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Free Trapper's Pass
Free Trapper's Pass / or, the Gold-seeker's Daughter!
CHAPTER I.
THE RAID OF THE BLACKFEET
On a tributary of the Yellowstone River, and near to the Bighorn Mountains, there stood, at the time our story opens, a cabin. Though roughly constructed, there was an air of nicety and comfort about it, which could hardly be expected in a frontier log-house. On the outside, the walls presented a comparatively smooth surface, though a glance would be sufficient to satisfy one that the work was of the axe and not of the plane. On the inside, the walls seemed to be plastered with a material, which, in its primitive state, resembled stiff brown clay; and it was through a chimney of the same substance that the smoke of the fire within found vent.
A fair girl stood in the shadow of the rude doorway. Her hair, golden as the memory of childhood’s days, floated in soft ringlets over her exquisitely-formed shoulders, half concealing in its wavy flow her lovely cheeks, mantling with the rich hue of life – cheeks which, long ago, might have been tinged with the sun’s brown dye, but which now, miracle though it might seem, bore little trace of old Sol’s scorching hand, or tell-tale mark of western marches. Blue eyes she had, and a lovely light lingered in their liquid depths, while her form was one corresponding to her face, slender, but lithe and springing, well calculated to endure, along with a stout heart, the privations which must come upon one thus so strangely out of place.
Half turning, she threw up one beautiful arm, and with her hand shaded her eyes from the glare of the sun, at the same time glancing to the right. As she did so, she gave a slight start, for, in the distance, she had caught sight of an approaching horseman. As cause for fear was, however, quickly removed, as she almost immediately recognized him as a friend. Murmuring lightly to herself:
“Ah, John Howell! What can he be after?” She watched with some interest his onward progress. Why was it that he so suddenly halted? Why did horse and rider remain mute and motionless, gazing in the direction of a mound which lay not far distant from the cabin?
From behind its concealing shade, with a horrid yell, a band of Indian braves at least fifty in number, in single file approached.
The majority of the band came directly toward the house, but the form of Howell, stationed, sentinel like, upon the crest of a knoll, having been speedily observed, a squad of four well-mounted and well-armed braves dashed toward him at full speed.
Half the intervening distance had been traversed before the trapper – for such was the white man – had fully determined whether their advance was friendly or hostile in its nature. When at length he caught fuller glances of their forms, it was with remarkable celerity that he unslung his rifle and brought it to bear upon the nearest of the advancing foes, tersely exclaiming:
“Blackfeet, by mighty!”
At the touch of the finger upon the trigger the weapon was discharged, and he who had been the mark, fell. Without waiting to see the success of his shot, Howell turned his horse and struck the heavy Mexican spurs deep into his sides, speeding in hot haste over the rolling ground, with the three red-skins following in close pursuit.
While these things were transpiring, the main body was marching steadily toward the cabin. Simultaneously with the report of Howell’s rifle, the band halted in front of the dwelling.