Текст книги "The Headless Horseman"

Автор книги: Captain Reid

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Chapter XXXVII. A Man Missing

The breakfast bell of Casa del Corvo had sounded its second and last summons – preceded by a still earlier signal from a horn, intended to call in the stragglers from remote parts of the plantation.

The “field hands” labouring near had collected around the “quarter;” and in groups, squatted upon the grass, or seated upon stray logs, were discussing their diet – by no means spare – of “hog and hominy” corn-bread and “corn-coffee,” with a jocosity that proclaimed a keen relish of these, their ordinary comestibles.

The planter’s family assembled in the sala were about to begin breakfast, when it was discovered that one of its members was missing.

Henry was the absent one.

At first there was but little notice taken of the circumstance. Only the conjecture: that he would shortly make his appearance.

As several minutes passed without his coming in, the planter quietly observed that it was rather strange of Henry to be behind time, and wonder where he could be.

The breakfast of the South-western American is usually a well appointed meal. It is eaten at a fixed hour, and table-d’hôte fashion – all the members of the family meeting at the table.

This habit is exacted by a sort of necessity, arising out of the nature of some of the viands peculiar to the country; many of which, as “Virginia biscuit,” “buckwheat cakes,” and “waffles,” are only relished coming fresh from, the fire: so that the hour when breakfast is being eaten in the dining-room, is that in which the cook is broiling her skin in the kitchen.

As the laggard, or late riser, may have to put up with cold biscuit, and no waffles or buckwheat cakes, there are few such on a Southern plantation.

Considering this custom, it was somewhat strange, that Henry Poindexter had not yet put in an appearance.

“Where can the boy be?” asked his father, for the fourth time, in that tone of mild conjecture that scarce calls for reply.

None was made by either of the other two guests at the table. Louise only gave expression to a similar conjecture. For all that, there was a strangeness in her glance – as in the tone of her voice – that might have been observed by one closely scrutinising her features.

It could scarce be caused by the absence of her brother from the breakfast-table? The circumstance was too trifling to call up an emotion; and clearly at that moment was she subject to one.

What was it? No one put the inquiry. Her father did not notice anything odd in her look. Much less Calhoun, who was himself markedly labouring to conceal some disagreeable thought under the guise of an assumed naïvété.

Ever since entering the room he had maintained a studied silence; keeping his eyes averted, instead of, according to his usual custom, constantly straying towards his cousin.

He sate nervously in his chair; and once or twice might have been seen to start, as a servant entered the room.

Beyond doubt he was under the influence of some extraordinary agitation.

“Very strange Henry not being here to his breakfast!” remarked the planter, for about the tenth time. “Surely he is not abed till this hour? No – no – he never lies so late. And yet if abroad, he couldn’t be at such a distance as not to have heard the horn. He may be in his room? It is just possible. Pluto!”

“Ho – ho! d’ye call me, Mass’ Woodley? I’se hya.” The sable coachee, acting as table waiter, was in the sala, hovering around the chairs.

“Go to Henry’s sleeping-room. If he’s there, tell him we’re at breakfast – half through with it.”

“He no dar, Mass’ Woodley.”

“You have been to his room?”

“Ho – ho! Yas. Dat am I’se no been to de room itseff; but I’se been to de ’table, to look atter Massa Henry hoss; an gib um him fodder an corn. Ho – ho! Dat same ole hoss he ain’t dar; nor han’t a been all ob dis mornin’. I war up by de fuss skreek ob day. No hoss dar, no saddle, no bridle; and ob coass no Massa Henry. Ho – ho! He been an gone out ’fore anb’dy wor ’tirrin’ ’bout de place.”

“Are you sure?” asked the planter, seriously stirred by the intelligence.

“Satin, shoo, Mass’ Woodley. Dar’s no hoss doins in dat ere ’table, ceppin de sorrel ob Massa Cahoon. Spotty am in de ’closure outside. Massa Henry hoss ain’t nowha.”

“It don’t follow that Master Henry himself is not in his room. Go instantly, and see!”

“Ho – ho! I’se go on de instum, massr; but f’r all dat dis chile no speck find de young genl’um dar. Ho! ho! wha’ebber de ole hoss am, darr Massr Henry am too.”

“There’s something strange in all this,” pursued the planter, as Pluto shuffled out of the sala. “Henry from home; and at night too. Where can he have gone? I can’t think of any one he would be visiting at such unseasonable hours! He must have been out all night, or very early, according to the nigger’s account! At the Port, I suppose, with those young fellows. Not at the tavern, I hope?”

“Oh, no! He wouldn’t go there,” interposed Calhoun, who appeared as much mystified by the absence of Henry as was Poindexter himself. He refrained, however, from suggesting any explanation, or saying aught of the scenes to which he had been witness on the preceding night.

“It is to be hoped he knows nothing of it,” reflected the young Creole. “If not, it may still remain a secret between brother and myself. I think I can manage Henry. But why is he still absent? I’ve sate up all night waiting for him. He must have overtaken Maurice, and they have fraternised. I hope so; even though the tavern may have been the scene of their reconciliation. Henry is not much given to dissipation; but after such a burst of passion, followed by his sudden repentance, he may have strayed from his usual habits? Who could blame him if he has? There can be little harm in it: since he has gone astray in good company?”

How far the string of reflections might have extended it is not easy to say: since it did not reach its natural ending.

It was interrupted by the reappearance of Pluto; whose important air, as he re-entered the room, proclaimed him the bearer of eventful tidings.

“Well!” cried his master, without waiting for him to speak, “is he there?”

“No, Mass’ Woodley,” replied the black, in a voice that betrayed a large measure of emotion, “he are not dar – Massa Henry am not. But – but,” he hesitatingly continued, “dis chile grieb to say dat – dat – him hoss am dar.”

“His horse there! Not in his sleeping-room, I suppose?”

“No, massa; nor in de ’table neider; but out da, by de big gate.”

“His horse at the gate? And why, pray, do you grieve about that?”

“’Ecause, Mass’ Woodley, ’ecause de hoss – dat am Massa Henry hoss – ’ecause de anymal – ”

“Speak out, you stammering nigger! What because? I suppose the horse has his head upon him? Or is it his tail that is missing?”

“Ah, Mass’ Woodley, dis nigga fear dat am missin’ wuss dan eider him head or him tail. I’se feer’d dat de ole hoss hab loss him rider!”

“What! Henry thrown from his horse? Nonsense, Pluto! My son is too good a rider for that. Impossible that he should have been pitched out of the saddle – impossible!”

“Ho! ho! I doan say he war frown out ob de saddle. Gorramity! I fear de trouble wuss dan dat. O! dear ole Massa, I tell you no mo’. Come to de gate ob do hashashanty, and see fo youseff.”

By this time the impression conveyed by Pluto’s speech – much more by his manner – notwithstanding its ambiguity, had become sufficiently alarming; and not only the planter himself, but his daughter and nephew, hastily forsaking their seats, and preceded by the sable coachman, made their way to the outside gate of the hacienda.

A sight was there awaiting them, calculated to inspire all three with the most terrible apprehensions.

A negro man – one of the field slaves of the plantation – stood holding a horse, that was saddled and bridled. The animal wet with the dews of the night, and having been evidently uncared for in any stable, was snorting and stamping the ground, as if but lately escaped from some scene of excitement, in which he had been compelled to take part.

He was speckled with a colour darker than that of the dewdrops – darker than his own coat of bay-brown. The spots scattered over his shoulders – the streaks that ran parallel with the downward direction of his limbs, the blotches showing conspicuously on the saddle-flaps, were all of the colour of coagulated blood. Blood had caused them – spots, streaks, and blotches!

Whence came that horse?

From the prairies. The negro had caught him, on the outside plain, as, with the bridle trailing among his feet, he was instinctively straying towards the hacienda.

To whom did he belong?

The question was not asked. All present knew him to be the horse of Henry Poindexter.

Nor did any one ask whose blood bedaubed the saddle-flaps. The three individuals most interested could think only of that one, who stood to them in the triple relationship of son, brother, and cousin.

The dark red spots on which they were distractedly gazing had spurted from the veins of Henry Poindexter. They had no other thought.

Chapter XXXVIII. The Avengers

Hastily – perhaps too truly – construing the sinister evidence, the half-frantic father leaped into the bloody saddle, and galloped direct for the Fort.

Calhoun, upon his own horse, followed close after.

The hue and cry soon spread abroad. Rapid riders carried it up and down the river, to the remotest plantations of the settlement.

The Indians were out, and near at hand, reaping their harvest of scalps! That of young Poindexter was the firstfruits of their sanguinary gleaning!

Henry Poindexter – the noble generous youth who had not an enemy in all Texas! Who but Indians could have spilled such innocent blood? Only the Comanches could have been so cruel?

Among the horsemen, who came quickly together on the parade ground of Port Inge, no one doubted that the Comanches had done the deed. It was simply a question of how, when, and where.

The blood drops pretty clearly, proclaimed the first. He who had shed them must have been shot, or speared, while sitting in his saddle. They were mostly on the off side; where they presented an appearance, as if something had been slaked over them. This was seen both on the shoulders of the horse, and the flap of the saddle. Of course it was the body of the rider as it slipped lifeless to the earth.

There were some who spoke with equal certainty as to the time – old frontiersmen experienced in such matters.

According to them the blood was scarce “ten hours old:” in other words, must have been shed about ten hours before.

It was now noon. The murder must have been committed at two o’clock in the morning.

The third query was, perhaps, the most important – at least now that the deed was done.

Where had it been done? Where was the body to be found?

After that, where should the assassins be sought for?

These were the questions discussed by the mixed council of settlers and soldiers, hastily assembled at Port Inge, and presided over by the commandant of the Fort – the afflicted father standing speechless by his side.

The last was of special importance. There are thirty-two points in the compass of the prairies, as well as in that which guides the ocean wanderer; and, therefore, in any expedition going in search of a war-party of Comanches, there would be thirty-two chances to one against its taking the right track.

It mattered not that the home of these nomadic savages was in the west. That was a wide word; and signified anywhere within a semicircle of some hundreds of miles.

Besides, the Indians were now upon the war-trail; and, in an isolated settlement such as that of the Leona, as likely to make their appearance from the east. More likely, indeed, since such is a common strategic trick of these astute warriors.

To have ridden forth at random would have been sheer folly; with such odds against going the right way, as thirty-two to one.

A proposal to separate the command into several parties, and proceed in different directions, met with little favour from any one. It was directly negatived by the major himself.

The murderers might be a thousand, the avengers were but the tenth of that number: consisting of some fifty dragoons who chanced to be in garrison, with about as many mounted civilians. The party must be kept together, or run the risk of being attacked, and perhaps cut off, in detail!

The argument was deemed conclusive. Even, the bereaved father – and cousin, who appeared equally the victim of a voiceless grief – consented to shape their course according to the counsels of the more prudent majority, backed by the authority of the major himself.

It was decided that the searchers should proceed in a body.

In what direction? This still remained the subject of discussion.

The thoughtful captain of infantry now became a conspicuous figure, by suggesting that some inquiry should be made, as to what direction had been last taken by the man who was supposed to be murdered. Who last saw Henry Poindexter?

His father and cousin were first appealed to.

The former had last seen his son at the supper table; and supposed him to have gone thence to his bed.

The answer of Calhoun was less direct, and, perhaps, less satisfactory. He had conversed with his cousin at a later hour, and had bidden him good night, under the impression that he was retiring to his room.

Why was Calhoun concealing what had really occurred? Why did he refrain from giving a narration of that garden scene to which he had been witness?

Was it, that he feared humiliation by disclosing the part he had himself played?

Whatever was the reason, the truth was shunned; and an answer given, the sincerity of which was suspected by more than one who listened to it.

The evasiveness might have been more apparent, had there been any reason for suspicion, or had the bystanders been allowed longer time to reflect upon it.

While the inquiry was going on, light came in from a quartet hitherto unthought of. The landlord of the Rough and Ready, who had come uncalled to the council, after forcing his way through the crowd, proclaimed himself willing to communicate some facts worth their hearing – in short, the very facts they were endeavouring to find out: when Henry Poindexter had been last seen, and what the direction he had taken.

Oberdoffer’s testimony, delivered in a semi-Teutonic tongue, was to the effect: that Maurice the mustanger – who had been staying at his hotel ever since his fight with Captain Calhoun – had that night ridden out at a late hour, as he had done for several nights before.

He had returned to the hotel at a still later hour; and finding it open – on account of a party of bons vivants who had supped there – had done that which he had not done for a long time before – demanded his bill, and to Old Duffer’s astonishment – as the latter naïvely confessed – settled every cent of it!

Where he had procured the money “Gott” only knew, or why he left the hotel in such a hurry. Oberdoffer himself only knew that he had left it, and taken all his ‘trapsh’ along with him – just as he was in the habit of doing, whenever he went off upon one of his horse-catching expeditions.

On one of these the village Boniface supposed him to have gone.

What had all this to do with the question before the council? Much indeed; though it did not appear till the last moment of his examination, when the witness revealed the more pertinent facts: – that about twenty minutes after the mustanger had taken his departure from the hotel, “Heinrich Poindexter” knocked at the door, and inquired after Mr Maurice Gerald; – that on being told the latter was gone, as also the time, and probable direction he had taken, the “young gentlemans” rode off a a quick pace, as if with the intention of overtaking him.

This was all Mr Oberdoffer knew of the matter; and all he could be expected to tell.

The intelligence, though containing several points but ill understood, was nevertheless a guide to the expeditionary party. It furnished a sort of clue to the direction they ought to take. If the missing man had gone off with Maurice the mustanger, or after him, he should be looked for on the road the latter himself would be likely to have taken.

Did any one know where the horse-hunter had his home?

No one could state the exact locality; though there were several who believed it was somewhere among the head-waters of the Nueces, on a creek called the “Alamo.”

To the Alamo, then, did they determine upon proceeding in quest of the missing man, or his dead body – perhaps, also, to find that of Maurice the mustanger; and, at the same time, avenge upon the savage assassins two murders instead of one.

Chapter XXXIX. The Pool of Blood

Notwithstanding its number – larger than usual for a party of borderers merely in search of a strayed neighbour – the expedition pursued its way with, considerable caution.

There was reason. The Indians were upon the war-trail. Scouts were sent out in advance; and professed “trackers” employed to pick up, and interpret the “sign.”

On the prairie, extending nearly ten miles to the westward of the Leona, no trail was discovered. The turf, hard and dry, only showed the tracks of a horse when going in a gallop. None such were seen along the route.

At ten miles’ distance from the Fort the plain is traversed by a tract of chapparal, running north-west and south-east. It is a true Texan jungle, laced by llianas, and almost impenetrable for man and horse.

Through this jungle, directly opposite the Fort, there is an opening, through which passes a path – the shortest that leads to the head waters of the Nueces. It is a sort of natural avenue among the trees that stand closely crowded on each side, but refrain from meeting. It may be artificial: some old “war-trail” of the Comanches, erst trodden by their expeditionary parties on the maraud to Tamaulipas, Coahuila, or New Leon.

The trackers knew that it conducted to the Alamo; and, therefore, guided the expedition into it.

Shortly after entering among the trees, one of the latter, who had gone afoot in the advance, was seen standing by the edge of the thicket, as if waiting to announce some recently discovered fact.

“What is it?” demanded the major, spurring ahead of the others, and riding up to the tracker. “Sign?”

“Ay, that there is, major; and plenty of it. Look there! In that bit of sottish ground you see – ”

“The tracks of a horse.”

“Of two horses, major,” said the man, correcting the officer with an air of deference.

“True. There are two.”

“Farther on they become four; though they’re all made by the same two horses. They have gone up this openin’ a bit, and come back again.”

“Well, Spangler, my good fellow; what do you make of it?”

“Not much,” replied Spangler, who was one of the paid scouts of the cantonment; “not much of that; I hav’n’t been far enough up the openin’ to make out what it means – only far enough to know that a man has been murdered.”

“What proof have you of what you say? Is there a dead body?”

“No. Not as much as the little finger; not even a hair of the head, so fur as I can see.”

“What then?”

“Blood, a regular pool of it – enough to have cleared out the carcass of a hull buffalo. Come and see for yourself. But,” continued the scout in a muttered undertone, “if you wish me to follow up the sign as it ought to be done, you’ll order the others to stay back – ’specially them as are now nearest you.”

This observation appeared to be more particularly pointed at the planter and his nephew; as the tracker, on making it, glanced furtively towards both.

“By all means,” replied the major. “Yes, Spangler, you shall have every facility for your work. Gentlemen! may I request you to remain where you are for a few minutes. My tracker, here, has to go through a performance that requires him to have the ground to himself. He can only take me along with him.”

Of course the major’s request was a command, courteously conveyed, to men who were not exactly his subordinates. It was obeyed, however, just as if they had been; and one and all kept their places, while the officer, following his scout, rode away from the ground.

About fifty yards further on, Spangler came to a stand.

“You see that, major?” said he, pointing to the ground.

“I should be blind if I didn’t,” replied the officer. “A pool of blood – as you say, big enough to have emptied the veins of a buffalo. If it has come from those of a man, I should say that whoever shed it is no longer in the land of the living.”

“Dead!” pronounced the tracker. “Dead before that blood had turned purple – as it is now.”

“Whose do you think it is, Spangler?”

“That of the man we’re in search of – the son of the old gentleman down there. That’s why I didn’t wish him to come forward.”

“He may as well know the worst. He must find it out in time.”

“True what you say, major; but we had better first find out how the young fellow has come to be thrown in his tracks. That’s what is puzzling me.”

“How! by the Indians, of course? The Comanches have done it?”

“Not a bit of it,” rejoined the scout, with an air of confidence.

“Hu! why do you say that, Spangler?”

“Because, you see, if the Indyins had a been here, there would be forty horse-tracks instead of four, and them made by only two horses.”

“There’s truth in that. It isn’t likely a single Comanch would have had the daring, even to assassinate – ”

“No Comanche, major, no Indyin of any kind committed this murder. There are two horse-tracks along the opening. As you see, both are shod; and they’re the same that have come back again. Comanches don’t ride shod horses, except when they’ve stolen them. Both these were ridden by white men. One set of the tracks has been made by a mustang, though it it was a big ’un. The other is the hoof of an American horse. Goin’ west the mustang was foremost; you can tell that by the overlap. Comin’ back the States horse was in the lead, the other followin’ him; though it’s hard to say how fur behind. I may be able to tell better, if we keep on to the place whar both must have turned back. It can’t be a great ways off.”

“Let us proceed thither, then,” said the major. “I shall command the people to stay where they are.”

Having issued the command, in a voice loud enough to be heard by his following, the major rode away from the bloodstained spot, preceded by the tracker.

For about four hundred yards further on, the two sets of tracks were traceable; but by the eye of the major, only where the turf was softer under the shadow of the trees. So far – the scout said the horses had passed and returned in the order already declared by him: – that is, the mustang in the lead while proceeding westward, and in the rear while going in the opposite direction.

At this point the trail ended – both horses, as was already known, having returned on their own tracks.

Before taking the back track, however, they had halted, and stayed some time in the same place – under the branches of a spreading cottonwood. The turf, much trampled around the trunk of the tree, was evidence of this.

The tracker got off his horse to examine it; and, stooping to the earth, carefully scrutinised the sign.

“They’ve been here thegither,” said he, after several minutes spent in his analysis, “and for some time; though neither’s been out of the saddle. They’ve been on friendly terms, too; which makes it all the more unexplainable. They must have quarrelled afterwards.”

“If you are speaking the truth, Spangler, you must be a witch. How on earth can you know all that?”

“By the sign, major; by the sign. It’s simple enough. I see the shoes of both horses lapping over each other a score of times; and in such a way that shows they must have been thegither – the animals, it might be, restless and movin’ about. As for the time, they’ve taken long enough to smoke a cigar apiece – close to the teeth too. Here are the stumps; not enough left to fill a fellow’s pipe.”

The tracker, stooping as he spoke, picked up a brace of cigar stumps, and handed them to the major.

“By the same token,” he continued, “I conclude that the two horsemen, whoever they were, while under this tree could not have had any very hostile feelins, the one to the tother. Men don’t smoke in company with the design of cutting each other’s throats, or blowing out one another’s brains, the instant afterwards. The trouble between them must have come on after the cigars were smoked out. That it did come there can be no doubt. As sure, major, as you’re sittin’ in your saddle, one of them has wiped out the other. I can only guess which has been wiped out, by the errand we’re on. Poor Mr Poindexter will niver more see his son alive.”

“’Tis very mysterious,” remarked the major.

“It is, by jingo!”

“And the body, too; where can it be?”

“That’s what purplexes me most of all. If ’t had been Indyins, I wouldn’t a thought much o’ its being missin’. They might a carried the man off wi them to make a target of him, if only wounded; and if dead, to eat him, maybe. But there’s been no Indyins here – not a redskin. Take my word for it, major, one o’ the two men who rid these horses has wiped out the other; and sartinly he have wiped him out in the litterlest sense o’ the word. What he’s done wi’ the body beats me; and perhaps only hisself can tell.”

“Most strange!” exclaimed the major, pronouncing the words with emphasis – “most mysterious!”

“It’s possible we may yet unravel some o’ the mystery,” pursued Spangler. “We must follow up the tracks of the horses, after they started from this – that is, from where the deed was done. We may make something out of that. There’s nothing more to be learnt here. We may as well go back, major. Am I to tell him?”

“Mr Poindexter, you mean?”

“Yes. You are convinced that his son is the man who has been murdered?”

“Oh, no; not so much as that comes to. Only convinced that the horse the old gentleman is now riding is one of the two that’s been over this ground last night – the States horse I feel sure. I have compared the tracks; and if young Poindexter was the man who was on his back, I fear there’s not much chance for the poor fellow. It looks ugly that the other rid after him.”

“Spangler! have you any suspicion as to who the other may be?”

“Not a spark, major. If’t hadn’t been for the tale of Old Duffer I’d never have thought of Maurice the mustanger. True, it’s the track o’ a shod mustang; but I don’t know it to be hisn. Surely it can’t be? The young Irishman aint the man to stand nonsense from nobody; but as little air he the one to do a deed like this – that is, if it’s been cold-blooded killin’.”

“I think as you about that.”

“And you may think so, major. If young Poindexter’s been killed, and by Maurice Gerald, there’s been a fair stand-up fight atween them, and the planter’s son has gone under. That’s how I shed reckon it up. As to the disappearance o’ the dead body – for them two quarts o’ blood could only have come out o’ a body that’s now dead – that trees me. We must follow the trail, howsoever; and maybe it’ll fetch us to some sensible concloosion. Am I to tell the old gentleman what I think o’t?”

“Perhaps better not. He knows enough already. It will at least fall lighter upon him if he find things out by piecemeal. Say nothing of what we’ve seen. If you can take up the trail of the two horses after going off from the place where the blood is, I shall manage to bring the command after you without any one suspecting what we’ve seen.”

“All right, major,” said the scout, “I think I can guess where the off trail goes. Give me ten minutes upon it, and then come on to my signal.”

So saying the tracker rode back to the “place of blood;” and after what appeared a very cursory examination, turned off into a lateral opening in the chapparal.

Within the promised time his shrill whistle announced that he was nearly a mile distant, and in a direction altogether different from the spot that had been profaned by some sanguinary scene.

On hearing the signal, the commander of the expedition – who had in the meantime returned to his party – gave orders to advance; while he himself, with Poindexter and the other principal men, moved ahead, without his revealing to any one of his retinue the chapter of strange disclosures for which he was indebted to the “instincts” of his tracker.