The War Trail: The Hunt of the Wild Horse

“And the wolves? Do you think they have followed across the stream?”

“Ne’er a wolf o’ ’em – ne’er a one. The vamints hed more sense. They knowd thur legs wan’t long enough, an thet ur current wud a swep ’em a mile afore they kud a swum half-way acrosst. The wolves, they stayed on this side, I reck’n. Look hyur – hyur’s thur tracks. Wagh! thur wur a wheen o’ the filthy beests. Geehosophat! the bank ur paddled like a sheep-pen.”

We bent down to examine the ground. Sure enough, it was covered with the tracks of wolves. A numerous band had crowded together on the spot; and as the prints of their feet pointed in all directions, it was evident they had not gone forward, but, brought to a stand by the torrent, had given up the chase, and scattered away.

Pray heaven it was no mere conjecture!

With Rube it was a belief; and as I had grown to put implicit reliance in the old trapper’s wood-craft, I felt reassured. Rube’s opinions, both as to the steed having safely crossed, and the discomfiture of the wolves, were shared by the rest of my followers – not one of whom was a mean authority on such a subject. Garey – second only to his older comrade in the working out of a prairie syllogism – gave Rube’s statement his emphatic confirmation. The steed was yet safe – and pray heaven, the rider.

With lighter heart I sprang back into the saddle. My followers imitated the example, and with eyes scanning the stream, we rode along the bank to seek for a crossing.

There was no ford near the spot. Perhaps where the steed had passed over the stream might have been waded at low-water; but now, during the freshet, the current would have swept off horse and man like so much cork-wood. The rocks – the black waves that rushed between them – the boiling, frothing eddies – discouraged any attempt at crossing there; we all saw that it was impracticable.

Some rode up stream, others went in the opposite direction.

Both parties met again with blank looks; neither had found a crossing.

There was no time to search further – at least my impatience would no longer brook delay. It was not the first time for both my horse and myself to cross a river without ford; nor was it the first time for many of my followers.

Below the rapids, the current ran slow, apparently ceasing altogether. The water was still, though wider from bank to bank – a hundred yards or more. By the aid of the moonlight, I could tell that the bank on the opposite side was low and shelving. It could be easily climbed by a horse.

I stayed to reason no further. Many a hundred yards had Moro swum with his rider on his back – many a current had he cleft with his proud breast far more rapid than that.

I headed him to the bank, gave him the spur, and went plunging into the flood.

Plunge – plunge – plunge! I heard behind me till the last of my followers had launched themselves on the wave, and were swimming silently over.

One after another we reached the opposite side, and ascended the bank.

Hurriedly I counted our number as the men rode out; one had not yet arrived. Who was missing?

“Rube,” answered some one.

I glanced back, but without feeling any uneasiness. I had no fear for the trapper; Garey alleged he was “safe to turn up.” Something had detained him. Could his old mare swim?

“Like a mink,” replied Garey; “but Rube won’t ride her across; he’s afeerd to sink her too deep in the water. See! yonder he comes!”

Near the middle of the stream, two faces were observed rippling the wave, one directly in the wake of the other. The foremost was the grizzled front of the old mustang, the other the unmistakeable physiognomy of her master. The moonlight shining upon both rendered them conspicuous above the dark brown water; and the spectacle drew a laugh from those who had reached the bank.

Rube’s mode of crossing was unique, like every action of this singular man. Perhaps he adopted it from sheer eccentricity, or maybe in order that his mustang might swim more freely.

He had ridden gently into the water, and kept his saddle till the mare was beyond her depth – then sliding backward over her hips, he took the tail in his teeth, and partly towed like a fish upon the hook, and partly striking to assist in the passage, he swam after. As soon as the mare again touched bottom, he drew himself up over the croup, and in this way regained his saddle.

Mare and man, as they climbed out on the bank – the thin skeleton bodies of both reduced to their slenderest dimensions by the soaking water – presented a spectacle so ludicrous as to elicit a fresh chorus of laughter from his comrades.

I stayed not till its echoes had died away; but pressing my steed along the bank, soon arrived at the rapids, where I expected to recover the trail.

To my joy, hoof-marks were there, directly opposite the point where the steed had taken to the stream. Rube was right. He had waded safely across.

Thank heaven! at least from that peril has she been saved!

Chapter Sixty Four.

A Lilliputian Forest

On resuming the trail, I was cheered by three considerations. The peril of the flood was past – she was not drowned. The wolves were thrown off – the dangerous rapid had deterred them; on the other side their footprints were no longer found. Thirdly, the steed had slackened his pace. After climbing the bank, he had set off in a rapid gait, but not at a gallop.

“He’s been pacin’ hyar!” remarked Garey, as soon as his eyes rested upon the tracks.

“Pacing!”

I knew what was meant by this; I knew that gait peculiar to the prairie horse, fast but smooth as the amble of a palfrey. His rider would scarcely perceive the gentle movement; her torture would be less.

Perhaps, too, no longer frighted by the fierce pursuers, the horse would come to a stop. His wearied limbs would admonish him, and then —

Surely he could not have gone much farther?

We, too, were wearied, one and all; but these pleasing conjectures beguiled us from thinking of our toil, and we advanced more hopefully along the trail.

Alas! it was my fate to be the victim of alternate hopes and fears. My new-sprung joy was short-lived, and fast fleeted away.

We had gone but a few hundred paces from the river, when we encountered an obstacle, that proved not only a serious barrier to our progress, but almost brought our tracking to a termination.

This obstacle was a forest of oaks, not giant oaks, as these famed trees are usually designated, but the very reverse – a forest of dwarf oaks (Quercus nana). Far as the eye could reach extended this singular wood, in which no tree rose above thirty inches in height! Yet was it no thicket – no under-growth of shrubs – but a true forest of oaks, each tree having its separate stem, its boughs, its lobed leaves, and its bunches of brown acorns.

“Shin oak,” cried the trappers, as we entered the verge of this miniature forest.

“Wagh!” exclaimed Rube, in a tone of impatience, “hyur’s bother. ’Ee may all get out o’ yur saddles an rest yur critturs: we’ll hev to crawl hyur.”

And so it resulted. For long weary hours we followed the trail, going not faster than we could have crawled upon our hands and knees. The tracks of the steed were plain enough, and in daylight could have been easily followed; but the little oaks grew close and regular as if planted by the hand of man; and through their thick foliage the moonlight scarcely penetrated. Their boughs almost touched each other, so that the whole surface lay in dark shadow, rendering it almost impossible to make out the hoof-prints. Here and there, a broken branch or a bunch of tossed leaves – their under-sides shining glaucous in the moonlight – enabled us to advance at a quicker rate; but as the horse had passed gently over the ground, these “signs” were few and far between.

For long fretful hours we toiled through the “shin-oak” forest, our heads far overtopping its tallest trees! We might have fancied that we were threading our way through some extended nursery. The trail led directly across its central part; and ere we had reached its furthest verge, the moon’s rays were mingling with the purple light of morning.

Soon after the “forest opened;” the little dwarfs grew further apart – here scattered thinly over the ground, there disposed in clumps or miniature grove? – until at length the sward of the prairie predominated.

The trouble of the trackers was at an end. The welcome light of the sun was thrown upon the trail, so that they could lift it as fast as we could ride; and, no longer hindered by brake or bush, we advanced at a rapid rate across the prairie.

Over this ground the steed had also passed rapidly. He had continued to pace for some distance, after emerging from the shin-oak forest; but all at once, as we could tell by his tracks, he had bounded off again, and resumed his headlong gallop.

What had started him afresh? We were at a loss to imagine; even the prairie-men were puzzled!

Had wolves again attacked him, or some other enemy? No; nor one nor other. It was a green prairie over which he had gone, a smooth sward of mezquite-grass; but there were spots where the growth was thin – patches nearly bare – and these were softened by the rain. Even the light paw of a wolf would have impressed itself in such places, sufficiently to be detected by the lynx-eyed men of the plains. The horse had passed since the rain had ceased falling. No wolf, or other animal, had been after him.

Perhaps he had taken a start of himself, freshly affrighted at the novel mode in which he was ridden – still under excitement from the rough usage he had received, and from which he had not yet cooled down – perhaps the barbed points of the cohetes rankled in his flesh, acting like spurs; perhaps some distant sound had led him to fancy the hooting mob, or the howling wolves, still coming at his heels; perhaps —

An exclamation from the trackers, who were riding in the advance, put an end to these conjectures. Both had pulled up, and were pointing to the ground. No words were spoken – none needed. We all read with our eyes an explanation of the renewed gallop.

Directly in front of us, the sward was cut and scored by numerous tracks. Not four, but four hundred hoof-prints were indented in the turf – all of them fresh as the trail we were following – and amidst these the tracks of the steed, becoming intermingled, were lost to our view.