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Read Ebook: The Talking Leaves: An Indian Story by Stoddard William O
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Ebook has 2455 lines and 69301 words, and 50 pages
So it came to pass that before the warriors had completed their task the two girls had struck the trail along which the blue-coated cavalry had entered the valley.
"Rita, I see something."
"What is it?"
"Come! See! Away yonder."
Rita's eyes were as good as anybody's, always excepting Apaches' and eagles', and she could see the white fluttering object at which her adopted sister was pointing.
The marks of the wheels and all the other signs of that trail, as they rode along, were quite enough to excite a pair of young ladies who had never seen a road, a pavement, a sidewalk, or anything of the sort; but when they came to that white thing fluttering at the foot of a mesquite-bush they both sprung from their saddles at the same instant.
One, two, three--a good deal dog's-eared and thumb-worn, for they had been read by every man of the white party who cared to read them before they were thrown away, but they were very wonderful yet. Nothing of the kind had ever before been imported into that region of the country.
Ni-ha-be's keen black eyes searched them in vain, one after another, for anything she had ever seen before.
"Rita, you are born white. What are they?"
Poor Rita!
Millions and millions of girls have been "born white," and lived and died with whiter faces than her own rosy but sun-browned beauty could boast, and yet never looked into the fascinating pages of an illustrated magazine.
How could any human being have cast away in the wilderness such a treasure?
Rita was sitting on the grass, with one of the strange prizes open in her lap, rapidly turning the leaves, and more excited by what she saw than were Many Bears and his braves by all they were discovering upon the trampled level around the spring.
"Rita," again exclaimed Ni-ha-be, "what are they?"
"They are talking leaves," said Rita.
"Did you say, Murray, there were any higher mountains than these?"
"Higher'n these? Why, Steve, the mountains we crossed away back there, just this side of the Texas border, were twice as high, some of them."
"These are big enough. Are there any higher mountains in the world than ours? Did you ever see any?"
"I've seen some of them. I've heard it said the tallest are in India. South America can beat us. I've seen the Andes."
"I don't want to see anything that looks worse to climb than this range right ahead of us."
"Where the Apaches got through, Steve, we can. They're only a hunting-party, too."
"More warriors than we have."
"Only Apaches, Steve. Ours are Lipans. There's a big difference in that, I tell you."
"The Lipans are your friends."
"Yours too, and you must let them think you are their friend--strong. The Apaches are everybody's enemies--mine, yours--only fit to be killed off."
"You've killed some of 'em."
"Not so many as I mean to kill. That's one thing I'm on this trip for. Old Two Knives would almost have given it up if it hadn't been for me."
"I don't feel that way about the Lipans if they did capture me. All I want of them is to get away and go back to the settlements."
"Maybe your folks won't know you when you come."
Steve looked down at his fine muscular form from limb to limb, while the stern, wrinkled face of his companion almost put on a smile.
"I'd have to wash, that's a fact."
"Get off your war-paint. Put on some white men's clothing. Cut your hair."
"They'd know me then."
"You've grown a head taller since you was captured, and they've made a Lipan of you all over but in two places."
"What are they?"
"Your eyes and hair. They're as light as mine were when I was of your age."
"I'm not a Lipan inside, Murray, nor any other kind of Indian. It would take more than three years to do that."
"I've been among 'em seven. But then I never would paint."
The sun and the wind had painted him darkly enough; and if his hair had once been "light," it was now as white as the tops of the mountains he and Steve had been looking at.
Behind them, on a barren sandy level, through which ran a narrow stream of ice-cold water, about three-score of wild-looking human beings were dismounted, almost in a circle, each holding the end of a long "lariat" of strong hide, at the other end of which was a horse.
Some seemed to have two and even three horses, as if they were on an errand which might use up one and call for another. That was quite likely, for Lipan warriors are terribly hard riders.
Those who had now but one horse had probably worn out their first mount and turned him adrift by the way-side, to be picked up, Indian fashion, on the way home.
When a plains Indian leaves a horse in that way, and does not find him again, he tries his best to find some other man's horse to take his place.
More than sixty Indian warriors, all in their war-paint, armed to the teeth, with knives, revolvers, repeating-rifles of the best and latest patterns, and each carrying a long steel-headed Mexican lance.
Not a bow or arrow or war-club among them. All such weapons belong to the old, old times, or to poor, miserable, second-rate Indians, who cannot buy anything better. The fierce and haughty Lipans and Comanches, and other warlike tribes, insist on being armed as well as the United States troops, and even better.
What could a cavalryman do with a lance?
About as much as an Indian with a sword; for that is one weapon the red men could never learn the use of, from King Philip's day to this.
It was luncheon-time with that Lipan war-party, and they were hard at work on their supplies of dried venison and cold roast buffalo-meat.
Their halt would not be a long one in a spot where there was no grass for their horses, but they could hold a council while they were eating, and they could listen to a speech from the short, broad, ugly-looking old chief who now stood in the middle of the circle.
"To-la-go-to-de will not go back now till he has struck the Apaches. He has come too far. The squaws of his village would laugh at him if he rode through the mountains and came back to them with empty hands."
That was the substance of his address, put again and again in different shapes, and it seemed to meet the approval of his listeners.
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