Lahoma

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This etext was prepared by Pat Pflieger

LAHOMA

by John Breckenridge Ellis

CHAPTER I
THE TOUCH OF A CHILD

"I have given my word of honor--my sacred oath--not to betray what
I have discovered here."

At these words from the prisoner, a shout arose in which oaths and
mocking laughter mingled like the growling and snapping of hunger-
maddened wolves.

"Then if I must die," Gledware cried, his voice, in its shrill
excitement, dominating the ferocious insults of the ruffians, "don't
kill the child--you see she is asleep--and she's so young--only
five. Even if she were awake, she wouldn't know how to tell about
this cabin. For God's sake, don't kill the little girl!"

Since the seizure of Gledware, the child had been lying on the rude
table in the midst of a greasy pack of cards--cards that had been
thrown down at the sound of his galloping horse. The table
supported, also, much of the booty captured from the wagon-train,
while on the dirt floor beside it were prizes of the freebooting
expedition, too large to find resting-place on the boards. Nor was
this all. Mingled with stolen garments, cans and boxes of
provisions, purses and bags of gold, were the Indian disguises in
which the highwaymen from No-Man's Land had descended on the
prairie-schooners on their tedious journey from Abilene, Kansas,
toward the Southwest.

In the midst of this confusion of disguises, booty and
playing-cards, surrounded by cruel and sensual faces, the child
slept soundly, her lips slightly parted, her cheeks delicately
flushed, her face eloquent in its appeal of helplessness, innocence
and beauty. One of the band, a tall broad-shouldered man of
middle-age, with an immense quantity of whiskers perhaps worn as a
visible sign of inward wildness, was, despite his hardened nature,
moved to remonstrance. Under cover of lurid oaths and outrageous
obscenity, he advanced his opinion that "the kid" needn't be shot
just because her father was a sneak-jug spy.

"Shut up!" roared a tremendous voice, not directly to the
intercessor, or to the prisoner, but to all present. Evidently it
was a voice of authority, for comparative silence followed the
command. The speaker stepped forward, thrust his fingers through
his intensely red shock of hair, and continued, with one leg thrust
forward:

"You know I am something of an orator, or I guess you wouldn't of
made me your leader. Now, as long as I'm your leader, I'm going to
lead; but, I ain't never unreasonable, and when talk is needed, I'm
copious enough. I am called 'Red Kimball,' and my brother yonder,
he is knowed as 'Kansas Kimball.' What else is knowed of us is
this: that we wasn't never wont to turn loose a spy when once
ketched. Here is a man who says he is Henry Gledware--though God
knows if that's so; he comes galloping up to the door just as we are
in the midst of a game. I stakes all my share of the spoils on the
game, and Brick Willock is in a fair way to win it, that I admit,
but in comes this here spy--"

The prisoner in a frenzied voice disclaimed any purpose of spying.
That morning, he had driven the last wagon of the train, containing
his invalid wife and his stepdaughter--for the child lying on the
table was his wife's daughter. At the alarm that the first wagon
had been attacked by Indians, he had turned about his horses and
driven furiously over the prairie, he knew not whither. All that
day he had fled, seeing no one, hearing no pursuing horse-beat. At
night his wife, unable, in her weak condition, to sustain the
terrible jolting, had expired. Taking nothing from the wagon but
his saddle, he had mounted one of the horses with the child before
him, and had continued his flight, the terrific wind at his back.
Unaware that the wind had changed, he had traversed horseback much
of the distance traveled during the day, and at about two in the
morning--that is to say, about all hour ago--seeing a light, he had
ridden straight toward it, to find shelter from the storm.

The prisoner narrated all this in nervous haste, though he had
already given every particular, time and again. His form as well
as his voice trembled with undisguised terror, and indeed, the red
and cruel eyes fastened contemptuously on him might have caused a
much braver man than Gledware to shudder visibly.

"Well, pard," said the leader of the band, waiting until he had
finished, "you can't never claim that you ain't been given your say,
for I do admire free speech. I want to address you reasonable, and
make this plain and simple, as only a man that has been alleged to
be something of an orator can accomplish. My men and me has had our
conference, and it's decided that both of you has got to be shot,
and immediate. The reasons is none but what a sensible man must
admit, and such I take you to be. I am sorry this has happened, and
so is my men, and we wish you well. It's a hard saying, pard, but
whatever your intentions, a spy you have proved. For what do you
find on busting open our door? Here we sit playing with our booty
for stakes, and our Indian togs lying all about. You couldn't help
knowing that we was the 'Indians' that gutted them wagons and put
up the fight that left every man and woman dead on the field except
that there last wagon you are telling us about. You might wish you
didn't know the same, but once knowed, we ain't going to let you
loose. As to that wagon you claim to have stole away from under our
very noses--"

A skeptical laugh burst from the listeners.

Gledware eagerly declared that if he had the remotest idea in what
direction it had been left, he would be glad to lead them to the
spot. He could describe it and its contents--

"You see, pard," Red Kimball interposed, "you are everlasting losing
sight of the point. This here is 1880, which I may say is a recent
date. Time was when a fellow could live in Cimarron, and come and
go free and no questions asked--and none answered. But civilization
is a-pressing us hard, and these days is not our fathers' days. We
are pretty independent even yet in old Cimarron, but busybodies has
got together trying to make it a regular United States territory,
and they ain't going to stand for a real out-and-out band of
highwaymen such as used to levy on stage-coaches and wagon-trains
without exciting no more remarks than the buffaloes. You may be
sorry times is changed; so am I; but if times IS fresh, we might as
well look 'em in the face. Us fellows has been operating for some
years, but whatever we do is blamed on the Indians. That there is
a secret that would ruin our business, if it got out. Tomorrow, a
gang of white men will be depredating in the Washita country to get
revenge for today's massacre, and me and my men couldn't join in the
fun with easy consciences if we knowed you was somewheres loose, to
tell your story."

Again Gledware protested that he would never betray the band.

"Oh, cut this short," interposed Kansas Kimball, with an oath.
"Daylight will catch us and nothing done, if we listen to that
white-livered spy. We don't believe in that wagon he talks about,
and as for this kid, he brought her along just to save his bacon."

"No, as God lives!" cried Gledware. "Can't you see she is dead for
sleep? She was terrified out of her wits all day, and I've ridden
with her all night. Don't kill her, men--" He turned impassioned
eyes on the leader. "Look at her--so young--so unsuspecting-- you
can't have the heart to murder a child like that in cold blood."

"Right you are!" exclaimed the man with the ferocious whiskers--he
who had been spoken of as Brick Willock. "You'll have to go, pard,
but I'm against killing infants."

The leader darted an angry glance at the man who, but for the
untoward arrival of Gledware, would have won from him his share of
the booty. But his voice was smooth and pleasant as he resumed:
"Yes, pard, the kid must die. We couldn't do nothing with her, and
if we left her on some door-step, she's sure old enough, and she
looks full sharp enough, to tell sufficient to trammel us good and
plenty. If we sets her loose in the prairie, she'd starve to death
if not found--and if found, it would settle our case. And as Kansas
says, this debate must close, or daylight will catch us."

Brick Willock, with terrible oaths, again expressed himself as
strongly opposed to this decision.

"Well, Brick," said Red, with a sneer, "do YOU want to take the kid
and raise her, yourself? We've either got to do away with her, or
keep her hid. Do YOU want to be her nurse, and keep with her in
some cave or other while we go foraging?"

Willock muttered deep in his throat, while his companions laughed
disdainfully.

"We've had enough of this!" Red declared, his voice suddenly grown
hard and cold. "Kansas, take the prisoner; Brick Willock, as you're
so fond of the kid, you can carry HER." He opened the door and a
rush of wind extinguished the candle. There was silence while it
was being relighted. The flickering light, reddening to a steady
glow, revealed no mercy on the scowling countenances about the
table, and no shadow of presentiment on that of the still
unconscious child.

Red went outside and waited till his brother had drawn forth the
quivering man, and Brick Willock had carried out the girl. Then he
looked back into the room. "You fellows can stay in here," he said
authoritatively. "What we've got to do ain't any easier with a lot
of men standing about, looking on."

The man who had relighted the candle, and who crouched to shield it
with a hairy hand from the gust, nodded approval. His friends were
already gathering together the cards to lose in the excitement of
gambling consciousness of what was about to be done. Red closed
the door on the scene, and turned to face the light.

The wind came in furious gusts, with brief intervals of calm. There
were no clouds, however, and the moon, which had risen not long
before, made the prairie almost as light as if morning had dawned.
As far as the eye could reach in any direction, nothing was to be
seen but the level ground, the unflecked sky, the cabin and the
little group near the tethered ponies.

Gledware had already been stationed with his face toward the moon,
and Kansas Kimball was calmly examining his pistol. Between them
and the horses, Brick Willock had come to a halt, the little girl
still sleeping in his powerful arms. Red's eagle eye noted that
she had unconsciously slipped an arm about the highwayman's neck,
as if by some instinct she would cling the closer to the only one
in the band of ten who had spoken for her life.

Red scowled heavily. He had not forgiven Willock for beating him
at cards, still less for his persistent opposition to his wishes;
and he now resolved that it should be Willock's hand to deal the
fatal blow. He had been troubled before tonight by insubordination
on the part of this man of bristling whiskers, this knave whose
voice was ever for mercy, if mercy were possible. Why should
Willock have joined men who were without scruple and without shame?
As the leader stared at him sullenly, he reflected that it was just
such natures that fail at the last extremity of hardihood, that
desert comrades in crime, that turn state's evidence. Yes--Willock
would deal the blow, even if Red found it necessary to call all his
men from the cabin to enforce the order.

The captain's fears were not groundless. He would have been much
more alarmed, could he have known the wonderful thoughts that surged
through Willock's brain, and the wonderful emotions that thrilled
his heart, at the warm confiding pressure of the arm about his neck.

CHAPTER II
BRICK MAKES A MOVE

As Kansas Kimball raised his weapon to fire, the man before him
uttered a cry of terror and began to entreat for his life. In the
full light of the dazzling moon, his face showed all the pallor,
all the contortions of a coward who, though believing himself lost,
has not the resolution to mask his fear. He poured forth incoherent
promises of secrecy, ejaculations of despair and frenzied assurances
of innocence.

"Hold on, Kansas!" interposed Red. "There's not a one of the bunch
believes that story about the last wagon getting away, and the dying
wife. We know this Gledware is a spy, whatever he says, and that
he brought the kid along for protection. He knew if we got back to
No-Man's Land we couldn't be touched, not being under no
jurisdiction, and he wanted to find us with our paint and feathers
off. He's a sneaking dog, and a bullet's too good for him. But
--"with an oath--"blessed if he don't hate to die worse than any man
ever I saw! I don't mind to spare him a few minutes if he's
agreeable. I put it to him--would he rather the kid be put out of
the way first, and him afterwards, or does he want the first call?"

"For God's sake, put it off as long as you will!" quavered the
prisoner. "I swear I'm no spy. I swear--"

"This is unpleasant," the captain of the highwaymen interposed.
"Just you say another word, and I'll put daylight into you with my
own hand. Stand there and keep mum, and I'll give you a little
breathing space."

Kansas, not without a sigh of relief, lowered his weapon and looked
questioningly at his brother. The shadow of the log cabin was upon
him, making more sinister his uncouth attire, and his lean
vindictive face under the huge Mexican hat. Gledware, not daring
to move, kept his eyes fixed on that deep gloom out of which at any
moment might spurt forth the red flash of death. From within the
cabin came loud oaths inspired by cards or drink, as if the inmates
would drown any calls for mercy or sounds of execution that might
be abroad in the night.

"Now, Brick Willock," the leader spoke grimly, "take your turn
first. That kid's got to die, and you are to do the trick, and do
it without any foolishness."

"I can't," Willock declared doggedly.

"Oh, yes; yes, you can, Brick. You see, we can't 'tend to no infant
class, and I ain't hard-hearted enough to leave a five-year-old girl
to die of hunger on the prairie; nor do I mean to take her to no
town or stage-station as a card for to be tracked by. Oh, yes, you
can, Brick, and now's the time."

"Red," exclaimed Willock desperately, "I tell you fair, and I tell
you foul, that this little one lives as long as I do."

"And what do you aim to do with her, eh, Brick?"

Willock made no reply. He had formed no plans for his future, or
for that of the child; but his left arm closed more tightly about
her.

"Now, Brick," said Red slowly, "this ain't the first time you have
proved yourself no man for our business, and I call Kansas to
witness you've brought this on yourself--"

Without finishing his sentence, Red swiftly raised his arm and fired
pointblank at Willock's head as it was defined above the sleeping
form. Though famed as an orator, Red understood very well that, at
times, action is everything, and there is death in long speaking.
He was noted as a man who never missed his mark; and in the Cimarron
country, which belonged to no state and therefore to no court,
extensive and deadly had been his practise, without fear of
retribution.

Now, however, his bullet had gone astray. The few words to which
he had treated himself as an introduction to the intended deed had
proved his undoing. They had been enough to warn Willock of what
was coming; and just before Kansas had been called on "to witness,"
that is an instant before Red fired, Willock had sent a bullet
through the threatening wrist. The two detonations were almost
simultaneous, and Red's roar of pain, as he dropped his weapon, rang
out as an accompaniment to the crash of firearms.

The next instant, Willock, with a second shot from his six-shooter,
stretched Kansas on the ground; then, rushing forward with reversed
weapon, he brought the butt down on Red's head with such force as
to deprive him of consciousness. So swift and deadly were his
movements, so wild his appearance as, with long locks streaming in
the wind and huge black whiskers hiding all but glittering eyes,
aquiline nose and a brief space of tough red skin--so much more like
a demon than a man, it was no wonder that the child, awakened by the
firing, screamed with terror at finding her head pressed to his
bosom.

"Come!" Willock called breathlessly to the prisoner who still stood
with his back to the moon, as if horror at what he had just
witnessed rendered him as helpless as he had been from sheer terror.
Still holding the screaming child, he darted to the ponies that were
tied to the projecting logs of the cabin and hastily unfastened two
of the fleetest.

Henry Gledware, awakened as from a trance, bounded to his side.
Willock helped him to mount, then placed the child the saddle in
front of him.

"Ride!" he urged hoarsely, "ride for your life! They ain't no other
chance for you and the kid and they ain't no other chance for me."

He leaped upon the second pony.

"Which way?" faltered Gledware, settling in the saddle and grasping
the bridle, but without the other's practised ease.

"Follow the moon--I'll ride against the wind--more chance for one
of us if we ain't together. Start when I do, for when they hear
the horses they'll be out of that door like so many devils turned
loose on us. Ride, pardner, ride, and save the kid for God's sake!
Now--off we go!"

He gave Gledware's pony a vicious cut with his lariat, and drove
the spurs into his own broncho. The thunder of hoofs as they
plunged in different directions, caused a sudden commotion within
the isolated cabin. The door was flung open, and in the light that
streamed forth, Willock, looking back, saw dark forms rush out,
gather about the prostrate forms of the two brothers, move here and
there in indecision, then, by a common impulse, burst into a
swinging run for the horses.

As for Gledware, he never once turned his face. Urging on his horse
at utmost speed, and clasping the child to his breast, he raced
toward the light. The shadow of horse, man and child, at first long
and black, lessened to a mere speck, then vanished with the rider
beyond the circle of the level world.

CHAPTER III
FLIGHT

Brick Willock, galloping toward the Southeast, frequently looked
back. He saw the desperadoes leap upon their horses, wheel about
in short circles that brought the animals upright, then spring
forward in pursuit. He heard the shouting which, though far away,
sounded the unmistakable accent of ungovernable fury. In the
glaring moonlight, he distinguished plainly the cloud of dust and
sand raised by the horses, which the wind lifted in white shapes
against the deep blue of the sky. And looking beyond his pursuers
toward the rude cabin where the highwaymen had so long held their
rendezvous, he knew, because no animate forms appeared against the
horizon, that the Kimball brothers lay where he had stretched them-
-one, senseless from the crashing blow on his head, the other,
lifeless from the bullet in his breast.

The little girl and her stepfather had vanished from the smooth open
page of the Texas Panhandle--and Brick Willock rejoiced, with a joy
new to him, that these escaped prisoners had not been pursued. It
was himself that the band meant to subject to their savage vengeance,
and himself alone. The murder of the child was abhorrent to their
hearts which had not attained the hardened insensibility of their
leader's conscience, and they were willing for the supposed spy to
escape, since it spared them the embarrassment of disposing of the
little girl.

But Brick Willock had been one of them and he had killed their
leader, and their leader's brother, or at least had brought them to
the verge of death. If Red Kimball revived, he would doubtless
right his own wrongs, should Willock live to be punished. In the
meantime, it was for them to treat with the traitor--this giant of
a Texan, huge-whiskered, slow of speech, who had ever been first to
throw himself into the thick of danger but who had always hung back
from deeds of cruelty. He had plundered coaches and wagon-trains
with them, he had fought with them against strong bodies of emigrants,
he had killed and burned--in the eyes of the world his deeds made him
one of them, and his aspect marked him as the most dangerous of the
band. But they had always felt the difference--and now they meant to
kill him not only because he had overpowered their leader but because
of this difference.

As their bullets pursued him, Willock lay along the body of the
broncho, feeling his steed very small, and himself very large--and
yet, despite the rain of lead, his pleasure over the escape of the
child warmed his heart. The sand was plowed up by his side from
the peppering of bullets--but he seemed to feel that innocent
unconscious arm about his great neck; the yells of rage were in his
ears, but he heard the soft breathing of the little one fast asleep
in the midst of her dangers.

He had selected for himself, and for Gledware, ponies that had often
been run against each other, and which no others of all Red
Kimball's corral could surpass in speed. Gledware and the child
were on the pony that Kimball had once staked against the swiftest
animal the Indians could produce--and Willock rode the pride of the
Indian band, which had almost won the prize. The ponies had been
staked on the issue of that encounter--and the highwaymen had
retained, by right of craft and force, what the government would
not permit its wards to barter or sell.

The race was long but always unequal. The ruffians who had dashed
from the scene of the cabin almost in an even line, scattered and
straggled unevenly; now only two were able to send bullets whistling
about Willock's head; now only one found it possible to cover the
distance. At last even he fell out of range. The Indian pony,
apparently tireless, shot on like an arrow driven into the teeth of
the wind, sending up behind a cloud of dust that stretched backward
toward the baffled pursuers, a long wavering ribbon like a clew left
to guide the band into the mysterious depths of the Great American
Desert.

When the last of the pursuers found further effort useless, he
checked his horse. Willock now sat erect on the broncho's bare
back, lightly clasping the halter. Looking behind, he saw seven
horsemen in varying degrees of remoteness, motionless, doubtless
fixing their wolfish eyes on his fleeing form. As long as he could
distinguish these specks against the sky, they remained stationary.
To his excited imagination they represented a living wall drawn up
between him and the abode of men. Should he ever venture back to
that world, he fancied those seven avengers would be waiting to
receive him with taunts and drawn weapons.

And his conscience told him that the taunts would be merited, for
he had turned traitor, he had failed in the only virtue on which his
fellow criminals prided themselves. Yes, he was a traitor; and by
the only justice he acknowledged, he deserved to die. But the child
who had lain so trustingly upon his wild bosom, who had clung to him
as to a father--she was safe! An unwonted smile crept under the
bristling beard of the fugitive, as he urged the pony forward in
unrelaxing speed. Should he seek refuge among civilized communities,
his crimes would hang over his head--if not discovered, the fear of
discovery would be his, day and night. To venture into his old haunts
in No-Man's Land would be to expose his back to the assassin's knife,
or his breast to ambushed murderers. He dared not seek asylum among
the Indians, for while bands of white men were safe enough in the
Territory, single white men were at the mercy of the moment's caprice--
and certainly, if found astride that Indian pony which the agent had
ordered restored to its owner, his life would not be worth a thought.

These were desperate reflections, and the future seemed framed in
solitude, yet Brick Willock rode on with that odd smile about the
grim lips. The smile was unlike him--but, the whole affair was such
an experience as had never entered his most daring fancy. Never
before in his life had he held a child in his arms, still less had
he felt the sweet embrace of peaceful slumber. To another man it
might have meant nothing; but to this great rough fellow, the very
sight of whom had often struck terror to the heart, that experience
seemed worth all the privations he foresaw.

The sun had risen when the pony, after a few tottering steps,
suddenly sank to earth. Willock unfastened the halter from its
neck, tied it with the lariat about his waist, and without pause,
set out afoot. If the pony died from the terrible strain of that
unremitting flight, doubtless the roving Indians of the plains would
find it and try to follow his trail; if it survived he would be
safer if not found near it. In either case, swift flight was still
imperative, and the shifting sand, beaten out of shape by the
constant wind, promised not to retain his footprints.

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