s> \s 2229452 CONTENTS. CHAPTER PAGE XXVEL THE CITY WITH A PAST 313 XXVIII. OLD JEREMY'S NIECE 323 XXIX. THE HEIR 332 XXX. A STRANGE FAMILY 343 XXXL THE LUNCH-PARTY 357 XXXII. A VISITOR AT THE BROCK HOUSE . . . 365 XXXIII. "SHE'S NOT GOING TO BE WORSE!" . . .375 XXXIV. "DEAR CHILD, YOU FORGOT TO TELL HIS NAME," 384 XXXV. "YouB COUSIN'S WIFE! CAPTAIN ELYOT'S WIFE!" 390 XXXVI. "AND NOW WILL YOU NOT SEND FOR COUSIN ROBERT ? " 400 XXXVII. WATTING 411 XXXVIII. COMPENSATION . . 421 HIS INHERITANCE. CHAPTER I. BLOSSOM. IT is November of 185-, and Blossom is going back across the plains to her home. Seventeen j^ears before, a baby had been born, within a rude fort upon the Arkansas River, to the post-sutler Stubbs and his wife ; and this baby was Blossom. It is but just to say, that, earlier in life, this man Stubbs, had borne another name, which had been lost, beyond finding again, somewhere in the Western wilder- ness ; or, to be exact, his odd, stunted figure had won for him this sobriquet, before which his rightful cognomen burned dimly for a while, and finally went out altogether. He had resigned his name without much of an effort to retain it, thereby showing little of pride or spirit. But rights of any kind were held here only at the muzzle of a revolver, and had been gradually narrowed down, until they involved little more than life and liberty : to con- tend for any thing less was hardly worth the powder. And then one name was as good as another, or even better if it carried an idea, which Stubbs certainly 7 8 HIS INHERITANCE. did. The early trappers and traders of the Far West were not given to much speaking. Each brief word was suggestive ; and the names, bestowed in praise or derision, were mostly biographies in miniature. Some- times they were but personally descriptive, as in this case, or they were made to serve as a perpetual ex- clamation-point after a man. But, however expressive such titles may be when applied to one individual, they become incongruous, not to say absurd, when made to include a family. What could be more appropriate, more sharply descrip- tive of the broad-shouldered, serene-faced, stumpy little man who bore it, than the name of Stubbs ? But it was a grim sarcasm upon the woman who had shared his quarters for a dozen years before the baby's eyes opened upon them. She was tall ; she was gaunt as a gray wolf in winter. She was strong of arm and stout of nerve, with a talent for devising, and a will for executing, almost any work. She could serve a dinner to a tolerably straitened garri- son that would tempt a king ; or she could steady a rifle, and drop a red-skin if need be at three hundred yards. There was even a rough kind of femininity about the woman, who was by no means disagreeable to look at, with her bright black eyes, and her brown cheeks show- ing a subdued flame. She had been known more than once to nurse a wounded man back to life when the surgeons had given him up, with just scolding enough, it must be owned, to spur him on to convalescence. Add to these the aggressive qualities of thrift and neatness, and we shall have a perfect character, you will say. Oh, no ! Do you fancy that all the natural graces as well as the Christian virtues are to be found -in one HIS INHERITANCE. 9 individual ? She was envious. But that is not so rare a fault that it need be dwelt upon. She was crafty and unscrupulous. But the first she concealed by the second ; and the third, in tending upon the other two, kept in the background. And then she was comely to look at (and that is a better cloak than charity even), with her sleek black hair, and the fresh color just dead- ened by the tan on her cheeks, comely to look at, if one could forget the embers in her eyes, which a gust of passion might blow into a blaze. After all, it was a kind of beauty which a man might like to look upon, but would hardly covet for his own. As for her thrift and neatness, the sutler's quarters showed the effect of these good qualities, which were a kind of stockade about the real woman. Her home was tidy and inviting, or would have been, but that the tidiness became tyrannical at times. Gradually a kind of cabaret of a most respectable pattern was established here, where the officers dropped in of an evening to order a bit of supper, which the mistress of the house was not above cooking with her own hands. A well- thumbed pack of cards was brought into requisition while waiting for this to be served ; and rumor did say that many a pile of government gold changed hands over the table here. But rumor is always malicious, and this may or may not have been true. Drinking there certainly was, ,but no brawling over the cards or wine, or the friendly pipe with Stubbs himself, who was a quiet, shrewd man, an excellent listener at all times ; and what could be more desirable in a compan- ion ? He could even tell a story of his own when Mrs. Stubbs was not by ; for the post-sutler stood some- what in awe of his energetic helpmeet. There was not 10 HIS INHERITANCE. her equal this side the Rocky Mountains, he often declared ; and as this assertion included not only the plains, but that mystical region " the States," it was a rare compliment indeed. Still it must be owned that she was a kind of moral car of Juggernaut to the man ; and not to Stubbs alone, but to all the frequenters of the house, not one of whom would have dared offer any thing but the most exaggerated respect to its mistress. In her own domain she ruled a queen. She served, it is true, but by favor ; and woe to any man who forgot what was due from a guest to Ms hostess ! for a warm corner in the little family-room was not to be despised of a winter night, when the snow covered them in, and the wind howled a dismal chorus outside, while the rusty stove at the officers' quarters gave out smoke without heat. Here the fire was always bright, with an apple or two puffing and spitting steam before it, or the red-hot poker innocently but significantly blinking among the coals. The rough plastered walls were covered with prints which Stubbs had found in trading-expeditions to the States, or Mrs. Stubbs had scissored thriftily from illus- trated journals, and were volumes in themselves of history, biography, and travel. But, since the titles had been mostly sacrificed to space, there was a tanta- lizing indefiriiteness about the whole, which possibly enhanced its interest. A Mexican blanket covered the centre of the floor upon extraordinary occasions, with rude skins spread here and there for softer comfort. Scant curtains of red moreen hid the tiny windows, and gave color to the place'; while the furniture was made up of odd pieces brought by the sutler at various times from Independence, that outpost of civilization HIS INHERITANCE. 11 at this time. It had been chosen with an eye for but one quality, durability ; and even this had required an eye of faith. But its "exceeding lastingness," like that in Kalander's house, had almost made it appear by this time exceeding beautiful. Comfortable it was, at least. And this was the home into which, after a dozen childless years spent in as many rough, rude places, the baby came to the post-sutler Stubbs and his wife. It was an event to stir the foundations of their world ; but it brought little change. Sergeant Duckling im- provised a cradle from the half of an old Hour-barrel, which Mrs. Stubbs covered with gay-flowered chintz ferreted from Stubbs's stock of unsalable wares, and set up in a corner seemingly devised expressly for it. To be sure, the pipes were banished now to the adjoining store ; but the baby more than made up for any such deficiency. It was passed from hand to hand, and tossed and dandled in air in a way that would have agonized a less courageous mother. But Mrs. Stubbs bore it all with the equanimity of pride and ignorance. And the child laughed and crowed its delight at the involuntary gymnastics it was made to perform in the arms of its rough friends. A pale, delicate little flower was this which had blossomed upon Mrs. Stubbs's bosom. The ways of Providence are indeed past finding out. A wolfs cub, a young coyote, would have been more akin to the woman. But no : wolf-cubs are born into sheep- folds, and lambs lie down by lions, and no one knows the reason why. Still, something of softening did come to her with motherhood, as well as a deeper craft and a more grasping ambition. The one growing purpose of her life had been to push Stubbs on in the world, 12 HIS INHERITANCE. where, or toward what end, she hardly knew. They had schemed and worked and hoarded, the man, at least, honestly enough, until they had become rich, rich even for " the settlements," where Mrs. Stubbs's eyes and desires were wont to turn. But now, what would she not do for the child ! There was no limit to her desires, or to the vague visions over that rude cradle. But no ambitious dreams disturbed the father. There is a vein of poetry in the nature of every man ; and the coming of the baby was like sinking a shaft into Stubbs's soul, though very little of the precious ore ever came to the surface a few trifling specimens only to show the richness of the lode. He was by no means a godly man ; but, cradling the child in his arms, he would croon over her hour after hour, not the rollicking songs of a camp, but quaint, awful hymns, enough to strike terror to the heart of an ordinary individual, and picked up no one knew where. " Great spoils I shall win From death, hell, and sin," sang the father in a hoarse, broken voice, and with many a twist and turn to the weird air. The child looked up into his face, and smiled her contentment. What were death, hell, and sin to her happy babyhood ! It was he who first called her Blos- som ; and a frail little blossom she was, with her white face, her solemn brown eyes, and her hair like the fluff on the dandelions in summer-time. And Blossom she came to be to all the garrison, from the stern colonel in command, down to little Bob White, who made .the last in the line on dress-parade. Not that this was her bap- HIS INHERITANCE. 13 tismal name ; for christened she was one sabbath after- noon in summer, in the presence of the whole garrison, through the zeal of the new chaplain it must be owned, rather than from any desire of her parents. The poor man had but scant opportunity for wearing his bands, or performing the rites of his church here, and could not allow such an one as this to go by unimproved. The child looked gravely, but without fear, upon the assembled company, until she caught sight of Sergeant Duckling's good-natured face, when she broke into an irreverent, gurgling laugh, ending in a most uncompro- mising crow, greatly to the embarrassment of the chap- lain, who was young and unmarried. The colonel tried to frown down the smile awakened by this undignified conduct of the candidate ; but there was a twinkle in his own eye. Dear me ! Had he not dandled the child in his own arms by the hour, when his wife had bor- rowed her for the afternoon ? "Name this child," said the chaplain hastily. He was alarmed for his own dignity and the solem- nity of the service he had inaugurated. Mrs. Stubbs stood like a drum-major by her husband's side, gorgeous in a new pink bonnet fashioned directly after that of the colonel's wife. She gave him a nudge with her elbow to remind him to speak up promptly, which only served to rout every idea from poor Stubbs 's mind. It was only when this domestic spur had been applied the second time that he succeeded in stammer- ing out a name which nobody could understand. The chaplain, however, took it up, and repeated it in a sono- rous voice. To tell the truth, he had it upon a bit of paper in his hand all the time. The asking was but a form. 14 HIS INHERITANCE. It was his mother's name over which Stubbs had stammered. It had not been uttered for many a long year ; nor was it embarrassment alone that brought the quaver to his voice as he pronounced it. The water dropped upon the child's wondering face, the last prayer was uttered, the last amen pronounced, the band struck up, the company dispersed, and little Blossom was made a Christian. Not that she had been so great a sinner before. She was a gentle child from her birth ; and the " old Adam," whom the chaplain had prayed that her heart might be rid of, seemed hardly to have taken a lodgement there. Her pretty ways had made her the pet of the garrison. Never a week passed, that Orderly Sims did not appear with the compliments of the colonel's lady, and begging the loan of Miss Blossom for the day. From these visits she returned, decked out like a queen barbaric, and laden with spoils. Even the Indians hanging about the post awakened to something like interest at sight of the white pappoose. Their tawny faces had no terror for the child ; and, when she arrived at the dignity of standing upon her feet, the gentle young tyrant refused any covering for those dimpled members, but the softest of deer-skin moccasons, braided and fringed and beaded after the pattern of the ones worn by her dusky friends. But, if these were her friends, Bob White was her slave. He it was who carved a misshapen piece of anatomy, which he called a doll, for Blossom's delight, and which became her greatest treasure. And so the years slipped by, but not without seasons of bitter pain. More than once were her friends ordered away, not to return, and Blossom's tender heart was broken in the parting. Even Bob White's turn came HIS INHERITANCE. 15 at last ; and he marched out of the gate with his com- pany, his boyish heart heavier than the knapsack on his shoulders. He had sat up half the night to cut out a rude figure of a horse as a parting-present for Blossom. It was a pitiful creature, if the truth be told. Endowed with life, it would have found locomotion impossible, from the difference in the length of its legs, if nothing more, and would have been shot, in mercy, no doubt. But Blossom wept fond, bitter tears over it (Bob had baptized it already with his own), and hid it under her pillow at night, refusing to be comforted for the loss of her friend. " Why did he go away ? " she asked of her mother. " Because he had to," was the not very satisfactory response. " Why did he had to ? " " He must go with the rest. Somebody else'll come," Mrs. Stubbs added, with a clumsy attempt at comfort- ing, " somebody you'll like a deal better." The child regarded her with grave eyes. All language beyond the simplest was a foreign tongue to her as yet. She did not take in its meaning readily. Then, all at once, she broke into an astonished burst of tears. " But Jwant Bob White ! " she said. She had not yet learned the hard lesson, to take what one can get, and be thankful and quiet : so she sobbed herself to sleep, poor little Blossom ! As she grew older, the ladies at the post taught her to read and to sew, in neither of which not uncommon accomplishments Madam Stubbs excelled. Blossom conquered her letters without much difficulty, and pricked her way along the path of needlework hardly less slowly. There was a natural refinement about the 16 HIS INHERITANCE. child, which these gentle associations had nourished ; and it was not book-learning or fine sewing alone the little maiden was gaining day after day, the mother saw, with uneasy pride and a twinge of jealousy. Were they not drawing the child away from her ? And yet she looked with admiration upon the growing accomplishments of the girl, and the gentle ways which came to her as by right of birth ; while between Blossom and her father there was neither misgiving nor fear, but a sympathy which needed not the expression of words, though they talked together often by the hour, cheek to cheek, under the stars or in the dim firelight. " Father, what are the stars ? " she asked one night, when, held in his arms, she had pulled aside the little red curtain before the window. " Them's worlds, Blossom, as big or bigger'n this, I reckon." " Oh, no, father ! " the child replied, with a grave shake of the head. " They're too little. And you shouldn't tell such stories to Blossom," she added reprov- ingly, quoting a caution she had overheard from the lips of the colonel's lady the day before, " because she might believe 'em." " Then they're eyes," said Stubbs, who would have named them any thing to please the child. He took the reproof as gravely as it was given. " That's what they are, Blossom : they're good folks's eyes, up in heaven." "Yes," said the child, entirely satisfied, "they're eyes ; and they always look at Blossom." He taught her something of arithmetic, and even ferreted a geography from his stores, over which" he was hardly less mystified than she. To crown all, he was HIS INHERITANCE. 17 discovered one day poring over an old grammar, his sleeves rolled up, and his shirt-collar unbuttoned. " It's for the little un," he said, shutting the book up in confusion. " I thought as how she might come to it by an' by." It was told as a great joke that Stubbs had begun the study of grammar ; and many were the thrusts at him in consequence, which he turned off good-naturedly. But a great trouble was beginning to gather in his heart. He had learned something, if not grammar, from the volume he could not master ; and this was, that Blos- som must go away. The wife of the commanding officer had spoken to him about it before now. Her own daughters were in the States at school, and Blossom must go : he could not teach her. He acknowledged it to himself at last ; and the gentle, pretty little creature, with her refined ways and her warm heart, must not be left to grow up in ignorance. The colonel's wife put it to him in this way ; but he knew it before she spoke : it had been growing upon him day by day, like a heavy burden. It was very kind in the wife of the command- ing officer to take such an interest in a child who was, after all, only the post-sutler's daughter. She did not, indeed, suggest the fashionable establishment where her own daughters were fitting themselves for an elegant and rather mild struggle with life ; but she did what was better for the child, she recommended an old schoolmate of her own, now in straitened circum- stances, who would perhaps, for a consideration, take charge of Blossom, and superintend her education for a term of years. She even wrote and arranged the whole matter, with Stubbs's sanction. And so it cume about that Blossom left hqjne ; though how it came about, and 18 HIS INHERITANCE. through what agony of parting, we need say nothing here. Hearts bleed and heal again, or learn to cover their wounds, and the world goes on. And people who are neither cultured, nor hardly civilized, as we reckon such things, forget themselves in the good of others, and give up their own out of their arms, if, by so doing, a blessing may but come to them. Already a dream of making a lady of her daughter had taken possession of Mrs. Stubbs. It reconciled her, in a measure, to parting with Blossom. But no such vision consoled the father. In some way, which he scarcely understood, it was to be a gain to the child : that was all. So he made the long journey over the trail to Independence with her, and from there to the town where she was to be left. Something in the face of the woman to whom she was to be intrusted pleased the father, when they had found her at last ; and he left the child with a sense of security which did much to comfort him, though with ill-concealed grief over the parting. " Bring her up to be a straight kind of a gal," he said. Then he kissed Blossom good-by, and turned his face back toward the wilderness indeed I Once a year, from this time, he visited her, affecting to examine into the progress she had made in her studies, with an inward wonderment, but an outward composure, which quite deceived the girl, who believed that he knew it all. Even when she learned otherwise, she kept that knowledge to herself, for love of him. But after these visits, which his wife seldom shared, a strange restless- ness took possession of the man for a time. " I reckon by another year we shall sell out, and shift to the States, by spring, most likely," he would say, until it came to be a proverb at the post (where Blossom had grown HIS INHERITANCE. 19 to be a myth, as her old friends were ordered away, and replaced by men who had never known her) ; so that, when any thing was particularly uncertain, its time was fixed at the day " when Stubbs sells out, and shifts to the States." And now to return to the beginning of the chapter : Blossom, aged seventeen, her education at last com- pleted, was going back to her home. 20 HIS INHERITANCE. CHAPTER II. TOWARD THE SETTING SUN. ALONG train of covered wagons is slowly drag- ging itself westward across the plains, along the valley of the Arkansas River, winding in and out among the hillocks which mark the surface, and hugging the ground as it crawls on like some huge white serpent upon the scorched grass. It lacks hardly an hour of sunset, and they have been upon the move since daylight, with but a short halt at noon ; yet the drivers urge on the weary creatures that pull the laden wagons. They have left the river at a point where the trail divides to form a bow. The arc follows the windings of the stream ; while the string, which they pursue, leads through a more barren region, a valley where, at this season (the middle of Novem- ber), nothing meets the eye but the lowering sky over- head, and the rolling land beneath it covered with blackened, scrubby buffalo-grass. Through all the long day they have been shut into this valley of desolation, spurring on the exhausted animals, and choosing this route, though it leads away from wood and water, in order, if possible, to shorten the distance to Fort Atchi- son. Rumors reached them, before setting out from HIS INHERITANCE. 21 Independence, that the Santa Fe* trail was infested by hostile Indians ; but, so far, they have been unmolested. Last night, however, the smoke of numerous camp-fires off in the south-west excited their alarm ; a false one, perhaps, since they may have risen from some camp peaceably disposed, moving south to winter-quarters. If they had been well guarded, or unhampered by these heavy wagons, the dozen irresponsible men of the party might have pushed on at a faster pace to the fort ; but with a force of scarce thirty men, picked up by chance at the last moment, discretion was better than foolhardy haste. Another day will bring them to the river again, if no ill chance befall them; and the setting of another sun to Fort Atchison, the destination of the larger part of the train. As for the remainder of the wagons, which are to go on to Santa F6* even, an additional force can be procured at the fort to guard their passage, if necessary. The wagons creak on heavily as the sun slowly moves toward its setting, and the cold of a November night begins to settle down upon the weary company. Every thing like song or story has long since died among them. A muttered oath at the oxen or mules, a muttered complaint disguised in a curse, are the only ex- pressions left ; and these grow stronger by condensation as the weary miles stretch out under their heavy feet. Suddenly, as they gaze with dull eyes upon the distance, which tempts with no change from the monotonous landscape about them, a faint puff of dust rises, grows, spreads, rolls into a cloud against the reddening hori- zon, a revolving yellow cloud, from which are pres- ently projected two mounted figures tearing down the trail to meet them. The wagons are hastily drawn into 22 HIS INHERITANCE. a double line, with the cavalry on either side ; but scarcely is this accomplished, when, the cloud having cleared behind the advancing riders, they discover that their foes if foes they are number but these two men ; and in a moment more they recognize the black, flying locks, and even the gaudily-fringed buckskins, of Tony Baird, the half-breed scout, who, with a compan- ion of his own profession, has been out since daylight. The strain of anxious expectation, and the prepara- tions for defence, give place to the most heedless curi- osity ; for only in moments of actual danger is there any thing like discipline in the loose-bound company. Every man rushes to the front to hear the news, the teamsters abandoning their wagons, and even pressing before stout, purple-faced Captain Luttrell, who com- mands the escort. One of these, whose face shows the delicate coloring, and suggests the texture, of an ox- hide, is the first to address the new-comers. But Dan Cogger is the wagon-master of the train, and has there- fore some right to a front place and the first word. His shoulders, with which he pushes himself through the little crowd gathered about the horsemen, are those of a bison, hidden under a coarse flannel shirt. His long nether limbs are covered by a pair of old buck- skins, tanned, one might say, with dust and ashes, and half concealed by long cavalry boots. Drawn down over his stiff red hair, and almost hiding his sharp gray eyes, is a cavalry hat, from which all grace of outline departed long since, with full half its rim. " We're uncommon glad to see ye," says the wagon- master with a grim smile, as the scouts bring up their ponies with a jerk, throwing each upon its haunches ; " but 'pears to me it's hardly wuth while t' kill the HIS INHERITANCE. 23 beasts, an' come tearin' down on us 's though a thou- san' devils were arter ye." The wagon-master is somewhat ashamed of the war- like preparation made to receive the two scouts. " A thousand devils ! " gasps one, out of breath with the race. " Ye may say that ; an', if ye put it at two, ye won't be far out o' the way. We followed their trail for a mile or two, till it struck off toward the river, where they're camped most likely by this time, not half a dozen miles from here." " And the tracks were fresh ? " Captain Luttrell takes up the question. " Not three hours old." " Some camp, perhaps, moving south," the captain says carelessly, taking his cigar from his lips. " I'll be if it was ! " replies the scout, whose pro- fessional acuteness seems called into question by this remark. " We followed 'em up sharp for a mile or two, and there wasn't the scratch of a lodge-pole among 'em." " How many, did you say ? " Captain Luttrell throws away his cigar : it has lost its flavor. " Five hundred, a thousand, ten thousand, as many as you'll want to see, I reckon : we forgot to count 'em." And, without waiting to be questioned further, the scout drew the bridle across the neck of his mustang, and rode off among the men. They were a feeble force of fighting men, a small company of cavalry, a couple of officers on the way to join their commands, and half a dozen young blades from the States in search of adventure. This was all. The teamsters would count for nothing in case of an attack. 24 HIS INHERITANCE. Cogger's sharp features had been working in a re- markable manner during this brief dialogue, as though he were trying with difficulty to swallow this unwel- come news. " We must make the best of onpleasant sarcum- stances," he says at last, giving one final contortion to his face. " Ef the durned fools ain't left the teams ! " he burst out in angry amazement, forgetting that he had been pushed and jostled by these same men for the past five minutes. But he had been in spirit in the midst of that Comanche camp up the river, count- ing his enemies, and balancing the rather uneven chances of the next day. He turned upon the recre- ant drivers now, with a skilful discharge of ingenious oaths, which sent every man to his place, and, by re- storing the atmosphere ordinarily hanging about the train, revived its fainting courage in a measure. They must push on. Every mile gained was a fresh hold on life. With this foe between them and the fort, there was every thing to fear. Still, by chance or good fortune, they might yet escape their foes, who were, perhaps, unaware of their approach. If they could but slip by the Indian camp before striking the river again ! The darkness, the bend in the trail, would favor the attempt ; or, at the worst, they were not far from help. Dan Cogger, riding at the head of the train, his torn hat pulled down over his restless gray eyes, was already planning in his mind how, when night should have come, to dodge the Indian camp, gallop to the fort, rout out the " regulars," and return before the approach of the wagons should be discovered by their enemies. They had been foolhardy to leave Independence with so small a force ; but they had waited, with the promise HIS INHERITANCE. 25 of an additional company which never came, until there was almost as much to fear from drifting snow-storms as from savage foes ; more, indeed, since the latter (if true to tradition or precedent) should by this time have moved their camps south of the river, docked of feath- ers, and washed free from war-paint. From the weather they had so far suffered nothing. It had been unex- ceptionally clear, though growing colder day by day, and threatening snow of late ; and, as for other dan- gers, they had not so much as met the track of one unshod pony, until the report the scouts brought in to-night. But they had reached the debatable land, the common hunting-ground of the tribes ; and it would be strange indeed if they crossed it without an adven- ture. Not a crack from a driver's whip broke upon the still air as the day drew swiftly to its close. Oh the lagging indifference of the dull-eyed beasts, dragging the slow- moving wagons on, while danger crouched behind every hillock, and life waited for them hardly twenty miles away ! At last one of the oxen staggered, at- tempted one more uncertain step, and fell. Before he had struck the ground, the driver had unfastened the chain, and was dragging at the heavy yoke. The great wheels swung slowly to one side, the whole train gave this feeble lurch ; and the poor animal was left to his I at i . More than one of the others showed signs of giving out ; but they pushed on until they had reached the hanks of a small creek fringed with willows, flowing at a little distance into the Arkansas River. And here they prepared to encamp for the night. The great yellow disk of a November sun hangs upon the peak of a distant " divide " as the wagons are 26 HIS INHERITANCE. drawn into a close circle, within which the animals are corraled. They are guarded and tended with extra care to-night ; for they are worth all that a man would give for his life. The men gather the half-consumed branches of the leafless willows, over which the Indian fires have swept, to make a feeble blaze by which they may prepare their supper when the darkness shall have hung a blanket between them and their foes. To send up the smoke of a camp-fire now, or to ring out into the resonant air the stroke of an axe, would be to bring their enemies upon them at once. Even the harsh voices of the teamsters, and the curses of the men mov- ing among the animals, are so subdued as to lose the emphasis which is all their power. They realize, with Cogger, that it is " by dodgin', not by fightin',' ' they are to get in this time, if at all. A young man, mounted upon a clean-limbed, broad- flanked bay mare, has struck off alone from the camp while these preparations for the night are being made. The small head of the animal droops wearily as she realizes that her day's work is not yet done. She steps cautiously into the stream beside which the camp is forming, and where a thin film of ice is beginning to gather ; then gaining the other side, and taking heart, perhaps of necessity, she throws off her weariness with a bound, and stretches into a gallop across the valley, shut in on either side, at the distance of half a mile, by irregular hills. Under a summer sky, with the grass fresh, and matted into a thick carpet, the pale green of the willows lying against the darker color of the hills, and with the water-course gurgling over its shallows, this valley might have a charm of its own. But now, blackened and dreary from fire and approaching night, HIS INHERITANCE. 27 darkened and chill with coming winter, it holds nothing to attract the eye. The bridle drops upon the neck of the horse as it bears its rider slowly over the broken land leading to the low crest of the hill before them. That gained, the young man unslings a glass from his side, and scans the darkening landscape. Not a cloud breaks the short waving line of the horizon in the west as the sun drops from the point where it has hung for a moment. With its fall a flood of gold pours out along the sky. Bold and sharp against it stand out the hills, brought strangely near by the deceptive air. How nar- row the earth grows for once ! A gallop to the ridge beyond, where the horseman is standing, and one might plunge off into space. Bold and sharp, too, rises this mounted figure in its travel-worn cavalry jacket hand- somely braided and frogged. A fine target for an arrow you would be, Captain Robert Elyot, did an Indian chance to hide behind the mound you scan so carelessly ! Perhaps he thinks the same ; for gathering the loosened bridle, with a touch of his heel to the side of the ani- mal, he is off like an arrow down the slope toward the camp. Hardly has he gained the level ground, when some one comes riding slowly to meet him. It would be im- possible to tell which wears the more dejected air, the lop-eared, lop-headed, drooping-tailed animal approach- ing, whose appearance is a sermon upon the vanity of life and the futility of beastly effort, or the scantily mustachioed young officer astride him. " Confound the plains ! " the latter mutters gloomily, as he joins Captain Elyot. " I tell you, Elyot, a snail would sicken of the pace we have kept up the past three days." 28 HIS INHERITANCE. " Your horse seems to be rather the worse for it ; " and there is a laugh in the eye of the speaker as he regards the sorry beast the new-comer rides. "Yes, I know, broken-winded, spavined, blind in one eye, too, I fancy. I'd like to see that dealer again ! Lord ! I'd like to see anybody out of this infernal region of sand and buffalo-grass. I say, Elyot, is it always like this ? " And he throws a glance of contempt upon their sur- roundings, which should have stirred the very bosom of the earth. " Worse, a thousand times worse ! " laughs the other. " If we run through this, we shall be snowed in at the fort in less than a week." "And then?" " Oh ! we smoke, play cards, hate each other heartily, and hide it; and you've no idea what an amount of surplus energy a man may work off in that way. Then there'll be five hundred red-devils, more or less, hanging about the fort to beg or steal, unless, as they say, they're out on the war-path. In that case, we may be ordered south on a campaign, with the weather cold enough to freeze the flesh, and shiver it off your bones." " Good heavens ! " ejaculated the younger man. "Oh! it's not so bad a life, after all, when you're used to it," the first speaker went on. " There are always ladies at the post ; and, if we're not sent off, we get up a dance, or theatricals, or something to make the time pass." " And do you like it ? " asked the younger man, when they had ridden in silence for a moment. "Do I like it? Do I like the service?" rejoined the other one coldly. HIS INHERITANCE 29 " But it is rather hard, to send a man into this wil- derness the first year," stammered Lieutenant Orme. " That depends. Every thing is hard when a man is determined not to be satisfied. But you'll keep such sentiments from the major's ears, if you're wise. And you'll be thankful enough, a dozen years hence, that you were sent out here to rough it a while, rather than to some soft spot in the States, within arm's-length of your mother, and with nothing to do but polish your sword, and show off your new uniform." " My mother ! " repeated the boy (for he was hardly more), "I wish I could see her!" And he turned away his head. " I wish you could," said the other with good-natured roughness. "I never had a mother or a sister whom I could remember," he added in a softer tone. " But I tell you, Orme, this won't do, you know. You can't take such a face as that into Atchison. It's hard enough for a man to hold his own there, without hanging out such a signal as you're carrying. We ought to strike the fort by sunset to-morrow," he added ; " that is, if we get in at all." But, though he said this under his breath, the young lieutenant caught the words. " What do you mean ? " " You heard the report the scouts brought in" " No : I was asleep in one of the wagons the last hour or two before we halted." " That there are from five hundred to a thousand red-skins between us and Atchison ? " " And you think they'll come down on us ? " The lieutenant's eye had lost its dulness, the peevish tone had left his voice, as he put the question excitedly. 30 HIS INHERITANCE. Captain Elyot regarded him oddly for a moment. " You'll do," he said with a laugh, " though I began to think I had a molly-coddle on my hands. Think we shall see 'em ? Why, man, they're not five miles away. See here ! " and, wheeling his horse sharply, he struck back upon the way they had just come over, followed by his companion as fast as his forlorn beast could carry him. As they approached the crest of the hill where he had stood a few moments before, Captain Elyot dis- mounted, and, leaving his horse, made the ascent on foot. He even dropped to the ground before gaining the summit, with a caution he would have scorned had he been alone. But " the boy may as well learn to take care of himself," thought this young mentor. The grayness of night was beginning to gather. The swelling land behind them was already indistinct in out- line, as the two young men lay side by side upon the coarse scorched grass, while the elder pointed away toward the south-west, where the glare of sunset still lit up the sky. Like mighty steps the hills rose to meet it, the last seeming hardly a mile away. A faint gray cloud lay against the flame-colored sky ; a fixed base, hardly perceptible, moored it to the earth. " Smoke, by thunder ! " and the younger man sprang to his knees. " Lie low ! " said Captain Elyot sharply, pulling him to the ground again. " Yes, it is a camp-fire," he added reflectively. " I almost fancied I was mistaken when I had ridden away from it. And we shall have them down upon us to-morrow, unless they have heard noth- ing of our coming, and have other game in hand, which I very much doubt. But come, it's time we were on the move again ; " and he began the descent. HIS INHERITANCE. 31 " See here, Elyot," said Lieutenant Orme, as they were mounting the beasts, that were too weary to stray far from the spot where they had been left. " I hope you don't think, because I grumbled just now, that I should show the white feather if" " Nonsense, man ! " said the other quickly, springing into the saddle with an agility one would hardly have expected from a frame by no means light. " But, when you have been in what you call this ' wilderness ' as long as I, you'll learn that there are worse fates than crawl- ing over a tolerable road, with plenty to eat, such as it is, a clear sky overhead, and the prospect of keep- ing your scalp for twenty-four hours, at least. But come on, or Luttrell will fancy we've fallen into a trap already ; " and, spurring their jaded horses, they soon gained the camp. " Ye'll be bringin' the varmints down on us, with yer keerless ways," growled Cogger as they came up. " Thar an't no sense in temptin' the devil ! Hev ye seen any thing like a camp-fire off thar ? " jerking his head to the southward. Leaving the lieutenant to tell his own story, Captain Elyot strolled away to a more quiet part of the camp, to reflect, perhaps, by himself, upon the probable events of the next day as foreshadowed by that little cloud of smoke. He wrapped the cape of the coat he had taken from the saddle about his head, for the air had turned chill as winter, and threw himself down by one of the deserted wagons. Here and there, outside the dim circle of ghostly wagons, burned low fires, about which preparations for the evening meal were going on. Overhead the stars grew brighter and brighter as the darkness shut them 32 HIS INHERITANCE. in, while above the sound of wrangling voices and the trampling of uneasy hoofs rose, louder and yet more loud, the howl of the gray wolf and the sharp bark of the coyote. It would be strange, indeed, if, in such a scene, and with the assurance of an enemy so near, unpleasant visions did not dodge the waking thoughts of a man, even though he were, like this one, young, handsome, and heir to a fine property ; since half the pangs we suffer are from possibilities. He had seen enough of this kind of warfare to know, that, if attacked by a foe of half the number the scout had reported, they could hardly hope to hold out long enough to fight the whole ground over between this and Fort Atchison. At such a time, youth, good looks, or worldly prospects count for little. Life stretches out wide and green and beau- tiful when one's eyes seem likely to be forced to close upon it. Personal beauty was a snare to which he had given little thought ; and wealth even, though already in his hand, could do nothing for him here. That barest of all comforting reflections was his, if the worst came, there was no one to grieve for him : he was alone in the world. Old uncle Jeremy, his near- est of kin, away off in an Eastern city, who had quar- relled with and finally buried all his own children, would hardly weep for his nephew and heir, since he already regarded with a kind of jealousy the man who was some day to enjoy what he was by no means willing to give up. Ah, if money could be changed into a spiritual medium, there would be few legacies left to the world ! But since that could not be, in case he was taken off, this wealth, which, it must be avowed, Captain Elyot had looked forward to spending after a way of his own, HIS INHERITANCE. 33 would go the Lord knew where ! For uncle Jeremy was neither pious nor charitable. He had fallen into as low a state of mind as it is possible for a young fellow without a particle of senti- ment to descend to, when something occurred which swept the whole dismal reverie away in an instant. 34 HIS INHERITANCE. CHAPTER III. "YOU GAVE MY LITTLE GAL A PEECIOUS SCAKE." A MOVEMENT in the wagon above him made him raise his head. Every sound might have a double meaning now. Then no, yes, it was the pretty, neatly dressed foot of a woman being pushed timidly down from the wagon. It found a resting- place, and another followed ; the skirt of a gown, gray in the dim light, came within the range of his vision ; and at last, with a spring from the precarious perch where it had rested for an instant, the figure of a girl came lightly to the ground. She was young : the faint outline against the dark- ening sky told that. She was a lady he knew from her step, as she came cautiously over the rough grass, her dress brushing his foot. But who was she ? and where had she been hidden so long ? To spring up was his first impulse ; but this would doubtless alarm her. No : it would be better to steal quietly away when she had passed on, which he soon saw she had no intention of doing. He rose noiselessly. Screened by the wagons, she watched the dark figures moving in and out of the light from the dim camp-fires as the prepara- tions for supper went on. It was a childish curiosity, HIS INHERITANCE. 35 for she did not seem to search for any one. A little shawl hung loosely over her shoulders. She threw it over her head, and, growing bold, stepped out a few paces from the wagons, with the gesture of a truant, ready to fly back at the slightest alarm. The young man laughed to himself at the caution with which she kept her eyes upon the men around the fires, with no thought of danger in the rear. He intended to slip away unperceived, but he delayed a moment too long. Some unconscious movement betrayed him to this girl, watchful as a hound. She turned in affright ; and he met a pair of soft, wide-opened eyes shining through the twilight, and a repressed exclamation of terror, as she sprang back toward the wagon, where she stood panting and at bay. " Please go away ! " said a low voice, which fright made to vibrate. Captain Elyot removed his hat. But it was not in human nature to go ; not in strong, young, curious human nature, at least. "I am afraid I startled you," he said respectfully. " I beg your pardon, but " " Oh, please go away ! " The girl was glancing from side to side, as though in doubt which way to fly. To scale the wagon in the face of the enemy was not to be thought of. "Certainly, madam. I only desired to apologize. I trust you will believe I had no thought of playing the spy." His words were severely proper : his air, as he took one step backward in proof of sincerity, was almost abject in its humility. The girl regarded him doubt- fully. She held her gown with both hands, in the very attitude of escape. 36 HIS INHERITANCE. " Oh, no, no ! I am sure you had not ! " she said hurriedly, perhaps with an idea of conciliation, since her timid dismissal had not taken effect. " But if you would go away ! " There was hardly the thickness of a cobweb between the quavering voice and tears. " I believe she is afraid of me ! " exclaimed the young man, in blank blundering astonishment ; and thereupon took himself off without another word. He had skirted half the circle of the camp before it occurred to him to cover his head with the cavalry hat he still carried in his hand. Who was she ? And why was she here ? And, above all. how had her presence been concealed for so long a time ? He ran over the train in his mind. There was the party from the States travelling in an old stage-coach ; but he set that aside at once. Then there were the wagons belonging to the sutler at Fort Atchison, and the others going to points farther on. In the darkness, and deserted as they were by their drivers, he could not tell from which of these the girl had descended. But he resolved to have an eye upon that part of the train when the com- mand to " catch up " should come the next morning. Then he went off in search of Lieutenant Orme and supper; after which, the incident passed from his mind, as he joined the informal council gathered to talk over the chances of the morrow. " It's no use deceivin' yerselves," Cogger was saying, as he came up to the group, gathered in a circle about the ashes of what had been at best but the suggestion of a camp-fire. "The rascals'll scent us out before we've been an hour on the trail, ef they ain't a'ready. Lord knows I ain't no fellership with fitin' when I kin HIS INHERITANCE. 37 run. But it's agin natur' to expect them oxen to do much toward streakin' it to a place o' safety, let alone the wagons." The speaker paused after thus stating the case, and, drawing his blanket a little more closely about his shoulders, proceeded to puff away seriously at his pipe. A desultory discussion followed his words. But this he interrupted after a moment. " I wouldn't give much for our har, sech as 'tis," he said in a cheerful spirit of prophecy, " ef they come down on us, unless the major kin send some o' them lazy fellers at the fort t' give us a h'ist." " If we had twenty-five more men, I'd defy any num- ber of them," said Captain Luttrell boldly. " Ef ye had ! " Cogger repeats dryly, blowing a cloud of smoke from his nostrils. "I wish to the Lord we'd never started!" mutters one of the young men from civilization. "I reckon ye do," says Cogger complacently. "I don't expect to enjoy it much myself. But thar'll be a struggle for't before they git my skelp among 'em. Ef some o' you boys who ain't good fur nuthin else 'ud try for the fort now, ye'd get in, most likely, under kiver o' the dark, and could rout out the reg'lars afore we're clean done for. Ye've got to do somethin' for yer- selves," he added when no response came from the party to whom this was addressed. " They do say that Providence takes keer o' them as can't look out for themselves ; but I reckon 'tain't in the Injun country." " Why shouldn't we all try for the fort when the night has fairly set in ? " says the penitent adventurer who had spoken before. "There are horses enough, and the scouts know the country." 38 HIS LNHEKITANCE. " An' leave the teams?" The pipe almost fell from Cogger's mouth with his gasp of utter astonishment. " "Tain't what I've come for, young man, t' save my skin. I could 'a' done that a durned sight easier by stayin' in the States. I kalkerlate t' git these wagons through, or lay my bones beside 'em." " Is there any one who will try for the fort ? " Captain Luttrell asks, breaking in impatiently. "There's no use in wasting our time in this way. If any one goes, he ought to be off in an hour. The moon'll be up soon after midnight." " I will," says Tony Baird. Captain Elyot rose to his feet: "-And I." "And I," said Lieutenant Orme, springing from his place. "Let me go with you, Elyot," he added eagerly in a lower tone. " 'Tain't no use," Cogger broke in : " two's enough. Ye'll be more likely t' git through." "I believe it is so," said Captain Luttrell. "We shall have to excuse you this time, lieutenant. And, indeed, we must not weaken our force here more than is neces- sary." "We may as well git what sleep we kin," says Cogger, rolling himself up in his blanket when Captain Luttrell had disappeared to write a despatch for the major commanding at Fort Atchison. " We'll have to stretch out a couple of hours arter midnight. Thar ain't no sense in lyin' round, an' just waitin' to be swallered up. It kind o' keeps up a man's courage to be movin' on, especially a man who ain't no more gift at fitin' than I hev." For Cogger parades his cowardice ostentatiously, though everybody knows that there is not a more fearless man upon the plains. A short, broad figure, under a regulation cap, had been HIS INHERITANCE. 39 moving about upon the edge of the group during this conversation. The man advanced to Captain Elyot now, and, touching his cap, said, " A word with ye, cap'n." " Is that you, Stubbs ? " For it was the sutler from Fort Atchison. " Speak quick, man. I've no time to spare." But the sutler, by a mysterious motion of the head, drew the young man away from the others. Even in the dim light of the stars, one might see that Stubbs had given particular attention to his personal appear- ance, a fact so noticeable by daylight as to draw upon him many a jest. The dust, which had covered them all day after day, was carefully removed from his garments ; his mild, broad face was closely shaven ; and even his linen did not appear neglected. But all this, it may be imagined, Captain Elyot did not notice now. There was a nervous, anxious manner about the sutler, much more apparent than any peculiarity of dress. Nor was it strange, since a small fortune had been invested in the wagons he was pushing on to the fort. The chance of losing this, to say nothing of personal danger, might well alarm him. " Well," said Captain Elyot, when they had gained a spot quite beyond the hearing of the others, and still the sutler hesitated. " Whatever it is, Stubbs, speak out. You forget that I have to be off in half an hour. Have the horses stampeded, or a spy crept into camp, or " "No; but you gave my little gal a precious scare ! " said the man at last. His little girl ! The words were an enigma to the young man. He almost thought anxiety had given Stubbs's dull brain a turn. Then the scene of an hour 40 HIS INHERITANCE. before came back to him. His little girl ! Could this be Stubbs's daughter ? Various traditions, rumors, and authenticated stories began to gather and concentrate in his mind. He had not sat by Stubbs's fire of even- ings for six months past, without hearing of Blossom's beauty, her learning (somewhat exaggerated, it must be owned), and her pretty ways. Though, to do Stubbs justice, he had seldom referred to her, except indirectly, or by a pathetic sigh over her absence. It was Mrs. Stubbs, who, with certain possibilities in her mind, had taken every opportunity to expatiate upon Blossom's charms. Some red-cheeked Amazon, after the type of the mother, Captain Elyot had fancied her to be ; or some moon-faced damsel, a sketch in chalk of Stubbs, whose good-nature would be equalled only by her stupidity. But this pretty little creature, with her frightened eyes and the unconscious grace that bespoke her a lady this, Stubbs's daughter ! " I reckon it was a s'prise to ye," said Stubbs, with a touch of pride in his voice. " Ye see, I'm fetchin' her home. At least," he added, and all his former anxiety seemed to return, and weigh down his words till they were almost too heavy to be uttered, "that's what I've started fur." "But how have you managed to hide her all this time? And good Lord, man!" as a vision of the morrow rose in his mind " what are you going to do with her now ? " The young man had forgotten his haste to be gone. He could think of nothing but the dreadful fright and worse fate to which the poor girl might be exposed on the morrow, the girl who had trembled at sight of him. HIS INHERITANCE. 41 " "What will you do with her ? " he asked sharply. The man was a fool to bring his daughter into such danger. " That's what I wanted to ask ye," said poor Stubbs abjectly. " I know I ought never to 'ave brought her. She ain't like her mother." "I should think not." A vision of Mrs. Stubbs, with her soldierly figure and fearless face, crossed the young man's mind. " I ought to have sold out, and " "But it's too late for that," said the young man impatiently. And the poor girl had no one to depend upon but this stupid fellow (whom he had found tolera- bly companionable before now). Some wild scheme of freeing himself from his offer to ride to the fort tempted Captain Elyot ; and yet he could not do it in honor. No, he must go. But he would say a word to Orme, or even speak to Luttrell. Stubbs was not to be trusted with such a charge. He forgot that the girl was Stubbs's own daughter. " You're going to try for the fort ? " Stubbs broke in upon his revery timidly. " Yes." " Don't ye think, cap'n " the man's voice trembled over the words, " don't ye believe ye could take the little gal along ? " " Good Lord, Stubbs ! It is impossible." " She could ride with the bes't of ye. I learned her myself," Stubbs said eagerly. " But we may never reach the fort." " There's no reason why ye shouldn't. It's the wagons the devils are arter. If ye had a fresh horse, now I wouldn't look at your money yesterday for 42 HIS INHERITANCE. Black Jess, I'd half promised her to Luttrell at a higher figger ; but she's yours, an' nothin' to pay " "Keep your bribes for those who want them. A man don't take pay for a service like that," said Captain Elyot proudly. " And it's out of the question, Stubbs. It can't be done." He was moving off, when the sutler seized him by the arm. " You ain't got no wife nor children ; but you must have a heart in ye somewhere to feel for them as has. Why, I've seen ye carry a wounded dog in yer arms ; an' wouldn't ye do as much for one o' God's human creeters ? Oh ! ye don't know what it is to have the little gal hangin' on ter yer heart day an' night, till ye couldn't git no rest for thinkin' of her. Sech a soft, frightsome little thing, scared of her shadder ! An' to think " And the man covered his face with his hands. " Yes, I know," Captain Elyot said hesitatingly. " But Captain Luttrell would never consent : so much depends upon our getting in ! " " He'd never say no to you ; an' there ain't a man among 'em, but 'ud be sorry to know thar was a woman in camp if the Injuns come down on us to-morrow. Offer him what ye will, cap'n. He ain't afraid o' the touch o' gold: 'twon't blister his hand. Tell him he never should repent it as long as he lived. There are some favors a man don't- forget in a hurry." " But the scout ? " " Tony ? He'd sell his soul for' a silver dollar : it's a pity if he wouldn't do a feller-creeter a good turn for a dozen gold ones." " Well, well," said Captain Elyot reluctantly. " I'll HIS DTHEEITANCE. 43 do what I can for you, Stubbs. This is no place for a woman. Any way, I'll speak to Luttrell." " Then you'll do it ? You'll run the little gal into the fort?" " I'll do what I can : God knows she ought not to be here." Already he was assuming responsibility over this girl with whom he had not exchanged a dozen words. But Stubbs was wringing his hand in a passion of gratitude. " God bless ye ! God bless ye ! I knew ye would. It'll be made up to ye, though ye won't take the horse. An' I don't care what comes now, if the child'll only get to her mother. I sha'n't never see the fort myself ; but" " Nonsense, man ! What are you talking about ? " "It's been a-weighin' me down," Stubbs replied gloomily, " down an' down, till the heart's clean gone out o' me. One stroke more'd do it; an' I reckon I'll git that to-morrow." "You're low-spirited from worrying over this mat- ter," said Captain Elyot cheerfully. " You'll cheer up by daylight. But suppose you try for the fort yourself, you might go in my place : I'll speak to Luttrell about it." But Stubbs shook his head. " I ain't never yet left the teams ; an' I'll stand by 'em to the last." " Then I must be off. I'll see Captain Luttrell at once. I reckon I can bring him round : so you may as well prepare your daughter. Don't frighten her. Or has she heard?" 44 HIS INHERITANCE. " She don't so much as know there's an Injun within a hundred miles." " So much the better. Bring her here in half an hour, and mind you don't keep us waiting. I hope you can mount her; for I haven't a spare animal. The mare I rode to-day is quite used up." " Never you fear about a horse for Blossom : I'll see to that. Jest you make it right with the cap'n an' the rest of 'em ; and don't stand for the price." " I'll try : a man can't promise more." They separated hastily, Stubbs to go and prepare Blossom for her night-ride, and Captain Elyot to con- ciliate the commanding officer and the scout. " What the is his daughter here for ? " said Cap- tain Luttrell angrily. " But I suppose you may as well take her ; " for Captain Elyot had dropped a careless word or two of Stubbs's anxiety, and hinted at a debt of gratitude, which nobody was so well able to pay as the sutler. " I hope he won't forget it if we ever get in, that's all," grumbled the captain, folding up the despatch he had been writing on his knee. " He put a devilish price on that mare of his yesterday : I don't care if you tell him so." The chink of gold proved sweetly persuasive to the scout. Words were unnecessary. There remained only Cogger to be conciliated ; and him Captain Elyot met close to the appointed rendezvous. " I s'pose the cap'n's given ye his orders ? " said the wagon-master, coming to a halt. He had not been able to act upon the advice bestowed so lavishly upon the others, to catch what rest might be had between now and midnight. HIS INHERITANCE. 45 "Yes: I have the despatches here ; " and Captain Elyot laid his hand upon his breast. " But I was looking for you. Do you know, Cogger, there's a woman in the train ? " This was no time to choose his words, or to break more gently the subject on his mind. " Now, if them blasted " "It's only Stubbs's daughter, and he is taking her home to her mother." " Ye don't say ! Wharever's he kep' her ? " " I don't know ; in one of the wagons, probably. But he wants us to take her into the fort to-night. Captain Luttrell does not object, if we are willing to make the attempt. This'll be no place for a woman, if the Indi- ans attack us." Cogger would have whistled, but caution checked him in the act. "'Twas a kind o' mean trick in Stubbs," he said thoughtfully, after a moment of silence. "We didn't kalkerlate to take no glass-ware this trip: we didn't pervide for't. An' he knew it. I reckon he can take keer o' his own darter," he added, with the air of a man who washes his hands of the whole affair. "Tony thinks we can do it," said Captain Elyot quietly ; " and Luttrell has consented." " He don't think so for nothin'. I take it 'tain't pure love o' God in either of 'em. Not that I've any thing to say agin you, Captain Elyot. But why didn't Stubbs come to me with his darter, square-like, before we left Independence? I'd 'a' said to him, 'Keep the gal t' the States, for the present. 'Tain't no time t' be teamin' \\iniiiiin-folks over the trail, nigh on ter winter as 'tis, an' with sech a fearsome sperit for Injuns as I be.' " 46 HIS INHERITANCE. " But the girl is here." " Wall, wall, 'tain't nuthin t' me. But I wouldn't 'a' thought it o' Stubbs. Him an me's been pardners for years. But ye'll strike a crooked trail in most men, an' where ye ain't lookin' for't ; an', ten chances t' one, it'll be on account of a woman." He was moving away; but he turned back to add, " Ef ye hold t' the same mind, ye'd better shet Tony Baird's mouth, an' creep out o' camp kind o' unbeknownst t' the rest. An' it's tune ye were off." " I gave Stubbs half an hour to meet us here. It's hardly up yet. And I cautioned Tony to say nothing about the affair to any one. Here he is now," he went on, as the scout came up through the darkness from the corral, leading his horse. A servant followed, with Captain Elyot's; and behind them appeared a third, leading Black Jess, which Captain Luttrell had coveted at the sutler's hands. A woman's saddle was fitted to her back. Stubbs had, perhaps, foreseen an emergency like this, and provided for it. " I was ordered to bring her here," said the man who held the bridle. Captain Elyot recognized him as one of Stubbs's team- sters, a man regularly employed about the fort. " But are you sure she is safe ? " " As gentle as a lamb, sir ; and it won't be the first time Miss Blossom's rode her, either, or since we left the States," he added in a still lower tone, and with a quiet chuckle. "Jess knows her, don't ye, Jess?" And he stroked the face of the beautiful animal, who rubbed her forehead against his arm with a whinny, which seemed in response to his words. Night had settled lower and lower upon the camp : HIS INHERITANCE. 47 beyond the darker shadows of the circling wagons, and the still forms of the men near at hand, nothing could be discerned. The sentinels, chilled by the keen air, huddled in pairs close to the ground, wrapped in their blankets, open-eyed, attent, but silent as sphinxes. The time had come for the party to set out for the fort. They waited only for Blossom. 48 HIS INHERITANCE. CHAPTER IV. "I'LL BE THE FIKST TO MEET YOU WHEN YOU COME IN." wagon in which Blossom is hidden is by daylight the shabbiest in the train. No one looking upon it from the outside would fancy for a moment that any precious thing had been committed to its keeping. A time-worn, dust-stained " tilt " is stretched over its ribs, showing many a rent and clumsily-bestowed patch ; the wheels protest loudly against each revolution ; and the joints seem about to wrench themselves apart at every lurch over the uneven ground. But this shabbiness, after all, is not weakness. It has been added to and heightened by Stubbs as a snare and a delusion ; for Stubbs is not the first man whom love has made ingen- ious and even artful. One incongruity in the arrange- ment of the team did awaken comment for a time. The shabby wagon was not drawn by oxen, as were most of the others in the train, but by stout, strong mules, capable of great speed if put to the test. But as they never have been put to the test, and as the size and general appearance of the wagon gives the impression of weight, comment gives out after the first day or two, and goes to sleep again, without arousing suspicion. HIS INHERITANCE. 49 But it is over the interior arrangements that Stubbs's ingenuity has spread itself, and borne fruit. The outer covering may be torn, dexterously and never to the windward : the inner (save where some provision has been made for ventilation) is whole, and laughs at the rain. If any one were curious enough to search beneath this, he would still be baffled by the craftiness of the little sutler. To all appearance it is filled with rough deal boxes, packed so closely together as to leave hardly a crack between. But really each one has been sawed off a few inches from the end ; and, all having been fas- tened firmly together, they form a stout wall rising half way about the interior. One of the rough planks, when unfastened from within, swings back to form a door to the tiny apartment, which is thus secured from all surprise. The narrow walls inside are hung about with scarlet blankets, the floor covered with fine buffalo-skins, a wise precaution ; for the cold has been strengthening every day. A pile of wolf-skins in one corner serves for a lounging-place by day and a warm couch by night ; or a hammock, hanging from one loop now, can be stretched across the diminutive apartment if need be. A swinging-shelf and glass serve for a toilet-table ; a box, deftly concealed, for a wardrobe ; while another shelf holds a few books ; and thrust into pockets, which the girl has amused herself by attaching to the hang- ings of her apartment, are all the little knick-knacks of use or fancy which a thoroughly-indulged young person of delicate tastes might gather about herself, fancying them, after a time, indispensable. A frail work-basket, built, it would seem, upon a foundation of blue ribbon and straws, which the wind might blow away, hangs suspended over the wolf-skin couch, where at this 50 HIS INHERITANCE. moment lies a half-completed mystery in worsted work. The needle is thrust in as though it had been hastily deserted ; the bright wools have fallen in a neglected tangle upon the floor. Ah, Blossom, Blossom ! are these the neat habits and orderly ways you are carrying home, after so many years of training in the States ? But where is the little mistress of the place ? She is standing before the glass, if the truth must be told, enveloped in a very faint glory from the rays of a flickering candle. The curtains and screens so carefully provided shut in the feeble light from any stray passer outside. A soft gray gown and little fur-lined sack, from which she seemed to have slipped just now, lie on the floor at her feet. She is arrayed in a pair of full dark-blue trousers and a belted blouse. Under the stars this might well pass for the dress of a boy. She is draw- ing her brown hair at this moment into a loose twist upon the crown of her head, covering it at last with a broad-brimmed, low-crowned felt hat. Then she sur- veys herself in the glass, not with curiosity, or a shadow of coquettish amusement at the odd, piquant little figure reflected there. She turns about, sets her hat more firmly upon her head, with a grave, critical air, and with even a touch of sadness or foreboding in the childish countenance, from which time has scarcely smoothed away the baby-dimples yet. At a peculiar tap upon the wall behind her, she starts hurriedly, and covers the candle with a screen, when the knock is repeated. She draws the bolt fastening her into her hiding-place. The door swings into the little room, and Stubbs follows it. " See ! I have dressed as you bade me," Blossom says. She uncovers the candle, and stands in its trern- HIS INHERITANCE. 51 bling light. Her eyes are dark, and her face is pale, under its yellow, flickering rays. " Must I really go, and without you? I am afraid when I think of it." There is a break in her voice, the slipping of a string to jar the melody. " The night is so dreadful ; and I heard the men outside, while you were gone, say that the Indians had risen all along the trail. Is that why you are sending me away ? " She threw her arms about her father, and tried to read the truth in his face. " They lied, child : there wa'n't no truth in it. They were just tryin' to scare one another; that's all." And yet should he let her go away with no suspicion of the truth? She would be sure to learn something of it from her companions. Would it not be better for him to tell her now ? " There ain't any Injuns within a dozen miles. Some o' the boys reckoned they saw smoke off t' the so'th'ard, where there's a camp most likely." " Then there is a camp ? And so near ! " He felt the girl tremble in his arms. No, he could not tell her. " Mebbe," he said slowly. Oh the artful simplicity and doubt in his voice ! " A peaceful kind o' camp, with women an' children." Blossom breathed again. But still she hung upon his neck. " Let me stay with you," she pleaded. " I wouldn't be afraid with you." " Ain't I been . a good father to ye, child ? " The man's breath came hoarse and heavy, as though the weight upon his breast was more than he could bear. " Not as though I'd had advantages, an' lived t' the 52 HIS INHERITANCE. States ; but ain't I been as good as I've know'd how t' be?" " Oh, better than anybody in the world ! " sobbed the girl. " And couldn't ye trust me, Blossom, jest this once, and go like a good gal ? I ought never to 'a' brought ye. This ain't no place for ye. But I wanted ye so, child ! ye don't know ; " and he stroked the shoulder of the girl with his broad rough hand. Only Blossom's low sobs broke the silence for a mo- ment. Then she raised her head. "I'll go, father; and I'll try not to be afraid. You'll be coming soon ? " she added timidly. But Stubbs had turned his back upon her. " Don't mind about me : you'll have yer mother ; I ought to 'a' fetched her oftener t' see ye. She's an uncommon woman, yer mother is. She'll do more for ye'n ever I could." But his voice broke over the last words. " But you speak as if as if you were not coming at all," burst out poor Blossom, frightened at she knew not what. " To be sure I'm coming," said Stubbs, with a hoarse, broken laugh. " You'll be lookin' out for us at sunset to-morrow, ef there don't no storm set in. Or don't be watchin', child ; p'raps we sha'n't get in till daylight." He was kneeling on the floor as he spoke, before a box bound about with iron, and with a padlock hanging to it. Out from its depths he now brought a small pistol, beautified with chased and frosted work in silver. He put it into her hands. " Don't be scairt," for she had nearly cried out when she saw what the bauble was. " I bought it for ye, child. I thought 'twould please HIS INIIEKITANCE. 53 ye. See, there's silver an' shinin' stones on it." He loaded it with careful, trembling hands. Then he came and stood beside her, and showed her how it was to be held and cocked and fired. Twice over he did this. " But what am I to do with it, father dear ? " " I've known o' women's putting 'em to their heads sooner'n t' fall into the hands o' the Injuns," he said carelessly, while he fitted a cap to it; but great drops of perspiration started out on his forehead. " Just wear it in yer belt, child, so : 'twont do no harm, an' I thought 'twould look kind o' neat." He took her face in his hard hands, and kissed her tenderly, her smooth fore- head, her soft pretty hair, from which the hat had fallen. "It's time ye were settin' off," he said: "yell think sometimes of yer poor old father ? " "I shall think of you all the way," said Blossom; " and I'll be the first to meet you when you come in." " I wouldn't be lookin' out : 'tain't good luck, they say. But it's time ye were leavin'. I'll just see if they're ready for ye." He put the little fur-lined jacket upon her with clumsy tenderness. It brought back her baby-days, when he had dressed her many a time. " My little gal ! " he said softly, as his hand brushed her cheek. He had raised the blanket to leave her, when a new thought seemed to strike him. " There ain't any such thing as a Bible among your traps ? " Blossom's eyes opened wide ; but she silently handed him a Testament from the swinging-shelf above her. He shook his head. "Ye might read a word or two before ye start. My old mother set a store by that book. She used to read it to me when I was a little un. There's somethin' in it about * long-suiferin' an' tender mercies.' * Long-sufferin',' " he repeated slowly. 54 HIS INHERITANCE. " That's a good word. It sounds kind of encouragin' to a man that's been roughin' it here for most twenty years." Then he went out by the way he had come in, carefully closing the door after him. Blossom sat down upon the pile of skins after he had gone. Her fears had been much more over the dark- ness through which she must journey, and the dread of making it with strange companions, than of any actual danger. But she was accustomed to obedience, and she had promised to go : so now she put aside her ter- rors as well as she could, and set herself to obeying his parting injunction. She opened the Testament at ran- dom, and read the chapter her eyes first fell upon. It was not at all appropriate to her situation, but she read it carefully to the end ; while her fears crept away with soft-shod feet, and her anxiety over her father gradu- ally followed. That had lingered last, an indefinable pain and fear connected with him ; but this, too, slipped away as she read: while he, searching about in the darkness for Captain Elyot and the scout, answer- ing the challenges of the sleepy sentinels, and making hasty, thoughtful preparations for her departure, had bidden her already a last farewell in his heart. When still she was not summoned, she busied herself quite simply, putting her apartment in order, as though she were to return to it again. These natural, every- day duties helped to compose her mind ; and she was ready and quite calm when her father came, a few mo- ments later, with a cup of coffee in his hand. He brought out some simple food, and set it before her. " Ye must eat and drink, child, or ye'll be faint, an' give out before ye git there." He held the cup while she drank. It was baby Blossom again in his arms. HIS INHERITANCE. 55 " D'ye remember how I carried ye all night long when ye were down with the fever ? There couldn't nobody else give ye so much as a drop o' water." She was gentle and dainty, and not like him or his ways ; but she had chosen him before all the others in that time, so long ago. Yes, Blossom remembered well. But it brought the tears to her eyes to-night. Why did he recall it now ? He pressed her to eat. He waited upon her like a servant ; no, he served her like a slave, a slave who loved his chains. But the bread grew more and more bitter every moment to Blossom, who swallowed her tears with it. Every sound was still : even the animals within the corral seemed sleeping, as they crept out of the wagon. The darkness was only a dusky gray. The great white stars were pale to-night. The sleeping men did not stir at the sound of their feet as they passed. A sen- tinel sprang up in their way, but at a low word he fell back. Three horses were tied to one of the wagons. Cogger and the scout and another figure stood by them. " Is that you, Stubbs ? This way." Black Jess gave a whinny of welcome as the girl brushed by. Some one lifted her into the saddle. She was trembling with fright or cold. " You'll take care of her ? " Stubbs said hoarsely. " I will," replied a suppressed voice at her elbow, as her foot found the stirrup. " With my life," it added. " An' if the wust comes " " I'll do by her as though she were my own sister ; " and Captain Elyot sprang into the saddle, and took Blossom's bridle in Ms hand. 56 HTS INHERITANCE. " I b'lieve ye." " Come, come," and Cogger pressed in between them. " 'Tain't no time for manners. The moon'll be up afore ye know it. I hope ye ain't one o' the screechin' kind ? " to Blossom. "I I don't know." " Ye'll keep quiet, little gal, whatever comes ? " said Stubbs, stroking the horse upon which Blossom was seated with what tenderness ! " Yes, father." " Because," Cogger went on, " I've known a whole camp o' red-devils turned out jest by the screech of a woman. Not that I was meanin' t' speak ha'sh t' ye," he went on apologetically, examining her bridle, and giving a critical shake to the saddle ; " but ye see, fur myself, I'm powerful skeert ov Injuns, and hate most awful to wake 'em up. Wall, that's about all. - Ye can tell the major," addressing himself to Captain Elyot, " ef he could spare us a company o' reg'lars, we'd be obleeged to him." " To-morrow," whispered Blossom, leaning down, and throwing her arms around her father's neck. " Don't tell me not to watch for you. I'll be the first to meet you." Poor Stubbs tried to speak, but the words would not come. He felt her warm kisses on his face, then she was gone. The three figures moved off slowly, until the darkness shut Blossom from her father's sight. He strained his eyes till they could serve him no lon- ger ; then he dropped upon the ground, and listened to the muffled sound of the horses' hoofs, till that, too, died away. Cogger moved uneasily about at a little dis- tance, and finally joined him. HIS INHERITANCE. 57 "Ye'd better sleep while ye ken," he said, ostenta- tiously wrapping his blanket about himself. " Thar ain't no sleep for me," replied the little sutler, resting his face upon his hands, and staring straight into the darkness where Blossom had disappeared. " Kind o' low in yer mind, ain't ye ? " queried Cogger. " But, Lord, man I they'll git in. I'll trust Tony for that." " I ought never to 'a' brought her," pursued Stubbs gloomily. " Thet's so," said the wagon-master. " Thet's what I said t' the cap'n. 'Twarn't quite the squar' thing. Howsomever, I don't bear no grudge agin ye." But even this generous concession failed to comfort Stubbs. " You see, I kind o' hankered after her," he went on, partly to himself. " I s'pose so," said Cogger. " They seem to ; though I don't know much about wimmin myself. They 'pear mostly to be gittin' in folks's way. There was a gal, once, down Washita way," he added after a reflective pause. " H'm, ye should 'a' heerd that gal laugh ! But I ain't much to look at myself," he went on, " an' that goes a long way with wimmin. Though I hev thought but thar, most likely she wouldn't 'a' looked at sech a poor-sperited creeter." And, after this remarkable piece of confidence, Cog- ger did at last roll himself into a gray cocoon, and resign himself to sleep. When he was still, Stubbs rose quietly, and strolled off to his wagons, entering the one Blossom had occu- pied. There was no confusion of hurried departure here. Every thing was tidy and in its place. Even 58 HIS INHEKITANCE. the gray gown, hardly yet cold from her form, was fold- ed neatly, and lay upon the pile of wolf-skins where the little figure had rested so many times. He took the soft fabric between his hands. It was like Blossom, it was almost a part of herself; and he stroked it gently, until, in the working of his mind, his hand forgot the motion. No one had thought to put out the candle. It burned low, and there was a winding-sheet about it, if the man had but looked to see. After a time he roused himself, searched around for a moment, then took an old memorandum-book from his pocket, and began to write. It was a brief record which he made ; but he hesitat- ed long over it, and finished it with a sigh at last. He tore out the leaf, and, after a moment of consideration, pinned it to the little gray gown. Then he went out, and lay down with the rest. HIS INHERITANCE. 59 CHAPTER V. "A GIRL! WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT IT?" rriHE moon has been up for an hour, and shines J- white and cold over the level stretch of sandy plain around Fort Atchison. The river sleeps in its shallow bed under a thin coverlet of ice. The very night itself seems sleeping, or would but for this one open eye coldly staring down. The sentinels, with the capes of their coats muffled about their heads, pace off the weary time, longing for the hour of relief, yet stolidly going their rounds. One, more alive than the rest, suddenly halts in his steps to listen. A faint, continuous, and increasing sound has scattered the stillness hanging over the fort. It breaks at length into the thud of hoofs upon the frozen ground. A dark speck upon the eastern horizon is growing each moment. It divides into two or three moving objects. " Buffaloes," mutters the man with faint interest. A dStour throws the figures, still draw- ing near, against the pale sky. " Injuns ! " he utters aloud, and begins to feel the stirring of a soul within his torpid body. Other ears have caught the sound. Heads are thrust out of hastily opened windows, voices follow ; nearer and nearer stretch the mounted figures 60 HIS INHEKITANCE. in a straight line for the gate. " Tony Baird, by ! " exclaims the sentinel, and calls for the corporal of the guard, as the scout, followed by Captain Elyot, support- ing what seems to be a boyish figure upon the horse beside him, sweeps up to the gate. In a moment they are within and surrounded. Even Mrs. Bryce, wife of the major commanding at the post, follows her husband, having donned those articles of apparel first in hand, and which, it must be confessed, are neither numerous nor becoming. But she is an old campaigner, and knows the advantage of being to the front at once. Claudia Bryce, the major's daughter, and Miss Laud, who is paying her a long visit, run out, muffled up to their eyes, and join the gathering crowd about Captain Elyot, just as the young man has told his story, and delivered his despatches into the hands of the major. " We crept by their camp not six miles from the wag- ons; but, what with the distance and the darkness, we could not estimate their number." The bugle sounds " To horse ! " rousing the last sleeper, and awakening general confusion. There are calls and shouts, and a hasty running to and fro, with the trampling of iron-shod feet, while the women press curiously around Captain Elyot, who is lifting Blossom from her horse. They stare at her nondescript dress, when all at once her hat falls off, and her pretty brown hair comes rolling down over her shoulders. " A girl ! Who would have thought it ? " " Scandalous ! " whispers Miss Bryce, who would have been a fright in such a costume. " Poor child I What a sweet face ! " says another. " Who is she ? " rustles all through the little crowd. HIS INHERITANCE. 61 Even her strange dress and unconscious condition can- not hide the attributes of a lady. She must be some one of distinction, bound for a post farther on. " Nae gude, I daresay," ventures Jinny, Mrs. Bryce's overgrown Scotch maid, who stands on the outskirts of the assembled company, her hands upon her hips, pre- pared to defy the Devil and all his works as displayed in the person of Blossom. But there is no end to the officiousness of those near by. " Bring her to our house," says the major's wife, bustling up with an air of command. " Get your salts, Claudia, quick : she seems to have fainted." " Where is her mother ? Will nobody call her moth- er? " Captain Elyot exclaims impatiently, trying to push his way as well as he can, for the burden in his arms, through the crowd of females, each one of whom, unless it be strong-minded Jinny, has something to suggest or offer. " She's only frightened half to death." Then, in the silence that has dropped on the little company, he explains hastily, " She is Stubbs's daughter. Where is her mother ? " " Oh ! " and the crowd fell back to a woman, liter- ally to a woman ; for Jinny alone stood her ground. " Who'd 'a' believed it ! Stubbs's lass ! I'll fetch her mither, mon, if ye'll bide here. Or maybe ye'd best follow. An' t' think," said she to herself, when she had started off at a galloping pace more swift than graceful, " t' think I should 'a' ta'en her to be the Devil's ain ! But beauty's aye deceitfu'," she added by way of excuse. "An' who'd 'a' thought Stubbs's lass would 'a' been sae bonnie ! " Half way to the sutler's quarters they met Mrs. Stubbs, to whom the birds of the air had perhaps carried the news. 62 HIS INHERITANCE. " An' did you bring her in, Cap'n Elyot ? " said the woman, receiving the girl in her strong arms, without a word of love or welcome over the unconscious form. " It's a good night's work you've done for yourself. We sha'n't be forgetting it in a hurry. But is it true that the Injuns are out on the trail ? " She was holding the girl close in her arms. The rising wind had seized the red shawl she had thrown hastily over her head when she ran out at the exciting news. It caught the long loose locks of her straight black hair, and blew it about her face, where the color came and went, as she asked this question, like the pale and glow of the iron under the hammer. " Yes : we passed a large camp less than a dozen miles from here. But the wagons were safe enough a couple of hours ago. I'm going back now with re-enforce- ments to bring them in. Any message for your hus- band?" The woman was moving off already with her burden. There was no change in her countenance at this corrob- oration of her fears. "You might tell him not to throw himself into the thick of it. He ain't so spry as he used to be," she added as an apology for the caution. " But, man, come on to the house, and I'll get ye a bite an' something to keep the cold out." " Thanks, but we're off now ; " and he took the bridle of the fresh horse from the servant who led it up at the moment. " Bide at our house, mon. I'd set ye out something in a wink ; an' the leddies 'ud be proud to see ye," said Jinny, who lingered near. " Thanks, Jinny ; but I shall fare as well as the rest HIS INHERITANCE. 63 of them. I'll pay my respects to the ladies to-morrow, if we have good luck. Take care that Sergeant Mc- Dougal doesn't run his head against a bullet, Jinny, and good-by to you." At this thrust the girl threw her apron over her head, with a bashful giggle. " O Jinny ! " He reined in his horse. " Look in on Mrs. Stubbs by and by , and, if you can do any thing for the daughter, I'll make it up to the sergeant!" And his horse's hoofs rattled over the ground as he dashed to the head of the troop, and rode out at the gate. The clank and jingle of accoutrements, with the thud of hoofs, died away, and the company of riders was soon only a cloud of dust under the paling moon. The gates were closed, and securely fastened: the crowd scattered, the ladies suddenly aware that broad day- light would hardly find presentable a costume which might be picturesque enough at a midnight alarm. Reveille sounded. The routine of the day began, the garrison being quickened into unusual activity by the news Captain Elyot had brought in. Sleep was not to be thought of in the midst of such excitement. Even the ladies at headquarters had no intention of seeking their beds again, though daylight had hardly streaked the east. " We may as well make ourselves comfortable," said Claudia Bryce, the major's daughter, wrapping a plaid about her shoulders, and curling herself upon the outside of the bed in the low narrow room that was Claudia's "bower," while waiting for Jinny to come and light her fire. " My flesh fairly creeps," said Miss Laud, preparing 64 HIS INHERITANCE. to follow her example. " Are you sure, Claudia, there is no danger of their attacking the fort ? " " Perfectly sure," Claudia responded coolly. " It is only a thieving expedition after the wagons." " But, if they attack the wagons, there will be fight- ing." " Perhaps ; though they are much more likely to run when they see the troops, and know that the post is aroused." Then they came back to the incident which had so startled them. "It was quite dramatic," said Miss Laud lightly. " Really, Claudia, in a play nothing could be more effec- tive. And what an odd dress ! One would have taken her to be a boy, but for that unlucky hat. Pray, do you army ladies affect such costumes ? " " Not at all," Claudia replied with emphasis. " No lady in the army, or anywhere else, would think of wear- ing such a dress." " Then I conclude, my dear, that you do not consider this young person to be a lady." " A lady ! " repeated Miss Bryce in scorn. " What are you thinking of, Kitty. You heard him call for her mother. She is the sutler's daughter. You remember Mrs. Stubbs ? You bought your worsteds of her yes- terday." "It can't be possible, Claudia! That dreadful woman ! But the daughter is very pretty," Miss Laud persisted, " far prettier than any girl at the post, unless, dear, we except ourselves, as is quite proper and right," she added with a laugh. " She is extremely artful," retorted Miss Bryce, who did not smile over her friend's pleasantry. " Did you HIS INHERITANCE. 65 see how her hair fell down just at the right moment, when Captain Elyot lifted her from her horse ? " Miss Bryce's own locks were heavy and blonde ; but they lay, for the most part, upon the dressing-table before her. "O Claudia! you can't believe that she pulled out the pins ! " "I can believe any thing of that class of people," Claudia answered scornfully. "My dear, you are at odds with your conditions. You should have been born an English duchess, to talk of ' that class of people ! ' Whatever the cause, the tableau was very effective," yawned Miss Laud, pulling the wrap up to her pink and white chin ; for the morn- ing was chilly, and Jinny unaccountably delayed. "And mademoiselle, the sutler's daughter, has come to stay ? " " Yes, I believe so, unless some unexpected piece of good fortune removes the whole family." " You will hardly think it necessary to call ? " " To be sure not." " I am afraid it will be rather dull for the poor thing. She certainly had the appearance of a lady." " I am not responsible for such a misfortune," Claudia responded coldly. " And that was Captain Elyot," Miss Laud went on meditatively. "Claudia, why did you never tell me hdw handsome he is?" " And he never looked at me, though I stood directly before him," burst out Miss Bryce, who could keep back no longer the cause of her extraordinary ill-humor. " He has been away three months, and comes back to ask for Mrs. Stubbs ! " " Be reasonable, dear. Think of the excitement of 66 HIS INHERITANCE. the moment, his haste, the errand he had come on, and that girl in his arms to be disposed of. He was be- wildered with questions " " But he was not blind." " And, even if you were close beside him, he might not have recognized you in the dark." " O Kitty ! it was a bright moonlight." " Between moonlight and dawn, dear, and we wrapped up like Esquimaux." (And really Claudia was very plain, and not at all like herself in a neglectful or hur- ried toilet, thought Miss Laud in the very depths of her soul.) "Still he might have given you a look, a word, and you almost engaged to him," she added inconsistently. " I never said that, Kitty." " But you told me of his constant visits and his de- votion, before he went East. If such conduct has any meaning which it frequently has not, I must confess," she added frankly. " How do I know that he may not have been equally devoted to this girl?" asked Claudia, hot and suspi- cious. "Think of the long journey across the plains together! Chance, rather than choice, breeds love, Kitty. Oh, you know it does ! And, though he rode in before my eyes, he never gave me a thought. It was all for this girl and her mother." " To get rid of her, dear. But don't cry, pray don't. Jinny will come, and everybody will wonder at your red eyes. And will you let me give you a piece of advice ? " Claudia regarded her friend inquiringly. " Go and call upon this girl at once, to-day. Oh ! there is nothing in it. She looked like a child." " Go and call ? " repeated Miss Bryce. Indignation dried up her tears. " Never ! " HIS INHERITANCE. 67 "No, I don't suppose you will," Miss Laud said slowly, entirely unmoved by Claudia's wrath, directed now to herself. "I don't suppose I should myself. But I am convinced that would be the best thing to do, although very likely I shouldn't do it. But at least you will not show any annoyance when he comes back ? You will appear the same as usual to him ? " " Why shouldn't I appear the same ? " replied Clau- dia, turning upon her friend. " He is nothing to me," she added, with a rather late assumption of dignity. Then she had nearly broken down again. " There are others more mindful of me than he shows himself to be," she said with a choking voice. " To be sure there are." Miss Laud hastened to con- cur with her. " Lieutenant Gibbs, for instance, who would cut off his head for you any day. I am not so sure that he would sacrifice his mustache." "Why do you speak of that idiot?" Claudia said crossly. And then Jinny did at last appear to light the fire, an interruption Miss Laud secretly rejoiced in. Clau- dia's manner had become decidedly disagreeable, and she was glad that the conversation had come to an end. She hastened to dress, in order to leave the room before Jinny had finished her task. Left to herself, Claudia might recover her usual tolerable humor, and even con- sider her advice. It could not be that she was so weak as to show herself mortified and angry to her friends, who would easily divine the cause, and, above all, to Captain Elyot himself ! 68 HIS INHERITANCE. CHAPTER VI. COMING HOME. ALL day long Blossom lay upon the bed her mother had aired and spread with her own hands in ex- pectation of her coming. Much of the time she was alone, lying with close-shut eyes, hearing her mother's sharp, quick voice, and the half-breed Tolee's muttered replies through the thin partition, as in a dream. Tolee moved about lazily among her pots and pans in the kitchen. Not even the coming home of her young mistress, or the expected arrival of her master with the friends he might bring to sup with him, could rouse her. But Mrs. Stubbs was alert and everywhere, tasting of the simmering preparations for a feast already under way in the kitchen, peering with curiosity and pride over Blossom's pillows, and answering the constant summons to the store. Was there always this strange, loud restlessness about the woman, moving the very air perceptibly? Blossom felt her coming before she drew near; her heart beat quickly; involuntarily she closed her eyes, and feigned sleep. She was half afraid of this mother, with her sharp voice and abrupt ways, so unlike the gentle manners to which the girl had be- come accustomed. Had she really come home? Do HIS INHERITANCE. 69 our friends come to us when they stand before our glad eyes, and lay their hands in ours ? Are not the distant often nearer, the dead even, more truly present ? Blos- som's heart, with the first moment of consciousness, had travelled back over the trail to the wagon-train. The brown, rolling land was around her again. Again she heard the creak of the slow-moving wheels. Screened by the darkness, she had mounted Black Jess, and rode by her father's side. Then her dream vanished as she opened her eyes, and saw her mother standing by the bed with a tray in her hand. The woman had come in with careful step, almost afraid that a breath might blow away the pretty creature lying on the pillows, and whom she could hardly yet realize to be her own. " You must try to eat a bit," she said, setting down her tray. " It's wearing toward night, and not a mouth- ful have you taken to-day." "Night?" repeated Blossom, sitting up in a little flurry of excitement. "I ought not to have slept so long. They'll be coming in, and I promised " " There's time enough," said the woman ; but her hand shook nervously as she set out the tray, and gave the little bowl of steaming broth to Blossom. " It's a long hour to dark yet, and they won't come before that." She moved about restlessly while Blossom sipped her broth. More than once she pulled the curtain, and looked out upon the waning day. A fierce wind swept by : the great snow-clouds that had been rolling up for hours, now spread out a solid phalanx. "There's snow in the air," she said with a shiver: " I've felt it all day. There'll be a storm to-morrow." "But they'll be in before that." 70 HIS INHERITANCE. Content, and a hope that was like assurance, had come to Blossom with the spoonfuls of warm broth she was sipping. " Yes, long before that," the mother repeated hastily. She left the window, and from the foot of the bed watched the girl as she ate, but with an ear for every sound outside. They ought to come in now, this mo- ment: they should have been in an hour ago, if no harm had befallen them. If she could but see and know the worst ! If she could have borne the brunt of it instead of Stubbs ! who was not indeed, as she had told Captain Elyot, the man he had been once. Ah ! to wait and listen was like being bound with chains. The wind seemed to bring strange, frightened voices : the air was full of cries as she moved to the window again. The dog in his kennel just outside howled a warning for somebody. Blossom, unconscious of her mother's anxiety, had begun to lose something of her timidity. She prattled like a child, now of her father, of the train, of her joy at coming home. " I should have been quite happy," she ran on, " if aunt Julia had not been so sad over my coming away." " She's no aunt of yours," Mrs. Stubbs said sharply, suddenly recalled from her own thoughts. " And she's forgot it, most likely, by this time." " I think she can't have quite forgotten it so soon." Tears had come into Blossom's eyes at this rough-shod comfort. " And she was very kind, and wished me to call her aunt. Nobody could have been so kind," the girl went on " unless," she added, suddenly mindful to whom she was speaking, " it were you or dear father." Her tears were falling now. "Don't cry, child," Mrs. Stubbs said impatiently. HIS INHERITANCE. 71 " She set a store by you, I don't doubt; but that's past and gone." " She has hardly any one in the world but me," Blos- som persisted, little dreaming of the jealous pain she aroused in her mother's heart. No one but her! And did this woman who had cared for Blossom so many years really lay claim to the child? She had been hired to shelter and teach her. The term of service was over. There was an end of it. " But I shall see her again. She will come to us, or we shall go there; " and Blossom wiped away her tears. " You're low from the fright and all," Mrs. Stubbs said evasively. Come to them? or they go to her? Never! the woman said in her heart, losing sight of every thing, for the moment, but that this woman had won the child's love to herself. But Blossom would forget. Her own life had been too full from day to day to hold repinings : so it musfr be with the child. And she held in the bitter words on her lips. " You'll be better in the morning. The scare was too much for you. Lord! when I was your age I'd have thought nothing of a gallop of twenty miles, or a brush with the red-skins either. But girls ain't now what they used to be. Why, I've heard Miss Claudia here screech out ut a striped snake I could V killed with the heel <>!' my shoe." " Miss Claudia ! " Blossom caught at the name. "Yes, the major's daughter. You must have seen her. She was out with the rest of 'em when you came in this morning. But I forgot : you didn't know any thing about it. She's a friend of the cap'n's, Cap'n Elyot." Blossom's face warmed into interest at this 72 HIS INHERITANCE. name. The mother marked it. " They did say he was paying attention to her before he got leave, and left for the States; but I never believed it. He can see as far as the best of 'em ; and she's false, Miss Claudia is." Mrs. Stubbs made this damaging statement against the major's daughter as calmly as though it had been the mildest innuendo. " But I reckon you saw a good deal of the captain on the way out," she added slyly, watch- ing the girl, whose face was turned toward her. " Yes," Blossom said slowly, unconscious of this espionage : " I saw him often riding with the others. I came to know his face quite well." "He's a pleasant-spoken young man. Many's the evening he's spent here, smoking a pipe with your fa- ther, or taking a hand at cards with the rest of 'em." "I never heard him speak," Blossom said thought- fully, " or only once. It was the night before we left the train, last night. How long ago it seems ! I climbed down from the wagon (it was dark, you know) for a breath of air, and and I met him face to face." " He had a pleasant word for you, I'll warrant." Blossom did not say that she had given him no oppor- tunity to offer such a word. " He apologized, and went away," she said ; but she blushed a little, remembering how she had begged him to go. She must have ap- peared very silly in his eyes. " But there was the long ride to the fort," persisted the mother, anxious to know how far this most fortu- nate acquaintance had progressed. " It don't stand to reason that he never spoke to you once on the way." " I hardly know, I cannot remember ; but I was so frightened at last ! " Blossom lost sight of every thing HIS INHERITANCE. 73 else in the recollection of it. " We rode close to their camp, so close, that we thought we had roused them. I shall never forget it ! " And the girl began to tremble, covering her face. " There, don't think about it," said the mother, who hardly knew how to deal with fancies and fears so un- like her own. "It'll pass out of your mind when you've slept on it. Yes, he's a real gentleman, Cap'n Elyot is," she went on, going back to the first subject. "Stubbs'll give him something handsome when he comes in, though ten chances to one he won't take it ; he's that proud, Cap'n Elyot is. But we'll ask him to supper. Your father'll know I'm getting ready for 'em, and'll bring him here, I don't doubt." "And you think there is no danger? " Blossom inquired in a trembling voice. The ride of the night before had come back to her so vividly as to arouse her fears again. "How can that be, with the troops to back 'em? Why, the Injuus'll fly like smoke before the wind." Blossom was assured by the bold words ; the more, per- haps, because she remembered who rode at the head of the company from the fort. "You just make yourself fine, child, and don't worry about your father. Put on your prettiest ribbons ; for I'm greatly mistaken if we don't have a handsome young man to supper to-night." "But they're bringing my ribbons in with them," laughed Blossom. " I shall have no time to put them on. And, O mother! I have no clothes but these." And the girl looked ruefully at the odd dress which she had worn into the fort. " Never you mind, child. You've that in your face that's better than fine clothes," the mother said proudly. " An' Cap'n Elyot has seen 'em a'ready : so it won't sig- 74 HIS INHERITANCE. nify. You don't happen to know if there's any one else your father'd be likely to bring home with him ? " " There was a captain I have forgotten his name. He had charge of the train." " Luttrell, perhaps. He's expected about this time." "Yes; and there was the wagon-master," Blossom said hesitatingly : " he seemed to be a friend to father." " Cogger ? They've been back and forth together a good many years now," the woman said indifferently. " But he won't come, nor Cap'n Luttrell, if I have my way. Thank God, we've done keeping open house, and being at the beck and call of anybody who'd a mind to come. I made 'em a grand supper before your father set out, and told 'em 'twas the last they need look for here. We'll keep to ourselves, now that you've come home. 'Twouldn't be seemly to be having every- body hanging about the house. We'll pick and choose among 'em. And Stubbs may open the store to the rest, if they must have their pipe and their game, and something to wash down their losses; for they do play high sometimes, though it's not for me to say so. Not that it's worse than at any of the other posts," she added with quick caution. " And what can you expect of men who've nothing else to do the most of the time ? Whatever'!! become of 'em when they've killed off all the Injuns the Lord knows ! " The woman had worked herself into a cheerful humor over the derelictions of those about her. "I'll just take one more look into the kitchen," she said, " and then go and dress myself ; for it's wearing toward night." The clouds seemed to drop lower and lower until they shut out every gleam of light. " Yes, it's wearing fast toward night ; " and she sighed as she hastened away. Her cheerfulness had been only on the surface, after all. HIS INHERITANCE. 75 She was detained as she passed through the store. Perhaps the odors from the feast in preparation savory, and growing stronger had stolen through the fort ; for more than one idler dropped in to pay a trib- ute to Stubbs's popularity, and express a hope that all would go well with the train. They might, perhaps, look in later in the evening, when he had really arrived, which must be soon now: it would be too dark to follow the trail in an hour. But Mrs. Stubbs was deaf to all such suggestions. She had not prepared her ban- quet, roasting and broiling over the fire, to serve those who had staid at home. It would be time enough to gather whoever chose to come when her expected guests failed her. So she made but brief answer to all the congratulations over her daughter's return. Yes, she was quite recovered, since they were so polite as to ask. But, though more than one of the young officers had brushed up his uniform, it was all in vain. No invitation to walk into the parlor they all knew so well followed this cool reply. They began to realize at last that the door of that mild paradise was, indeed, closed upon them. Then Mrs. Stubbs hastened away to dress. She laid by the common dark print worn ordinarily, and brought out a high-colored silk of old-fashioned make, which liad been folded away for years. Some young ambi- tion, outgrown later, some womanly desire to be dressed like the best of those about her, had given it a place among her stores. It was creased in odd squares from lying folded away, and rattled like paper when she shook it out ; but she arrayed herself in it with trem- bling hands. A thoughtless word, never intended to give pain, which Blossom had dropped carelessly about 76 HIS INHERITANCE. aunt Julia's tasteful dress, had brought this from its hiding-place. The girl should see that her mother, too, could be fine if she chose. The bright colors height- ened her dark beauty. She stood before the glass, and smoothed her sleek hair, and pinned a handkerchief across her bosom, a deeper red than usual flushing her brown cheeks at this late consciousness of her good looks. It was years since such a thought had crossed her mind. She was shy of showing herself to Blossom when all was done. What if the girl should laugh at her for her pains? She hesitated at the door of the parlor. There was a flash of warm color in the room as the fire flamed up. Odd, incongruous pieces of furniture were ranged stiffly against the walls. The pipes, and the well-stained, rickety card-tables, which had been the chief ornaments of the apartment, were gone. The sanded floor was covered now with a gay carpet. The roses upon it bloomed into sudden summer as the firelight touched them. It had all been made gay and ugly in anticipation of Blossom's coming. Comfort had been scared away ; and stiff, conventional propriety sat bolt upright in the heavy arm-chairs, or propped itself primly upon the high-backed sofa. The girl for whom all this sacrifice had been made, if sacrifice it was, had curled herself upon the hearth-rug within the circle of flickering light, her loose, pretty hair mak- ing a kind of dusky nimbus about her head. The quiet of the room, broken only by the shrieking wind out- side, oppressed her. The forebodings which waiting and listening bring to the stoutest heart began to weigh upon her. There came a cheerful rustle at the door, as Mrs. Stubbs in her paper gown stepped into the room. The yellow, dancing light struck the bright HIS INHEKITA^CE. 77 colors, and stretched up to the handsome, crimsoning face under the smooth dark hair. Blossom started as though she had seen a vision. " How beautiful you are ! " she exclaimed, her eyes opening wide, her hands unclasping. " As fine as your friends t' the States ? " And Mrs. Stubbs laughed a shy, awkward laugh as she busied herself over the fire. " Oh, much finer ! " Blossom said gravely. " It was only because she was so good to me, and dear, that aunt Julia was beautiful to look at." She brought out from its corner one of the heavy old arm-chairs. It squeaked and groaned as she set it be- fore the blaze. It burst out into hideous, sprawling flowers as the light touched it, blue and yellow and purple, which the paper gown crushed and covered ruthlessly as Mrs. Stubbs took her place in it. There were companionship and cheer in the fire, though they sat voiceless before it. The wind swept around the house, and wailed in the chimney as they waited in silence. All at once there was a tramp of feet outside. Blossom caught her mother's arm, and listened, her heart still, her lips apart, while the red glow died on the woman's face. A moment, and it passed by. It was only the relieving guard. Suddenly, in a lull of the wind, an icy tap struck the window-pane. Mrs. Stubbs started from her seat, and hurried to the window. Not a dozen rods away lay the broad, frozen river, and beyond, the endless stretch of sandy plain. But her eyes, blinded by the fire, saw only the thick darkness shutting them in. " I must go out," she said half wildly. " I'll be back soon." For her own fears were thrown upon Bios- 78 HIS INHERITANCE. som's face. " Don't be frightened. It's nothing at all. Only I've an errand down to the major's. I forgot it before." " But can't Tolee go ? The storm has begun." " No, no ! I'll go myself," the woman said, putting Blossom by, and beginning to wrap a shawl about her head. " Take me with you, then." It was dreadful to be left "alone. What was it her mother feared? Could something have befallen the train? But her father had said that they might not get in till hours later than this, till morning even. " Do let me go." But her mother would not listen. "I'll be back soon," she said; " keep the fire bright against they come ; and, if you mind staying alone, you can go to the kitchen." Then she closed the door after her, and went out into the night. Yes, the snow was falling. It was that which had struck against the window. The wind still raged. It beat on her head, and pulled at her shawl, and threw a mocking laugh after her as she struggled on. Already she had forgotten Blossom. She and Stubbs were alone again, in her excited imagination, as they had been be- fore Blossom came to them. Ah, many a dark night, with the wind and the wolves howling about her, had she waited for him ! The snow must have been falling softly for some time. It covered her feet as she pushed through the light drifts. She had known a storm like this to sweep down, and bury horses and men from sight. The river would be hidden in an hour. The trail would be lost. A lantern went hurrying by in the darkness. There was the tread of feet, the trample of hoofs, muffled by the snow. Others watched as well as she. She hastened on, where, or to what end, she HIS INHERITANCE. 79 hardly knew herself: the snow and sleet struck her face like a stinging hand. There were lights in the windows she passed. From one came a ringing laugh. Let them laugh ! Housed safe and warm, they had no thought of those who might be lying stiff and stark under the snow, or pressing on to their death. There was a faint, answering wail from a distance, as the wind shrieked, and was still for a moment. Was it the wind, or the call of belated men borne in upon her bewildered ears ? Again it came. It was caught up and echoed with a great shout below her. The shawl blew back from her head, as, her arms thrown free, she struggled toward the gate. There were voices and cries, and lan- terns swinging high in air. A dozen mounted figures dashed away with a cheer. Thank God ! The wagons were coming in at last I Blossom went back to the fire, where her mother had left her. It was better to be alone than with stupid Tolee in the kitchen. She sat down to wait as patient- ly as she could. She had no presentiment of harm that could have befallen her father when she had put away the nervous terrors that fluttered about her, and gave herself really to consider the subject. Had he not assured her that there was nothing to fear? She re- membered now that she was hungry. It might be late before their grand supper was served, if, indeed, it was not spoiled in waiting ; for already a faint, alarming scent of burning stole in from the kitchen. She begged a cake of Tolee, who, stupid or ungracious, would have put her off ; then she came back to her post to eat it, and listen and wait. The dancing firelight made her yawn. In spite of herself she grew drowsy, and dozed. It might have been a few moments, it might have been 80 HIS INHERITANCE. hours, when the wind blew down the chimney with a screech, flapping a sudden gust in her face, putting out the candle she had lighted, and sending the ashes scurrying over the hearth. She sprang up, frightened and wide awake. Her mother had not returned. She was still alone. Was she dreaming yet? Or were strange, confused sounds tossed back and forth outside, a new awakening at the post, like that upon which she had closed her eyes early in the morning ? She lit the candle ; but before her eager hands could set it in its place, or the shadow had been driven to the corners of the room, these sounds drew near. She flew to throw the door wide open at the tread of feet outside. He must have come ! Had she not said that she would be the first to greet him ? All the confused, far-off voices flew into the room as the wet wind struck her face. The long red rays from a lantern swung zigzag on the snow. Voices were calling, shouts replying; a rider galloped by ; lights were dancing in the distance. But what was this the men were bearing past her into the house, this dragging, heavy burden wrapped from sight ? And why did her mother follow, weeping, and wringing her hands ? The blanket dropped from the dead face , and Blos- som fell like a snowflake where she had stood aside to let them pass. For it was Stubbs dead, shot through the heart. And this was Blossom's coming home. HIS INHERITANCE. 81 CHAPTER VII. THE HOUSE WITH DEATH IN IT. THE train had been attacked at daybreak ; but the little company defended itself bravely until re- enforcements from the fort surprised and scattered the enemy. Only two men were killed, of whom the post- sutler was the first to fall. Five or six more were wounded, but not dangerously ; and the wagons, for which all this jeopardy and loss of life had been incurred, were safely convoyed to the fort at last. It was the bustle and din of the camp forming just outside the stockade, which had rushed in upon Blossom when she opened the door to meet her father. No one noticed the girl. The men returned, and passed out by the way they had come, leaving the wife alone with her dead. But hardly had the door closed after them, when it was cautiously opened once more, and Cogger, who had been one of the bearers of poor Stubbs's body, appeared again, thrusting his head in warily, and finally stepping carefully into the room. " Wharever's the little gal ? " he muttered to himself. Some late remembrance of Blossom standing in the open door, with her happy, welcoming face, had crossed his mind, and made him return. What had become of 82 HIS INHERITANCE. the child ? Who would try to comfort her ? And then the man, peering about in the dim light, discovered a little dark heap lying behind the door. " Poor creeter ! " And he raised her in his arms, holding her fearfully and at arm's-length. " I declar' t' goodness, I don' know what t' do for ye. Whar's yer mother? 'Pears t' me she'd better be tendin' t' the livin' than groanin' over the dead. Cryin' won't bring him t' life." And, still bearing Blossom in his arms, he crossed the room to the door, from behind which came at intervals the sound of low groans and the restless tread of feet. " She ain't in no state t' tend t' ye," he said, after listening a moment, addressing unconscious Blossom. " I reckon I'll hev t' try my hand." He laid the girl down upon the floor, with her feet to the fire, and, going out, returned with a handful of snow, with which he sprinkled her face, and bathed her temples. Then he set himself to rubbing her hands with a corner of his rough coat, carefully choosing the cleanest ; and at last, taking a flask from his pocket, wet her lips with its contents from time to time. His awkward yet gentle efforts were not in vain. The dark eyelashes laid upon the white cheeks trembled visibly ; the breath of return- ing life warmed the death-like face. " She's comin' 'round," muttered the delighted wagon-master. He took off his drenched, shabby hat, and threw it upon the floor, and with both hands proceeded to smooth his rough hair down upon either side of his face. " I ain't much t' look at, an' I might skeer her ef she opened her eyes sudden," he apologized to himself for this un- usual exercise of the toilet. Acting upon this thought, too, he tried to wrench his countenance into something like a smile, with which to greet her when she should HIS INHERITANCE. 83 return to life. Fortunately the fire demanded his atten- tion ; and it was at this moment that Blossom, coming to herself, and unclosing her eyes, sat up to find a strange figure thrusting the poker sharply among the coals, and laying a forestick upon the andirons. She recognized his profile against the light, and her thoughts flew to the last time she had seen him ; then they trav- elled home to the present, and she burst into tears. " Now don't 'ee," said the man, at his wits'-end to know how to console her. u 'Tain't no use, ye know : he's dead." " I know it," sobbed Blossom. " O father, father ! " " He set a store by his little gal," Cogger ventured, when she had wept in silence a while. " You should V heerd him the night ye rode off with the cap'n ! " " Did he speak of me ? Oh ! what did he say ? " Blossom forgot her crying for a moment. To hear his words was like bringing her father to life again. " Was he glad that I had gone ? " " Uncommon," Cogger replied sententiously. " Tell me all he said : don't leave any thing out." " Wall, ef I ken. But ye see, I didn't lay it by, as 'twere, not thinkin' of sech an occasion. 'Twas arter ye'd gone, ye know, an' the boys were mostly sleepin', seein' 's we'd got t' catch up in an hour or two. But thar wa'n't no sleep fur him, he sed. Them was his own words, * Thar ain't no sleep -fur me.' ' " Did he say so ? Poor father ! Was he afraid some harm would come to me ? " " Jest that. * I ain't slept day nor night,' sez he, ' for thinkin' o' the little gal. Ef I kin only git her safe to her mother, who's an uncommon woman ! ' An' so she is : she reminds me of a gal I knew once down Wash- 84 HIS INHERITANCE. ita way, tho' that ain't neither here nor thar ; " and Cogger fell into a reverie. " And was that all ? Did he say nothing more ? " " 'Pears t' me thar was somethin' about what a com- fort ye'd been t' him, and somethin' about how ye'd hung on to his heart, and how he'd wanted most power- ful t' see ye. They was good words, I know, fur a man t' have in his mouth t'ward the last." The fire blazed high, and set all the room aglow again ; it touched Blossom's pale cheek laid against the purple and yellow arm-chair. Outside the storm still raged ; but something like comfort stilled the girl's heart. He thought of her, he remembered her to the last. " But oh ! there is something else I want to ask you," she said, trying to keep back her sobs. " Did you know, were you beside him when " she shuddered, and hid her face. " No : I can't say's I wos, an' be truthful. Ye see, I ain't no sperit whatever when there's Injuns 'round. I can't do nothin' but tear arter 'em, an' cut an' slash among 'em." Blossom raised her head, and regarded him with wet, astonished eyes. " But I should think, if you are so afraid, you'd run away from them." " One ud think so, sartain," Cogger replied thought- fully ; " but I don't. It's fear, I s'pose ; an' that's all," he said, taking up his shabby hat, and moving toward the door. " Don't speak about it," when the girl would have thanked him. " Your father 'n' me was pardners for years. I'd do ye a sarvice with a cheerful sperit any time, if so be as ye needed one. Not thet I'm t' be in these parts long ; but anybody along the trail knows Dan Cogger, an', if ye need a friend, ye won't look far HIS INHERITANCE. 85 for one." Then, with a like message for her mother, he took his leave. While this interview was taking place down at the sutler's quarters, a very different scene was presented at Major Bryce's, where Captain Elyot had dropped in for a word with Mrs. Bryce. Several ladies had assembled, in spite of the storm, to discuss the attack upon the wagon-train, and pick up any item of news it might have brought in. The major's daughter had been serv- ing tea ; and the little flurry of fright and excitement which had pervaded the small community had only stimu- lated every one to unusual spirits : so that it was a very cheerful and almost gay company in the midst of which Captain Elyot found himself. " O Captain Elyot ! " they exclaimed, surrounding him. " How glad we are to see you safely back again ! And now we shall hear the truth of it. They say you were quite a hero." " You are very kind," the young man replied gravely. " But poor Stubbs was the only hero, and he paid dear enough for his honors. How do you do, Miss Claudia?" as the major's daughter set down the cup of tea in her hand, and turned to meet him. His tone was warm enough for friendliness as Claudia gave him her hand ; but there was in his manner neither the eagerness nor the confusion with which a lover is supposed to meet his mistress after a long absence. Miss Laud was watching him with her sharp eyes. " He is very handsome, but not a bit in love," she said to herself. As for Claudia, she greeted him with an embarrassment she could not control, blushing to her hair ; for by this time she had assumed the puffs and curls and braids, 86 HIS INHERITANCE. and made herself fine, with the hope that chance or inclination, or some good fate, would bring the young man here. " You must be very tired. Will you let me give you some tea ? " She had marked his great cavalry boots, and the dis- orderly dress, which he had had no time to arrange ; but did not this speak of his eagerness to come to her, as well as of dangers past, and glory indeed? for he had fought with the bravest, she knew. She was a soldier's daughter ; and her heart beat with pride over this hand- some, bold young man who was a hero in all eyes to-night. He might deny it ; but he was a hero, never- theless. She pulled up an arm-chair, for every one had risen at his entrance. " Sit down and make yourself comfortable while I call Jinny to bring a fresh pot: it will take but a moment. I wish you had come an hour earlier : you would have been better served." But Captain Elyot declined the chair turned so invit- ingly to the fire. " I have had a cup of tea already," he said, " and thank you all the same. And I really cannot stay. I only called to pay my respects at headquarters," he added, with a gallant bow to the major's daughter, too gallant, by far, Miss Laud thought, " and to say a word to your mother." Mrs. Bryce came bustling up at the moment to press Claudia's offer of hospitality. She was a stout, fussy woman, with a red face, all aglow now with good will. " You are quite too good," he said gratefully, and a little ashamed of the honors thrust so openly upon him. " I really cannot stay : I thought perhaps you would go HIS INHERITANCE. 87 down to the sutler's. Mrs. Stubbs must be in great trouble. I'm on my way there now." And it was for this he had come ! Claudia's heart turned to a stone. " To be sure I will ! I was telling the major a few moments ago that some one ought to go down there. Just wait till I can put on my cloak. Or don't let me keep you : it is really dreadful. Jinny will go with me ; and I'll stop long enough to put up a few things that may be needed." " And if you could do any thing for the daughter," said Captain Elyot, turning to Claudia. " The poor girl must be nearly distracted. If you could bring her here ? " he suggested with well-meant stupidity. He made the proposition boldly. His reception had been so kind, that he was afraid to ask nothing, espe- cially as he remembered that he and Claudia had been the best of friends before he went East. Miss Laud, standing behind Miss Bryce, pulled at her gown. Now was the time to show herself unsuspicious, and to win his gratitude. Claudia could not be so blind, so foolishly perverse, as to refuse ! "I don't know," Claudia stammered, suddenly cold, and unmindful of this pantomime advice. " I am afraid we are full. But mamma will do what is neces- sary, I don't doubt." Then she moved away and left him, somewhat be- wildered, it must be owned, and not at all sure that she had accepted his suggestion. But Miss Laud followed him to the door. " Claudia will go down in the morning, I am sure," she said. " You see how impossible it is for her to leave now. If / could do any thing but of course a straii- 88 HIS INHERITANCE. ger would only be in the way. It is very sad for them ! Claudia and I were speaking of the daughter this morn- ing. Such a sweet face as she has ! " And the young man went off, with his heart warm toward Miss Bryce and her friend, who would do all they could to heal the cruel hurt Blossom had received. How stupid he had been to misunderstand Claudia for a moment, and to leave without a word ! He forgot that she had turned away from him. The windows at the sutler's were dark, and beaten full of snow, when he reached the house. There was no response to his tap at the door ; and he ventured to enter unannounced the room where he had spent so many evenings. It was unlighted, the candle had burned out, and no one had thought to replace it, and seemed empty of human presence ; for in the dark- ness he did not notice the girl, who had cried herself to sleep upon the floor at last. A bright line of light under the door at the foot of the room drew him on. It must be there they had laid Stubbs ; and there he should find the widow and Blossom. But again no one responded to his knock at the door ; and, after a moment, he pushed it open, and stepped into the room. There was something awful in the stillness of the bare little bedroom in which Stubbs reposed. It was not death alone that struck a chill to his heart. He had become, in a measure, accustomed to that, to death in its most dreadful forms, in the vestments and attitudes of life, with open, staring eyes, out under the wide sky. It was the death-in-life of the woman's face beside the bed that filled him with awe, and froze the words upon Ms lips. What comfort could he bring to this HIS INHERITANCE. 89 woman, with her dead lying stretched out before her ? He stood a moment, with uncovered head, looking down upon the quiet face from which all earthly passion had faded. It seemed even to wear an expression of con- tent, as though this long sleep were sweet and dream- less, and full of rest. So should he be some day ; but he could not bring it home to his consciousness now. With the blood quick and warm in his veins, his thoughts flew rather to the living. Where was Stubbs's daughter ? Where was Blossom ? He had promised to stand by her at the worst, never dreaming that the worst would be like this. But he would not forget his vow. Here, by the dead body of her father who had committed her to his keeping, he renewed it. She should find a friend in him. Then he approached the woman who sat at the foot of the bed, her hands locked, her eyes staring straight before her. He spoke to her ; but she did not move. He touched her arm ; but she shook him off. " Where is the child ? Where is Miss Blossom ? " he asked, stooping down, and speaking in her ear. That would recall her. But she only turned her vacant, bloodshot eyes upon him without a word. She had forgotten the child. But Blossom could not be far away. It was cruel to leave her alone. How little Claudia and her friend had realized her forlorn condition ! If they had known it, they would have come to her at once, he deluded him- self with thinking. He could do nothing for the sutler's wife ; but it could not be long now before Mrs. Bryce came to her. One of her own sex would know, as he did not, how to touch the springs of her heart, and make an outlet for her sorrow. He closed the door after him with that hush which 90 HIS INHERITANCE. the presence of the dead imposes on us all, and returned to the parlor. The room had been familiar enough to him once ; but the very outline of it seemed changed now, as his eyes became somewhat accustomed to the darkness. A little heap of darker shadows before the dying embers of the fire caught his eye. Could that be Blossom ? He crossed the floor, uttering her name in a subdued voice. There was a movement among the shadows on the hearth-rug, then a figure, slight, and with unbound hair, rose between him and the faint glow of the firelight. " Who is it ? " asked Blossom in a heart-broken tone, which touched the young man more than the sight of the dead face he had just left. " And you are all alone ? " said he, without waiting to announce himself. " Let me get a light. There used to be matches here." He had pushed the heavy chair away, and was search- ing upon the mantel while he spoke. It had been laden, when he knew it last, with pipes and matches, and boxes of tobacco. But all was indeed changed here. " Wait : I will bring one," Blossom said, disappear- ing for a moment, to return with a little circle of flaring light about her head from the lamp in her hand, light- ing up her pale face and heavy eyes as she set it down upon the table. Then she waited, with her hands crossed, and a strange calm upon her childish counte- nance, in an attitude of utter self-forgetfulness, for what he was about to say. There came to him, like an echo, a recollection of the scene he had just left. And not one of those women had thought of this poor child! It was an injustice to HIS INHERITANCE. 91 the ladies of the post, since more than one of them had spoken pityingly of both Blossom and her mother, though no one but the major's wife had proposed going to them. Mrs. Stubbs had inspired her acquaintances with an awe which amounted to terror among the female and more timid portion. They looked down upon her, to be sure, as belonging to another order than themselves ; but they sympathized with her so far as it was possible. And yet might she not resent a sym- pathy which had had no forerunner of friendliness ? " And you are entirely alone ? This ought not to be," said Captain Elyot, with a glance of surprise over the fine, dismal apartment which had put on such a strange face to him. " But Mrs. Bryce, the major's wife, will be down directly : she'll take you home with her, I hope." " Oh, don't send me away ! " Blossom's sobs broke out anew at this. " Send you away ? It's not for me to send you away, or do any thing else, as for that matter. Only nobody seems to think of you. They're coming down to see what can be done for your mother ; and I hoped some of them would take you home." "But I would rather stay with him," said Blos- som brokenly, and hardly above her breath. " Then you shall," the young man replied, with a de- cision which set Blossom's timid heart at rest. " But I have something for you here." He approached the table where she had set the light down, and which formed a barrier between them, behind which the child stood, with a pitiful attempt at quiet and self-control. Some locks of her soft 92 HIS INHERITANCE. brown hair, loosely curling, fell over her face. She pushed them back, and took up the scrap of crumpled paper he laid before her, an occasional sob- bing breath breaking the silence between them as she tried to make out the scrawling lines written upon it. It was the leaf from the memorandum-book which Stubbs had pinned upon the little gray gown in the wagon. Some curious eyes had found it out, and it had come to Captain Elyot's hand. " I kommit my soul to God, and all I die possessed of to my wife and the child. May Crod have them in his keepin ! " It read. It was Stubbs's last will and testament. Poor Blossom's tears burst out afresh at this. Ten- der as his heart was toward her in her trouble, the young man was sorely at a loss to comfort her ; and yet he would not go away and leave her alone. Would none of the women ever come ! " You see, he felt that he was going to die, and had you in his mind at the very last," he ventured, when she had cried a few mo- ments, with hysterical sobs it frightened him to hear. And then he went on to speak of her father's death : it was instantaneous, painless. Gradually the sobs be- came less violent as she listened. Without being aware of it, he had said the very words Blossom most longed to hear. There had been a horror in her mind, which had fairly overcome her grief, in regard to the manner of his death. She knew nothing of it ; but vague recollec- tions of stories heard and read in years past, of Indian tortures and massacres, had crowded together, and as- sumed dreadful shapes in her fancy. His words brought a relief that almost took away her pain. HIS INHERITANCE. 93 He did not think it necessary to add that he had risked his own life to drag the lifeless body out of the reach of the savages. He had no thought of himself at the moment. It was enough to see that the child was stilled and comforted. " We were old friends, your father and I," he said at last, making a boast of a friendship he would hardly have given a thought to twenty-four hours before ; and yet his heart was really warm at the remembrance of the little sutler's many virtues. " I hope you won't forget it, or that your father trusted you to me. I'll be a kind of brother to you, if you'll let me," he added with sudden shyness. And Blossom put out one of her little hands, and raised her face, all wet with tears, to smile a feeble smile more sad than crying, at this promise. Then Mrs. Bryce's loud rap sounded at the door; and she came bustling in, full of, it must be owned, rather condescending kindness. She would have low- ered her voice, and chosen her words more carefully, in another house ; for there are different qualities of sympathy, and we mete them out according to the case in hand. And close behind Mrs. Bryce followed the chaplain and his wife. Something of the sorrowfulness of grief seemed to fly away from the house as the door opened for all these officious, well-meaning people to enter in; and death was no longer awful and still, but a confusion of strange running to and fro, of whisperings and beckonings, and mysterious figures passing in and out, with faces which strove to be sad, but were only strange and bewildering. By and by the echo of a prayer came out from the room where the dead man lay. 94 HIS INHERITANCE. Captain Elyot stole away from it all, haunted by Blossom's pale, frightened face, and the hoarse sobs coming from the bedside of the dead man, like a dread- ful response to the prayers the chaplain was reading out of his book. HIS INHERITANCE. 95 CHAPTER VIII. A NEW LIFE. funeral was over, and Stubbs was laid away to -- his long sleep, and still the earth rolled on. The snows swept in upon Fort Atchison as the winter drew near ; the river, shut into its shallow bed, was covered from sight; and only the cold sky overhead and the broken snow-white land, desolate as a sun-scorched des- ert, met the eyes of the little company locked in at the post. Long before this, the train, of which the sutler's wag- ons had formed a part, had reached its destination. Blossom, with tears in her eyes, and a strange sense of loneliness in her heart, had watched them until the white top of the last disappeared in the distance as they moved off upon the southern trail. Before setting out, 1 _;<.' r had repeated his offer of friendly aid to Mrs. Stubbs. "I ain't o' much 'count, bein' but a fearsome sort o' a person at best," he had said ; " but I'd be glad t' do ye a sarvice, seein's Stubbs an' me were as good as pardners for years. Any thing short o' fi'tin' the Injuns," he added, as though afraid of having promised too much. But Mrs. Stubbs received this bashful proffer of ser- 96 HIS INHERITANCE. vice with an indifference almost contemptuous. It was not to such friends as this she should look now. The first shock of stunning grief had passed away ; but it had hardened her heart. Her ambition had been checked for a time by the lethargy which held her, to be turned now into new and wider channels, and to flow the swifter for the accumulated force gathered in the mean time. All was changed at the sutler's quarters ; but this change had been planned before Stubbs's untimely death. There were no more merry stories or hilarious songs over steaming glasses; neither chink of gold, nor rustle of cards, nor, indeed, any other sound of rev- elry, floated out from the sutler's parlor now. A decent respect for Stubbs's memory might have modified this gayety for a while ; but it was understood at the post that there was to be no return to these festivities. Stubbs's daughter had come home at last ; and the fam- ily was to retire within itself, and be clothed upon with the decent reserve enveloping the half a dozen other families of the garrison. Although honestly lamented by his friends and patrons, Stubbs would hardly have been mourned as he was, but for the fact that his death deprived the post of a social centre. His virtues became, for the moment, the universal topic of conversation, at least among the male residents at the fort. His obli- ging manners ; a friendly familiarity tempered with def- erence ; his stories, in which he never played the hero ; above all, his punch, which might have vied with Samson for strength, were extolled to a degree that would have made proud the heart of the sutler, could he have known it. Alas ! appreciation and honor are plants which grow mostly in graveyards. But, while HIS INHERITANCE. 97 every thing else withered and died, Stubbs's memory was kept green throughout all the long, cold winter. In one respect there was no perceptible change. Mrs. Stubbs, who had been for years the active partner in affairs pertaining to the store, conducted the busi- ness still. This was the more necessary, since months must elapse before any one could be appointed to fill the place nominally vacant. It was well, too, for the woman, that some sharp necessity urged her on at this time, when despair, and a sense of loss she could hardly comprehend, pulled her down constantly. But, as the days went on, she turned more and more from the past. The present was full for her, full of cares and vexations which sharpened the temper, never of the mildest, and irritated the nerves, strained almost to breaking by the shock she had endured. The future alone was pleasant to contemplate. All the wild schemes that had been only fascinating dreams over Blossom's rude cradle came back to her now. What should prevent their becoming realities ? She courted them ; she dwelt among them in her occasional moments of leisure ; they crept in upon her work, bewildering her brain, and confusing her hands. How to work them out into practical life was the problem that puz- zled her. But this she would learn, or it would come to her later. There was nothing to which she might not attain, now that there was no one to put a check upon her desires. But it was not for herself that she had encouraged these new-formed schemes. The child had come to mingle in all her thoughts. She was the object and < i ii(l of all her ambitious hopes. To speak gentle words, or to caress her, to sympathize in any degree with her 98 HIS INHERITANCE. tastes, to enter even the gates of her innocent fancies, she could not. But to work for Blossom with her hard hands, to scheme subtly, and even fight for her if need be, all this she could and would do. Sometimes the apathy of grief or added years tempted her to seek ease and quiet instead. The old, strong life that had tingled in her veins to her finger- ends, making her restless, active, aggressive, seemed to have ebbed away, leaving her stranded high and dry, moved only by an occasional tide. The muscles of her strong arms lost their solidity ; the fresh color died in her cheeks ; the keen fire died in her eyes ; and white threads began to mark the shining black hair. A strange indifference to every thing lay in wait for her continually, against which she battled feebly. She had been knocked down, battered, bruised, left like one dead; but her strength was coming back, though she was still blinded and dizzy. In a little time she could renew the struggle, if her courage would but hold out. There was one circumstance which stung her to some- thing of her old keenness ; and that was the indifference with which Blossom's appearance had been received at the post by the ladies sojourning there. With one exception, no one of them had called upon her, or extended to her the slightest civility. Claudia Bryce had not been persuaded, though Miss Laud had done her best, to follow her mother to the sutler's, either on the night he was brought home dead, or on any of the succeeding days. Blossom need not have protested against being sent away: she was not asked to ex- change the gloom of her own home for the more cheer- ful atmosphere at the major's. Mrs. Bryce knew noth- ing of this suggestion ; and Claudia had not repeated it. HIS INHERITANCE. 99 One exception there was to the general indifference. Mrs. Brown, the chaplain's wife, did indeed call upon the stranger. Mrs. Stubbs, entering hastily from the store one afternoon, unwarned of this visit, found her occupying one of the purple and yellow arm-chairs. The sutler's widow felt that it was but a professional call, and in her heart resented it, sitting upon the edge of one of her own fine chairs in stiff, unbending dig- nity, and taking no part in the conversation. Blos- som, meanwhile, by no means self-conscious enough to attribute the visit to any motive but kindness, too sim- ple-hearted to give it a thought, indeed, chattered unreservedly of her Eastern home, her friends, and her school-life ; for to that pleasant past Mrs. Brown had considerately directed the polite interrogations which supported the rather frail discourse between them. Shadows and sunlight crossed the girl's face as one memory after another was awakened, and the long, slanting sunbeams from the little windows passed by the ugly gay chairs, and gaudy flowering carpet, to touch the graceful figure in the simple dark-blue gown, and to crown, for the moment, with almost perfect beauty, the bright, warm face. Mrs. Brown, who had come at the suggestion of her husband, Mrs. Stubbs was not so far out of the way, after all, was quite won by the girl's pretty, childish face, and modest, graceful ways. " Who would have believed it ! " she said to herself, with an unconscious glance toward the mother, stiff, ill at ease, and almost forbidding in aspect. " How lonely the poor little thing must be ! " And she urged Blossom to come and s