CHAPTER III. TEDDY O’DOHERTY’S ENCOUNTERS.

It will be remembered that upon the appearance of the strange animal, during the preceding spring, one member of the party, (Teddy O’Doherty,) was asleep, and failed to see it.

But he heard enough of it continually. It was described and conjectured upon again and again in his hearing, until he came to look upon it as an old acquaintance; but having never set eyes upon it himself, he attached little credit to these numerous accounts, and supposed it was a bear or something similar.

“A pecoolyer-lookin’ critter, as everybody obsarved when they viewed me; but a critter, fur all that, that nobody need be afeard of.”

So, when a short distance from the camping-ground of his friends, he left them and started in quest of the antelope, he had no thought of the other dreaded creature that had been seen in this region, and that made its home so near at hand.

Passing over the ridge, he found himself in such a heavily-wooded country, that he dismounted and continued his hunt on foot. His horse was thus left but a short distance from the camp, and the Irishman understood well enough that he would not increase the distance.

The sun was low in the horizon, but, looking westward, Teddy caught sight of the faint column of smoke that had arrested the attempt of old Stebbins. He paused a moment and looked earnestly toward it.

“Red naygurs,” he concluded, “and they’ve squatted down rather close, as Bridget used to observe, when she sot on one side the house in Tipperary, and I on t’other. I will go and inthrodooce myself.”

The intervening ground was very favorable for a reconnoissance, and he moved along with little fear of being discovered. It was fully dark when he reached the strange camp, where not a single person was visible; but a few minutes examination showed that a large number of Blackfeet Indians had encamped there, but all had been gone several hours.

A little careful examination of the surrounding ground, by means of a torch, showed further that they had mounted their horses and gone due westward, exactly in the opposite direction from their friends, and the very course they would have desired them to take.

This was a pleasing discovery for Teddy, but he was reminded that he had started out to procure a much-needed supper for himself and friends, and that night had closed around him without his having done so.

But good fortune awaited him. This was a country of bountiful game, and the Blackfeet had evidently been feasting, for they had left behind them such an abundance of buffalo-meat and venison, that Teddy found no difficulty in picking up an all-sufficiency for his friends.

To make the load as convenient, however, as possible, he put his share within, making a hearty and enjoyable supper, and made sure that he had secured to his back all that Stebbins and Black Tom could dispose of, and then he started homeward.

In his explorations around the camp fire, he had given it such a stirring up that it was burning vigorously, and threw quite an extended circle of light though the surrounding gloom.

Teddy was standing by the fire, looking in upon the embers, and reflecting how good he felt after his dinner, when it suddenly occurred to him that he was a fine target for any foe that might be lurking in the vicinity.

The thought had scarcely crossed his mind, when he saw something flickering before his eyes; he heard a whizz, and knew on the instant that an arrow had missed his face by scarce a hand’s breadth.

Instinctively he threw his head back, and then jumped back in the darkness.

“Be the Vargin, but that’s a _leetle_ too close, as me uncle obsarved, when by mistake he shaved off his nose, instead of the mustache on his chin. Begorra; if I kin only get a chance at the spalpeen.”

He understood from what direction the deadly missile had come, although he could not tell how far away the Indian stood that had fired it. The Irishman was now enveloped in the gloom of the woods, and his self confidence returned. The experience which had been his with the veteran prairie-men had taught him to move over the ground with the stealth and silence of the Blackfoot himself, and were he so fortunate as to be approaching his treacherous foe, he was certain there was no danger of his betraying himself.

“I’m moving as silent as a fairy,” he reflected; “it’s a handy thrick fur a chap in my sitooation--bad luck to it!”

In the darkness his foot caught in a projecting root, and the consequence was, Teddy was thrown forward flat upon his face.

“Bad luck to it!” he repeated, as he hastily scrambled to his feet, “hilloa, there! hold on I say!”

He heard a hurried tramp, and in the gloom caught a flitting glance of an Indian speeding rapidly away from him.

“Howld on, ye dirty coward!” called out the irate Teddy, dashing after him, “howld on, I say, or I’ll bate ye, and I’ll bate yees if ye do.”

It is hardly worth while to say that the Irishman’s command was unheeded. The red-skin whisked away, like a flitting phantom, and almost instantly vanished. Teddy pursued him for a short distance, but he was not much of a runner, and his pursuit could not result in any thing but a complete failure.

He was not given time to aim and fire his gun. His “short and decisive campaign” against the Blackfeet was a defeat!

“Bad luck to that rut!” he muttered, as he made his way back to it; “it was all through that!”

He groped around until he discovered the scene of his mishap, when he revenged himself by tearing and ripping the mute offender to pieces.

“It was yees that saved a coward’s life!” he exclaimed, as he finished his self-imposed task, “and yees shall niver do the likes ag’in.”

It may be said that it takes a hungry man to appreciate the same gnawing want in another, and so Teddy almost forgot that he had a couple of friends, something over half a mile distant, who were looking longingly for his coming.

“They kin wait as well as mesilf,” he concluded, when he recalled the fact. “Thrue, I have a sooper within, and be the same towken, their sooper is without--but, then, what’s the difference?”

However, he concluded that, as the night was now quite well advanced, there was no objection to his rejoining the trappers, and so he started forward.

There was a moon above the tree-tops, and where the country was open he had quite a clear view for a distance of several rods; and, as he recollected very well the route taken in his hunt, there was no fear of his losing his way.

As he moved along, he could see the dark line of the ridge outlined against the sky beyond, and he knew that only a short distance on the other side, his comrades were looking for his coming.

Teddy had a pretty correct idea of the gastronomic capacity of his friends, and so he had loaded himself down pretty heavily with the plunder found around the Blackfoot camp-fire. All that he carried was cooked and prepared, ready for eating.

He was scarcely half-way to the ridge, when he became sensible that he had a very heavy load upon his back; and, coming across a large, flat rock, he sat down upon it for a few minutes’ rest.

“Begorra, if the spalpeens ate all of that, it’ll do till they raich the States ag’in. Hilloa, there!”

This exclamation was caused by the sight of a man walking in a direction at right angles to his own, and only a rod or two in advance. He was walking leisurely, like some one who was returning from a wearisome hunt; and, what surprised Teddy, he was certainly a white man, rather young in years.

“Hilloa, I say!” called out the Irishman, again.

The stranger abruptly paused, and looked inquiringly toward him.

“Well, what is it ye want?”

“Who the blazes be yees?”

“I don’t know as that concerns you,” replied the stranger, resuming his walk, and almost immediately disappearing in the darkness.

The exasperated Teddy shouted to him to hold on, calling him a coward, and seeking by every means imaginable to bring him back. Had it not been that he was so heavily loaded, he would have sought to follow and bring him to terms; but the Irishman scarcely had time to rise to his feet, when the man had vanished.

“Jist me luck!” he growled, as he sunk back again to finish his rest. “I once walked siven miles to attind the wake of Micky McMaghaghoghmoghlan, and whin I got there, found he hadn’t died at all; and so, whin I was felicytaterin’ mesilf on a fight wid this impudent spalpeen, he walks away, widout exchanging a crack of the head wid me. Bad luck to him! but I’ll have a muss wid somebody, if it’s wid old Stebbins or Black Tom, and then I’ll be sure to get whopped, which is better nor not fightin’ at all, at all.”

Teddy was about to resume his walk, when a peculiar sound, something like the bark of a dog, caught his ear.

“What the dooce is that?” he exclaimed, staring about him. “Who’s got dogs in this part of the world?”

His inquiry was answered by a sight of the creature itself. He saw a large, clumsy-looking animal, with an immense head and a most frightful-looking body, spotted and striped in the most terrible manner, coming straight toward him.

“Begorra! but it’s the divil,” was the Irishman’s conclusion, as he sat like one transfixed, staring at it. “It’s the divil himself, dressed up in his bist soot, and going to the circus.”

It can not be said that Teddy was particularly frightened, for he had his loaded gun in his possession, and with that he was justified in having confidence in his powers of attack and defense.

But suddenly, he recalled the stories he had heard of the strange monster that haunted this portion of the North-West.

“It’s worse nor the divil,” he muttered, “fur it’s _that_, be the howly Vargin!”

This discovery caused the Irishman some little trepidation, but, at the same time, he was rather pleased that he was about to have an opportunity to try his gun upon it.

Indeed, as the nameless beast continued his leisurely advance, his appearance would have struck terror into the heart of any one. The fantastic, extraordinary hue of its body and legs, the immense tail curved over the back, and its ponderous build, were such that, once seen, no one ever could forget them.

“An’ they say he ates min whole,” thought Teddy, as he silently drew his rifle around in front of him. “His head is big enough, be the powers! Wonder, now, if he isn’t a shark that’s immigrating from the Atlantic to the Pacific.”

The fearful brute continued his leisurely advance, as if he saw not, or, at least, cared not for the man who was seated almost in his path. His course was such that, if unchanged for a few seconds longer, would lead him about a rod to one side of the amazed hunter.

The latter, as may well be supposed, scrutinized it most sharply as it approached, and under the dim light of the moon, he had a good opportunity to notice its characteristics.

Its head and body have already been described; its short, dumpy legs very much resembled those of an elephant, while, barring the trunk and tusks, its head was not very dissimilar. It had the same immense palm-leaf like ears; but its mouth looked like that of an alligator--so that its cannibal propensities did not seem so unlikely after all.

It moved heavily and somewhat awkwardly, but its appearance was that of an animal of prodigious strength, much the superior of the famed grizzly bear, and a creature to be shunned in a hand-to-hand encounter.

The idea that would naturally suggest itself upon a glance at this strange creature, would be that it was a cross, combining in itself the characteristics of several animals; but men who had spent years in the West, and understood its native inhabitants thoroughly, declared that such could not be the case. Its build and appearance was unlike any thing that had ever been seen in these parts. It was _sin generis_, and unlike any thing else.

Some believed that it belonged to an extinct race; probably to the era of the mastodon, and other monsters whose remains are found in the earth; that by some strange providence, it had escaped the destruction of its kind, and still wandered over the world, like a lost sheep, looking in vain for its fold--the last and the least of its race.

But this was a fantastic theory--so utterly impossible, that it deserves no more than simple reference here.

There certainly were some established facts regarding this monster which are utterly unaccountable. It had been fired at again and again, by the most skillful hunters, and yet never gave the slightest evidence of being hurt. Bullets that would have bored their way through the hide of the rhinoceros, and torn on through bone and muscle to the seat of life, seemed to glance aside, as harmless as the tiny hailstones.

There was many a man, certainly, who had tried his weapon upon it, and it still walked the earth to defy their skill and efforts. There were hunters who said they had seen it bite a man in two at one mouthful--just as the alligator or shark serve the swimmer that ventures into their domain.

But while we have drifted into this digression, the situation of Teddy O’Doherty has become more and more critical. He sat with his gun in hand, with his eyes fixed upon the brute, waiting for the opportunity to fire.

He had determined that if it headed straight toward him, he would be polite enough to step aside, for _that_ certainly was not the antagonist to engage in a close fight; but it did not swerve an inch from its path.

And walking thus, it passed about a rod to the left of Teddy, who cautiously raised his gun and took aim.

What better opportunity was possible? It was so close that he could have tossed his hat upon it, and was turned broad-side toward him. If he could stand a shot then, surely he was invulnerable to powder and bullet.

The hunter aimed directly behind the fore leg--that spot which is the vital one to the most dreaded animal, and through which the messenger of death makes his way without challenge. He waited until the foot was thrust forward, and his aim was absolutely certain.

The next instant his piece was discharged.

“Thar! be the Virgin, if that doesn’t fotch yees--”

Heavens! what did he hear and see?

He heard that same bark-like cry that had first caught his ear, and saw the brute coming straight toward him!

Flesh and blood could not stand it; and with a howl of terror, Teddy broke in a run for the camp. A few furious bounds carried him to the bottom of the ridge, when his bad luck overtook him.

Glancing back, he saw the dreadful beast close upon him, galloping along like the cat, when frolicking with its prey. The load upon the back of the fugitive made him somewhat awkward in his movements, and he stumbled and fell flat upon his face. Ere he could rise, his foe was upon him!