Chapter XXII.—Life Among the Trappers.
IT is one thing to chase a horse; it is another thing to catch it. Little consideration and less sagacity are required to convince us of the truth of that fact.
The reader may perhaps venture to think this rather a trifling fact. We are not so sure of that. In this world of fancies, to have any fact incontestably proved and established is a comfort, and whatever is a source of comfort to mankind is worthy of notice. Surely our reader won’t deny that. Perhaps he will, so we can only console ourself with the remark that there are people in this world who would deny anything—who would deny that there was a nose on their face if you said there was!
Well, to return to the point, which was the chase of a horse in the abstract; from which we will rapidly diverge to the chase of Dick Varley’s horse in particular. This noble charger, having been ridden by savages until all his old fire and blood and mettle were worked up to a red heat, no sooner discovered that he was pursued than he gave a snort of defiance, which he accompanied with a frantic shake of his mane and a fling of contempt in addition to a magnificent wave of his tail. Then he thundered up the valley at a pace which would speedily have left Joe Blunt and Henri out of sight behind if—ay! that’s the word, if! What a word that if is! what a world of ifs we live in! There never was anything that wouldn’t have been something else if something hadn’t intervened to prevent it! Yes, we repeat, Charlie would have left his two friends miles and miles behind in what is called " no time," if he had not run straight into a gorge which was surrounded by inaccessible precipices, and out of which there was no exit except by the entrance, which was barred by Henri, while Joe advanced to catch the runaway.
For two hours at least did Joe Blunt essay to catch Charlie, and during that space of time he utterly failed.
“It won’t do, Henri,” said Joe, advancing towards his companion, and wiping his forehead with the cuff of his leathern coat; “I can’t catch him. The wind’s a’most blowed out o’ me body.”
“Dat am vexatiable,” replied Henri, in a tone of commiseration. “S’pose I wos make try?”
“In that case I s’pose ye would fail. But go ahead, an’ do what ye can. I’ll hold yer horse.”
So Henri began by a rush and a flourish of legs and arms that nearly frightened the horse out of his wits. For half an hour he went through all the complications of running and twisting of which he was capable, without success, when Joe Blunt suddenly uttered a stentorian yell that rooted him to the spot on which he stood.
To account for this, we must explain that in the heights of the Rocky Mountains vast accumulations of snow take place among the crevices and gorges during winter. Such of these masses as form on steep slopes are loosened by occasional thaws, and are precipitated in the form of avalanches into the valleys below, carrying trees and stones along with them in their thundering descent. In the gloomy gorge where Dick’s horse had taken refuge the precipices were so steep that many avalanches had occurred, as was evident from the mounds of heaped snow that lay at the foot of most of them. Neither stones nor trees were carried down here, however, for the cliffs were nearly perpendicular, and the snow slipping over their edges had fallen on the grass below. Such an avalanche was now about to take place, and it was this that caused Joe to utter his cry of alarm and warning.
Henri and the horse were directly under the cliff over which it was about to be hurled, the latter close to the wall of rock, the other at some distance away from it.
Joe cried again, “Back, Henri! back vite!” when the mass flowed over and fell with a roar like prolonged thunder. Henri sprang back in time to save his life, though he was knocked down and almost stunned; but poor Charlie was completely buried under the avalanche, which now presented the appearance of a hill of snow.
The instant Henri recovered sufficiently, Joe and he mounted their horses and galloped back to the camp.
Meanwhile another spectator stepped forward upon the scene they had left, and surveyed the snow hill with a critical eye. This was no less than a grizzly bear, which had, unobserved, been a spectator, and which immediately proceeded to dig into the mound, with the purpose, no doubt, of disentombing the carcass of the horse for purposes of his own.
While he was thus actively engaged the two hunters reached the camp, where they found that Pierre and his party had just arrived. The men sent out in search of them had scarcely advanced a mile when they found them trudging back to the camp in a very disconsolate manner. But their sorrows were put to flight on hearing the way in which the horses had been returned to them with interest.
Scarcely had Dick Varley, however, congratulated himself on the recovery of his gallant steed, when he was thrown into despair by the sudden arrival of Joe with the tidings of the catastrophe we have just related.
Of course there was a general rush to the rescue. Only a few men were ordered to remain to guard the camp, while the remainder mounted their horses and galloped towards the gorge where Charlie had been entombed. On arriving, they found that Bruin had worked with such laudable zeal that nothing but the tip of his tail was seen sticking out of the hole which he had dug. The hunters could not refrain from laughing as they sprang to the ground, and standing in a semicircle in front of the hole, prepared to fire. But Crusoe resolved to have the honour of leading the assault. He seized fast hold of Bruin’s flank, and caused his teeth to meet therein. Caleb backed out, but before he could recover from his surprise a dozen bullets pierced his heart and brain.
“Now, lads,” cried Cameron, setting to work with a large wooden shovel, “work, like niggers If there’s any life left in the horse, it’ll soon be smothered out unless we set him free.”
The men needed no urging, however. They worked as if their lives depended on their exertions. Dick Varley in particular, laboured like a young Hercules, and Henri hurled masses of snow about in a most surprising manner. Crusoe, too, entered heartily into the spirit of the work, and, scraping with his forepaws, sent such a continuous shower of snow behind him that he was speedily lost to view in a hole of his own excavating. In the course of half an hour a cavern was dug in the mound almost close up to the cliff, and the men were beginning to look about for the crushed body of Dick’s steed, when an exclamation from Henri attracted their attention.
“Ha! mes ami, here am be one hole.”
The truth of this could not be doubted, for the eccentric trapper had thrust his shovel through the wall of snow into what appeared to be a cavern beyond, and immediately followed up his remark by thrusting in his head and shoulders. He drew them out in a few seconds, with a look of intense amazement.
“Voilà! Joe Blunt. Look in dere, and you shall see fat you vill behold.”
“Why it’s the horse, I b’lieve!” cried Joe. “Go ahead, lads!”
So saying, he resumed his shovelling vigorously, and in a few minutes the hole was opened up sufficiently to enable a man to enter. Dick sprang in, and there stood Charlie close beside the cliff, looking as sedate as if all that had been going on had no reference to him.
The cause of this safety was simple enough. The precipice beside which he stood when the avalanche occurred overhung its base at that point considerably, so that when the snow descended a clear space of several feet wide was left all along its base. Here Charlie had remained in perfect comfort until his friends dug him out.
Congratulating themselves not a little on having saved the charger and bagged a grizzly bear, the trappers remounted, and returned to the camp.
For some time after this nothing worthy of particular note occurred. The trapping operations went on prosperously and without interruption from the Indians, who seemed to have left the locality altogether. During this period, Dick, and Crusoe, and Charlie had many excursions together, and the silver rifle full many a time sent death to the heart of a bear, and elk, and buffalo; while, indirectly, it sent joy to the heart of man, woman, and child in the camp, in the shape of juicy steaks and marrow-bones. Joe and Henri devoted themselves almost exclusively to trapping beaver, in which pursuit they were so successful that they speedily became wealthy men, according to backwood notions of wealth. With the beaver that they caught they purchased from Cameron’s store powder and shot enough for a long hunting expedition, and a couple of spare horses to carry their packs. They also purchased a large assortment of such goods and trinkets as would prove acceptable to Indians, and supplied themselves with new blankets, and a few pairs of strong moccasins, of which they stood much in need.
Thus they went on from day to day, until symptoms of the approach of winter warned them that it was time to return to the Mustang Valley. About this time an event occurred which totally changed the aspect of affairs in these remote valleys of the Rocky Mountains, and precipitated the departure of our four friends, Dick, Joe Henri, and Crusoe. This was the sudden arrival of a whole tribe of Indians.