The three halted their horses and stood for a minute or two on the very crest of the pass. The fierce wind out of the northwest blew directly in their faces and both riders and horses alike were covered with snow. But Dick felt a wonderful thrill as he gazed upon the vast white wilderness. East and west, north and south he saw the driving snow and the lofty peaks and ridges showing through it, white themselves. The towns below and the cabins that snuggled in the coves were completely hidden. They could see no sign of human life on slope or in valley.
“Looks as wild as the Rockies,” said the sergeant tersely.
“But you won't find any Injuns here to ambush you,” said Red Blaze, “though I don't make any guarantee against bushwhackers and guerillas, who'll change sides as often as two or three times a day, if it will suit their convenience. They could hide in the woods along the road an' pick us off as easy as I'd shoot a squirrel out of a tree. They'd like to have our arms an' our big coats. I tell you what, friends, a mighty civil war like ours gives a tremenjeous opportunity to bad men. They're all comin' to the top. Every rascal in the mountains an' in the lowlands, too, I guess, is out lookin' for plunder an' wuss.”
“You're right, Red Blaze,” said the sergeant with emphasis, “an' it won't be stopped until the generals on both sides begin to hang an' shoot the plunderers an' murderers.”
“But they can't ketch 'em all,” said Red Blaze. “A Yankee general with a hundred thousand men will be out lookin' for what? Not for a gang of robbers, not by a jugful. He'll be lookin' for a rebel general with another hundred thousand men, an' the rebel general with a hundred thousand men will be lookin' for that Yankee general with his hundred thousand. So there you are, an' while they're lookin' for each other an' then fightin' each other to a standstill, the robbers will be plunderin' an' murderin'. But don't you worry about bein' ambushed. I was jest tellin' you what might happen, but wouldn't happen. We kin go down hill fast now, and we'll soon be in Hubbard, which is the other side of all that fallin' snow.”
The road down the mountain was also better than the one by which they had ascended, and as the horses with their calked shoes were swift of foot they made rapid progress. As they descended, the wind lowered fast and there was much less snow. Red Blaze said it was probably not snowing in the valley at all.
“See that shinin' in the sun,” he said. “That's the tin coverin' on the steeple of the new church in Hubbard. The sun strikes squar'ly on it, an' now I know I'm right 'bout it not snowin' down thar. Wait 'til we turn 'roun' this big rock. Yes, thar's Hubbard, layin' out in the valley without a drop of snow on her. It looks good, don't it, friends, with the smoke comin' out of the chimneys. That little red house over thar is the railroad an' telegraph station, an' we'll go straight for it, 'cause we ain't got no time to waste.”
They emerged into the valley and rode rapidly for the station. Farmers on the outskirts and villagers looked wonderingly at them, but they did not pause to answer questions. They galloped their tired mounts straight for the little red building, which was the station. Dick sprang first from his horse, and leaving it to stand at the door, ran inside. A telegraph instrument was clicking mournfully in the corner. A hot stove was in another corner, and sitting near it was a lad of about Dick's age, clad in mountain jeans, and lounging in an old cane-bottomed chair. But Dick's quick glance saw that the boy was bright of face and keen of eye. He promptly drew out his papers and said:
“I'm an aide from the Northern regiment of Colonel Newcomb at Townsville. Here are duplicate dispatches, one set for the President of the United States and the other for the Secretary of War. They tell of a successful fight that we had last night with Southern troops, presumably the cavalrymen of Turner Ashby. I wish you to send them at once.”
“He's speakin' the exact truth, Jim,” said Red Blaze, who had come in behind Dick, “an' I've brought him an' the sergeant here over the mountains to tell about it.”
The boy sprang to his instrument. But he stopped a moment to ask one question.
“Did you really beat 'em off?” he asked as he looked up with shining eye.
“We certainly did,” replied Dick.
“I'll send it faster than I ever sent anything before,” said the boy. “To think of me, Jim Johnson, sending a dispatch to Abraham Lincoln, telling of a victory!”
“I reckon you're right, Jim, it's your chance,” said Red Blaze.
Jim bent over the instrument which now began to click steadily and fast.
“You're to wait for answers,” said Dick.
The boy nodded, but his shining eyes remained bent over the instrument. Dick went to the door, brushed off the snow, came back and sat down by the stove. Sergeant Whitley, who had tied the horses to hitching posts, came in, pulled up an empty box and sat down by him. Red Blaze slipped away unnoticed. But he came back very soon, and men and women came with him, bringing food and smoking coffee. There was enough for twenty.
Red Blaze had spread among the villagers, every one of whom he knew, the news that the Union arms had won a victory. Nor had it suffered anything in the telling. Colonel Newcomb's regiment, by the most desperate feats of gallantry, had beaten off at least ten thousand Southerners, and the boy and the man in uniform, who were resting by the fire in the station, had been the greatest two heroes of a battle waged for a whole night.
Curious eyes gazed at Dick and the sergeant as they sat there by the stove. Dick himself, warm, relaxed, and the needs of his body satisfied, felt like going to sleep. But he watched the boy operator, who presently finished his two dispatches and then lifted his head for the first time.
“They've gone straight into Washington,” he said. “We ought to get an answer soon.”
“We'll wait here for it,” said Dick.
The three messengers were now thoroughly warmed at the stove, they had eaten heartily of the best the village could furnish, and a great feeling of comfort pervaded them. While they were waiting for the reply that they hoped would come from Washington, Dick Mason and Sergeant Whitley went outside. No snow was falling in the valley, but off on the mountain crest they still saw the white veil, blown by the wind.
Red Blaze joined them and was everywhere their guide and herald. He ascribed to them such deeds of skill and valor that they were compelled to call him the best romancer they had met in a long time.
“I suppose that if Mr. Warner were here,” said the sergeant, “he would reduce these statements to mathematics, ten per cent fact an' ninety per cent fancy.”
“Just about that,” said Dick.
Red Blaze came to them presently, bristling with news.
“A farmer from a hollow further to the west,” he said, “has just come in, an' he says that a band of guerillas is ridin' through the hills. 'Bout twenty of them, he said, led by a big dark fellow, his face covered with black beard. They've been liftin' hosses an' takin' other things, but they're strangers in these parts. Tom Sykes, who was held up by them an' robbed of his hoss, says that the rest of 'em called their leader Skelly. Tom seemed to think that mebbe they came from somewhere in the Kentucky mountains. They called themselves a scoutin' party of the Southern army.”
Dick started violently.
“Why, I know this man Skelly,” he said. “He lives in the mountains to the eastward of my home in Kentucky. He organized a band at the beginning of the war, but over there he said he was fightin' for the North.”
“He'll be fightin' for his own hand,” said the sergeant sternly. “But he can't play double all the time. That sort of thing will bring a man to the end of a rope, with clear air under his feet.”
“I'm glad you've told me this,” said Red Blaze. “Skelly might have come ridin' in here, claimin' that he an' his men was Northern troops, an' then when we wasn't suspectin' might have held up the whole town. I'll warn 'em. Thar ain't a house here that hasn't got two or three rifles an' shotguns in it, an' with the farmers from the valley joinin' in Hubbard could wipe out the whole gang.”
“Tell them to be on guard all the time, Red Blaze,” said Whitley with strong emphasis. “In war you've got to watch, watch, watch. Always know what the other fellow is doin', if you can.”
“Let's go back to the station,” said Dick. “Maybe we'll have an answer soon.”
They found the young operator hanging over his instrument, his eyes still shining. He had been in that position ever since they left him, and Dick knew that his eagerness to get an answer from Washington kept him there, mind and body waiting for the tick of the key.
Dick, the sergeant, and Red Blaze sat down by the stove again, and rested there quietly for a quarter of an hour. Red Blaze was thinking that it would be another cold ride back over the pass. The sergeant, although he was not sleepy, closed his eyes and saw again the vast rolling plains, the herds of buffalo spreading to the horizon, and the bands of Sioux and Cheyennes galloping down, their great war bonnets making splashes of color against the thin blue sky. Dick was thinking of Pendleton, the peaceful little town in Kentucky that was his home, and of his cousin, Harry Kenton. He did not know now where Harry was, and he did not even know whether he was dead or alive.
Dick sighed a little, and just at that moment the telegraph key began to click.
“The answer is coming!” exclaimed the young operator excitedly and then he bent closer over the key to take it. The three chairs straightened up, and they, too, bent toward the key. The boy wrote rapidly, but the clicking did not go on long. When it ceased he straightened up with his finished message in his hand. His face was flushed and his eyes still shining. He folded the paper and handed it to Dick.
“It's for you, Mr. Mason,” he said.
Dick unfolded it and read aloud:
“Colonel John D. Newcomb:
“Congratulations on your success and fine management of your troops. Victory worth much to us. Read dispatch to regiment and continue westward to original destination.
A. LINCOLN.”
Dick's face glowed, and the sergeant's teeth came together with a little click of satisfaction.
“When I saw that it was to be read to the regiment I thought it no harm to read it to the rest of you,” said Dick, as he refolded the precious dispatch and put it in his safest pocket. “Now, sergeant, I think we ought to be off at full speed.”
“Not a minute to waste,” said Sergeant Whitley.
Their horses had been fed and were rested well. The three bade farewell to the young operator, then to almost all of Hubbard and proceeded in a trot for the pass. They did not speak until they were on the first slope, and then the sergeant, looking up at the heights, asked:
“Shall we have snow again on our return, Red Blaze? I hope not. It's important for us to get back to Townsville without any waste of time.”
“I hate to bring bad news,” replied Red Blaze, “but we'll shore have more snow. See them clouds, sailin' up an' always sailin' up from the southwest, an' see that white mist 'roun' the highest peaks. That's snow, an' it'll hit the pass just as it did when we was comin' over. But we've got this in favor of ourselves an' our hosses now: The wind is on our backs.”
They rode hard now. Dick had received the precious message from the President, and it would be a proud moment for him when he put it in the hands of the colonel. He did not wish that moment to be delayed. Several times he patted the pocket in which the paper lay.
As they ascended, the wind increased in strength, but being on their backs now it seemed to help them along. They were soon high up on the slopes and then they naturally turned for a parting look at Hubbard in its valley, a twin to that of Townsville. It looked from afar neat and given up to peace, but Dick knew that it had been stirred deeply by the visit of his comrades and himself.
“It seems,” he said, “that the war would pass by these little mountain nests.”
“But it don't,” said Red Blaze. “War, I guess, is like a mad an' kickin' mule, hoofs lashin' out everywhar, an' you can't tell what they're goin' to hit. Boys, we're makin' good time. That wind on our backs fairly lifts us up the mountain side.”
Petty had all the easy familiarity of the backwoods. He treated the boy and man who rode with him as comrades of at least a year's standing, and they felt in return that he was one of them, a man to be trusted. They retained all the buoyancy which the receipt of the dispatch had given them, and Dick, his heart beating high, scarcely felt the wind and cold.
“In another quarter of an hour we'll be at the top,” said Petty. Then he added after a moment's pause: “If I'm not mistook, we'll have company. See that path, leadin' out of the west, an' runnin' along the slope. It comes into the main road, two or three hundred yards further on, an' I think I can see the top of a horseman's head ridin' in it. What do you say, sergeant?”
“I say that you are right, Red Blaze. I plainly see the head of a big man, wearing a fur cap, an' there are others behind him, ridin' in single file. What's your opinion, Mr. Mason?”
“The same as yours and Red Blaze's. I, too, can see the big man with the fur cap on his head and at least a dozen following behind. Do you think it likely, Red Blaze, that they'll reach the main road before we pass the mouth of the path?”
A sudden thought had leaped up in Dick's mind and it set his pulses to beating hard. He remembered some earlier words of Red Blaze's.
“We'll go by before they reach the main road,” replied Red Blaze, “unless they make their hosses travel a lot faster than they're travelin' now.”
“Then suppose we whip up a little,” said Dick.
Both Red Blaze and the sergeant gave him searching glances.
“Do you mean—” began Whitley.
“Yes, I mean it. I know it. The man in front wearing the fur cap is Bill Skelly. He and his men made an attack upon the home of my uncle, Colonel Kenton, who is a Southern leader in Kentucky. He and his band were Northerners there, but they will be Southerners here, if it suits their purpose.”
“An' it will shorely suit their purpose to be Southerners now,” said Red Blaze. “We three are ridin' mighty good hoss flesh. Me an' the sergeant have good rifles an' pistols, you have good pistols, an' we all have good, big overcoats. This is a lonely mountain side with war flyin' all about us. Easy's the place an' easy's the deed. That is if we'd let 'em, which we ain't goin' to do.”
“Not by a long shot,” said Sergeant Whitley, resting his rifle across the pommel of his saddle. “They've got to follow straight behind. The ground is too rough for them to ride around an' flank us.”
Dick said nothing, but his gauntleted hand moved down to the butt of one of his pistols. His heart throbbed, but he preserved the appearance of coolness. He was fast becoming inured to danger. Owing to the slope they could not increase the speed of their horses greatly, but they were beyond the mouth of the path before they were seen by Skelly and his band. Then the big mountaineer uttered a great shout and began to wave his hand at them.
“The road curves here a little among the rocks,” said the sergeant, who unconsciously took command. “Suppose we stop, sheltered by the curve, and ask them what they want.”
“The very thing to do,” said Dick.
“Sass 'em, sergeant! Sass 'em!” said Red Blaze.
They drew their horses back partially in the shadow of the rocky curve, but the sergeant was a little further forward than the others. Dick saw Skelly and a score of men emerge into the road and come rapidly toward them. They were a wild-looking crew, mounted on tough mountain ponies, all of them carrying loot, and all armed heavily.
The sergeant threw up his rifle, and with a steady hand aimed straight at Skelly's heart.
“Halt!” he cried sharply, “and tell me who you are!”
The whole crew seemed to reel back except Skelly, who, though stopping his horse, remained in the center of the road.
“What do you mean?” he cried. “We're peaceful travelers. What business is it of yours who we are?”
“Judgin' by your looks you're not peaceful travelers at all. Besides these ain't peaceful times an' we take the right to demand who you are. If you come on another foot, I shoot.”
The sergeant's tones were sharp with resolve.
“Your name!” he continued.
“Ramsdell, David Ramsdell,” replied the leader of the band.
“That's a lie,” said Sergeant Whitley. “Your name is Bill Skelly, an' you're a mountaineer from Eastern Kentucky, claimin' to belong first to one side and then to the other as suits you.”
“Who says so?” exclaimed Skelly defiantly.
The sergeant beckoned Dick, who rode forward a little.
“I do,” said the boy in a loud, clear voice. “My name is Dick Mason, and I live at Pendleton in Kentucky. I saw you more than once before the war, and I know that you tried to burn down the house of Colonel Kenton there, and kill him and his friends. I'm on the other side, but I'm not for such things as that.”
Skelly distinctly saw Dick sitting on his horse in the pass, and he knew him well. Rage tore at his heart. Although on “the other side” this boy, too, was a lowlander and in a way a member of that vile Kenton brood. He hated him, too, because he belonged to those who had more of prosperity and education than himself. But Skelly was a man of resource and not a coward.
“You're right,” he cried, “I'm Bill Skelly, an' we want your horses an' arms. We need 'em in our business. Now, just hop down an' deliver. We're twenty to three.”
“You come forward at your own risk!” cried the sergeant, and Skelly, despite the numbers at his back, wavered. He saw that the man who held the rifle aimed at his heart had nerves of steel, and he did not dare advance knowing that he would be shot at once from the saddle. A victory won by Skelly's men with Skelly dead was no victory at all to Skelly.
The guerilla reined back his horse, and his men retreated with him. But the three knew well that it was no withdrawal. The mountaineers rode among some scrub that grew between the road and the cliff; and Whitley exclaimed to his two comrades:
“Come boys, we must ride for it! It's our business to get back with the dispatches to Colonel Newcomb as soon as possible, an' not let ourselves be delayed by this gang.”
“That is certainly true,” said Dick. “Lead on, Mr. Petty, and we'll cross the mountain as fast as we can.”
Red Blaze started at once in a gallop, and Dick and the sergeant followed swiftly after. But Sergeant Whitley held his cocked rifle in hand and he cast many backward glances. A great shout came from Skelly and his band when they saw the three take to flight, and the sergeant's face grew grimmer as the sound reached his ears.
“Keep right in the middle of the road, boys,” he said. “We can't afford to have our horses slip. I'll hang back just a little and send in a bullet if they come too near. This rifle of mine carries pretty far, farther, I expect, than any of theirs.”
“I'm somethin' on the shoot myself,” said Red Blaze. “I love peace, but it hurts my feelin's if anybody shoots at me. Them fellers are likely to do it, an' me havin' a rifle in my hands I won't be able to stop the temptation to fire back.”
As he spoke the raiders fired. There was a crackling of rifles, little curls of blue smoke rose in the pass, and bullets struck on the frozen earth, while two made the snow fly from bushes by the side of the road. The sergeant raised his own rifle, longer of barrel than the average army weapon, and pulled the trigger. He had aimed at Skelly, but the leader swerved, and a man behind him rolled off his horse. The others, although slowing their speed a little, in order to be out of the range of that deadly rifle, continued to come.
The pursuit at first seemed futile to Dick, because they would soon descend into Townsville's valley, and the raiders could not follow them into the midst of an entire regiment. But presently he saw their plan. The pass now widened out with a few hundred yards of level space on either side of the road thickly covered with forest. The branches of the trees were bare, but the undergrowth was so dense that horsemen could be hidden in it. Bands of the raiders darted into the woods both to right and left, and he knew that advancing on a straight line one or the other of the parties expected to catch the fugitives who must follow the curves of the road.
The advantage of the pursuit was soon shown as a shot from the right whistled by them. Red Blaze, quick as lightning, fired at the flash of the rifle.
“I don't know whether I hit him or not,” he said, judicially, “but the chances are pow'ful good that I did. Still it looks as if they meant to hang on an' likely we kin soon expect shots from the other side, too. Then if they know the country as well as they 'pear to do they'll have us clamped in a vise.”
As he spoke his eyes twinkled cheerfully out of his flaming countenance.
“You certainly seem to take it easy,” said Dick.
“I take it easy, 'cause the jaws of that vise ain't goin' to clamp down. Bein' somewhat interested in a run for your life you haven't noticed how dark it's gettin' up here on the heights an' how hard it's snowin'. It's comin' down a lot thicker than it was when we crossed the first time.”
It was true. Dick noticed now that the snow was pouring down, and that all the peaks and ridges were lost in the white whirlwind.
“I told you that I had been a traveler,” said Red Blaze. “I've been as far as fifty miles from Townsville, and I know all the country in every direction, twenty miles from it, inch by inch. Inside five minutes the snowstorm will be on us full blast, an' we won't be able to see more'n twenty yards away. An' that crowd that's follerin' won't be able to see either. An' me knowin' the ground inch by inch I'll take you straight back to your regiment while they'll get lost in the storm.”
There was room now in the road for the three to ride abreast, and they kept close together. They heard once a shout behind them and saw the flash of a firearm in the white hurricane, but no bullet struck them, and they kept steadily on their course, Red Blaze directing with the sure instinct that comes of long use and habit.
Heavier and heavier grew the snow. There was but little wind now, and it came straight down. It seemed to Dick that the whole earth was blotted out by the white fall. He and the sergeant resigned themselves completely to the guidance of Red Blaze, who never veered an inch from the right path.
“If I didn't know the way my hoss would,” he said. “I'd just give him his head an' he'd take us straight to his warm stable in Townsville, an' the two bundles of oats that I mean to give him. I reckon it was pretty smart of me, wasn't it, to order a snowstorm an' have it come just when it was needed.”
Again the cheerful eyes twinkled in the flaming face.
“You're certainly a winner,” said Dick, “and you win for us all.”
The snow was now so deep in the pass that they could not proceed at great speed, but they did the best they could, and, as Red Blaze said, their best, although it might be somewhat slow, was certainly better than that of Skelly and his men. Dick believed in fact that the raiders had been compelled to abandon the pursuit.
When they reached a lower level, where the snow was far less dense, they stopped and listened. The sergeant's ears had been trained to uncommon keenness by his life on the plains, and he could hear nothing but the sigh of the falling snow. Nor could Petty, who had fine ears himself.
They descended still further, and made another stop. It was snowing here also, but it was merely an ordinary fall, and they could get a long view back up the pass. They saw nothing there but earth and trees covered with snow. Looking in the other direction they saw the sunshine gleaming for a moment on a roof in Townsville.
“We're all safe now,” said Red Blaze, “an' we'll be with the soldiers in another half hour. But just you two remember that mebbe the next time I couldn't call up a snowstorm to cover us an' save our lives.”
“Once is enough,” said Dick, “and, Mr. Petty, Sergeant Whitley and I want to thank you.”
Mittened hands met buckskinned ones in the strong grasp of friendship, and now, as they rode on, the whole village emerged into sight. There was the long train standing on the track, the smoke rising in spires from the neat houses, and then the figures of human beings.
The fall of snow was light in the valley and as soon as they reached the levels the three proceeded at a gallop. Dick saw Colonel Newcomb standing by the train, and springing from his horse he handed him the dispatch. The colonel opened it, and as he read Dick saw the glow appear upon his face.
“Fire up!” he said to Canby, the engineer, who stood near. “We start at once!”
The troops who were ready and waiting were hurried into the coaches, and the engine whistled for departure.
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