring in eighteen miles above the city, it gained in greatness. Other large rivers have been tamed and rendered nearly harmless, but these two have baffled man's labors and ingenuity, and finally the contributing stream has been given up as incorrigible.

The confusion of the passengers attending to their baggage, places at table and their sleeping quarters grew constantly less as mile followed mile, and by the time the _Belle_ swung in a great, westward curve to leave the Father of Waters for the more turbid and treacherous bosom of the Big Muddy, many were eagerly looking for the line marking the joining of the two great streams. It was plain to the eye, for the jutting brown flood of the Missouri, dotted with great masses of drift, was treated with proper suspicion by the clearer flood of the nobler stream, and curved far out into the latter without losing the identity of its outer edge for some distance below.

Chapter III

Armijo'S Strong Arm

Piloting on the Mississippi was tricky enough, with the shifting bars and the deadly, submerged logs, stumps, and trees; but the Missouri was in a class by itself; indeed, at various stages of high water it seemed hardly to know its own channels or, in some places, even its own bed. It threw up an island today to remove it next week or ten years later, and cut a new channel to close up an old one whenever the mood suited. Gnawing off soft clay promontories or cutting in behind them was a favorite pastime; and the sand and clay of its banks and the vast expanses of its bottoms coaxed it into capricious excursions afield. More than one innocent and unsuspecting settler, locating what he considered to be a reasonable distance from its shores on some rich bottom, found his particular portion of the earth's surface under the river or on its further bank when he returned from a precipitate and entirely willing flight.

There were two tricks used on the river to get out of sandbar difficulties that deserve mention. During certain stages of the river it for some reason would cross over from one side of its bed to the other, and between the old and the new deep channels would be a space of considerable distance crossed by the water where there was no channel, but only a number of shallow washes, none of which perhaps would be deep enough to let a steamboat through. The deepest would be selected, and if only two or three more inches of water were needed, the boat would be run up as far as it could go, the crew would fix the two great spars with their shoes against the bottom, slanting downstream, set the steam capstans drawing on their ropes, and then reverse the paddle wheel. The turning of the great wheel would force water under the hull while the spars pushed backward and, raising a platform of water around her and taking it with her, she would slide over the shallow place and go on about her business.

In case of a bar where there were no submerged banks to hold a platform of water, and only a few more inches needed, the spars would be used as before, but the paddle wheel would remain idle. The backward thrust of the spars would force the boat ahead, while their lifting motion would raise it a little. This being repeated again and again would eventually "walk" the boat across and into deeper water on the other side. It was a slow and laborious operation and sometimes took a day or two, but it was preferable to lying tied to the bank and waiting for a rise, often a matter of a week or more.

All this was an old story to Tom, who now was on his fifth trip up the river, for he was an observant young man and one who easily became acquainted with persons he wished to know. These included the officers and pilots, who took to the upstanding young plainsman at first sight and gave painstaking answers to his many but sensible questions. In consequence his knowledge of the river was wide and deep, although not founded on practical experience.

Long before the packet turned into the Missouri he had his affairs attended to and was leaning against the rail enjoying the shifting panorama. But the scenery did not take all of his attention, for he was keeping a watch for a certain Mexican trader and for the young lady of the glove; and after the boat had rounded into the Big Muddy, he caught sight of the more interesting of the two as she walked forward on the port side in the company of her escort. Waiting a few moments to see if they would discover him, he soon gave it up and went in search of the purser, who seemed to know about everyone of note in St. Louis.

"Hello, Tom," called that officer, having recovered his breath after the rush. "Yo're goin' back purty quick, ain't you?"

"Reckon not. One night an' one day in th' city was enough. But this cussed packet is near as lonesome. I don't know a passenger on board."

"I can fix that," laughed the purser. "I know about three-quarters of 'em, an' can guess at th' rest. I counted seven professional gamblers comin' up th' plank. They'll be in each other's way. You feelin' like some excitement?"

"Not with any of them," answered Tom, grinning. "I can count seven times seven of them fellers in Independence; an' I hear some of 'em are plannin' to join up with th' next outgoing train."

"Well," mused the purser. His face cleared. "There's that sneakin' minister. Havin' looked in everythin' but our mouths, he'll mebby have time to convert a sinner. How 'bout him?"

"Don't hardly think he can do much with me," muttered Tom. He considered a moment and tried to hide his grin. "Now I noticed an elderly old gentleman with a young lady, gettin' aboard jest before I did. They was leavin' you when I showed up. Happen to know 'em?"

"You shouldn't 'a' give back th' glove when you did," laughed the officer. "You should 'a' had yore quarrel with Schoolcraft first, so you could 'a' waited till we was under way before you handed it back to her. That would 'a' give you a better chance to get acquainted. I've heard that frontierin' sharpens a man's wits, but I dunno. Want to meet 'em? Th' old sport's interesting when he ain't tryin' to beat th' gamblers at their own game. An' he's plumb successful at it, too, if there ain't too many ag'in him."

Tom had the grace to flush under his tan, but he thankfully accepted the bantering and the suggestion. "What you suppose I've risked wastin' my time talkin' to you for?" he demanded.

"You know cussed well you wasn't wastin' it," retorted the purser. "Come on, an' meet one of th' finest young ladies in St. Louis. She won't care if you pay more attention to her uncle."

A few minutes later Tom had been made acquainted with the couple and they soon discovered that they had mutual friends in the city. Time passed rapidly and Patience Cooper and her uncle, Joseph, took a keen interest in their companion's account of life on the prairies. He found that the uncle was engaged in the overland trade and was going out to Independence to complete arrangements for the starting of his wagons with the Santa Fe caravan. Finding that they were to be seated at different tables they had the obliging steward change their places so they could be together, and after the meal the uncle begged to be excused and headed for the card room, which brought a fleeting frown to the face of his niece. Tom observed it without appearing to and led the way to some chairs on deck near the rail.

The blast of the whistle apprised them of a landing in sight and soon they picked it out, as much by the great piles of firewood as by any other sign. This was the little hamlet of St. Charles, and here came on board several plainsmen and voyageurs who, having missed the packet at St. Louis, had hastened across the neck of land to board it here. As soon as the gangplank touched the bank a hurrying line of men depleted the great wood pile, and in a few minutes the landing stage swung aboard again and the _Missouri Belle_ circled out into mid-channel, a stream of sparks falling astern.

An annoying wind had been blowing when they left the parent stream, annoying in a way a stranger to the river never would have dreamed. There being no permanence to the channels, no fixity to the numerous bars, no accurate knowledge covering the additions to the terrible, destroying snags lurking under the surface, the pilot literally had to read his way every yard and to read it anew every trip. All he had to go by was the surface of the water, and it told him a true tale as long as it was reasonably placid. From his high elevation he looked down into the river and learned from it where the channel lay; and from arrow-head ripples and little, rolling wavelets, where the snags were, for every one close enough to the surface to merit attention was revealed by the telltale "break" on the water. Let a moderate wind blow and his task became harder and more of a gamble; but even then, knowing that the waves run higher over deeper water, he still could go ahead; but above a certain strength the wind not only baffled his reading, but gave such a sidewise drift to the shallow-draft, high-riding vessel that he could not hope to take it safely through some of the narrower channels. Rain or hail, which turned the surface into a uniform area of disturbance, instantly closed his book; and in this event he had no recourse except to lie snugly moored to the south bank and wait until the weather conditions changed. Sometimes these waits were for a few hours, sometimes for a day or more; and when the persistent southwest prairie gales blew day and night, moving great clouds of sand with them, the boat remained a prisoner until they ceased or abated.

There was good reason for choosing that south bank, for the stronger winds almost invariably came from that direction during the navigation season, and the bank gave a pleasing protection. While lying moored, idleness in progress did not mean idleness all around, for the boilers ate up great quantities of wood, and in many cases the fuel yards were the growing trees and windfalls on the banks. Once the boat was moored the crew leaped ashore and became wood-choppers, filling the fuel boxes and stacking the remainder on shore for future use. In a pinch green cottonwood sometimes had to be used, but it could be burned only by adding pitch or resin.

Nowhere on the river was a navigation mark, for nowhere was the channel permanent enough to allow one to be placed. It was primitive, pioneer navigation with a vengeance, requiring intelligent, sober, quickwitted and courageous men to handle the boats. On the Missouri the word "pilot" was a term of distinction.

The river was high at this time of the year, caused less by the excessive rains and melting snows in the mountains, being a little early for them, than by the rains along the immediate valley; bottom lands were flooded, giving the stream a width remarkable in places and adding greatly to the amount of drift going down with the current.

The afternoon waned and the wind died, the latter responsible for the pilot's good nature, and the shadows of evening grew longer and longer until they died, seeming to expand into a tenuity which automatically effaced them. But sundown was not mooring time, for the twilight along the river often lasted until nine o'clock, and not a minute was wasted.

When St. Charles had been left astern Tom had led his companion up onto the hurricane deck and placed two chairs against the pilot house just forward of the texas, where the officers had their quarters. The water was now smooth, barring the myriads of whirling, boiling eddies, and from their elevated position they could see the configuration of the submerged bars. The afterglow in the sky turned the mud-colored water into a golden sheen, and the wind-distorted trees on the higher banks and ridges were weirdly silhouetted against the colored sky. Gone was the drab ugliness. The finely lined branches of the distant trees, the full bulks of the pines and cedars and the towering cottonwoods, standing out against the greenery of grass covered hills, provided a soft beauty; while closer to the boat and astern where sky reflections were not seen, the great, tawny river slipped past with a powerful, compelling, and yet furtive suggestion of mystery, as well it might.

Tom was telling of the characteristics of the river when the boat veered sharply and caused him to glance ahead. A great, tumultuous ripple tore the surface of the water, subsided somewhat and boiled anew, the wavelets gold and crimson and steel blue against the uniform lavender shade around them. The many-fanged snag barely had been avoided as it reached the upward limit of its rhythmic rising and falling.

Soon a bell rang below and the boat slowed as it headed in toward a high, wooded bank. Nudging gently against it the packet stopped, men hurried lines ashore, made them fast to the trees and then set a spring line, which ran from the stern forward to the bank ahead of the bow, so as to hold the boat offshore far enough to keep it afloat in case the river should fall appreciably during the night. The pilot emerged behind them, glanced down at the captain overseeing the mooring operations, and then spoke to Tom, who made him acquainted with Patience and invited him to join them. He gladly accepted the invitation and soon had interested listeners to his store of knowledge about the river. Darkness now had descended and he pointed at the stream.

"There's somethin' peculiar to th' Missouri," he said. "Notice th' glow of th' water, several shades lighter than th' darkness on th' bank? On the Mississippi, now, th' water after dark only makes th' night all th' blacker; but on this stream th' surface can be seen pretty plain, though not far ahead. We take full advantage of that when we have to sail after dark. We would be goin' on now, except that we got news of a new and very bad place a little further on, an' we'd rather tackle it when we can see good."

"Oh," murmured Patience. "A ghost road leading through a void."

A long, dark shape appeared on the "ghost road" and bore silently and swiftly down upon the boat, struck the hull a glancing blow, scraped noisily, ducked under, turned partly and scurried off astern. It was a trimmed tree trunk, and by its lowness in the water it told of a journey nearly ended. Before long one end would sink deeper and deeper, finally fastening in the alluvial bottom and, anchoring securely, lie in wait to play battering ram against some ill-fated craft surging boldly against the current.

The lanterns on shore began to move boatward as the last of the wooding was finished and the fuel boxes again were full. Farther back among the trees some trappers had started a fire and were enjoying themselves around it, their growing hilarity and noise suggesting a bottle being passed too often. Gradually the boat became quiet and after another smoke the pilot arose and excused himself, saying that it was expected that the journey would be resumed between three and four o'clock in the morning.

"How long will it take us to reach Independence Landing?" asked Patience.

The pilot shook his head. "That depends on wind, water, and th' strength of th' current, though th' last don't make very much difference sometimes."

Tom looked up inquiringly. "I don't just understand th' last part," he confessed. "Mebby I didn't hear it right."

"Yes, you did," replied the pilot, grinning in the darkness. "When she's high she's swift; but she's also a hull lot straighter. Th' bends of this river are famous, an' they add a lot of miles to her length. They also cut down th' slant of her surface, which cuts down th' strength of th' current. At lower water we'd have a longer distance to sail, but a gentler current. When she rises like she is now she cuts off, over or behind a lot of th' bends an' makes herself a straighter road. An' th' shorter she gits, th' steeper her pitch grows, which makes a stronger current. She jest reg'lates herself accordin' to her needs, an' she gits shet of her floods about as quick as any river on earth. Oh, I tell you, she's a cute one; an' a mean one, too!"

"She's shore movin' fast enough now," observed Tom, watching the hurtling driftwood going spectrally down the almost luminous surface. "How long will this high water last, anyhow?"

"Considerable less than th' June rise," answered the pilot. "She's fallin' now, which is one of th' reasons we're tied to th' bank instid of goin' on all night. This here rise is short, but meaner than sin. Th' June rise is slower an' not so bad, though it lasts longer. It comes from th' rains an' meltin' snow in th' mountains up above. Down here th' current ain't as swift as it is further up, for this slope is somethin' less than a foot to th' mile; but if it warn't for th' big bottoms, that let some of th' water wander around awhile instid of crowdin' along all at once, we'd have a current that'd surprise you. Jest now I figger she's steppin' along about seven miles an hour. Durin' low water it's some'rs around two; but I've seen it nearer ten on some rises. There are places where steamboats can't beat th' current an' have to kedge up or wait for lower water. About gittin' to Independence Landin', or what's left of it, I'll tell you that when we pass Liberty Landin'. Miles through th' water ain't miles over th' bottom, an' it's th' last that counts. Besides, th' weather has got a lot to say about our business. I hope you ain't gittin' chilled, Miss Cooper, this spring air cuts in amazin' after sundown."

"I _am_ beginning to feel it," she replied, arising, "I'll say good night, I believe, and 'turn in.'"

Tom escorted her to the lower deck and watched her cross the cabin and enter her room, for he had no illusions about some of the men on board. As her door closed he wheeled and went to look at the engines, which were connected directly to the huge paddle wheel. The engineer was getting ready to climb into his bunk, but he smoked a pipe with his visitor and chatted for a few minutes. Tom knew what it meant to be an engineer on a Missouri river packet and he did not stay long. He knew that his host scarcely took his hand from the throttle for a moment while the boat was moving, for he had to be ready to check her instantly and send her full speed astern. The over-worked system of communication between the pilot house and the engine room had received its share of his attention during his runs on the river.

He next went forward along the main deck and looked at the boilers, the heat from them distinctly pleasing. As he turned away he heard and felt the impact from another great, trimmed log slipping along the faint, gray highway. Some careless woodcutter upstream had worked in vain. He stopped against the rail and looked at the scurrying water only a few feet below him, listening to its swishing, burbling complaints as it eddied along the hull, seeming in the darkness to have a speed incredible. A huge cottonwood with its upflung branches and sunken roots paused momentarily as it struck a shallow spot, shivered, lost a snapping dead limb, collected a surprising amount of debris as it swung slowly around and tore free from the clutching mud of the bottom and, once more acquiring momentum, shot out of sight into the night, its slowly rising branches telling of the heavy roots sinking to their proper depth. Next came a tree stump like some huge squid, which must have been well dried out and not in the water for very long, else it would have found the bottom before this. Then a broken and waterlogged keelboat, fully twenty-five feet long, scurried past, a great menace to every boat afloat. Planks, rails from some pasture fence, a lean-to outhouse, badly smashed, and a great mass of reeds and brush came along like a floating island. The constantly changing procession and the gray water fascinated him and he fairly had to tear himself away from it. Strange splashings along the bank told him of undermined portions of it tumbling into the river, and a louder splash marked the falling of some tree not far above.

"She's talkin' a-plenty tonight," said a rough voice behind him and he turned, barely able to make out a figure dressed much the same as he was; but he did not see another figure, in Mexican garb, standing in the blackness against a partition and watching him. The speaker continued. "More gentle, this hyar trip; ye should 'a' heard her pow-wowin' th' last run up. I say she's wicked an' cruel as airy Injun; an' nothin' stops her."

"I can't hardly keep away from her," replied Tom, easily dropping into the language of the other; "but I ain't likin' her a hull lot. A hard trail suits me better."

"Now yer plumb shoutin'," agreed the other. "If 'twarn't fer goin' ashore every night, up in th' game country, I don't reckon I'd want ter see another steamboat fer th' rest o' my days. Everythin' about 'em is too onsartin."

Tom nodded, understanding that his companion was a hunter employed by the steamboat company to supply the boat's table with fresh meat. After the game country, which really meant the buffalo range, was reached this man went ashore almost every night and hunted until dawn or later, always keeping ahead of the boat's mooring and within sight of the river after daybreak. Whatever he shot he dragged to some easily seen spot on the bank for the yawl to pick up, and when the steamboat finally overtook him he went aboard by the same means. His occupation was hazardous at all times because of the hostility of the Indians, some few of which, even when their tribes were quiet and inclined to be friendly for trade purposes, would not refuse a safe opportunity to add a white man's scalp to their collection. The tribes along the lower sections of the river were safer, but once in the country of the Pawnees and Sioux, where his hunting really began, it was a far different matter. He did not have much of the dangerous country to hunt in because the _Belle_ did not go far enough up the river; but the hunters on the fur company's boats went through the worst of it.

"Goin' out this spring?" asked the hunter.

"Yep; Oregon, this time," answered Tom. "My scalp ain't safe in Santa Fe no more. Been thar?"

"Santa Fe, yep; Oregon, no. Went to N'Mexico in '31, an' we got our fust buffaler jest tother side o' Cottonwood Creek. It war a tough ol' bull. Bet ye won't git one thar no more. We forded th' Arkansas at th' lower crossin' an' follered th' dry route. Hear thar's a track acrost it now, but thar warn't any then. Don't like that stretch, nohow. Longest way 'round is th' best fer _this_ critter. Ye got Bent's Fort handy ter bust up th' trip, git supplies an' likker; an' I'd ruther tackle Raton Pass, mean as it is, than cross that cussed dry plain atween th' Crossin' an' th' Cimarron. I'd ruther have water than empty casks, airy time; an' fur's th' Injuns air consarned, 'twon't be long afore ye'll have ter fight 'em all th' way from th' frontier ter th' Mexican settlements. They'll be gittin' wuss every year."

"Yer talkin' good medicine," replied Tom, thoughtfully. "'Twon't be safe fer any caravan ter run inter one o' them war parties. Thar cussin' th' whites a'ready, an' thar bound ter jine han's ag'in us when th' buffaler git scarce."

The hunter slapped his thigh and laughed uproariously. "Cussed if that ain't a good un! Why, th' man ain't alive that'll live ter see that day. They won't git scarce till Kansas is settled solid, an' _then_ there'll have ter be a bounty put on 'em ter save th' settlers' crops. Why, thar's _miles_ o' 'em, pardner!"

"I've _seen_ miles o' 'em," admitted Tom; "but they'll go, an' when they once start ter, they'll go so fast that a few years will see 'em plumb wiped out."

"Shucks!" replied the hunter, "Why, th' wust enemies they got is th' Injuns an' th' wolves. Both o' them will go fust, an' th' buffalers'll git thicker an' thicker."

"_We_ are thar worst enemies!" retorted Tom with spirit. "Th' few th' Injuns kill don't matter--if it did they'd 'a' been gone long ago. They only kill fer food an' clothin'; but we kill fer sport an' profit. Every year that passes sees more whites on th' buffaler ranges an' more hides comin' in ter th' settlements; an' most of them hides come from th' cows. Look at th' beaver, man! Thar goin' so fast that in a few years thar won't be none left. Thar's only one thing that'll save 'em, an' that's a change in hats. Killin' fer sport is bad enough, but when th' killin' is fer profit th' end's shore in sight. What do we do? We cut out th' buffaler tongues an' a few choice bits an' leave th' rest for th' wolves. Th' Injuns leave nothin' but th' bones. Why, last trip acrost I saw one man come inter camp with sixteen tongues. He never even bothered with th' hump ribs! I told him if he done it ag'in an' I saw him, I'd bust his back; an' th' hull caravan roared at th' _joke_!"

"Danged if it warn't a good un," admitted the hunter, chuckling. "Have ter spring that on th' boys." He turned and looked around. "Them fellers on th' bank air shore havin' a good time. They got likker enough, anyhow. Cussed if it don't sound like a rendezvous! Come on, friend: what ye say we jine 'em? It's too early to roll up, an' thar's only card buzzards in th' cabin a-try-in' ter pick th' bones o' a merchant."

"We might do wuss nor that," replied Tom; "but I don't reckon I'll go ashore tonight."

"Wall, if ye change yer mind ye know th' trail. I'm leavin' ye now, afore th' bottles air all empty," and the hunter crossed the deck and strode down the gangplank.

Tom watched the hurrying, complaining water for a few moments and then turned to go to the cabin. As he did so something whizzed past him and struck the water with a hiss. Whirling, he leaped into the shadows under the second deck, the new Colt in his hand; but after a hot, eager search he had to give it up, and hasten to the cabin, to peer searchingly around it from the door. The only enemy he had on board to his knowledge was Schoolcraft--and then another thought came to him: was Armijo reaching out his arm across the prairies?

Joe Cooper was intent on his game; Schoolcraft and the Mexican trader were taking things easy at a table in a corner, and both had their knives at their belts. They did not give him more than a passing glance, although a frown crept across the Independence horse-dealer's evil face. Seating himself where he could watch all the doors, Tom tried to solve the riddle while he waited to scrutinize anyone entering the cabin. At last he gave up the attempt to unravel the mystery and turned his attention to the card game, and was surprised to see that it was being played with all the safeguards of an established gambling house. Having a friend in the game he watched the dealer and the case-keeper, but discovered nothing to repay him for his scrutiny. An hour later the game broke up and Joe Cooper, cashing in his moderate winnings, arose and joined Tom and suggested a turn about the deck before retiring. Tom caught a furtive exchange of fleeting and ironical glances between the case-keeper and the dealer, but thought little of it. He shrugged his shoulders and followed his new friend toward the door.

Ephriam Schoolcraft, somewhat the worse for liquor, made a slighting remark as the two left the cabin, but it was so well disguised that it provided no real peg on which to hang a quarrel; and Tom kept on toward the deck, the horse-dealer's nasty laugh ringing in his ears. He could see where he was going to have trouble, but he hoped it would wait until Independence was reached, for always there were the makings of numerous quarrels on board under even the best of conditions, and he determined to overlook a great deal before starting one on his own account. It was his wish that nothing should mar the pleasure of the trip up the river for Patience Cooper.

He and his companion stopped in the bow and looked at the merry camp on shore, both sensing an undertone of trouble. Give the vile, frontier liquor time to work in such men and anything might be the outcome.

He put his lips close to his companion's ear: "Mr. Cooper, did you notice anyone hurry into the cabin just before I came in? Anyone who seemed excited and in a hurry?"

Cooper considered a moment: "No," he replied. "I would have seen any such person. Something wrong?"

"Schoolcraft, now; and that Mexican friend of his," prompted Tom. "Did they leave the cabin before you saw me come in?"

"No; they both were where you saw them for an hour or two before you showed up. I'm dead certain of that because of the interest Schoolcraft seemed to be taking in me. I don't know why he should single me out for his attentions, for he don't look like a gambler. I never saw him before that little fracas you had with him on the levee. Something up?"

"No," slowly answered Tom. "I was just wondering about something."

"Nope; he was there all the time," the merchant assured him. "Seems to me I heard about some trouble you had in Santa Fe last year. Anything serious?"

"Nothing more than a personal quarrel. I happened to get there after they had started McLeod's Texans on the way to Mexico City, and learned that they had been captured." He clenched his fists and scowled into the night. "One of the pleasant things I learned from a man who saw it, was the execution of Baker and Howland. Both shot in the back. Baker was not killed, so a Mexican stepped up and shot him through the heart as he lay writhing on the ground. The dogs tore their bodies to pieces that night." He gripped the railing until the blood threatened to burst from his finger tips. "I learned the rest of it, and the worst, a long time later."

Cooper turned and stared at him. "Why, man, that was in October! Late in October! How could you have been there at that time, and here, in this part of the country, now? You couldn't cross the prairies that late in the year!"

"No; I wintered at Bent's Fort," replied Tom. "I hadn't been in Independence a week before I took the boat down to St Louis, where you first saw me. There were four of us in the party and we had quite a time making it. Well, reckon I'll be turning in. See you tomorrow."

He walked rapidly toward the cabin, glanced in and then went to his quarters. Neither Schoolcraft nor the Mexican were to be seen, for they were in the former's stateroom with a third man, holding a tense and whispered conversation. The horse-dealer apparently did not agree with his two companions, for he kept doggedly shaking his head and reiterating his contentions in drunken stubbornness that, no matter what had been overheard, Tom Boyd was not going to Oregon, but back to Santa Fe. He mentioned Patience Cooper several times and insisted that he was right. While his companions were not convinced that they were wrong they, nevertheless, agreed that there should be no more knife throwing until they knew for certain that the young hunter was not going over the southwest trail.

Schoolcraft leered into the faces of his friends. "You jest wait an' see!" He wagged a finger at them. "Th' young fool is head over heels in love with her; an' he'll find it out afore she jines th' Santa Fe waggin train. Whar she goes, _he'll_ go. I'm drunk; but I ain't so drunk I don't know that!"

Chapter IV.

Tom Changes His Plans

Dawn broke dull and cold, but without much wind, and when Tom awakened he heard the churning of the great paddle wheel, the almost ceaseless jangling of the engine room bell and the complaining squeaks of the hard-worked steering gear. A faint whistle sounded from up river, was answered by the _Missouri Belle_, and soon the latter lost headway while the two pilots exchanged their information concerning the river. Again the paddles thumped and thrashed and the boat shook as it gathered momentum.

On deck he found a few early risers, wrapped in coats and blankets against the chill of the morning hour. The overcast sky was cold and forbidding; the boiling, scurrying surface of the river, sullen and threatening. Going up to the hurricane deck he poked his head in the pilot house.

"Come on in," said the pilot "We won't go fur today. See that?"

Tom nodded. The small clouds of sand were easily seen by eyes such as his and as he nodded a sudden gust tore the surface of the river into a speeding army of wavelets.

"Peterson jest hollered over an' said Clay Point's an island now, an' that th' cut-off is bilin' like a rapids. Told me to look out for th' whirlpool. They're bad, sometimes."

"To a boat like this?" asked Tom in surprise.

"Yep. We give 'em all a wide berth." The wheel rolled over quickly and the V-shaped, tormented ripple ahead swung away from the bow. "That's purty nigh to th' surface," commented the pilot. "Jest happened to swing up an' show its break in time. Hope we kin git past Clay before th' wind drives us to th' bank. Look there!"

A great, low-lying cloud of sand suddenly rose high into the air like some stricken thing, its base riven and torn into long streamers that whipped and writhed. The gliding water leaped into short, angry waves, which bore down on the boat with remarkable speed. As the blast struck the _Missouri Belle_ she quivered, heeled a bit, slowed momentarily, and then bore into it doggedly, but her side drift was plain to the pilot's experienced eyes.

"We got plenty o' room out here fer sidin'," he observed; "but 'twon't be long afore th' water'll look th' same all over. We're in fer a bad day." As he spoke gust after gust struck the water, and he headed the boat into the heavier waves. "Got to keep to th' deepest water now," he explained. "Th' snags' telltales are plumb wiped out. I shore wish we war past Clay. There ain't a decent bank ter lie ag'in this side o' it."

For the next hour he used his utmost knowledge of the river, which had been developed almost into an instinct; and then he rounded one of the endless bends and straightened out the course with Clay Point half a mile ahead.

"Great Jehovah!" he muttered. "Look at Clay!"

The jutting point, stripped bare of trees, was cut as clean as though some great knife had sliced it. Under its new front the river had cut in until, as they looked, the whole face of the bluff slid down into the stream, a slice twenty feet thick damming the current and turning it into a raging fury. Some hundreds of yards behind the doomed point the muddy torrent boiled and seethed through its new channel, vomiting trees, stumps, brush and miscellaneous rubbish in an endless stream. Off the point, and also where the two great currents came together again behind it two great whirlpools revolved with sloping surfaces smooth as ice, around which swept driftwood with a speed not unlike the horses of some great merry-go-round. The vortex of the one off the point was easily ten feet below the rim of its circumference, and the width of the entire affair was greater than the length of the boat. A peeled log, not quite water-soaked, reached the center and arose as vertical as a plumb line, swayed in short, quick circles and then dove from sight. A moment later it leaped from the water well away from the pool and fell back with a smack which the noise of the wind did not drown. To starboard was a rhythmic splashing of bare limbs, where a great cottonwood, partly submerged, bared its fangs. To the right of that was a towhead, a newly formed island of mud and sand partly awash.

The pilot cursed softly and jerked on the bell handle, the boat instantly falling into half speed. He did not dare to cut across the whirlpool, the snag barred him dead ahead, and it was doubtful if there was room to pass between it and the towhead; but he had no choice in the matter and he rang again, the boat falling into bare steerageway. If he ran aground he would do so gently and no harm would be done. So swift was the current that the moment he put the wheel over a few spokes and shifted the angle between the keel-line and the current direction, the river sent the craft sideways so quickly that before he had stopped turning the wheel in the first direction he had to spin it part way back again. The snag now lay to port, the towhead to starboard, and holding a straight course the _Missouri Belle_ crept slowly between them. There came a slight tremor, a gentle lifting to port, and he met it by a quick turn of the wheel. For a moment the boat hung pivoted, its bow caught by a thrusting side current and slowly swinging to port and the snag. A hard yank on the bell handle was followed by a sudden forward surge, a perceptible side-slip, a gentle rocking, and the bow swung back as the boat, entirely free again, surged past both dangers.

The pilot heaved a sigh of relief. "Peterson didn't say nothin' about th' snag or th' towhead," he growled. Then he grinned. "I bet he rounded inter th' edge o' th' whirler afore he knowed it was thar! Now that I recollect it he did seem a mite excited."

"Somethin' like a boy explorin' a cave, an' comin' face to face with a b'ar," laughed Tom. "I recken you fellers don't find pilotin' monotonous."

"Thar ain't no two trips alike; might say no two miles, up or down, trip after trip. Here comes th' rain, an' by buckets; an' thar's th' place I been a-lookin' fer. Th' bank's so high th' wind won't hardly tech us."

He signaled for half speed and then for quarter and the boat no sooner had fallen into the latter than her bow lifted and she came to a grating stop. The crew, which had kept to shelter, sprang forward without a word and as the captain crossed the bow deck the great spars were being hauled forward. After the reversed paddles had shown the _Belle_ to be aground beyond their help, the spars were put to work and it was not long before they pushed her off again, and a few minutes later she nosed against the bank.

The pilot sighed and packed his pipe. "Thar!" he said, explosively. "Hyar we air, an' we ain't a-goin' on ag'in till we kin see th' channel. No, sir, not if we has ter stay hyar a week!"

Tom led the way below and paused at the foot of the companionway as he caught sight of Patience. He glowed slightly as he thought that she had been waiting for him; and when he found that she had not yet entered the cabin for breakfast, the glow became quite pronounced. He had seen many pretty girls and had grown up with them, but the fact that she was pretty was not the thing which made her so attractive to him. There was a softness in her speaking voice, a quiet dignity and a certain reserve, so honest that it needed no affectations to make it sensed; and under it all he felt that there was a latent power of will that would make panicky fears and actions impossible in her. And he never had perceived such superb defenses against undue familiarity, superb in their unobtrusiveness, which to him was proof of their sincerity and that they were innate characteristics. He felt that she could repel much more effectively without showing any tangible signs of it than could any woman he ever had met. He promised himself that the study of her nature would not be neglected, and he looked forward to it with eagerness. There was, to him, a charm about her so complex, so subtle that it almost completed the circle and became simple and apparent.

She smiled slightly and acknowledged his bow as he approached her.

"Good morning, Miss Cooper. Have you and your uncle breakfasted?"

"Not yet," she answered, turning toward the cabin. "I think he is waiting for us. Shall we go in?"

The plural form of the personal pronoun sent a slight thrill through him as he opened the door for her, showed her to the table, and seated her so that she faced the wide expanse of the river.

"I imagined that I felt bumps against the boat sometime during the night," she remarked. She looked inquiringly at Tom and her uncle. "Did we strike anything?"

"Why," Tom answered in simulated surprise, "no one said anything about it to me, and I've been with the pilot almost since dawn. The whole fact of the matter is that this river's dangers are much over-estimated, considering that boats of thirty feet and under have been navigating it since before the beginning of this century. And they had no steam to help them, neither."

Uncle Joe appeared to be very preoccupied and took no part in the conversation.

"I have heard uncle and father speak many times about the great dangers attending the navigation of the Missouri," she responded, smiling enigmatically, and flashing her uncle a keen, swift glance. "They used to dwell on it a great deal before father went out to Santa Fe. So many of their friends were engaged in steamboat navigation that it was a subject of deep interest to them both, and they seemed to be very well informed about it." She laughed lightly and again glanced at her uncle. "Since uncle learned that I might have to make the trip he has talked in quite a different strain; but he did suggest, somewhat hopefully, that we put up with the discomforts of the overland route and make the trip in a wagon. Don't you believe, Mr. Boyd, that knowledge of possible dangers might be a good thing?"

Uncle Joe gulped the last of his watery coffee, pushed back, and arose. "Want to see the captain," he said. "Meet you two later on deck," and he lost no time in getting out of the cabin.

"Well," came the slow and careful answer from Tom, "so many of us pass numerous dangers in our daily lives, unknown, unsuspected, that we might have a much less pleasant existence if we knew of them. If they are dangers that we could guard against, knowledge of them certainly would be a good thing."

She nodded understandingly and looked out over the tawny, turbulent flood, then leaned forward quickly; and her companion did not lose this opportunity to admire her profile. Coming down the stream like an arrow, with a small square sail set well forward, was a keelboat, its hide-protected cargo rising a foot or more above the gunwale amidships. Standing near the mast was a lookout, holding fast to it, and crouched on top of the cargo, the long, extemporized addition to the tiller grasped firmly in both hands, was the _patron_, or captain. Sitting against the rear bulkhead of the hold and facing astern were several figures covered with canvas and hides, the best shift the crew could make against the weather. The French-Canadian at the mast waved his hand, stopping his exultant song long enough to shout a bon voyage to the steamboat as he shot past, and the little boat darted from their sight into the rain and the rolling vapor of the river like a hunted rabbit into a tangle of briars.

"That's splendid!" she exclaimed, an exultant lilt in her voice. "That's the spirit of this western country: direct, courageous, steadfast! Can't you feel it, Mr. Boyd?"

His eyes shone and he leaned forward over the table with a fierce eagerness. In that one moment he had caught a glimpse into the heart and soul of Patience Cooper that fanned fiercely the flame already lighted in his heart. His own feelings about the West, the almost tearful reverence which had possessed him at the sight of those pioneer women, many with babes at their breasts, that he daily had seen come into Independence from the East to leave it on the West, the hardships past great enough to give pause to men of strength, but not shaking their calm, quiet determination to face greater to the end of that testing trail, and suffer privations in a vast wilderness; his feelings, his hopes, his faith, had come back to him in those few words almost as though from some spirit mirror. He choked as he fought to master himself and to speak with a level voice.

"Feel it?" he answered, his voice shaking. "I feel it sometimes until the sheer joy of it hurts me! Wait until you stand on the outskirts of Independence facing the sunset, and see those wagons, great and small, plodding with the insistent determination of a wolverine to the distant rendezvous! Close your eyes and picture that rendezvous, the caravan slowly growing by the addition of straggling wagons from many feeding roads. Wait until you stand on the edge of that trail, facing the west, with rainbows in the mist of your eyes! Oh, Miss Cooper, I can't--but perhaps we'd better go on deck and see what the weather promises."

She did not look at him, but as she arose her hand for one brief instant rested lightly on his outflung arm, and set him aquiver with an ecstatic agony that hurt even while it glorified him. He shook his head savagely, rose and led the way to the door; and only the moral fiber and training passed on to him through generations of gentlemen kept him from taking her in his arms and smothering her with kisses; and in his tense struggle to hold himself in check he did not realize that such an indiscretion might have served him well and that such a moment might never come again. Holding open the door until she had passed through, he closed it behind them and stumbled into a whirling gust of rain that stung and chilled him to a better mastery of himself. Opportunity had knocked in vain.

"Our friends, the pilots, will not be good company on a day like this," he said, gripping the rail and interposing his body between her and the gusts. "The gangplank's out, but there seems to be a lack of warmth in its invitation. Suppose we go around on the other side?"

On the river side of the boat they found shelter against the slanting rain and were soon comfortably seated against the cabin wall, wrapped in the blankets he had coaxed from his friend, the purser.

"Just look at that fury of wind and water!" exclaimed Patience. "I wonder where that little keelboat is by now?"

"Oh, it's scooting along like a sled down an icy slope," he answered, hoping that it had escaped the hungry maw of the great whirlpool off Clay Point. "They must have urgent reasons for driving ahead like that. It must be an express from the upper Missouri posts to St. Louis. McKenzie probably wants to get word to Chouteau before the fur company's steamboat starts up the river. Or it may be the urging of the thrill that comes with gambling with death."

Behind them Uncle Joe poked his head out of the cabin door and regarded them curiously. Satisfied that troublesome topics no longer were being discussed he moved forward slowly.

"Oh, here you are," he said, as though making a discovery. "I thought I might find you out here. Captain Newell ain't fit company for a savage wolf this morning. Have you heard how long we're going to be tied up?"

Tom drew a chair toward him and looked up invitingly. "Sit down, Mr. Cooper. Why, I understand we will stay here all day and night." He understood the other man's restlessness and anxiety about the wait, but did not sympathize with him. The longer they were in making the river-run the better he would be suited.

Uncle Joe glanced out over the wild water. "Oh, well," he sighed. "If we must, then we must. That river's quite a sight; looks a lot worse than it is. Hello! What's our reverend friend doing down there? Living in the hold?" He chuckled. "If he is, it's a poor day to come up for air."

They followed his glance and beheld a tall, austere, long-faced clergyman emerging from the forward hatch, and behind him came the pilot with whom they had talked the evening before. When both had reached the deck and stepped out of the rain the clergyman shook his head stubbornly and continued his argument.

"I was told to come up on this packet and examine her carefully on the way," he asserted, doggedly. "Liquor in vast quantities has been getting past both Fort Leavenworth and Bellevue; and while the military inspectors may be lax, or worse, that is an accusation which cannot truthfully be brought against us at the upper agency. If I am not given honest assistance in the prosecution of my search, your captain may experience a delay at our levee that will not be to his liking. It's all the same to me, for if it isn't found on our way up, it _will_ be found after we reach the agency."

"But, my reverend sir!" replied the pilot, in poorly hidden anger, "you've been from one end of th' hold to th' other! You've crawled 'round like a worm, stuck yore nose an' fingers inter everythin' thar war to stick 'em in; you've sounded th' flour barrels with a wipin'-stick, an' jabbed it inter bags an' bales. Bein' a government inspector we've had ter let ye do it, whether we liked it or not. I've got no doubts th' captain will be glad ter take down th' engines, rip open th' bilers, slit th' stacks an' mebby remove th' plankin' of th' hull; but--air ye listenin' close, my reverend sir? If ye try ter git me ter guide ye around in that thar hold ag'in, I'll prove ter ye that th' life o' a perfect Christian leads ter martyrdom. Jest ram that down yore skinny neck, an' be damned ter ye!"

"I will not tolerate such language!" exclaimed the indignant shepherd. "I shall report you, sir!"

"You kin report an' be damned!" retorted the angry pilot. "Yo're too cussed pious to be real. What's that a-stickin' outer yer pocket?"

The inspector felt quickly of the pocket indicated and pulled out a half-pint flask of liquor, and stared at it in stupefaction. "Why--I----"

"Yer a better actor than ye air a preacher," sneered the pilot, glancing knowingly from the planted bottle around the faces of the crowd which had quickly assembled. "O' course, you deal in precepts; but they'd be a cussed sight more convincin' fer a few examples along with 'em. Good day, my reverend sir!"

The frocked inspector, tearing his eyes from the accusing bottle and trying to close his mouth, gazed after the swaggering pilot and then around the circle of grinning faces. A soft laugh from above made him glance up to where Patience and her companions were thoroughly enjoying the episode.

"Parson, I'll have a snorter with ye," said a bewhiskered bullwhacker, striding eagerly forward, his hand outstretched. "Go good on a mornin' like this."

"Save some fer me, brother," called a trapper, his keen eyes twinkling. "Allus reckoned you fellers war sort o' baby-like; but thar's th' makin' o' a man in you." He grinned. "'Sides, we dassn't let all that likker git up ter th' Injuns."

"Shucks!" exclaimed a raw-boned Missourian. "That's only a sample he's takin' up ter Bellevue. He ain't worryin' none about a little bottle like that, not with th' bar'ls they got up thar. What you boys up thar do with all th' likker ye take off'n th' boats? Nobody ever saw none o' it go back down th' river."

The baited inspector hurled the bottle far out into the stream and tried to find a way out of the circle, but he was not allowed to break through.

"You said somethin' about Leavenworth bein' careless, or wuss," said a soldier who was going up to that post. "We use common sense, up thar. Thar's as much likker gits past th' agencies on th' land side as ever tried ter git past on th' river. Every man up-bound totes as much o' it as he kin carry. Th' fur company uses judgment in passin' it out, fer it don't want no drunken Injuns; but th' free traders don't care a rip. If th' company ain't got it, then th' Injuns trade whar they kin git it; an' that means they'll git robbed blind, an' bilin' drunk in th' bargain. If I had my way, they'd throw th' hull kit of ye in th' river."

"That's right," endorsed a trapper, chuckling, and slapping the inspector on the back with hearty strength. "You hold this hyar boat to th' bank at Bellevue jest as long as ye kin, parson. It makes better time than th' boys goin' over th' land, an' 'tain't fair ter th' boys. Think ye kin hold her a hull week, an' give my pardners a chanct ter beat her ter th' Mandan villages?" He looked around, grinning. "Them Injuns must have a hull passel o' furs a-waitin' fer th' first trader."

"What's th' trouble here?" demanded the captain, pushing roughly through the crowd. "What's th' trouble?"

"Nothing but the baiting of a government inspector and a wearer of the cloth," bitterly answered the encircled minister.

"Oh," said the captain, relieved. "Wall, ye git as ye give. Are ye through with th' hold?"

The inspector sullenly regarded him. "I think so," he answered.

The captain wheeled to one of the crew. "Joe, throw on that hatch, lock it, and keep it locked until we get to Bellevue," he snapped. "We're ready to comply with government regulations, at the proper time and place. You and your friends can root around all you want after we get to Bellevue. The next time I find you in the hold with a lighted candle I'll take it away from you and lock you in there." He turned, ordered the crowd to disperse and went back to the texas.

It was an old story, this struggle to get liquor past the posts to the upper Missouri, and there were tricks as yet untried. From the unexpected passage of this up-bound inspector, going out to his station at the agency, and his officious nosings, it was believed by many that any liquor on board would not have a chance to get through. And why should the _Belle_ be carrying it, since her destination and turning point was Bellevue?

"Is it true that liquor is smuggled up the river?" asked Patience as the inspector became lost to sight below.

Her companions laughed in unison.

"They not only try to get it up," answered Tom, "but they succeed. I've been watching that sour-faced parson on his restless ramblings about the boat, and I knew at once that there must be a game on. Sometimes their information is correct. However, I'll back the officers of this packet against him, any time."

"I'm afraid you'd win your bet, Mr. Boyd," choked the uncle.

"Uncle Joe! What do you know about it?" asked his niece accusingly.

"Nothing, my dear; not a single thing!" he expostulated, raising his hands in mock horror, his eyes resting on three new yawls turned bottomside up on the deck near the bow. He mentally pictured the half-dozen bullboats stowed on the main deck near the stern, each capable of carrying two tons if handled right, and he shook with laughter. This year the fur company's boat carried no liquor and its captain would insist on a most thorough inspection at Bellevue; but the fur posts on the upper river would be overjoyed by what she would bring to them. After the inspection she would proceed on her calm way, and tie against the bank at a proper distance above the agency; just as the _Belle_ would spend a night against the bank at a proper distance below Bellevue; and what the latter would run ashore after midnight, when the inquisitive minister was deep in sleep, would be smuggled upstream in the smaller boats during the dark of the night following, and be put aboard the fur boat above.

"Uncle Joe!" said his niece. "You know something!"

"God help the man that don't!" snorted her uncle. "Look there!"

A heavily loaded Mackinaw boat had shot around the next bend. It was of large size, nearly fifty feet long and a dozen wide. In the bow were four men at the great oars and in the stern at the tiller was the _patron_, singing in lusty and not unpleasant voice and in mixed French and English, a song of his own composing.

Patience put a finger to her lips and enjoined silence, leaning forward to catch the words floating across the turbulent water, and to her they sounded thus:

_"Mon pere Baptiste for Pierre Chouteau He work lak dam in le ol' bateau; From Union down le ol' Missou Lak chased, by gar, by carcajou._

_"Le coureurs des bois, le voyageur, too, He nevaire work so hard, mon Dieu, Lak Baptiste pere an' Baptiste fils, Coureurs avant on le ol' Missou._

_"McKenzie say: 'Baptiste Ladeaux, Thees lettaire you mus' geeve Chouteau; Vous are one dam fine voyageur-- So hurry down le ol' Missou._

_"Go get vous fils an' vous chapeau, You mebby lak Mackinaw bateau'-- Lak that he say, lak one dam day Le voyage weel tak to ol' St. Lou!"_

As the square stern of the fur-laden boat came opposite the packet the mercurial _patron_ stopped his song and shouted: "_Levez les perches!_" and the four oars rose from the water and shot into the air, vertical and rigid. The pilot of the steamboat, chancing to be in the pilot house, blew a series of short blasts in recognition, causing the engineer to growl something about wasting his steam. The crew of the Mackinaw boat arose and cheered, the _patron_ firing his pistol into the air. Gay vocal exchanges took place between the two boats, and the patron, catching sight of Patience, placed a hand over his heart and bowed, rattling off habitant French. She waved in reply and watched the boat forge ahead under the thrust of the perfectly timed oars.

"Mackinaw boat," said Tom, "and in a hurry. _There's_ the express. There is a belief on the river that the square stern of those boats gives them a speed in rapids greater than that of the current. They are very safe and handy for this kind of navigation, and well built by skilled artisans at the boat yards of the principal trading posts up the river. They are a great advance over the bullboat, which preceded them."

"And which are still in use, makeshifts though they are," said Captain Newell as he stopped beside them. "But you can't beat the bullboat for the purpose for which it was first made; that of navigating the shallower streams. I thought you would be glad to know that we expect to be under way again early in the morning. But, speaking of bullboats, did you ever see one, Miss Cooper?"

"I've had them pointed out to me at St. Louis, but at a distance," she answered. "Somehow they did not impress me enough to cause me to remember what they looked like."

"Why, I'll show you some," offered Tom eagerly. "There's half a dozen on the main deck."

Uncle Joe squirmed as he glanced around, and arose to leave for the card room, but the captain smiled and nodded.

"Yes, that's so, Mr. Boyd. Take a look at them when the rain lets up. We're always glad to carry a few of them back up the river, for we find them very handy in lightering cargo in case we have mean shallows that can be crossed in no other way. You'd be surprised how little water this boat draws after its cargo is taken ashore."

"But why do they call them bullboats?" asked Patience.

"They're named after the hides of the bull buffalo, which are used for the covering," explained the captain. "First a bundle of rather heavy willow poles are fashioned into a bottom and bound together with rawhide. To this other and more slender willow poles are fastened by their smaller ends and curved up and out to make the ribs. Then two heavy poles are bent on each side from stem to stern and lashed to the ends of the ribs, forming the gunwale. Everything is lashed with rawhide and not a bolt or screw or nail is used. Hides of buffalo bulls, usually prepared by the Indians, although the hunters and trappers can do the work as well, are sewn together with sinew after being well soaked. They are stretched tightly over the frame and lashed securely to the gun'le, and they dry tight as drumheads and show every rib. Then a pitch of buffalo tallow and ashes is worked into the seams and over every suspicious spot on the hides and the boat is ready. Usually a false flooring of loosely laid willow poles, three or four inches deep, is placed in the bottom to prevent the water, which is sure to leak in, from wetting the cargo. In the morning the boat rides high and draws only a few inches of water; but often at night there may be six or eight inches slopping around inside. I doubt if any other kind of a boat can be used very far up on the Platte, and sometimes even bullboats can't go up."

"How was it that the fur company's boat was tied at the levee at St. Louis, after we left?" asked Tom. "Rather late for her, isn't it?"

"Yes, it is," answered the captain. "The great event on this river has always been the annual upstream fur packet. She is coming along somewhere behind us, and very likely will pass us before we reach the mouth of the Kaw. They take bigger chances with the river than we do because they've got to get up to Fort Union and away again while there's water enough." He looked at Patience. "Are you going far, Miss Cooper?" he asked, anxious to get the conversation into channels more to his liking.

"Santa Fe, captain," she answered as placidly as though it were a shopping trip from her home to the downtown stores of St. Louis.

"Well, well!" he exclaimed, as if he had not known it. "That will be quite an undertaking!"

Tom Boyd was staring at her aghast, doubting his ears. The slowly changing expression on his face caught her attention and she smiled at him.

"You look as if you had seen a ghost, Mr. Boyd," she laughed.

"I'm going to do my very best not to see one, Miss Cooper; or let anyone else see one," he answered mysteriously. "I am glad that I, too, am bound for Santa Fe. It is a great surprise and pleasure to learn that you are going over the same trail."

"Why, didn't you say that you were going over the Oregon Trail this year?" she quickly asked. "At least, I understood you that way."

"I often let my enthusiasm run away with me," he answered. "Much as I would like to go out to Oregon I will have to wait until my affairs will permit me to follow my inclination. You see, I've made two trips to Santa Fe, it has got into my blood, and there are reasons why I must go over that trail again. And then, knowing the trail so well, it is possible that I can make very good arrangements this year. But isn't it a most remarkable coincidence?"

"Very," drily answered the captain. "By the way, Mr. Boyd: you and Mr. Cooper seem to be quite friendly, and neither of you waste much time in the company of your present roommates. Seeing that you are both bunked with strangers, how would it suit you if I put you together in the same room? Good: then I'll speak to Mr. Cooper, and if it's agreeable to him I'll have the change made. Sorry to tear myself away from you two, but I must be leaving now." He bowed and stepped into the cabin, smiling to himself. He distinctly remembered his conversation with the young man, only the day before, when Tom had assured him with great earnestness that he no longer could resist the call of the emigrant trail and that he was going to follow it with the first outgoing caravan. The captain was well pleased by the change in the young man's plans, for he knew that the niece of his old friend would be safer on her long journey across the plains if Tom Boyd was a member of the caravan. He turned his steps toward the gaming tables to find her uncle, whom he expected would be surrounded by the members of a profession which Joe Cooper had forsaken many years before for a more reputable means of earning a living.

The reputation of "St. Louis Joe" was known to almost everyone but his niece; and the ex-gambler was none too sure that she did not know it. While his name was well-known, there were large numbers of gamblers on both rivers, newcomers to the streams, who did not know him by sight; and it was his delight to play the part of an innocent and unsuspecting merchant and watch them try to fleece him. Not one of the professionals on the _Missouri Belle_ knew he was playing against a man who could tutor him in the finer points of his chosen art; but by this time they had held a conference or two in a vain attempt to figure why their concerted efforts had borne bitter fruit. One of them, smarting over his moderate, but annoyingly persistent losses, was beginning to get ugly. While his pocketbook was lightly touched, his pride was raw and bleeding. Elias Stevens was known as a quick-tempered man whom it were well not to prod; and Joseph Cooper was prodding him again and again, and appearing to take a quiet but deep satisfaction in the operation. At first Stevens had hungered only for the large sum of money his older adversary had shown openly and carelessly; but now it was becoming secondary, and the desire for revenge burning in Stevens was making him more and more reckless in his play.

The careless way in which Joe Cooper had shown his money to arouse the avarice of the gamblers had awakened quick interest in others outside the fraternity, and other heads were planning other ways of getting possession of it. Two men in particular, believing that the best chance of stealing it was while the owner of it was on the boat, decided to make the attempt on this night. If the boat should remain tied to the bank their escape would be easy; and if it started before daylight they could make use of the yawl, which was towed most of the time, and always during a run after dark.

Captain Newell looked in at the gambling tables and did not see his friend, but as he turned to look about the upper end of the cabin he caught sight of him coming along the deck, and stepped out to wait for him.

"Looking for me?" asked Uncle Joe, smiling.

"Yes; want to tell you that your young friend Boyd has changed his mind and is going out to Santa Fe to look after his numerous interests there. Ordinarily I would keep my mouth shut, but I know his father and the whole family, and no finer people live in St. Louis. Who have you in mind to go in charge of your wagons?"

Uncle Joe scratched his chin reflectively. "Well, I'd thought of Boyd and was kinda sorry he was going out over the other trail. I'll keep my eyes on the scamp. Strikes me he'd take _my_ wagons through for his keep, under the circumstances! He-he-he! Changed his mind, has he? D----d if I blame him; I'd 'a' gone farther'n that, at his age, for a girl like Patience. How about a little nip, for good luck?"

"Not now. How would you like to change sleeping partners?" asked the captain, quickly explaining the matter.

"First rate idea; th' partner I got now spends most of his nights scratching. Better shift me instead of him, or Boyd'll get cussed little sleep in that bunk."

Captain Newell leaned against the cabin and laughed. "All right, Joe; I'll have your things taken out and the change made by supper time, at the latest. Look out those gamblers in there don't skin you."

* * * * *

True to his word the captain shifted Joe Cooper to the room of his new friend, and sent the bull-necked, bullwhacking bully who had shared Tom's cabin to take the ex-gambler's former berth. This arrangement was suitable both ways, for not only were the two friends put together, but the two loud-voiced, cursing, frontier toughs found each other very agreeable. They had made each other's acquaintance at the camp-fire on the bank the night previous and like many new and hastily made friendships, it had not had time to show its weaknesses. One of them had stolen a bottle of liquor at the camp-fire carousal and upon learning of the change shortly after supper, had led his new roommate to their joint quarters to celebrate the event; where they both remained.

The early part of the night was passed as usual, Uncle Joe at the card tables, Tom Boyd with Patience and later mingling with the hunters and trappers in the cabin until his eyes became heavy and threatened to close. Leaving his friend at the table, he went to their room and in a few moments was so fast asleep that he did not hear the merchant come in. It seemed to him that he had barely closed his eyes when he awakened with a start, sitting up in the berth so suddenly that he soundly whacked his head against the ceiling. He rolled out and landed on the floor like a cat, pistol in hand, just as his roommate groped under the pillow for his own pistol and asked what the trouble was all about.

The sound of it seemed to fill the boat. Shouts, curses, crashes against the thin partition located it for them as being in the next room, and lighting a candle, the two friends, pistols in hands, cautiously opened the door just as one of the boat's officers came running down the passage-way with a lantern in his hand. There was a terrific crash in the stateroom and they saw him put down the light and leap into a dark shadow, and roll out into sight again in a tangle of legs and arms. Other doors opened and night-shirted men poured out and filled the passage.

The battle in the stateroom had taken an unexpected turn the moment the officer appeared, for the door sagged suddenly, burst from its hinges and flew across the narrow way, followed by a soaring figure, to one leg of which Ebenezer Whittaker, bully bullwhacker of the Santa Fe trail, was firmly fastened. After him dived his new friend, who once had ruled a winter-bound party of his kind in Brown's hole with a high and mighty hand. The trapper went head first into the growling pair rolling over the floor, his liquor-stimulated zeal not permitting him to waste valuable time in so small a matter as the identity of the combatants. He knew that one of them was his new roommate, the other a prowling thief, and being uncertain in the poor light as to which was which, he let the Goddess of Chance direct his energies.

At the other end of the passage-way the boat's officer, now reinforced by so many willing helpers that the affair was fast taking on the air of a riot, at last managed to drag the thief's lookout from the human tangle and hustle him into the eager hands of three of the crew, leaving the rescuers to fight it out among themselves, which they were doing with praiseworthy energy and impartial and indefinite aims. Considering that they did not know whom they were fighting, nor why, they were doing so well that Tom wondered what force could withstand them if they should become united in a compelling cause and concerted in their attack.

At the inner end of the passage, having beaten, choked, and gouged the thief into an inert and senseless mass, the bullwhacker turned his overflowing energies against his new and too enthusiastic friend, and they rolled into the stateroom, out again, and toward the heaving pile at the upper end of the hall. Striking it in a careless, haphazard but solid manner, just as it was beginning to disintegrate into its bruised and angry units, the fighting pair acted upon it like a galvanic current on a reflex center; and forthwith the scramble became scrambled anew.

Finally, by the aid of capstan-bars, boat hooks, axe handles, and cordwood, the boat's officers and crew managed to pry the mass apart and drag out one belligerent at a time. They lined them up just as Captain Newell galloped down the passage-way, dressed in a pair of trousers, reversed; one rubber boot and one red sock and a night shirt partly thrust inside the waistband of the trousers; but he was carefully and precisely hatted with a high-crowned beaver. He looked as if he were coming from a wake and going to a masquerade. Notwithstanding the very recent and exciting events he received a great amount of attention.

"What-in-hell's-th'-matter?" he angrily demanded, glaring around him, a pistol upraised in one hand, the other gripping a seasoned piece of ash. "Answer-me-I-say-what-in-hell's-th'-matter-down-here?"

"There was a fight," carefully explained the weary officer.

"Hell's-bells-I-thought-it-was-a-prayer-meetin'!" yelped the captain. "Who-was-fightin'?"

"_They_ was," answered the officer, waving both hands in all directions.

"What-about?"

The officer looked blank and scratched his head, carefully avoiding the twin knobs rising over one ear. "Damned if _I_ know, sir!"

"Were _you_ fightin', Flynn?" demanded the captain aggressively and with raging suspicion. "Come, up with it, were you?"

"No, sir; I was a-stoppin' it."

"My G-d! Then don't you never dare start one!" snapped the captain, staring around. "You look like the British at N'Orleans," he told the line-up. "What was it all about? Hell's bells! It _must_ 'a' had a beginning!"

"Yessir," replied the officer. "It sorta begun all at once, right after th' explosion."

"What explosion?"

"I dunno. I heard it, 'way up on th' hurricane deck, an' hustled right down here fast as I could run. Just as I got right over there," and he stepped forward and with his foot touched the exact spot, "that there stateroom door come bustin' out right at me. I sorta ducked to one side, an' plumb inter somebody that hit me on th' eye. I reckon th' fightin' was from then on. Excuse me, sir; but you got yore pants on upside-down--I means stern-foremost, sir."

"What's my pants got to do with this disgraceful riot, or mebby mutiny?" blazed the reddening captain. He couldn't resist a downward glance over his person, and hastily slipped the red-socked foot behind its booted mate.

Somebody snickered and the sound ran along the line, gathering volume. Glaring at the battle-scarred line-up, Captain Newell waved the pistol and seemed at a loss for words.

Uncle Joe stepped forward with the bullwhacker. "Captain, this man says he woke up an' found a thief reachin' under his pillow, where he keeps his bottle. I think the thief is against the wall, there; and his partner, who doubtless acted as his lookout, is in the hands of those two men. The rest of th' fightin' was promiscuous, but well meant. I reckon if you put those two thieves in irons an' let th' rest of us go back to our berths it'll be th' right thing to do. As for Flynn, he deserves credit for his part in it."

"That's my understanding of it, captain," said Tom, and again burst out laughing. "Evidently they were after Mr. Cooper's money, which he has shown recklessly, and they did not know that he had changed staterooms."

"Reckon that's it, captain!" shouted someone, laughingly. "Anyhow, it's good enough. Come on, captain; it's time for a drink all 'round!"

In another moment a shirt-tailed picnic was in full swing, the bottles passing rapidly.

Chapter V

The Insult

Shortly after dawn Tom awakened and became conscious of a steady vibration and the rhythmical splash of the paddle wheel. Hurriedly dressing he went out on deck and glanced shoreward. The cream-and-chocolate colored water, of an opacity dense enough to hide a piece of shell only a quarter of an inch below its surface, rioted past; to port was a low-lying island covered with an amazing mass of piled-up trees, logs and debris, deposited there by the racing current of the rapidly-falling stream; and the distant shore was covered with dense forests of walnut and cottonwood, interspersed with rich bottoms masked by tangles of brush. Farther up he knew the sight would change into an almost treeless expanse of green prairies, gashed by scored bluffs of clay. The surface of the river was not smooth and the wind already had reached disturbing strength, while an occasional gust of chilling rain peppered the water and assaulted the boat. From the beat of the paddles and the high frequency of the vibrations he knew the _Belle_ was going ahead under full steam, but his momentary frown was effaced by the thought that the pilot was competent and knew what he was doing. Still, he felt a little uneasy, and went forward to pay the pilot a visit.

Reaching the hurricane deck he saw both pilots at the wheel and also a lookout on the roof of the little house, while in the very point of the bow, on the main deck, another lookout was scrutinizing the river ahead.

"We're makin' good time," said Tom pleasantly as he poked his head in the pilot house.

"Yes," came an answering grunt; "too good, mebby."

His words and manner were not calculated to encourage conversation and the visitor went down to see about breakfast. Fortified by a cup of coffee he felt able to wait until the meal was ready and went out on deck again, standing in the shelter of an angle of the cabin, pretending to be interested in the slowly shifting panorama, but really impatiently waiting for the appearance of Patience Cooper. He had waited for about an hour, hardly stirring from his post near the door which she had used the morning before, when he caught sight of her crossing the cabin. Turning from the window and stepping forward he opened the door for her and after a short, cheerful talk about being under way again, led her to the breakfast table, ignoring the scowling horse-dealer who sat at a table in a corner talking to Elias Stevens.

Their breakfast did not take as long as it had on the previous morning, one reason being that while they ate they sensed the boat turn toward the shore and before they had finished it stopped along the bank and moored again.

"I do believe the rain has ceased for the day," Patience observed, peering out of the window by her side. "It is growing brighter every minute. I wonder why the boat has stopped?"

"Too much wind," answered her companion, nodding at the waves running past the boat.

"If that is all, I'm going ashore," she declared.

"You may find it disagreeable," warned Tom, delighted by the prospect of a tramp with her. "It is bound to be wet under foot and the wind will be cold and penetrating; but if you don't mind it, I'm sure _I_ don't." He finished his coffee and smiled. "It will be a great relief to get off this boat."

"Come on, then; I'll meet you at the landing stage in ten minutes," she exclaimed. "This will be a good opportunity to get accustomed to the heavy boots Uncle Joe had made for me. They smell like tallow candles with leather wicks, if you can imagine the combination."

He saw her enter her stateroom and then went to his own, got his rifle and stood at the gangplank like a sentry. In less than the allotted time she joined him, waved gaily at her uncle and the captain, who were talking together near the pilot house, and went down the sloping plank, eager to explore the river bank. As they reached the top of the terrace-like bank and turned to wave again, the sun broke through the clouds and turned the moisture-laden trees and brush into a jeweled fairyland. They did not go far south since they were restricted to the more open spaces where they could walk without rubbing against wet foliage, but they found comparatively open lanes along the top of the bank, from where they could keep watch over the packet and get back without undue haste at the sound of her warning whistle.

They crossed the trails of several animals and she listened with interest to her companion's description of their makers, wondering at his intimate knowledge of animal habits. Finally, coming to a great cottonwood log, stripped of its bark and shining in the sunlight, he helped her upon it and sat down by her side.

"You surprised me, Miss Cooper, when you mentioned you were going to Santa Fe," he said, turning to one of the subjects uppermost in his mind. "It is a long, tedious, trying journey to men, and it might prove infinitely more so to a woman."

"I suppose so," she replied reflectively. "But you know, Mr. Boyd, I haven't seen my father in five years, and his letter, sent back by the eastbound caravan from Santa Fe last year, told us how he missed me and how dissatisfied he was with his housekeeping arrangements and how he dreaded to spend another winter away from us. It was too late then, of course, to make the trip, but I determined to go to him with the first caravan leaving Independence this spring. Uncle Joe fumed and fussed about it and collected all the stories of privation, loss of sanity and sudden death, and everything else of a deterring nature and brought them home to me to serve as warnings. I can do anything I want with him except keep him from gambling, and when he really understood that nothing could stop me, he gave in and I soon had him so busy explaining away the woeful tales he had brought me, and hunting up new ones of a bright and cheerful aspect that he half believed them himself. I learned that all the Indians were pets, that there were miles of flowers all the way, that people near death from all kinds of causes miraculously recovered their health by the end of the first two days, and that the caravan had to watch closely to keep its members from leaving it and settling all along the trail."

They burst out laughing together. He could easily picture her uncle frantically reversing himself. He had taken a great liking to Joseph Cooper, who was a humorous, warm-hearted old fox among his friends, delighting in their pleasures and sunning himself complacently in their approbation. No trouble was too great for him to go through if it would bring happiness to those he cared for.

They laughed and chatted and enjoyed themselves greatly, and were very much surprised when his lean figure appeared beside the pilot house and they saw him wave his hat and motion toward his mouth with animation and great exaggeration.

"Good heavens! Is it dinner time already?" exclaimed Tom, sliding from the log, and becoming aware for the first time that the log had been far from as dry as he thought.

Laughing and scampering, they hurried back toward the landing, racing down the hill that led to the little opening in the grove not far from the water's edge. As they started down it Tom caught sight of several figures sprawled on the sand, which had dried quickly under the combined attacks of sun and wind. Among them he saw the lank form of Ephriam Schoolcraft slowly arising to one elbow as the horse-dealer turned and watched them come down the incline.

Patience stumbled, her heavy boots bothering her, and her companion checked himself and caught her as she pitched forward. Swinging her through the air, he put her down again on the other side of him and laughingly offered his arm.

"Thar ain't nothin' like 'lasses fer to draw flies," came the drawling, unpleasant voice of the sneering figure on the ground. "Blow flies air included. Wrap it in skirts an' young fellers make plumb fools o' theirselves. Any flirt kin pull th' wool over thar eyes like it war a loose skin cap." His raucous laugh was doubly disagreeable because of the sneer envenoming it, and Tom stiffened.

"I seed an example o' that right yere on this hyar packet; an' most likely I'll see a hull lot more o' it if I has patience. He-he-he!"

Tom checked his stride, but the quick, reassuring pressure on his arm made him keep on, his burning face held rigidly toward the boat. He dared not look at his companion. They walked silently up the landing stage and into the cabin, Tom waiting with ill concealed impatience until his companion should join her uncle at the table. But he was surprised, for she spoke in a pleasant, soft tone and ordered him to remain where he was for a few minutes. Before he could make up his mind what she meant he saw her lean over her uncle's table and say something. The ex-gambler pushed suddenly back, patted her on the head and walked briskly but nonchalantly toward the curious onlooker.

"You young folks never have any regard for an old man's comfort," he chuckled as he took hold of Tom's arm. "Now, sir, I'll take great pleasure in stretching my legs in any direction you may select, and in stretching the neck of any officious meddler. I am at your service, Tom; and, damn it, I'm not too old to become a principal!"

Tom stared at him for a moment as the words sunk in. "By G-d!" he murmured. "There ain't another like her in th' whole, wide world! Thank you, Mr. Cooper: if you'll be kind enough to stand on one side and keep the affair strictly between myself and that polecat, I'll try not to keep you from your dinner very long. He might have been decent enough to have picked his quarrel in some other way!"

Schoolcraft arose alertly as they entered the little clearing, and watched Tom hand the double-barreled rifle to his companion, slip off his belt and throw his coat over it. The horse-dealer grinned with savage elation as he discarded his own weapons and coat, hardly believing in his good fortune. Not many men along the border cared to meet him unarmed.

Tom stepped forward. "Every time I look at that terbaccer juice a-dribblin' down yer chin, Schoolcraft, it riles me," he said evenly. "I'm a-goin' ter wipe it off," and his open hand struck his enemy's jaw with a resounding whack as he stepped swiftly to one side. "You've allus had a sneakin' grudge ag'in me," he asserted, giving ground before the infuriated horse-dealer, "since I caught ye cheatin' at Independence. You've been tryin' ter work it off ever since we left th' levee. I reckon this belongs to you!"

He stepped in quickly and drove his right fist into Schoolcraft's mouth, avoiding the flailing blows. "If ye'll stand up ter it an' make it a fight," he jeered, "I'll be much obliged to ye, fer I've promised my friend not ter keep him from his dinner." Again he stepped in and struck the bleeding lips. He boxed correctly according to the times, except that he used his feet to good advantage. His education at an eastern university had been well rounded and he never allowed himself to get out of condition.

Schoolcraft, stung to fury, leaped forward to grapple, hoping to make it a rough-and-tumble affair, at which style of fighting he had but few equals. Instead of his adversary stepping to one side, he now stood solidly planted in one spot, his left foot a little advanced, and drove in a series of straight-arm blows that sent the horse-dealer staggering back. The younger man pressed his advantage, moving forward with unswerving determination, his straight punches invariably beating the ill-timed and terrific swings of his bleeding opponent, who showed a vitality and an ability to take punishment not unusual among the men of his breed. The horse-dealer knew that if the fight remained an open affair he would not last long, and he got command over his rage and began to use his head.

Suddenly he dropped to hands and knees under a right-hand blow that was a little short of hurting him, and sprang up under his enemy's guard, and brought exultant ejaculations from his little group of friends. But for the warning conveyed to Tom by the knowledge that he barely had touched the horse-dealer's jaw with that blow, and could not have knocked him down, the trick might have worked; and as it was it succeeded in bringing the two men to close grips. Schoolcraft's right arm slid around his enemy's waist and hugged him close, while the left slipped up between them until the hand went under the younger man's chin and began to push it up and back. It was the horse-dealer's favorite and most deadly trick and he exulted as he arched his back and threw his full strength into the task. Never had it failed to win, for the victim of that hold must either quit or have his neck broken; and the choice did not rest with the victim.

The muscles of Tom's neck stood out as though they would burst, the veins of his forehead and throat swelling into tiny serpents, and his crimson face grew darker and darker, a purplish tint creeping into it. But Schoolcraft found that he was dealing with a man who had studied wrestling as eagerly as its sister science. He also found that there was a counter to his favorite hold, always providing that it had been robbed of its greatest factor: surprise. For it to be deadly effective his whole strength had to be thrown into it instantly and meet no ready, rigid opposition; and in this he had failed because of the subtle warning conveyed to his adversary when he fell before a harmless blow. Almost before he knew it Tom's left arm, circling high in air, jammed in between their heads and forced its way down to Schoolcraft's cheek. At the same instant the right hand dashed down and got a hold inside his left thigh, close up against the crotch; and as the left arm thrust his head sidewise with a power not to be withstood, the right hand lifted suddenly to the right and he struck the ground on his head and shoulder with a shock which rendered him senseless.

The winner staggered back, braced himself and swayed a little on his feet as he sucked in great gulps of air. He wheeled savagely as he heard a shuffling step to one side and slightly behind him, but the precaution was not necessary, for simultaneously with the shuffling came Joe Cooper's snapped warning, cold and deadly.

"Better stop, Stevens! I'm only lookin' for an excuse to blow you open!"

Elias Stevens obeyed, standing irresolute and scowling. "You talk d----d big behind a gun!" he sneered.

"Only half as big as I might, seeing it's a double gun," retorted the older man. "If it don't suit you we can turn, step off ten paces an' fire when we're ready. Might as well make a good job of it while we're about it. I ain't no Mike Fink; but you ain't no Carpenter, so I reckon it's purty even."

"I'll take care of any objectors, in any fashion," said Tom, facing Stevens and the others. "I'll be ready fer you, Stevens, by th' time you get your weapons an' coat off, if you choose that way. Pickin' on an old man don't go while there's a younger one around; an', besides, it's my quarrel. There it is, in your teeth; take it, and eat it!"

"It war a fair fight," said an onlooker in grudging admiration. He expressed the ethics of the fighting current at that time in that part of the country. Any kind of fighting, be it with hands, feet, nails, teeth or other weapons was fair as long as no outsider took a hand in it. It had been the rule of the keelboatmen and they had carried it up and down the waterways, from New Orleans to the upper Mississippi and from Pittsburg to the Rockies.

Tom nodded. "All right. You can tell him that he won't get in close, next time," he said, glancing at the stirring loser. "Come on, Uncle Joe; your dinner's plumb cold an' ruined."

"I'm hot enough to warm it as I chaw!" snapped his friend. "I was scared for a moment, though; fighting out in this country don't get you nothin' but a tombstone, generally, an' you'll be cussed lucky if you get that. But you did what you started out to do; I couldn't see no tobacco juice on his chin th' last time I looked." He followed his companion down the bank and as they crossed the gangplank he chuckled. "I won't eat no liver for a long time, I reckon: his face near made me sick!"

"I shouldn't 'a' cut him up so," admitted Tom; "but I was forking off a grudge. Next time, I'll kill him." Then he thought of Patience and glowed all over. "There ain't another like her, nowhere!" he muttered.

Uncle Joe glanced sideways at the slightly marked face of his companion, shrewdly noting the expression of reverent awe and adoration.

"Young man," he said, "you're a little mite hasty, but I like 'em that way. I reckon if you took my waggins inter Santa Fe you'd get patience."

At this second play on her name within the last half hour Tom whirled in his tracks and held out his hand. "Uncle Joe, if you think I'm able to handle 'em, I'll take 'em through h--l if I have to, without a blister--" then he faltered and his face grew hard as he shook his head in regret. "I can't do it," he growled. "It wouldn't be fair to bring down Armijo's wrath on your niece and brother. He'd hound them like the savage brute he is. No; you'll have to keep to whatever arrangements you had in mind."

Uncle Joe shook his head. "That's too bad, Tom. I was counting on you keeping an eye on Patience and seeing her through. It's too cussed bad."

Tom's laugh rang out across the water. "Oh I'm going to do that! I'm bound for Santa Fe, either as a free lance or with trade goods of my own; but I am not going with your wagons. I got it pretty well figured out."

"I'm allus gettin' into places where I've got to back out," grumbled Uncle Joe. "Now I reckon I'll have to tell Patience you're too young an' giddy to handle my outfit. An' _then_ mebby I'll have to back out ag'in! Tell you one thing, this here Santa Fe trip may be fine for invalids, but it ain't done _my_ health no good!" While Tom laughed at him he considered. "Huh! I don't reckon it'll be a good thing to let her know that you an' Armijo are as friendly as a Cheyenne an' a Comanche. Cuss it! Oh, well; put away this gun an' come on in an' eat, if there's anything left."

Chapter VI

Indians And Gamblers

Shortly after noon the wind died down enough to let the packet resume her upstream labors, and expectations ran high that she would make a long, peaceful run. They were not to be realized.

The first unpleasant incident occurred when the boat had been run against a bank at a woodpile to replenish her fuel. The lines were made fast and the first of the wood-carriers had reached the stacked cordwood when from behind it arose a dozen renegade Indians, willing to turn momentarily from their horse-stealing expedition long enough to levy a tribute of firewater on the boat. They refused to allow a stick to be removed without either a fight or a supply of liquor and trade goods, and the leader of the band grappled with the foremost member of the crew and tried to drag him behind the shelter of the pile and so gain a hostage to give additional weight to their demands and to save them from being fired on.

Goaded by despair and fright from the unexpectedness of the attack and what might be in store for him the white man struggled desperately and, with the return of a measure of calmness, worked a neat cross-buttock on his red adversary and threw him sprawling out in plain sight of the boat. Half a dozen plainsmen on board had leaped for their rifles and shouted the alarm; a four pound carronade was wheeled swiftly into position and a charge of canister sent crashing over the woodpile into the brush and trees. The roar of the gun and the racket caused by the charge as it rattled through the branches and brush filled the savages with dismay and, not daring to run from the pile and up the bank under the cannon and the rapidly augmented rifles on the decks of the boat, they raised their hands and slowly emerged from their worthless breastwork.

Captain Newell shouted frantic instructions to his grim and accurate volunteers, ordering and begging in one breath for them not to fire, for he knew that bloodshed would start a remorseless sniping warfare along the river that might last for several seasons. At such a game the snipers on the banks, concealed as they would be, could reasonably be expected to run up quite a list of casualties on the boat. This was no new experience for him and he knew that nothing serious would grow out of it as long as none of the Indians were injured. This little party was composed of the renegade scourings of the frontier tribes which had been debauched by their contact with the liquor-selling whites and they were more fitted for petty thievery than the role of warriors. He shouted and argued and cursed and pleaded with the eager riflemen, most of whom burned with the remembrance of stolen packs of furs and equipment at the hands of such Indians as these.

The growling plainsmen, knowing that he was right and understanding his position, reluctantly kept their trigger fingers extended and finally lowered their pieces, hoping that the Indians would lose their heads and do some overt act; but the Indians were not fools, whatever else they might have been. With eager alertness on one side and sullen acquiescence on the other the wooding was finished, ropes cast off and the _Missouri Belle_ pushed quickly out into the stream, her grim faced defenders manning the stern decks and praying for an excuse to open fire.

No sooner had a reasonable distance been opened between the boat and the bank than the Indians, at a signal from their leader, leaped behind the woodpile and opened fire on the boat with muskets and bows and arrows, the latter weapons far more accurate than the miserable trade guns which a few of the braves carried. With them dropping an arrow is an instinct and they have developed it to a degree that is remarkable, to say the least; while with the smooth-bore trade guns, with varying charges of trade powder and sizes of balls, they were poor shots at any distance. Instantly two score rifles replied from the boat, pouring their leaden hail into the stacked wood, but without any noticeable result; and before a second round could be fired the distance had been increased to such an extent that only one or two excitable tenderfeet tried a second shot. The chief result of the incident was the breaking of the monotony of the trip and the starting of chains of reminiscences among the hunters and trappers to which the tenderfeet listened with eager ears.

After this flurry of excitement interest slowly swung far astern, where the American Fur Company's boat was supposed to be breasting the current on her long voyage to Fort Union and beyond, and many eyes were on the lookout for a glimpse of her smoke. A sight of the boat itself, except at close range, was almost hopeless because the bends in the river were so numerous and close together that the stream seemed like a narrow lake.

The surface of the water was becoming different from what it had been, for the great masses of floating debris had thinned and no longer came down in raft-like formations. This was due to the rapid falling of the water, which had stranded more and more of the bulkier drift and piled it up at the head of every island, emerging bar and jutting point. At the height of the freshets, especially the April rise, often the logs and trees came down so thick and solid that they resembled floating islands. This was in large measure due to the simultaneous floating of the vast accumulations piled up all along the banks, and it aroused disgust and anxiety in the hearts of the boatmen, who feared for hulls and paddle wheels.

The harmless brush with the Indians and the stories the affair had started quickened interest in firearms, and during the rest of the afternoon there was considerable target practice against the ducks, geese, and debris, and an occasional long shot at some animal on the distant bank.

Tom Boyd did his share of this, glad of the opportunity to try out his new and strange weapons, and to put off meeting Patience Cooper as long as he could, fearing her attitude concerning his fight with Schoolcraft. He found that the newly marketed Colt six-shooter was accurate and powerful at all reasonable ranges, beautifully balanced and well behaving. It attracted a great deal of attention from fellow travelers, for it was not as well-known in Missouri as it was in other parts of the country. The English rifle, not much heavier than the great Hawken weapons of his companions, despite its two barrels, shot true and strong, and the two ready shots at his command easily recompensed him for the additional weight. At this time, in the country into which he was going, an instantly available second shot had an importance not to be overlooked. To the Indians, especially, was it disconcerting, and its moral effect partook of the nature of magic and made a white man's "medicine" that demanded and received a wholesome respect. He found that it followed the rough and ready rule of the frontier that up to a hundred yards the proper charge was as much powder as would cover the bullet in the palm of the hand. In the long range shots the weapon was surprisingly accurate, and one thoughtful and intelligent hunter, who had guided several English sporting parties, gave the credit to the pointed bullets.

"Thar ain't no doubt about it, pardner," he confided to Tom as he slyly produced his own bullet mold, and showed it to his companion. "I've tried 'em out in my own rifle, an' they shore do shoot straighter an' further. This hyar mold war give ter me by a city hunter I had in my party when we found it would fit my rifle. I ain't usin' th' old un no more. Rub a leetle b'ar grease or buffaler tallow on th' patch paper, young man, ter make 'em go down easier. Thar good beaver."

The sun set in a gold and crimson glory, working its magic metamorphosis on river, banks, and bottoms, painting the colored cliffs and setting afire the crystals in which their clay was rich. Though usually the scenery along this river at this time of the year was nothing to boast of, there were certain conditions under which it resembled a fairyland. The rolling wavelets bore their changing colors across the glowing water and set dancing myriad flashes of sunlight; streaks of sunlight reached in under the trees along the bank and made fairy paths among the trunks, while the imbedded crystals in the clay bluffs glittered in thousands of pin-points of iridescent flame.

When supper time came around Tom still felt a little reluctant to meet Patience, worried by how she might greet him, although her actions preceding the fight should have told him that his fears were groundless. To his great relief she met him as graciously as she had before, and as a matter of fact he thought he detected a little more warmth and interest, but discounted this because he feared that his judgment might be biased in his favor by his hopes.

Uncle Joe apparently had forgotten all about the affair and did not refer to it in any way, confining himself to subjects connected with the great southwest highway, its trade, outfitting, the organization of the caravans, the merchandising at Santa Fe and bits of historical and personal incidents, not forgetting to comment on the personality of Armijo and his arbitrary impost of five hundred dollars on each wagon to cross the boundary, regardless of what its contents might be. He chuckled over the impost, for the goods which he had sent up to Independence by an earlier boat had been selected with that tax in mind. He had his own ideas about the payment of the impost, and although he could not entirely avoid it, he intended to take a great deal of the sting out of it.

He contended that the beating of unlawful duties was not cheating, since it was purely a game of one individual outwitting another, one being an arbitrary tyrant who was strongly suspected of pocketing the wagon tax for his own uses. The only trouble with his philosophy was what it set going, for having proved one evasion of tax to be honest it tended to go farther and justify other evasions which fairly crossed the ethical boundaries. One of these was the rumored prohibition of Mackinaw blankets and the export tax on specie. This last would be something of a hardship, for coin was the best and most easily carried of all mediums of payment, and the Mexican government, in levying this tax, would tend to force the traders to barter rather than sell their goods. If payment were had in specie, the wagons could be disposed of at a fair profit and mules used to pack it back to Missouri. When sewed tightly in rawhide bags it became an unshifting mass by the shrinking of the leather under the rays of the sun. Some of the traders took mules in exchange for their goods which, if they could be safely delivered in the Missouri settlements, would give an additional profit of no mean per centum; but losses in mules were necessarily suffered on the long return trip, and the driving, corralling, and guarding of a herd was a task to try the patience of a saint and the ingenuity of the devil. The Indians would take almost any kind of chances to stampede a herd of mules, and they were adepts at the game.

Uncle Joe had been over the trail, having gone out with that band of Missourians who took the first wagons across from Franklin in 1824, and he had kept in close touch with the New Mexican and Chihuahuan trade ever since. He knew the tricks, and had invented some of his own, which he guarded well. For the despotic Armijo he had a vast contempt, which was universal among the great majority of the men who knew anything at all about the cruel, conceited, and dishonest Governor of the Department of New Mexico. The unfortunate Texan Santa Fe Expedition had aroused bitter feelings among Americans and Texans against the Mexican, many of them having had friends and relatives in that terrible winter march of two thousand miles on foot from Santa Fe to the City of Mexico, which followed so close upon the heart-breaking and disastrous northward march from Texas to a vile betrayal and barbarous treatment. Anything American or Texas plainsmen could do to hurt or discredit the inhuman pomposity whose rise to power had been through black treachery and coldly planned murder, would be done with enthusiastic zeal.

At the close of the leisurely eaten meal they went on deck in time to see the _John Auld_ round the next upstream bend and forge forward, soon stopping, however, to drift past the slowed _Missouri Belle_ while their pilots exchanged terse information about the channels and snags. The _John Auld_ carried a small cargo of fur packs on her main deck and a few free hunters and trappers on their way to St. Louis to dispose of their goods and to outfit anew. By this time the fur of the pelts slipped and the fur taking season was over, but there was always the buffalo to lure them afield again.

The evening was delightful and hopes ran high for an uninterrupted voyage. Uncle Joe expressed the belief that the boat would run all night in view of the favorable weather; Tom demurring on the grounds of the rapidly falling river and the blackness of the nights. The boat curved sharply to avoid a jutting bar and straightened out again. Prompted by sight of some of the passengers who promenaded past them the talk swung to the fur trade in general and to the end of it, which was rapidly being brought nearer by the great tide of emigration setting in. Discussions regarding the emigrants and the great Oregon Trail followed as a matter of course and almost before they knew it it was time for Patience to retire, and her companions soon followed her example, Uncle Joe foregoing his usual night game.

When morning broke they found that they had sailed nearly all the night, and the boat kept on all day, stopping only at a few landings and to take on wood, of which she burned an amazing quantity. Another night's run brought them well up the river, but the following day found them tied to a bank, because of adverse weather. In the afternoon, the wind dying out, they were on the way again and another night's sail was looked for. Patience retired earlier than usual and when Tom returned from seeing her safely into her room he found Uncle Joe impatiently waiting for him.

"Come on, Tom," said the merchant. "I've still got a lot to learn about gamblin' an' there ain't much time left to do it in. Let's go back an' see if there's a game runnin'. I might as well let somebody else pay th' expenses of this trip."

Tom nodded and followed his companion into the cabin set apart for men and sat down at a table with two trappers, from where he could watch the game at close range, for he realized that the time for the gamblers to get the merchant's money also was getting short. Under the conditions almost anything might occur and he felt that he owed a debt to his friend for the part he had played during the fight with Schoolcraft.

Uncle Joe joined Stevens and a companion, who were idly playing and who seemed to be impatiently and nervously waiting for his appearance; soon a tense game was in progress. At a table in a corner from where the players could be closely watched Ephriam Schoolcraft, his face still badly bruised, was talking in sullen undertones to the little Mexican and another companion, while hunters, traders, trappers, and men of various other callings kept up a low hum of conversation throughout the cabin.

From one group came fragments of fur trade gossip: "Th' American Fur Company's talkin' about abandonin' Fort Van Buren. Thar's been a lot o' posts let go to grass th' last two years. Th' business ain't what it was ten year ago."

"On th' other hand," replied a companion, "Fox an' Livingston air goin' fer to put up a post at th' mouth o' th' Little Bighorn, which evens up fer Van Buren; an' Chardon's aimin' fer to put one up at th' mouth o' th' Judith. Th' trade's all right, only th' American's got more buckin' agin' it."

"'Tain't what it onct was, though," said a third trader. "Thar's too many posts an' private parties. Ye can't go nowhere hardly in th' Injun country without comin' slap up ag'in a post o' some kind. Thar's Zack: hey, Zack! Come over hyar!"

Zack, a mountain hunter and a free one, swung over and joined the group.

"Jest been palaverin' with some Canucks," he said. "Fur's I could git th' hang o' thar parley-vouz thar goin' up ter help open Fort William, at th' mouth o' th' Yallerstun, fer Fox an' Livingston. They sez Pratte an' Cabanne had took over Fort Platte, up nigh th' Laramie. How fur ye goin' on this packet, Smith?"

"Bellevue," answered Smith. "I'm headin' up th' Platte a-ways, if th' danged Pawnees let me git past. Pardner's waitin' near th' mouth with a bullboat. Reckon we kin count on enough water, this time o' year, fer ter float _that_; 'though I shore ain't bettin' on it," he chuckled.

Zack laughed. "Th' Platte shore comes close ter bein' all shadder an' no substance. Dangest stream _I_ ever seen, an' I've seen a-plenty."

"Don't think a hull lot o' that country, nohow," said a third. "Them Pawnees air th' worst thieves an' murderers this side o' th' Comanchees. They kin steal yer shirt without techin' yer coat, danged if they can't. Blast 'em, I _know_ 'em!"

Zack laughed shortly. "They ain't no-whar with th' Crows when it comes ter stealin'," he averred.

Smith chuckled again. "Yer right, Zack. He's pizen set ag'in 'em ever sence they stole his packs an' everythin' that wasn't a-hangin' ter him. 'Twarn't much o' a walk he had, though, only a couple hundred miles."

"Ye kin bet I'm pizen ag'in 'em sence then," retorted the Pawnee-hater vehemently. "If I tuk scalps I could show ye somethin'. They've paid a lot fer what they stole that time."

From another group came the mention of a name which took Tom's instant attention.

"I hears Ol' Jim Bridger's quit tradin' in furs as a reg'lar thing," said the voice. "They say he's gone in fer tinkerin' an' outfittin' up nigh Teton Pass. Got a fust rate post too, they say."

"Tinkerin' what?" demanded a listener. "What kin he outfit 'way up thar?"

"Emigrants!" snorted the first speaker. "Figgers on sellin' 'em supplies an' sich, an' repairin' fer 'em at his smithy. I shore reckon they'll need him a hull lot more'n he'll need them. That's a long haul fer wagons, tenderfeet's 'spacially--Independence ter th' Divide--'though it ain't what it was when Hunt an' Crooks went out thirty year ago."

"No, 'tain't," replied a third man. "An' it's a lucky thing fer th' tenderfeet that Nat Wyeth went an' built Fort Hall whar he did, even if 'twas fer th' Hudson Bay. I'm tellin' ye these hyar emigrants would be stayin' ter home from Oregon an' Californy if 'twarn't fer what us trappers has did fer th' country. Thar ain't nary a trail that we didn't locate fer 'em."

The first man nodded. "Not mentionin' th' Injuns afore us, we found thar roads, passes, an' drinkin' water fer 'em; an' now thar flockin' in ter spile our business. One thing, though, thar goin' straight acrost, most on 'em. It could be a hull lot worse."

While Tom's ears caught bits of the conversation roundabout his eyes paid attention to the gambling table and on two occasions he half arose from his chair to object profanely to the way Stevens played; but each time he was not quite sure. On the third occasion one of the trappers glanced at him, smiled grimly, and nodded at the hard-pressed gambler.

"Th' fur trade ain't th' only skin game, young feller," he softly said. "Ol' man a friend o' yourn?"

Tom nodded and watched more closely, and a moment later he stiffened again.

"Why, h--l!" growled the trapper, sympathizing with one of his own calling. "Go fur him, young feller, an' chuck him inter th' river! I'll hold off his pardner fer ye!"

An older trapper sauntered over and seated himself at Tom's side. "Been watchin' them fer quite a spell," he said in a low voice. "Ain't that ol' feller St Louis Joe?"

Tom shrugged his shoulders, and saw a great light. Who hadn't heard of St. Louis Joe? His new friend's love of gambling, and his success against Stevens and his crowd would be accounted for if the trapper was right. He glanced at the speaker and replied: "Don't know. I never saw him till I crossed th' levee at St. Louis jest afore we sailed."

"Looks a heap like him, anyhow," muttered the newcomer. "Fair an' squar, _he_ war. I seen him play when I war goin' down to N'Orleans, ten year ago. Never fergit a face, an' I shore remember _his_, fer he war playin' that time fer 'most all th' money in th' Mississippi Valley, I reckon. Consarn it, I _know_ it's him! Fer ol' times' sake, if he gits inter trouble with that skunk, I'm with him ter th' hilt." He started to leave the table, thought better of it and slid forward to the edge of his chair. "He's bein' cheated blind. I saw that skunk palm a card!"

Tom nodded, his hand resting on his belt, but he did not take his eyes from the game. He suspected that Uncle Joe was pretty well informed about what was going on and would object when it suited him.

The first trapper leaned over the table and whispered to his friend. "This young feller is watchin' the cheat, an' I'm watchin' th' pardner. You might keep an eye on that Independence hoss-thief over thar--that feller with th' raw meat face, that _this_ youngster gave him. From th' way he's lookin' thar ain't no tellin' how this hyar party is goin' ter bust up."

The second plainsman nodded and after a moment dropped his pipe on the floor. He shifted in his chair as he reached down for it and when he sat up again he was in a little different position, and not a thing at Schoolcraft's table escaped his eyes.

"I'll take th' greaser 'longside him," muttered the third plainsman. "W'ich is a plain duty an' a pleasure. Bet ye a plew I nail him atween his eyes, fust crack, if he gits hostile."

Suddenly there came a loud smack as Uncle Joe's left hand smashed down on the cards in Stevens' hand, holding them against the table while his right hand flashed under the partly buttoned edge of his long frock coat. It hung there, struggling with something in the inside pocket. Stevens had jerked his own hand loose, relinquishing the cards, and with the sharp motion a small, compact percussion pistol slid out of his sleeve and into his grasp as his hand stopped. He was continuing the motion, swinging the weapon up and forward when Tom, leaning suddenly forward in his chair, sent his heavy skinning knife flashing through the air. The first trapper had thrown a pistol down on the gambler's partner, the second stopped Ephriam Schoolcraft's attempted draw against Tom, and the third plainsman was peering eagerly along the barrel of his pistol at a spot between the Mexican's eyes. Had it been a well rehearsed act things could not have happened quicker or smoother.

Not five other persons in the cabin had any intimation of what was coming until Tom's knife, flying butt first through the air, knocked the pistol from Stevens' hand. The weapon struck the floor and exploded, the bullet passing through a cabin window. As the knife left his hand the thrower had leaped after it and he grabbed the desperate gambler in a grip against which it was useless to struggle. Uncle Joe, loosening his hold on the pocket pistol tangled in the lining of his coat, leaped around the table and quickly passed his hands over the clothing of the prisoner.

"What's th' trouble here?" demanded the quick, authoritative voice of the captain as he ran in from the deck. "Who fired that shot, an' why?"

He soon was made familiar with the whole affair and stepped to the table, picked up the cards and spread them for everyone to see. Asking a few questions of disinterested eye-witnesses, he looked about the cabin and spoke.

"I've nothing to say about gambling on this boat as long as gentlemen play," he said sharply. "When the play is crooked, _I_ take a hand. I can't overlook this." He motioned to the group of boat hands crowding about the door and they took hold of Stevens and his partner. "Take these men and get their effects, and then put them ashore in the yawl. I'll have provisions put aboard while you're gone. Stevens, due south not many miles is the St. Louis-Independence wagon road. It is heavily traveled this time of the year. You can't miss it. Besides that there are numerous cabins scattered about the bottoms, and not far upstream is a settlement. Take 'em away." Glancing over the cabin again and letting his eyes rest for a moment on Ephriam Schoolcraft, he wheeled and started for the door, but paused as he reached it. "If there's any further trouble I'll be on the hurricane deck, for'rd. We're going to run all night if we can. I don't want any more disturbance on this packet."

As the captain left, Uncle Joe thanked Tom and the trappers and joined them at their table, providing the refreshment most liked by the plainsmen, and the reminiscences became so interesting that the little group scarcely noticed Tom arise and leave it. He was too restless to stay indoors and soon found a place to his liking on the deck below, near the bow, where he paced to and fro in the darkness, wrestling with a tumult of hopes and fears. Reaching one end of his beat, he wheeled and started back again, and as he passed the cabin door he suddenly stopped and peered at the figure framed in the opening, and tore off his hat, too surprised to speak.

"Mr. Boyd?" came a soft, inquiring, and anxious voice.

"Yes, Miss Cooper; but I thought you were fast asleep long ago!"

"I was," she replied; "but something that sounded like a shot awakened me, and thinking that it seemed to come from the card tables, I became fearful and dressed as hurriedly as I could in the dark. Is--is Uncle Joe--all right?"

"In good health, good company, and in the best of spirits," replied Tom, smiling at how the last word might be interpreted. "I left him only a moment ago, swapping tales with some trappers."

"But the shot. Surely it _was_ a shot that awakened me?"

Tom chuckled. "Sleeve pistol fell to the floor and went off accidentally," he explained. "Luckily no one was hurt, for the ball passed out of a window and went over the river. Are you warm enough? This wind is cutting." At her assent he took a step forward. "I'll see you to your room if you wish."

"I'm too wide awake now to sleep for awhile," she replied, joining him. "Didn't the boat stop?"

"Yes; two passengers went ashore in the yawl," he answered. "These packets are certainly accommodating and deserve patronage. Why, Miss Cooper, you're shivering! Are you sure you are warm enough?"

"Yes," she answered. "Something is bothering me. I don't know what it is. I wish we were at Independence though. Day and night this river fascinates me and almost frightens me. It is so swift, so treacherous, so changeful. It reminds me of some great cat, slipping through a jungle; and I can't throw the feeling off. If you don't mind, I'll join you in your sentry-go, you seem to give me the assurance I lack; but perhaps I'll interfere with your thoughts?"

"Hardly that," he laughed, thrilling as she took his arm for safety against stumbles in the dark. "You stimulate them, instead. I really was pacing off a fit of restlessness; but it's gone now. Look here; I wonder if you fully realize the certain hardships and probable dangers of the overland journey you are about to make?"

"Perfectly, Mr. Boyd," she answered, quietly. "You'll find me a different person on land. I underestimate nothing, but hope for the best. From little things I've picked up here and there I really believe that the dangers of the trail will be incidental when compared with those at the other end--at Santa Fe. I have reason to believe that father has had a great deal of trouble, along with other Americans, with Governor Armijo. Why is it that American citizens are insulted with impunity by Mexican officials? I understand that an Englishman may safely travel from one end of Mexico to the other, secure from annoyance, unless it be at the hands of Indians over whom the government exercises but little control."

"It's a universal complaint along the frontier," he replied. "It seems to be the policy of this country to avoid hurting the sensibilities of any vicious officialdom or ignorant populace. We seem to prefer to have our citizens harassed, insulted, and denied justice, rather than assert unequivocally that the flag goes in spirit with every one of us so long as we obey the laws of any country we are in. If it were not for the banding together of the American traders and merchants in Santa Fe, it would be very hazardous for an American to remain there. Armijo has had a few clashes with our people and is beginning to have a little respect for their determination and ability to defend their rights. Since the sufferings of the Texans have become known, there are any number of Americans in frontier garb who would cheerfully choke him to death. It would be a godsend to the New Mexican people if----"

There came a terrific crash, the boat stopped suddenly and the deck arose under their feet as a huge log smashed up through it. They were torn apart and thrown down, and as Tom scrambled to his feet, calling his companion's name, he felt a great relief surge through him as he heard her answer.

Chapter VII

The Wrecking Of The Missouri Belle

Tom grasped his companion's arm and hurried her toward the place where the yawl was tied as shouts, curses, tearing wood and a panic-stricken crowd of passengers pouring out of the cabins and rooms turned the night into a pandemonium, over which the hysterical blasts of the whistle bellowed its raucous calls for help far and wide across water and land. There came a rush of feet and several groups of passengers dashed toward the yawl, but stopped abruptly and hesitated as the Colt in Tom's hand glinted coldly in the soft light of a cabin win