his feet were free. Scarcely knowing what he was doing, he followed in the direction the crowd had gone; and when he arrived at the chief's lodge he found that some unusual event was about to take place. The yells were hushed, and most of the Indians were gathered in a body on one side of the council ground, in the center of which two or three warriors were busy kindling a fire. Upon looking around for the trapper, he discovered him at the opposite side of the ground, standing with his back to a post, to which he was securely bound. Near him stood a couple of armed Indians; and when Frank approached his friend, they motioned him angrily to retire.
"Oh, don't I wish that my hands were unbound, and that I could have the free use of my knife for just one minute?" groaned Frank, as he reluctantly retraced his steps toward the chief's wigwam. "Dick wouldn't be in that fix long. He has saved me more than once, and I would risk any thing, if I could do as much for him now. Where is Bob, that he don't bring the trappers up here and attack these Indians?"
Frank stood off by himself and watched the preparations going on around him, and wondered what would be the next torture the savages would devise for their prisoner. He could not have been more terrified if he had occupied Dick's place, and had been every moment expecting to hear the death sentence passed upon him. He did not like the deliberation and gravity with which the Indians conducted their proceedings, nor the scowls of mingled hatred and triumph which they threw across the council-ground toward the helpless trapper. He thought things looked exceedingly dark for his friend.
The huge fire that had been kindled by the warriors was well under way at last, and a dozen chiefs walked out from among their companions, and seated themselves in a circle around it. The first business in order was smoking the pipe of peace. The pipe was brought in by an aged warrior, who lighted it with a brand from the fire, and was about to present it to the principal chief, when the proceedings were interrupted by the arrival of a party of four men, who walked up to the fire without ceremony, and seated themselves near it. Frank recognized them at a glance; and that same glance showed him that they had not come alone. They had brought a prisoner with them, and he was standing near the trapper, with his hands bound behind his back.
CHAPTER V
ARCHIE FINDS A NEW UNCLE
For an hour and a half after Frank left him, Archie walked up and down the banks of the brook, pulling out trout of a size and weight that astonished him. When nearly two hundred splendid fish had been placed upon his string, he put his line into his pocket, leaned his pole against a tree where he knew he could find it again if he should happen to want it, mounted his horse, and rode slowly toward the rancho, keeping a good lookout on every side for his cousin, and wondering what had become of him. It was getting late. The sun had sunk below the western mountains, the shadows of twilight were creeping through the valley, and Archie began to fear that Frank was in a fair way to pass the night among the grizzlies. He did not find him at the rancho; Adam had not seen him, and neither had Dick, who, upon finding that Archie had returned alone, pulled off his sombrero, and scratched his head furiously, as he always did when any thing troubled him.
"Where's the boy that fit that ar Greaser?" he asked, with some anxiety in his tone.
"I am sure I don't know," was the reply. "He went into the mountains to hunt up an elk for supper, and I haven't seen him since."
"The keerless feller!" exclaimed the trapper.
"He'll have to camp out all night if he doesn't come back pretty soon," continued Archie. "Won't he have a glorious time among the bears and panthers? I wish I had gone with him, for I know he will be lonesome."
"You can thank your lucky stars that you stayed at home. Thar's a heap wusser things in the world than grizzlies an' painters."
The tone in which these words were spoken made Archie uneasy; and when Dick drew old Bob and the Captain off on one side, and held a whispered consultation with them, he began to be really alarmed. He had never seen the trapper act so strangely. Heretofore, when Frank had got into trouble, Dick had always said: "I jest know he'll come out all right;" but he did not say so now. Archie could see that there was something in the wind that he did not understand.
While the Captain and his men were conversing, a trapper galloped up to the porch, and hurriedly ascending the steps, communicated in a whisper what was plainly a very exciting piece of news, for an expression of anxiety overspread the Captain's face, old Bob thumped the floor energetically with the butt of his rifle, and Dick once more pulled off his sombrero and dug his fingers into his hair. Almost at the same moment a second horseman approached from another direction, and he had something to tell that increased the excitement. The Captain listened attentively to his story, and then gave a few orders in a low tone to Dick and Bob, who shouldered their rifles, sprang down the steps, and stole off into the darkness like two specters. They had not made many steps before Archie was at their heels.
"Now, then, you keerless feller, jest trot right back to the house agin," said Dick.
"If you are going out to look for Frank I want to go too," replied Archie. "I can keep up with you."
"Go back," repeated the trapper; "you'll only be in the way. Thar's goin' to be queer doin's in this yere valley, an' you'll see enough to make you glad to stay in the house."
"What's up here, any how?" asked Archie, as he mounted the steps that led to the porch where Adam Brent was waiting for him.
"Indians," was the reply.
"Indians!" repeated Archie, who now thought he understood what the trapper meant when he said that there were things in the world more to be dreaded than bears and panthers. "You surely don't expect trouble with them?"
"That's what they say," replied Adam, coolly. "I heard Captain Porter tell father that they would be down on us, like a hawk on a Junebug, before we see the sun rise again."
"Well, I – I —Eh!" stammered Archie, almost paralyzed by the information.
"Oh, it's the truth. In the first place, they changed their camp very suddenly this afternoon, and without any cause; and since then they haven't showed themselves in the valley. That's a bad sign. When you know there are Indians about you, and you can't see them, look out for them, for they mean mischief. But when they are all around you, and you have to watch them closely to keep them from stealing every thing you've got, there's nothing to fear. In the next place, one of Captain Porter's trappers, who was out hunting this afternoon, said that he crossed the trail of a war party, numbering at least five hundred men. Another trapper brought the information that there is a large camp of Indians about ten miles back in the mountains, and that the braves are all in war-paint. Father says it is plain enough to him that they have determined upon a general massacre of all the settlers in the country. There'll be fun in this valley before morning, and you'll hear sounds and see sights you never dreamed of."
Archie was astounded – not only at the news he had heard, but also at the free and easy manner in which it was communicated. He was trembling in every limb with suppressed excitement and alarm; and here was this new friend of his standing with his hands in his pockets, and talking about a fight with the Indians – which would be delayed but a few hours at the most – with as much apparent indifference and unconcern as if it had been some holiday pastime. But then Adam was accustomed to such things. The house in which he lived has been used as a fort in days gone by, and when trouble was expected with the savages, the settlers, for miles around, would flock into it for protection. It had withstood more than one siege, and Adam, before he was strong enough to lift a rifle to his shoulder, had heard the war-whoop echoing through the valley, and had molded bullets and cut patching for the men who were standing at his father's side, defending the house against the assaults of the savages. Archie could have told of things that would have made Adam's hair stand on end. He had ridden in the cars and on steamboats; and he had
