CHAPTER XIII.

UNDER THE BRANDING IRON.

"Take that rock off my head," Jesse caught himself mumbling as he slowly returned to consciousness.

Two factors had served to save the outlaw's life: One that the Indian behind him had struck him a glancing blow, and the other that Jesse James' skull was too thick to break by any ordinary means.

But the blow had been a terrific one and the outlaw's head throbbed like a locomotive under full headway.

He emitted a subdued groan and tried to move. To his surprise he found he could not.

He was now conscious of shooting pains through his whole body. His arms were stretched above his head, and when he sought to draw them down by his side, he found he could not move them.

Jesse cautiously tried to move his feet, but like the arms, these also refused to respond to his will.

"That's queer," he thought. "I wonder if I'm dead."

He tried to recall the incidents that had preceded his present condition, but his mind was sluggish and just as he would almost come upon a solution of his strange condition, memory would elude him again.

He tried to open his eyes, but the eyelids seemed held down by some irresistible weight.

For a time the desperado sought to gratify the sensation of drowsiness that seemed to steal over him. Then he would suddenly awake with a start, the pain in his body more intense than before.

At last with a mighty effort of will he dragged his heavy eyelids open. At first he could see nothing for the darkness, then little by little he made out his surroundings.

He was in an Indian tepee.

"How did I get here?" he wondered.

He tried and tried to think.

Suddenly memory returned like a blow.

He remembered it all. The desperate battle on the ground--the club that finally had laid him low. But beyond that all was dark.

For a moment he could not make up his mind whether it was night or day, but glancing up he noted that the flap that covered the entrance to the wigwam showed a tiny ray of light through a fine slit that its owner had made for secret observations when within. Jesse wished he might be able to pull himself together sufficiently to get up and peek out.

But the effort to raise only gave him pain.

He sensed that his holsters were still at his sides and by their weight against his leg he judged that his guns must be in their places.

The thought gave him comfort. The outlaw's guns had become as much a part of himself as were his hands or his feet.

As his mind by slow process began to clear, he set about finding out why it was that he could not move--whether he had been seriously wounded or what mysterious force was holding him down.

The discovery came as a distinct shock and roused all the rage that his savage nature was capable of.

He was bound hand and foot.

Jesse's inclination was to give voice to his passions--to hurl invective at his unseen captors, to taunt them, to goad them, but not to plead. Jesse James had pleaded with no man in his eventful life. It was not in his nature to do so, nor would he begin now.

Yet he did not quite understand what manner of torture they had inflicted upon him to put him in such pain. But it was a matter of only a moment or so before he was made acquainted with his exact situation.

The great desperado had been subjected to the humiliation of being bound hand and foot. And more than that, his manacled hands had been triced up to a stake protruding from the ground some eighteen inches, and the feet had been treated similarly. His position was such that the weight of his body was a constant strain upon the thongs that bound him, a strain that extended through his entire body.

Jesse swore a terrible oath.

"I hope I killed the cursed savage," he gritted.

But his fond hopes were dashed almost at the moment of the utterance of them.

The flap was slowly pulled aside and an evil, ghastly face peered in--a face so torn and mutilated that Jesse observed nothing familiar in it.

He stared at it without speaking.

All at once he noticed that an ear was missing from the place where it should have been.

Then Jesse understood.

The face was that of his late antagonist, Great Bear.

The desperado laughed mockingly.

Great Bear jerked aside the flap so viciously that he tore it from its fastenings, allowing it to drop slowly from his lingering grasp as he surveyed his captive with malignant eyes.

"Welcome to our home, old scarred-face," jeered Jesse.

Great Bear made no reply, standing with head erect, searching keenly for some sign of fear or weakening in the face of his captive.

After a time, the redskin squatted on the turf and with chin in hands sat holding the outlaw with a steady gaze. For an hour he sat thus, Jesse glaring back at him with menacing, challenging eyes.

"Ugh! Paleface brave man," he grunted.

"Ugh! Big Chief a dirty cutthroat," retorted Jesse.

"Huh!" said Great Bear.

"I can lick you with one arm tied behind my back, old pizen snake," leered the desperado. "Let me up and I'll show you."

Great Bear rose, and stepping to the door gave a terse, guttural command to some one without. Returning to the wigwam, he squatted down at the great bandit's feet again and resumed his intent gaze into the other's face.

"Well," questioned Jesse, "Am I so purty that you can't keep your eyes off'n me? Think you'll know me when you see me again? I'd know you among a million with that face. I certainly did lam it to you, didn't I? I ought to have killed you when I had the chance up the tree there, but I hated to take an unfair advantage, even of such an old murderer as you are."

While the outlaw was now suffering terrible tortures from his strained position, he gave no sign to the waiting Indian chief.

A silent-footed savage appeared in the doorway, placing before the chief an earthen jar from which a thin curl of smoke ascended.

But even then Jesse did not catch the full significance of the chief's intentions.

From the receptacle the Indian removed a short iron rod. It's end was at white heat.

Great Bear moistened a finger at his lips and touched it. The rod hissed angrily.

Jesse understood now.

It was a branding iron. But still he did not quail, though his passions rose in a perfect storm.

"Paleface like um?" grinned Great Bear once more causing the hot iron to hiss.

"Never ate any," retorted the desperado with a grin that was even more expansive than that of the chief. "Going to brand some stock that you have stolen, eh?"

"Huh! Indian no brand cows. Um brand men. Um burn you."

"Oh, so that's the game is it? You're going to brand me like you would a critter on the range? Well, what do you think my men will do to you if I don't get away from here before you do it? Think they will do anything to you, you black-hearted cur?"

"Paleface no hurt Indian. Paleface all dead."

"That's a lie. One of them is here now watching you. He'll carry the word to the men and if there is not enough of them left he'll go to the fort for help. Guess the soldiers wouldn't do much to you."

Great Bear cast a glance that was almost apprehensive, out through the opening. With an expression that was half snarl, half grunt he drew the branding iron from the pot and squatted down beside the great outlaw, leering down into his face, gloating over the joy that was to be his.

Roughly he tore apart his prisoner's shirt and drove the blunt, white hot iron against his chest.

The iron hissed again. But this time a little thin line of blue smoke curled upward.

Great Bear inhaled a deep breath of heavenly satisfaction as the odour of burning flesh permeated his nostrils.

Jesse steeling himself, glared back at his tormentor. He gave no sign that he sensed the excruciating torture. But the lines of his mouth drew tense and hard.

The redskin replaced the iron in its heating pot and sat gloating over his victim as it burned again to a white heat.

Next he bared the left side of the outlaw and carefully selected his spot with the eyes of an expert, he applied the torture rod, holding it in place with steady, resistless pressure.

The agony that the victim suffered was almost more than human being could endure.

But still the man of iron there at the stake made no outcry, gave no sign, still smiling up at his tormentor. But the eyes were not in sympathy with the smile on the lips. They were cold and steely--they were the eyes of the gun-expert at the moment when he is about to take the life of a human being.

"Great Bear," began Jesse in an even, emotionless voice. "I shall be going away from here pretty soon. You will be dead then. I shall kill you. But before I go I am going to cut out your tongue and feed it to the dogs. Then I shall cut off your other ear and give it to the first drove of hogs that I meet. You'll be up in the Happy Hunting grounds then and you can't help yourself."

Once more the fiendish redskin tuned his branding iron to a sizzling white heat.

Great Bear felt the outlaw's cheek apparently with the intention of applying the iron there next. But for some reason, he evidently changed his mind. Carefully slitting the shoulders of Jesse's shirt, he burned a deep, livid impression on each, holding the iron for what, to the tortured bandit, seemed ages.

The great desperado was faint and dizzy, and tepee and savage danced before his eyes in a most outlandish fashion. Jesse wondered vaguely if all had gone suddenly crazy. But he had borne the ordeal without so much as a groan.

Great Bear scrutinized the outlaw's face keenly, and what he saw filled his soul with savage glee.

The Indian grunted a long-drawn grunt of satisfaction and laid aside his instrument of torture.

"Injun come again," he informed as Jesse opened his eyes once more. "Come tomorrow sun up. Take eyes out. Jesse Jame no fool Injun this time. No fool sojer. Byemby Jesse Jame Indian kill um. Injun get heap money for kill um Jesse Jame. Sojers no get um paleface. No get um money. Huh!"

"Jesse James will beat you yet," gasped the desperado weakly, mastering his faintness by a supreme effort. "He'll kill you!"

"Ugh!" breathed the savage, picking up his fire pot and departing from the wigwam without another word, nor once looking back at his miserable victim.

His fiendish torture had only just begun, and the anticipation in the mind of the savage was the keenest of all his inhuman emotions. He could afford to wait and he would yet see his victim writhe in agony and scream out as the awful pain was inflicted upon him.

Jesse emitted a long-drawn pent up sigh of relief, and a slight moan of agony escaped him as he closed his eyes wearily.

Great Bear had been gone but a moment when an Indian whom Jesse had never seen before, stalked in and made a careful examination of the tortured captive and his wounds.

From the savage's actions Jesse judged that he must be a medicine man. The outlaw grinned sardonically.

"Want to find out how much more I can stand, eh?" he jeered. "I'll take all you blood-thirsty devils can give me, don't you forget that."

His suspicions were confirmed when shortly after the medicine man had departed, three other Indians accompanied by Great Bear entered the wigwam, the chief giving them some terse directions in his own tongue that Jesse could not understand.

He did, however, understand the purport of it when the thongs that bound him to the stake, were severed by the strike of a keen-edged knife.

The desperado was roughly turned over on his face, and while two stalwart savages sat on him to hold him down, his arms were brought down to their normal position, then securely tied behind his back.

It was not much to be thankful for, but the change brought to Jesse the most heavenly sensation he ever had known.

His inclination was to draw a deep, long breath, but he resisted and shut his lips tight.

He would not give them that satisfaction.

The thongs that held his feet were now made doubly secure, so that in reality he was more helpless than before. But he was not inclined to complain, though the desperado never had been in such sore straits before.

His tormentors left him.

Jesse had been left lying on his face, the Indians not taking the trouble to turn him over. But after satisfying himself that he was alone, the outlaw cautiously rolled over on his back and rested for a few minutes. But his new position enabled him to see out through the opening, only the upper part of the flap having been put back in place by the savages when they left him.

He discovered that two stolid Indians had been left on guard. They were squatting on the ground in front of the wigwam. And now the desperado's mind began to work like a piece of well-oiled machinery, planning an escape. But just how he expected to accomplish this, was not clear to himself. Yet to his resourceful mind, no situation was impossible. Therefore the outlaw took cheer and set about the task in hand, regardless of the stinging pain from his burns, that he was now beginning to sense more keenly.

The desperado pricked up his ears at the sound of voices outside. He recognized the tones of Dew Drop, the Indian maiden. She was speaking loudly in her broken English, and Jesse understood instantly that she intended he should hear what she was saying.

Somewhere within her words there lay a message for him.

Dew Drop had launched into a perfect tirade of invective against the helpless desperado there in the wigwam, and with straining ears he listened for the words that would give him a clue to her motives. He observed too, that the shadows of night were falling. Between these two incidents the desperado believed there was a connection that augured well for his plans.

Once during her conversation with the Indians, he caught the words, "fire-water." Then Dew Drop's voice was heard no more, and he understood that she had gone away.

His heart sank. Perhaps he was wrong in his surmise, after all.

But Jesse's spirits revived a moment later when he heard her returning. He was at a loss at first to account for her movements. That something of interest to himself was occurring, Jesse was firmly convinced. But wriggle about as he would, he could not get a glimpse of the group outside.

However, the desperado's curiosity was soon rewarded.

"Firewater. That's it," he exclaimed. "By the great humping snakes. Sure as I am alive, the little savage is filling them up. I wonder what she's got up her sleeve now? If I only was able to get hold of my guns. I'd help her clean 'em out."

The sky was heavily overcast and black night had settled down over the scene, when finally labored breathing and guttural snores from without told the desperado that little Dew Drop's medicine had done its work well. Heap big Injun had gone to the happy hunting ground of dreamland.

But the bandit's thoughts were suddenly interrupted by a voice beside him.

"Jesse Jame," breathed the soft, purring voice of the Indian maid.

"Right you are, my little Dew Drop--"

"S-h-h-h!" cautioned the girl laying a soft, warm palm over his lips.

The sensation was peculiarly pleasant to the great bandit.

"Me cut um lariats. Um Jesse Jame go back by paleface brothers--"

"Where are they?" interrupted Jesse. "Do you know where they are now?"

"Dew Drop know. Dew Drop um know too bad chief kill um Jesse Jame morning."

"Hurry, little one," he begged, "let me get my guns. I must get out of here now."

He heard the girl utter a little startled exclamation as if she had been suddenly surprised by some one from without, then she sped away as silently as she had come, much to Jesse's surprise.

"Well, that gets me."

He could not understand her peculiar actions.

At least the desperado did not propose to remain quiescent when the way to freedom had been laid open to him. Dew Drop too, must have ere this, told the members of his band of his predicament, but by the time they were able to reach him, it might and probably would be too late.

Seconds were precious.

"I'd be a fool to stay here any longer," muttered Jesse. "The kid fluttered away like a frightened bird. Guess I'll go to."

Going, for the great desperado, however, was a far different matter. He could not walk nor could he crawl, and there seemed only one way left open to him, and this he adopted. He rolled.

It was not a dignified exit that he made from the wigwam, but it was better than being bound and guarded there with the prospect of further tortures in the morning.

He found his first difficulty was in getting out of the wigwam without pulling it down about him. This might attract attention and defeat his plan of escape. But Jesse finally accomplished it by going out head first, wriggling along like a clumsy snake on a frosty morning. His burns tortured him excruciatingly, but the great desperado shut his teeth together savagely and began to roll.

His two Indian guards lay directly in his path. Jesse with some misgivings and a greater effort, rolled over them as the quickest way to get on.

The Indians grunted but did not wake up, which he was positive would be the case in their condition. But the feel of their bodies against his had stirred the blood lust within him and suggested a new idea to the great desperado.

"If my hands only were free," he growled. "Ah, I have it. I'll try it," he gritted, with blazing eyes.

Quickly the outlaw rolled back to them. Now he was bent on a terrible revenge. And he forgot for the moment his own deadly peril in his ferocious desire to be revenged on Great Bear.

With as much speed as his manacled condition would permit, the great outlaw worked his head along the body of the Indian nearest to him. Not finding what he sought at first, he braced his feet with great difficulty and putting forth an almost superhuman effort, pushed and pushed against the redskin with his head, until the savage had been rolled over. The deed, however, had required a supreme effort.

The Indian squirmed and muttered surlily, but to the desperado's intense relief, did not awake.

Jesse searched at the side he had just turned up, and with a savage exclamation of delight, bit hard at the Indian's waist.

The desperado's face came away with the redskin's bowie between his teeth.

The outlaw could have shouted, so great was his joy. After laborious effort he succeeded in setting the keen-edged blade more firmly between his teeth, so that only the hilt was held by them.

Cautiously he squirmed and wriggled until his head and shoulders were over the body of the redskin whom he had again rolled over on his back.

The great desperado, still holding the knife in a vice-like grip between his teeth, twisted his head at right angles to his body and set the needle-like point of the blade, on the Indian's abdomen.

The cruel blood-thirstiness of what he was about to do made no impression on him, for Jesse was bent on a terrible vengeance. And it was a moment of supreme ecstasy for the bandit-chieftain, bound and manacled and helpless as he was.

Suddenly throwing the weight of his body on his toes and neck, the deadly bowie, by the sheer force of the outlaw's own weight, was driven into the Indian's bowels while the blood in a sudden red sheet, spurted into his mouth and eyes.

The redskin sprang almost clear of the ground, then settled back with a heavy groan, his stupor too heavy to resist the work of the vengeful blade.

With a fiendish light in his eyes the desperado gloated over the death throes of the unconscious savage, whose writhings, whose agonized twistings and muscular contractions, sent the outlaw into an ecstasy of delirious joy.

After a little, the Indian stiffened out and lay still.

"One!" snarled the desperado.

Once more the avenging outlaw crawled laboriously to his victim. And that despite the fact that every moment's delay placed his own life more and more in jeopardy.

Now came the most difficult part of his task. The bowie, driven in to its keen-edged limit, was tightly wedged in the body of the dead savage.

With feverish haste, the world's greatest desperado again buried his face in the awful pool of blood.

His teeth closed over the slippery hilt of the blade.

But it stubbornly resisted all his efforts.

The knife was too firmly embedded in its human sheath, to come away at his command.

The cords of the outlaw's neck swelled to enormous proportions from the fearful strain he was subjecting them to.

He sought to accomplish his ends, in another way. Biting the hilt as if he would sever it in twain, Jesse pushed against it with all the weight of his body. The keen edge, under his irresistable pressure, cut its way into the Indian's flesh at right angles to his body, thus widening the wound and making its sheath less binding.

Back and forth did the blood-thirsty outlaw work the blade.

He pushed and he pulled like a dog wrestling with a bone. He shook it like a rat. Then he gave it a long, vicious tug.

The bloody blade came away with a sickening sound.

And the desperado fell backward with a terrible curse. Yet, withal, his grip on the bloody hilt did not relax.

Now came the most arduous task of all, that of crawling over the body of his victim and rolling to the remaining savage, without losing the knife from his teeth. The feat was not so easy as it would seem, and he could accomplish it only by keeping his head from touching the ground over every inch of the way.

He struggled desperately.

Minutes elapsed.

But the second redskin died more speedily than had the first, Jesse having given him a terrible thrust with the deadly blade. And with eager, fascinated eyes he watched the death agonies of his victim. In a moment all movement ceased. The man was dead.

Jesse's work of vengeance, for the time, was ended. And now to roll for safety, if that were possible. Should he be caught, he knew that this time his punishment would be swift and sure. Great Bear would take no chances with him after this.

But just as the outlaw was about to start on his unequal journey, he suddenly espied the figure of an Indian standing a few paces away, in the gloom, gazing intently in his direction.

The desperado fairly held his breath. He wished now that he had brought away the bowie from his second victim. But it was too late to rectify his mistake.

Still, defenceless as he was, the great bandit devoutly hoped the savage redskin would throw himself upon him. Jesse believed that, with a well directed kick he could silence the fellow and put an end to him afterwards, for his thirst for blood had not yet been satisfied.

Though it would be a desperate chance he was willing and anxious to take it. But he was not given a chance to put his foolhardy plan into operation. The redskin emitted a sudden grunt, and dropping into a long lope, sped noiselessly toward the main part of the village, that lay some twenty rods to the west.

Jesse was off like a flash.

His one supreme object now was to put as much distance as possible between himself and his savage enemies.

But the laborious rolling process was too slow for him.

He had rolled himself clear of the bodies of his victims, when all at once, acting upon sudden impulse, he adopted a new and unique method of facilitating his progress. With a tremendous effort he raised himself on his manacled feet.

Despite the fact that his hands were tied behind him, the desperate man threw himself head first to the ground. None but the toughest skull could have survived the impact when his head struck the hard ground.

Jesse's object was now obvious.

The instant he sensed the feel of the ground under his head, by a sudden twist of the body, using his head as a pivot, the desperado threw himself to his feet again, thus finishing as pretty a head spring as ever a trained performer in a circus had done.

With movements so lightning-like that the eye, in the uncertain light, would scarcely have been able to follow them, the great bandit hurled himself into a mad whirl of somersaults that carried him away from the scene of his recent exploits almost as fast as his legs could have done had they been free.

He heard a loud commotion in the Indian village behind him. But whether the savages had learned of the death of the two men or that they simply had been told by the Indian who came upon him so suddenly, that the sentinels were asleep, he neither knew nor cared.

Jesse reasoned shrewdly that in any event the Indians would be delayed a few moments in their surprise at finding their companions murdered, and then the search for him in the wigwam and its immediate vicinity following, all of which would give him a fair start.

Still he knew his trail was as plainly marked as if it had been made by a log-rolling gang, a trail which they would have no difficulty in following at top speed. Therefore haste was all imperative if he hoped to keep his scalp fitted in its proper place. And the world's greatest bandit was not ready to part with that portion of his anatomy just yet.

On dashed the desperado, his movements resembling the evolutions of a cart wheel down a mountain road. And so rapid was his flight that he was unable to take note of either direction or location.

The savages were now hot on his trail.

He could hear their shouts as they discovered it. Like the bay of the hounds when close upon their prey they came rushing down upon him.

Jesse redoubled his efforts. Bending every nerve to the tremendous task before him, the terrible outlaw sprang far up into the air to increase the reach of his next leap.

He stiffened his nerves to meet the impact when his feet should next touch the ground.

But to his intense surprise, the feet did not touch at all. They were kicking wildly in empty space.

All at once the great desperado realized that he was falling through space.

Like a rock, hurled with terrific force, he had thrown himself over a sheer precipice whose rocky bottom lay two hundred feet below him.