Chapter 2: The Silver Bullet

The village, the largest belonging to the Wyandots, the smallest, but most warlike of the valley tribes, lay in a warm hollow, and it did not consist of more than a hundred and fifty skin tepees and log cabins. But it was intended to be of a permanent nature, else a part of its houses would not have been of wood. There was also about it a considerable area of cleared land where the squaws raised corn and pumpkins. A fine creek flowed at the eastern edge of the clearing. Henry and his comrades paused, where the line of forest met the open, and watched the progress of the army across the cleared ground. Everybody in the village, it seemed, was coming forward to meet the chief, the warriors first and then the old men, squaws and children, all alive with interest.

Timmendiquas strode ahead, his tall figure seeming taller in the light of the torches. But it was no triumphant return for him. Suddenly he uttered a long quavering cry which was taken up by those who followed him. Then the people in the village joined in the wail, and it came over and over again from the multitude. It was inexpressibly mournful and the dark forest gave it back in weird echoes. The procession poured on in a great horde toward the village, but the cry, full of grief and lament still came back.

“They are mournin’ for the warriors lost in the East,” said Tom Ross. “I reckon that after Wyomin’ an’ Chemung, Timmendiquas wasn’t able to bring back more than half his men.”

“If the Wyandots lost so many in trying to help the Iroquois, won’t that fact be likely to break up the big Indian league?” asked Paul.

Tom Ross shook his head, but Henry answered in words:

“No, the Indians, especially the chiefs, are inflamed more than ever by their losses. Moreover, as Timmendiquas has seen how the allied Six Nations themselves could not hold back the white power, he will be all the more anxious to strike us hard in the valley.”

“I’ve a notion,” said Shif’less Sol, “that bands o’ the Iroquois, ‘specially the Mohawks, may come out here, an’ try to do fur Timmendiquas what he tried to do fur them. The savages used to fight ag’in’ one another, but I think they are now united ag’in’ us, on an’ off, all the way from the Atlantic to the Great Plains.”

“Guess you’re right, Sol,” said Long Jim, “but ez fur me, jest now I want to sleep. We had a purty hard march to-day. Besides walkin’ we had to be watchin’ always to see that our scalps were still on our heads, an’ that’s a purty wearyin’ combination.”

“I speak for all, and all are with you,” said Paul, so briskly that the others laughed.

“Any snug place that is well hid will do,” said Henry, “and as the forest is so thick I don’t think it will take us long to find it.”

They turned southward, and went at least three miles through heavy woods and dense thickets. All they wanted was a fairly smooth spot with the bushes growing high above them, and, as Henry had predicted, they quickly found it--a small depression well grown with bushes and weeds, but with an open space in the center where some great animal, probably a buffalo had wallowed. They lay down in this dry sandy spot, rolled in their blankets, and felt so secure that they sought sleep without leaving anyone to watch.

Henry was the first to awake. The dawn was cold and he shivered a little when he unrolled himself from his blanket. The sun showed golden in the east, but the west was still dusky. He looked for a moment or two at his four friends, lying as still as if they were dead. Then he stretched his muscles, and beat his arms across his chest to drive away the frost of the morning that had crept into his blood. Shif’less Sol yawned and awoke and the others did likewise, one by one.

“Cold mornin’ fur this time o’ year,” said Shif’less Sol. “Jim, light the fire an’ cook breakfast an’ the fust thing I want is a good hot cup o’ coffee.”

“Wish I could light a fire,” said Long Jim, “an’ then I could give you a cup shore ‘nuff. I’ve got a little pot an’ a tin cup inside an’ three pounds o’ ground coffee in my pack. I brought it from the boat, thinkin’ you fellers would want it afore long.”

“What do you say, Henry?” asked Shif’less Sol. “Coffee would be pow’ful warmin’. None o’ us hez tasted anything but cold vittles for more’n a day now. Let’s take the chances on it.”

Henry hesitated but the chill was still in his blood and he yielded. Besides the risk was not great.

“All right,” he said; “gather dead wood and we’ll be as quick about it as we can.”

The wood was ready in a minute. Tom Ross whittled off shavings with his knife. Shif’less Sol set fire to them with flint and steel. In a few minutes something was bubbling inside Jim Hart’s coffee pot, and sending out a glorious odor.

Shif’less Sol sniffed the odor.

“I’m growin’ younger,” he said. “I’m at least two years younger than I wuz when I woke up. I wish to return thanks right now to the old Greek feller who invented fire. What did you say his name was, Paul?”

“Prometheus. He didn’t invent fire, Sol, but according to the story he brought it down from the heavens.”

“It’s all the same,” said the shiftless one as he looked attentively at the steaming coffee pot. “I guess it wuz about the most useful trip Promethy ever made when he brought that fire down.”

Everyone in turn drank from the cup. They also heated their dried venison over the coals, and, as they ate and drank, they felt fresh strength pouring into every vein. When the pot was empty Jim put it on the ground to cool, and as he scattered the coals of fire with a kick, Henry, who was sitting about a yard away suddenly lay flat and put his ear to the earth.

“Do you hear anything, Henry?” asked Shif’less Sol, who knew the meaning of the action.

“I thought I heard the bark of a dog,” replied Henry, “but I was not sure before I put my ear to the ground that it was not imagination. Now I know it’s truth. I can hear the barking distinctly, and it is coming this way.”

“Some o’ them ornery yellow curs hev picked up our trail,” said Shif’less Sol, “an’ o’ course the warriors will follow.”

“Which, I take it, means that it is time for us to move from our present abode,” said Paul.

Long Jim hastily thrust the coffee pot, not yet cold, and the cup back into his pack, and they went towards the South at a gait that was half a run and half a walk, easy but swift.

“This ain’t a flight,” said Shif’less Sol. “It’s just a masterly retreat. But I’ll tell you, boys, I don’t like to run away from dogs. It humiliates me to run from a brute, an’ an inferior. Hark to their barkin’.”

They now heard the baying of the dogs distinctly, a long wailing cry like the howling of hounds. The note of it was most ominous to Paul’s sensitive mind. In the mythology that he had read, dogs played a great rôle, nearly always as the enemy of man. There were Cerberus and the others, and flitting visions of them passed through his mind now. He was aware, too, that the reality was not greatly inferior to his fancies. The dogs could follow them anywhere, and the accidental picking-up of their trail might destroy them all.

The five went on in silence, so far as they were concerned, for a long time, but the baying behind them never ceased. It also grew louder, and Henry, glancing hastily back, expected that the dogs would soon come into sight.

“Judging from their barking, the Wyandots must love dogs of uncommon size and fierceness,” he said.

“‘Pears likely to me,” said Shif’less Sol. “We’re good runners, all five o’ us. We’ve shaken the warriors off, but not the dogs.”

“It’s just as you say,” said Henry. “We can’t run on forever, so we must shoot the trailers--that is--the dogs. Listen to them. They are not more than a couple of hundred yards away now.”

They crossed a little open space, leaped a brook and then entered the woods again. But at a signal from Henry, they stopped a few yards further on.

“Now, boys,” he said, “be ready with your rifles. We must stop these dogs. How many do you think they are, Tom?”

“‘Bout four, I reckon.”

“Then the moment they come into the open space, Tom, you and Paul and Jim shoot at those on the left, and Sol and I will take the right.”

The Indian dogs sprang into the open space and five rifles cracked together. Three of them--they were four in number, as Tom had said--were killed instantly, but the fourth sprang aside into the bushes, where he remained. The five at once reloaded their rifles as they ran. Now they increased their speed, hoping to shake off their pursuers. Behind them rose a long, fierce howl, like a note of grief and revenge.

“That’s the dog we did not kill,” said Paul, “and he’s going to hang on.”

“I’ve heard tell,” said Tom Ross, “that ‘cordin’ to the Indian belief, the souls o’ dead warriors sometimes get into dogs an’ other animals, an’ it ain’t fur me to say that it ain’t true. Mebbe it’s really a dead Injun, ‘stead o’ a live dog that’s leadin’ the warriors on.”

Paul shuddered. Tom’s weird theory chimed in with his own feelings. The fourth dog, the one that had hid from the bullets, was a phantom, leading the savages on to vengeance for his dead comrades. Now and then he still bayed as he kept the trail, but the fleeing five sought in vain to make him a target for their bullets. Seemingly, he had profited by the death of his comrades, as his body never showed once among the foliage. Search as they would with the sharpest of eyes, none of the five could catch the faintest glimpse of him.

“He’s a ghost, shore,” said Tom Ross. “No real, ordinary dog would keep under cover that way. I reckon we couldn’t kill him if we hit him, ‘less we had a silver bullet.”

The savages themselves uttered the war cry only two or three times, but it was enough to show that with the aid of the dog they followed relentlessly. The situation of the five had become alarming to the last degree. They had intended to pursue, not to be pursued. Now they were fleeing for their lives, and there would be no escape, unless they could shake off the most terrible of all that followed--the dog. And at least one of their number, Silent Tom Ross, was convinced thoroughly that the dog could not be killed, unless they had the unobtainable--a silver bullet. In moments of danger, superstition can take a strong hold, and Paul too, felt a cold chill at his heart.

Their course now took them through a rolling country, clad heavily in forest, but without much undergrowth, and they made good speed. They came to numerous brooks, and sometimes they waded in them a little distance, but they did not have much confidence in this familiar device. It might shake off the warriors for a while, but not that terrible dog which, directed by the Indians, would run along the bank and pick up the trail again in a few seconds. Yet hope rose once. For a long time they heard neither bark nor war cry, and they paused under the branches of a great oak. They were not really tired, as they had run at an easy gait, but they were too wise to let pass a chance for rest. Henry was hopeful that in some manner they had shaken off the dog, but there was no such belief in the heart of the silent one. Tom Ross had taken out his hunting knife and with his back to the others was cutting at something. Henry gave him a quick glance, but he did not deem it wise to ask him anything. The next moment, all thought of Tom was put out of his mind by the deep baying of the dog coming down through the forest.

The single sound, rising and swelling after the long silence was uncanny and terrifying. The face of Tom Ross turned absolutely pale through the tan of many years. Henry himself could not repress a shudder.

“We must run for it again,” he said. “We could stay and fight, of course, but it’s likely that the Indians are in large numbers.”

“If we could only shake off the hound,” muttered Tom Ross. “Did you pay ‘tention to his voice then, Henry? Did you notice how deep it was? I tell you that ain’t no common dog.”

Henry nodded and they swung once more into flight. But he and Shif’less Sol, the best two marksmen on the border, dropped to the rear.