CHAPTER VI.

WHITE LASSO’S CAPTURE.

“Heaven help me!” broke from Charley Shafer’s lips, when he found himself in the perilous situation described in chapter _fourth_.

As Frontier Shack sprung to the ground to attend to the black stallion, Charley immediately assumed the saddle. He feared that Tecumseh’s restlessness might result in some wild freak, and he hoped to reach the bridle and curb his ire while his master secured his new prize. But the boy’s hand had not disengaged the bridle from the thick mane, when the iron-gray bounded forward.

Young Shafer felt his comrade hurled from his perch, and found himself jerked forward by the bridle which his fingers tightly clutched.

Still, however, he retained his presence of mind, and discovering at once that he could not stop Tecumseh with the bridle, he grappled the long gray hairs of the mane with his hands, and held on for dear life.

Tecumseh was conscious that he had a rider, for he tried to shake the youth off as he bounded over the prairie like a rocket; but he found himself unable to do so.

On, on, still on; the horse actually seemed to gain strength as he proceeded, and, by fearful glances ahead, the young Ohioan saw that he was nearing the lost herd.

“I can’t hold out much longer!” he gasped between the clenched teeth, “but I dare not release my hold. In a moment I would be trampled to death by his hoofs, and father would never see his runaway boy again.”

Strangely Tecumseh would turn his head whenever a word fell from rider’s lips; the horse seemed to think the voice that of his master; but the desire to see his free comrades overruled the obedience he had loved in days gone by, and kept the demon in his eyes.

All at once the boy saw the wild herd execute a sudden halt, but the next moment they wheeled to the right, and dashed northward as swiftly as before.

The halt enabled Tecumseh to approach very near the lost horses, and, as he “cut corners” at break-neck speed, his rider saw the cause of the horses’ sudden change of route.

A long line of dark forms appeared between him and the gray horizon.

They were Indians, scarce a mile away.

How Charley Shafer’s heart sprung into his throat at the sight.

If they could but see him!

He released one hand from Tecumseh’s mane, waved his handkerchief above his head, wildly and with frantic gestures. But he found that he occupied an insecure seat, and was soon forced to clasp the mane again.

He groaned, as well he might, when he saw that his exertion for salvation had accomplished nothing, for the Indians turned toward the river and he soon lost sight of them.

At last Tecumseh reached his lost brethren. With wild neighs they welcomed him back, and he returned the salute with sundry plunges which almost unhorsed his despairing rider. The horse’s strength did not seem weakened in the least degree, and this told Charley Shafer that, in bygone days, he had been the monarch of some great equine family.

For he skirted the edge of the wandering herd like a meteor, and boldly threw himself in the van.

Now the boy clung closer than ever to the iron-gray, for eight hundred hoofs were thundering behind him, and the sound fell doomfully upon his ears.

He was riding, helpless, at the head of death.

The sun descended toward the grayish clouds that crowned the horizon, and still over the rolling land the lost herd, and its new leader, thundered on.

The boy at length became so weak and discouraged that it seemed as if he must tumble off the horse’s back, and Tecumseh himself seemed to know that his rider would soon drop from his perch.

Suddenly he thought of the Pawnee village, which Frontier Shack said was north of the Platte; and he knew that the horses were running in a northerly direction. Might they not encounter the Pawnee Loups, and then might a lasso not fall near Tecumseh’s head, and he be saved?

He scarcely dared hope for such a finale to his wild ride, and yet he prayed devoutly for it.

The prayers for such a deliverance still rose from his lips, when Tecumseh snorted with rage and sprung to the right.

Almost unhorsed by the unexpected movement, the young white buffalo-hunter raised himself, and uttered an ejaculation of joy commingled with anxious fear.

The lost band, in scaling a prairie hillock, had suddenly come upon a Pawnee village, and a band of Indians!

The latter were near, while far away he saw the former, resting idly by a shining stream, which he felt must be the Loup fork of the Platte.

The Pawnee horsemen, perhaps thirty in number, at once drove their spurs into the rowels of the fresh animals, with a yell which the lost steeds greeted with neighs of astonishment.

Charley saw lassoes made ready as the Pawnees rushed forward, and he saw, too, with infinite joy, that they were gaining on him, at no insignificant rate.

“God help them catch me!” he cried, for captivity was preferable to the doom which had stared him in the face so long.

The singular turn which affairs had taken threw new strength into his limbs; he reached forward, and griped the bridle which lay on Tecumseh’s neck. Then, sitting bolt upright in his saddle, he “see-sawed” on the Mexican bit with all his might.

His action bothered the horses that pressed in his rear, for Tecumseh could not push forward with the alacrity he had known, and the others crowded against him, much to his disquietude.

They tried to pull the brave boy from the saddle; they caught his garments with their teeth, and lacerated his limbs with their frantic exertions.

But, finding that Tecumseh’s rider was delaying his progress, they suddenly divided ranks, and, without mercy, left the iron-gray in the rear.

Charley Shafer could have shouted at his victory, but he was still in the midst of great perils, and he realized his situation.

Still with the strength born of desperation he “see-sawed” on the bit, each moment making the iron-gray more frantic than ever.

He did not look backward for the Pawnees; he feared that a backward glance, like that of Lot’s wife, might prove his destruction, and he was bent on conquering the trapper’s runaway.

Tecumseh tried to regain his position at the head of the band, but failed, and at last he found himself quite a distance in the rear. Foam now completely covered his fiery body, and he seemed more a white horse than a gray one.

On, on, he pushed with splendid resolution, and so intent was his rider in the work of conquering, that he did not hear the hoofs that crushed the new-born grass in his rear.

But Tecumseh heard the sounds, and put forth every effort of strength.

“What ails the bridle?” suddenly cried the young Ohioan, discovering that the reins had suddenly lengthened. “By my heart! the bit is out of his mouth!”

He spoke truly; his eye had not deceived him.

Now the steed was ungovernable again, and the boy dropping the reins fell forward on Tecumseh’s neck, too weak to sit upright.

Where were the Indians now? He turned, but could not see clearly. A dazzling mist floated before his eyes, and the air to him suddenly became dense.

He saw not, felt not, what Tecumseh did--the whirling rope, the sudden tightening of the strong cord, and the throttling that quickly followed.

He felt his hands unclasp, then came the sensation of being hurled through the air--then insensibility!

He opened his eyes amid thirty anxious Pawnee Indians, and his recovery was greeted with yells of delight and triumph.

“White boy ride hunter’s horse like young brave,” said the giant, who had lassoed Tecumseh, kneeling beside the youth he had rescued. “How he get off with the big steed?”

In a few words our hero acquainted the Pawnees with the circumstances attending his perilous ride, and they admired his pluck in sticking to the animal.

“Pale boy brave enough to be Pawnee,” the Indian, who was evidently a chief, continued. “He made White Lasso catch him, by making hunter’s horse tired. If gray horse stay at head of band, White Lasso no catch ’im and save boy.”

The youth smiled, and thanked the Pawnee for the life he had saved.

He felt that his pluck had gained him a friend among the Indians, and the thought was further strengthened by the Pawnee’s words.

“White boy sleep in White Lasso’s tent,” he said, lifting our weakened hero from the ground.

“Red Eagle got Gold Girl, Pale Pawnee keep the darker rose, and White Lasso make the young rider great chief.”

The youth instantly comprehended the Pawnee’s words. A division of the captives had already been made, and Mabel Denison had fallen into the hands of the renegade. He allowed a flush of mingled fear and shame to overspread his face, and he clenched his white hands till the nails blued the palms.

Perhaps he already loved the fair girl who had been his companion across the plains, and well might he fear for her safety, if such was the case.

“I will be near her,” he murmured, “and perhaps I may yet thank God for my fearful ride through the jaws of death.”

The Indians watched the youth and the disappearing horses alternately, until White Lasso strode toward his own steed, panting near by. He bore our hero in his arms, and seated him on the foam-flecked mustang, before vaulting into the Spanish saddle himself.

“White Lasso love white boy,” the Indian whispered to his charge. “He had a boy once; but the Apaches scalp ’im ’fore he won his feathers. Pale-face take that boy’s place now.”

The next moment a middle-aged Indian rode up to the chief.

“Upper Pawnees will want white boy. Kenoagla give him them other day.”

White Lasso’s face darkened, and fire flashed from his midnight orbs. His hand flew to his knife.

“White boy is White Lasso’s son now. Upper Pawnees no git ’im again. The Pale Pawnees can not give ’im back. Kenoagla not Pawnee’s true king!”

He shot a glance burdened with passion around upon the band, and the eyes which he met told that Tom Kyle’s days of mastery were drawing to a close.

Charley Shafer shot a look of admiration into White Lasso’s face; but the next words that fell from the Indian’s lips blanched his cheek.

“White Lasso cut boy’s heart ’fore he give ’im back to upper Pawnees.”

The night closed about the party before they entered the Indian village, and without exciting many of its inhabitants. Charley Shafer reached his captor’s tent.

“White boy tired; he sleep now,” said the chief, pointing to a couch of buffalo skins, in one corner of the lodge. “Nobody hurt ’im. White Lasso stand ’tween ’im and Upper Pawnees, Red Eagle and Kenoagla.”

The boy started.

If those three evils should combine against him, what could White Lasso do? The answer to this interrogative came to him in the echo of the Pawnee’s words.

“White Lasso cut boy’s heart ’fore he give ’im back to Upper Pawnee.”

With a sigh that indicated the prostration of a human frame, the peril-environed Ohio youth threw himself upon the skins and immediately went to sleep.

He dreamed of home in that peaceful slumber--not of his own danger, nor of his young comrade, who, during his sleep, was being ingulfed by the treacherous quicksand with a Pawnee lariat around his body.

After watching his captive awhile, White Lasso stole from the lodge, on tip-toe, and walked away.

Scarcely had he disappeared when the skinny curtain slowly parted, and a face was revealed by the fire which lighted up the small apartment.

“How come pale boy here when Kenoagla still far off?” murmured the secret visitant. “Where White Lasso find him? Ha! he pretty as river lily; his skin fairer than Red Eagle’s.” Then, after a long pause, “Red Eagle not so pretty as pale boy. But Winnesaw go tell Gold Girl that her fair-skinned brother sleeps in White Lasso’s lodge.”

Then the face disappeared, and the curtains met again.

A new love was born in the Pawnee village that night.