10 Classics Western Stories. Samuel Merwin
that rang like a silver trumpet, he repeated the ancient oath of the Willamettes,—the oath used by the Shoshones to-day.
“The earth hears us, the sun sees us. Shall we fail in fidelity to our chief?”
There was a pause. The distant cry of swans came from the river; the great trees of council rustled in the breeze. Multnomah rose from his seat, gripping the bow on which he leaned. Into that one moment he seemed gathering yet repressing all the fierceness of his passion, all the grandeur of his will. Far in the shade he saw Tohomish raise his hand imploringly, but the eyes of the orator sank once more under the glance of the war-chief.
“Go!”
An electric shock passed through all who heard; and except for the chiefs standing on its outskirts like sombre shadows, the grove was empty in a moment.
Beyond the waters that girdled the island, one runner took the trail to Puyallup, one the trail to Umatilla, one the path to Chelon, and one the path to Shasta; another departed toward the volcano-rent desert of Klamath, and still another toward the sea-washed shores of Puget Sound.
The irrevocable summons had gone forth; the council was inevitable,—the crisis must come.
Long did Multnomah and his chiefs sit in council that day. Resolute were the speeches that came from all, though many secretly regretted that they had allowed Multnomah’s oratory to persuade them into declaring for the council: but there was no retreat.
Across hills and canyons sped the fleet runners, on to the huge bark lodges of Puget Sound, the fisheries of the Columbia, and the crowded race-courses of the Yakima. Into camps of wandering prairie tribes, where the lodges stood like a city to-day and were rolled up and strapped on the backs of horses to-morrow; into councils where sinister chiefs were talking low of war against the Willamettes; into wild midnight dances of plotting dreamers and medicine-men,—they came with the brief stern summons, and passed on to speak it to the tribes beyond.
Chapter 1 THE BROKEN PEACE-PIPE.
My full defiance, hate, and scorn.
Scott.
It is the day after the departure of the runners to call the great council,—eight years since Cecil Grey went out into the wilderness. Smoke is curling slowly upward from an Indian camp on the prairie not far from the Blue Mountains of eastern Oregon. Fifteen or twenty cone-shaped lodges, each made of mats stretched on a frame-work of poles, compose the village. It swarms with wolfish-looking dogs and dirty, unclad children. Heaps of refuse, heads and feet of game, lie decaying among the wigwams, tainting the air with their disgusting odor. Here and there an ancient withered specimen of humanity sits in the sun, absorbing its rays with a dull animal-like sense of enjoyment, and a group of warriors lie idly talking. Some of the squaws are preparing food, boiling it in water-tight willow baskets by filling them with water and putting in hot stones.[3] Horses are tethered near the lodges, and others are running loose on the prairie.
There are not many of them. The Indians have only scores now where a century later Lewis and Clark found thousands; and there are old men in the camp who can recall the time when the first horses ever seen among them were bought or stolen from the tribes to the south.
On every side the prairie sweeps away in long grassy swells and hollows, rolling off to the base of the Blue Mountains.
The camp has the sluggish aspect that an Indian camp always presents at noonday.
Suddenly a keen-sighted warrior points to a dim speck far over the prairie toward the land of the Bannocks. A white man would have scarcely noticed it; or if he had, would have thought it only some wandering deer or antelope. But the Indians, glancing at the moving object, have already recognized it as a horseman coming straight toward the camp.
Some messenger it is, doubtless, from the Bannocks. Once the whole camp would have rushed to arms at the approach of a rider from that direction, for the two tribes had been at bitter enmity; but of late the peace-pipe has been smoked between them, and the old feud is at an end. Still, the sight arouses considerable curiosity and much speculation as to the object of the visitor.
He is a good rider, his horse is fleet, and in less time than would have been thought possible reaches the camp. He gallops up, stops near the lodges that are farthest out, and springs lightly to the ground. He does not go on into the camp, but stands beside his horse till advances are made on the other side.
The dogs bark at him; his steed, a fiery black, tosses its head and paws the ground; he stands beside it immovably, and to all appearance is ready so to stand till sunset. Some of the warriors recognize him as one of the bravest of the Bannocks. He looks like a daring, resolute man, yet wary and self-contained.
After a while one of the Cayuse warriors (for this was a camp of the Cayuses) advanced toward him, and a grave salutation was exchanged. Then the Bannock said that he wanted to see the Cayuse chief, Snoqualmie, in the council-lodge, for the chief of the Bannocks had sent a “talk” to the Cayuses.
The warrior left him to speak with Snoqualmie. In a short time he returned, saying that the chief and the warriors had gone to the council-lodge and were ready to hear the “talk” that their brother, the chief of the Bannocks, had sent them. The messenger tied his horse by its lariat, or long hair-rope, to a bush, and followed the brave to the lodge.
It was a large wigwam in the centre of the village. A crowd of old men, women, and children had already gathered around the door. Within, on one side of the room, sat in three rows a semi-circle of braves, facing the chief, who sat on the opposite side. Near the door was a clear space where the messenger was to stand while speaking.
He entered, and the doorway behind him was immediately blocked up by the motley crowd excluded from the interior. Not a warrior in the council looked at him; even the chief, Snoqualmie, did not turn his head. The messenger advanced a few paces into the room, stopped, and stood as impassive as the rest. Then, when the demands of Indian stoicism had been satisfied, Snoqualmie turned his face, a handsome but treacherous and cruel face, upon the messenger.
“The warrior comes to speak the words of our brother, the chief of the Bannocks; he is welcome. Shall we smoke the pipe of peace before we hear our brother’s words?”
The Bannock gazed steadily at Snoqualmie. In that fierce and proud regard was something the Cayuse could not fathom.
“Why should the peace-pipe be smoked?” he asked. “Was it not smoked in the great council a moon ago? Did not Snoqualmie say then that the two tribes should henceforth be as one tribe, and that the Bannocks should be the brethren of the Cayuses forever?”
“Those were the words,” replied the chief with dignity. “Snoqualmie has not forgotten them.”
All eyes were now turned on the messenger; they saw that something unexpected was coming. The Bannock drew his form up to its full height, and his resolute features expressed the bitterest scorn.
“Nor have the Bannocks forgotten. At the council you talked ‘peace, peace.’ Last night some of your young men surprised a little camp of Bannocks,—a few old men and boys who were watching horses,—and slew them and ran off the horses. Is that your peace? The Bannocks will have no such peace. This is the word the chief of the Bannocks sends you!”
Holding up the peace-pipe that had been smoked at the great council and afterward given to the medicine-men of the Bannocks as a pledge of Cayuse sincerity, he broke the long slender stem twice, thrice, crushed the bowl in his fingers, and dashed the pieces at Snoqualmie’s feet. It was a defiance, a contemptuous rejection of peace, a declaration of war more disdainful than any words could have made it.
Then, before they could recover from their astonishment, the Bannock turned and leaped through the crowd at the door,—for an instant’s stay was death. Even as he leaped, Snoqualmie’s tomahawk whizzed after him, and a dozen warriors were on their