10 Classics Western Stories. Samuel Merwin
me and wished me to abide always in their lodges and be one of them. But even while they spoke the Great Spirit whispered to me to go on, and an unrest rose within me, and I could not stay.
“So the years went by, and I wandered farther and farther to the west, across rivers and deserts, till I reached this tribe; and they said that farther on, toward the land of the Willamettes, a great river flowed through the mountains, and across it was a bridge of stone built by the gods when the world was young. Then I knew that it was the bridge of my vision, and the unrest came back and I arose to go. But the tribe kept me, half as guest and half as prisoner, and would not let me depart; until last night the runner came summoning them to the council. Now they go, taking me with them. I shall see the land of the bridge and perform the work the Great Spirit has given me to do.”
The old grand enthusiasm shone in his look as he closed. The Shoshone regarded him with grave attention.
“What became of the book that told of God?” he asked earnestly.
“A chief took it from me and burned it; but its words were written on my heart, and they could not be destroyed.”
They rode on for a time in silence. The way was rugged, the country a succession of canyons and ridges covered with green and waving grass but bare of trees. Behind them, the Blue Mountains were receding in the distance. To the west, Mt. Hood, the great white “Witch Mountain” of the Indians, towered over the prairie, streaking the sky with a long floating wreath of volcanic smoke. Before them, as they journeyed northward toward the Columbia, stretched out the endless prairie. Now they descended into a deep ravine, now they toiled up a steep hillside. The country literally rolled, undulating in immense ridges around and over which the long file of squaws and warriors, herds and pack-horses, wound like a serpent. From the bands ahead came shouts and outcries,—the sounds of rude merriment; and above all the long-drawn intonation so familiar to those who have been much with Indian horsemen,—the endlessly repeated “ho-ha, ho-ha, ho-ha,” a kind of crude riding-song.
After a while Cecil said, “I have told you the story of my life, will you not tell me the story of yours?”
“Yes,” said the renegade, after a moment’s thought; “you have shown me your heart as if you were my brother. Now I will show you mine.
“I was a Shoshone warrior.[5] There was a girl in our village whom I had loved from childhood. We played together; we talked of how, when I became a man and a warrior, she should become my wife; she should keep my wigwam; we would always love one another. She grew up, and the chief offered many horses for her. Her father took them. She became the chief’s wife, and all my heart withered up. Everything grew dark. I sat in my wigwam or wandered in the forest, caring for nothing.
“When I met her, she turned her face aside, for was she not the wife of another? Yet I knew her heart hungered for me. The chief knew it too, and when he spoke to her a cloud was ever on his brow and sharp lightning on his tongue. But she was true. Whose lodge was as clean as his? The wood was always carried, the water at hand, the meat cooked. She searched the very thought that was in his heart to save him the trouble of speaking. He could never say, ‘Why is it not done?’ But her heart was mine, and he knew it; and he treated her like a dog and not like a wife.
“Me too he tried to tread under foot. One day we assembled to hunt the buffalo. Our horses were all collected. Mine stood before my tent, and he came and took them away, saying that they were his. What could I do? He was a chief.
“I came no more to the council, I shared no more in the hunt and the war-dance. I was unhorsed, degraded, dishonored. He told his wife what he had done, and when she wept he beat her.
“One evening I stood on a knoll overlooking the meadow where the horses were feeding; the chief’s horses were there, and mine with them. I saw him walking among them. The sight maddened me; my blood burned; I leaped on him; with two blows I laid him dead at my feet. I covered him with earth and strewed leaves over the place. Then I went to her and told her what I had done, and urged her to fly with me. She answered only with tears. I reminded her of all she had suffered, and told her I had done only what was just. I urged her again to fly. She only wept the more, and bade me go. My heart was heavy but my eyes were dry.
“‘It is well,’ I said, ‘I will go alone to the desert. None but the wild beasts of the wilderness will be with me. The seekers of blood will follow on my trail; they may come on me while I am asleep and slay me, but you will be safe. I will go alone.’
“I turned to go. She sprang after me. ‘No,’ she cried, ‘you shall not go alone. Wherever you go I will go: you shall never part from me.’
“While we were talking, one who had seen me slay the chief and had roused the camp, came with others. We heard their steps approaching the door, and knew that death came with them. We escaped at the back of the lodge, but they saw us and their arrows flew. She fell, and I caught her in my arms and fled into the wood. When we were safe I looked at her I carried, and she was dead. An arrow had pierced her heart. I buried her that night beneath a heap of stones, and fled to the Cayuses. That is my story.”
“What will you do now?” asked Cecil, deeply touched.
“I shall live a man’s life. I shall hunt and go on the war-trail, and say strong words in the council. And when my life is ended, when the sunset and the night come to me and I go forth into the darkness, I know I shall find her I love waiting for me beside the death-trail that leads to the spirit-land.”
The tears came into Cecil’s eyes.
“I too have known sorrow,” he said, “and like you I am a wanderer from my own people. We are going together into an unknown land, knowing not what may befall us. Let us be friends.”
And he held out his hand. The Indian took it,—awkwardly, as an Indian always takes the hand of a white man, but warmly, heartily.
“We are brothers,” he said simply. And as Cecil rode on with the wild troop into the unknown world before him, he felt that there was one beside him who would be faithful, no matter what befell.
The long day wore on; the sun rose to the zenith and sunk, and still the Indians pushed forward. It was a long, forced march, and Cecil was terribly fatigued when at last one of the Indians told him that they were near a big river where they would camp for the night.
“One sun more,” said the Indian, pointing to the sun now sinking in the west, “and you will see the Bridge of the Gods.”
The news re-animated Cecil, and he hurried on. A shout rose from the Indians in advance. He saw the head of the long train of horses and riders pause and look downward and the Indians at the rear gallop forward. Cecil and his friend followed and joined them.
“The river! the river!” cried the Indians, as they rode up. The scene below was one of gloomy but magnificent beauty. Beneath them opened an immense canyon, stupendous even in that land of canyons,—the great canyon of the Columbia. The walls were brown, destitute of verdure, sinking downward from their feet in yawning precipices or steep slopes. At the bottom, more than a thousand feet below, wound a wide blue river, the gathered waters of half a continent. Beneath them, the river plunged over a long low precipice with a roar that filled the canyon for miles. Farther on, the flat banks encroached upon the stream till it seemed narrowed to a silver thread among the jutting rocks. Still farther, it widened again, swept grandly around a bend in the distance, and passed from sight.
“Tuum, tuum,” said the Indians to Cecil, in tones that imitated the roar of the cataract. It was the “Tum” of Lewis and Clark, the “Tumwater” of more recent times; and the place below, where the compressed river wound like a silver thread among the flat black rocks, was the far-famed Dalles of the Columbia. It was superb, and yet there was something profoundly lonely and desolate about it,—the majestic river flowing on forever among barren rocks and crags, shut in by mountain and desert, wrapped in an awful solitude where from age to age scarce a sound was heard save the cry of wild beasts or wilder men.
“It is the very river