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The Silver Canyon: A Tale of the Western Plains, a fiction by George Manville Fenn |
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Chapter 39. The End Of The Race |
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_ CHAPTER THIRTY NINE. THE END OF THE RACE Bart had the advantage of his enemies in this, that as long as he could keep well out of sight across the plains, he could go on as fast as his horse could gallop, while they had to cautiously track his every step. Then, too, when he came to dry, rocky, or stony portions, he took advantage thereof, for he knew that his horse's hoof-prints would be indistinct, and sometimes disappear altogether. These portions of the trail gave the Apaches endless difficulty, but they kept on tracking him step by step, and one slip on the lad's part would have been fatal. Fortune favoured him, though, and he pressed on, hitting the backward route pretty accurately, and recognising the various mountains and hills they had passed under the Beaver's guidance; and every stride taken by the untiring little horse had its effect upon the lad, for it was one nearer to safety. Still it was a terrible ride, for it was only after traversing some stony plain or patch of rock that he dared draw rein and take a few hours' rest, while his steed fed and recruited its energies as well. He would lie down merely meaning to rest, and then drop off fast asleep, to awake in an agony of dread, tighten his saddle-girths, and go on again at speed, gazing fearfully behind him, expecting to see the Apaches ready to spring upon him and end his career. But they were still, though he knew it not, far behind. All the same, though, they kept up their untiring tracking of the trail day after day till it was too dark to see, and the moment it was light enough to distinguish a footprint they were after him again. Such a pertinacious quest could apparently have but one result--that of the quarry of these wolves being hunted down at last. The days glided by, and Bart's store of provisions held out, for he could hardly eat, only drink with avidity whenever he reached water. The terrible strain had made his face thin and haggard, his eyes bloodshot, and his hands trembled as he grasped the rein--not from fear, but from nervous excitement consequent upon the little sleep he obtained, his want of regular food, and the feeling of certainty that he was being dogged by his untiring foes. Sometimes to rest himself--a strange kind of rest, it may be said, and yet it did give him great relief--he would spring from Black Boy's back, and walk by his side as he toiled up some rough slope, talking to him and encouraging him with pats of the hand, when the willing little creature strove again with all its might on being mounted; in fact, instead of having to whip and spur, Bart found more occasion to hold in his patient little steed. And so the time went on, till it was as in a dream that Bart recognised the various halting-places they had stayed at in the journey out, while the distance seemed to have become indefinitely prolonged. All the while, too, there was that terrible nightmare-like dread haunting him that the enemy were close behind, and scores of times some deer or other animal was magnified into a mounted Indian in full war-paint ready to bound upon his prey. It was a terrible journey--terrible in its loneliness as well as in its real and imaginary dangers; for there was a good deal of fancied dread towards the latter part of the time, when Bart had reached a point where the Apaches gave up their chase, civilisation being too near at hand for them to venture farther. On two occasions, though, the lad was in deadly peril; once when, growing impatient, the Apaches, in hunting fashion, had made a cast or two to recover the trail they had lost, galloping on some miles, and taking it up again pretty close to where Bart had been resting again somewhat too long for safety, though far from being long enough to recoup the losses he had sustained. The next time was under similar circumstances, the Apaches picking up the sign of his having passed over the plain close beside a patch of rising ground, where he had been tempted into shooting a prong-horn antelope, lighting a fire, and making a hearty meal, of which he stood sadly in need. The meal ended, a feeling of drowsiness came over the feaster, and this time Bart did not yield to it, for he felt that he must place many more miles behind him before it grew dark; so, rolling up the horse-hair lariat by which Black Boy had been tethered, once again he tightened the girths, and was just giving his final look round before mounting, congratulating himself with the thought that he had enough good roasted venison to last him for a couple more days, when his horse pricked his ears and uttered an impatient snort. Just at the same moment there was the heavy thud, thud, thud, of horses' hoofs, and, without stopping to look, Bart swung himself up on his horse's back and urged him forward with hand, heel, and voice. The plain before him was as level as a meadow, not a stone being in sight for miles, so that unless the cob should put his foot in some burrow, there was nothing to hinder his racing off and escaping by sheer speed. There was this advantage too: Black Boy had been having a good rest and feed, while the pursuers had doubtless been making a long effort to overtake him. The Apaches set up a furious yell as they caught sight of their prey, and urged on their horses, drawing so near before Bart could get anything like a good speed on, that they were not more than fifty yards behind, and thundering along as fast as they could urge their ponies. This went on for half a mile, Bart feeling as if his heart was in his mouth, and that the chances of escape were all over; but somehow, in spite of the terrible peril he was in, he thought more about the Doctor and the fate of his expedition than he did of his own. For it seemed so terrible that his old friend and guardian--one who had behaved to him almost as a father should be waiting there day after day expecting help in vain, and perhaps thinking that his messenger had failed to do his duty. "No, he won't, nor Joses neither, think that of me," muttered Bart. "I wish the Beaver were here to cheer one up a bit, as he did that other time when these bloodthirsty demons were after us." "How their ponies can go!" he panted, as he turned his head to gaze back at the fierce savages, who tore along with feathers and long hair streaming behind them, as wild and rugged as the manes and tails of their ponies. As they saw him look round, the Apaches uttered a tremendous yell, intended to intimidate him. It was just as he had begun to fancy that Black Boy was flagging, and that, though no faster, the Indians' ponies were harder and more enduring; but, at the sound of that yell and the following shouts of the insatiate demons who tore on in his wake, the little black cob gathered itself together, gave three or four tremendous bounds, stretched out racing fashion, and went away at a speed that astonished his rider as much as it did the savages, who began to fire at them now, bullet after bullet whizzing by as they continued their headlong flight. The sound of the firing, too, had its effect on Black Boy, whose ear was still sore from the effect of the bullet that had passed through it, and he tore away more furiously than ever, till, finding that the Indians were losing ground, Bart eased up a little, but only to let the cob go again, for he was fretting at being held in, and two or three times a bullet came in pretty close proximity to their heads. When night fell, the Apaches were on the other side of a long low ridge, down whose near slope the cob had come at a tremendous rate; and now that the Indians would not be able to follow him for some hours to come either by sight or trail, Bart altered his course, feeling sure that he could save ground by going to the right instead of to the left of the mountain-clump before him; and for the next few hours he breathed more freely, though he dared not stop to rest. The next day he saw nothing of his pursuers, and the next they were pursuers no longer, but Bart knew it not, flying still for his life, though he was now in the region that would be swept by the lancers of the Government. He did not draw rein till the light-coloured houses of the town were well within sight, and then he was too much excited to do more than ease up into a canter, for his nerves were all on the strain, his cheeks sunken, and his eyes starting and dull from exhaustion. But there was the town at last, looking indistinct, though, and misty. All seemed to be like a dream now, and the crowd of swarthy, ragged Mexicans in their blankets, sombreros, and rugs were all part of his dream, too, as with his last effort he thrust his hand into his breast, and took out the letter of which he was the bearer. Then it seemed to him that, as he cantered through the crowd, with his cob throwing up the dust of the plaza, it was some one else who waved a letter over his head, shouting, "The governor! the governor!" to the swarthy staring mob; and, lastly, that it was somebody else who, worn out with exhaustion now that the task was done, felt as if everything had gone from him, every nerve and fibre had become relaxed, and fell heavily from the cob he rode into the dust. _ |
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