Manly Wade Wellman - Novel 1966 (4 page)

 
          
“We
saw him with the things in his hands, and the woman dead on the ground. We tied
him up, while the chiefs talked of how to punish him. But Jipi was very strong.
He broke the lines that tied him, and ran away. From that day, the Cherokees called
Jipi an enemy, no longer a Cherokee, but worse than a snake, worse than a bad
spirit.”

 
          
Mark
digested the story. “And now you think he has come back, for some evil,” he
said at last.

 
          
“Yuh,
Jipi was a big man, and the tracks
are big. The red feathers are the same as Jipi’s feathers. And Jipi is a thief
and a killer. Jipi has a bad heart.”

 
          
“And
Jipi has friends,” contributed Mark. “You saw tracks with his, where they
talked together. Who are those friends?”

 
          
“More bad men, who will do bad things to your people.”

 
          
“Then
my people must be warned,” said Mark, standing up.

 
          
“Yuh.”

           
They headed swiftly back to the
Jarrett home. Mr. Jarrett was in the side yard, mending harness. He heard what
Tsukala had to say, and frowned over it.

 
          
“And
I’d hoped that at last we might live and labor here in peace,” said Mr. Jarrett
at last. “This calls for a council. We’ll tell Mace Hollon and the others.”

 
          
At
the tavern, Mr. Jarrett talked to his brother-inlaw, while Mark mounted a horse
to ride and summon Durwell and Captain Stoke, while Esau rode to call Ramsey,
Shelton, and Lapham from north of the Bear Paw homesteaders, this time for the
sternest of consultations.

 
          
“Egad,
gentlemen, I don’t rejoice in danger, yet never did I run from it,” stoutly
declared Seth Ramsey. “I fought in the war to free our country, and if I must
I’ll fight again to protect my home, even against this giant scoundrel Jipi.”

 
          
“He
sounds as tall as Goliath himself,” growled Durwell.

 
          
“Aye,
but Goliath came to his end at the hands of little David,” reminded Mace
Hollon. “I’m of Seth Ramsey’s mind. A dozen years ago I fought Ferguson on
Kings Mountain, and Tarleton at the Cowpens, and Cornwallis himself at Guilford
Court House. I’ll not turn and run from a red-skinned enemy, more than I ran
from a red-coated one.”

 
          
“So
do I swear, and so, I think, are we all agreed,” seconded big Philip Lapham.
“Any settlement in wild country must muster a fighting company in case of need.
Let us do that.”

 
          
“Captain
Stoke was an officer and must command us,” suggested Mark’s father, but Stoke
shook his gray head.

 
          
“Not
I, friend Hugh. Your wartime service was more than mine, and you were a wise,
brave sergeant. And you’ve eked a living here from the first and know the
region, and are our justice of the peace, to boot.”

 
          
“Friends,
let us vote,” said Joseph Shelton. “I call on Hugh Jarrett to be our militia
captain. What say you others?”

 
          
“Hugh
Jarrett,” said Simon Durwell.

 
          
“Amen
to that,” chimed in Ramsey, and the others spoke in agreement.

 
          
“Then
you’re Captain Jarrett as you are Justice Jarrett,” Stoke addressed Mark’s
father. “We’re your true men when you call on us. What are your first orders,
Captain?”

 
          
Hugh
pondered, then announced that he would appoint two lieutenants, Stoke for the
men living westward on the river, Ramsey for those with homes beyond the ridge.
He also urged that a fortress of some sort be planned, where the families could
find shelter if necessary. The others voted to build this at Mace Hollon’s
tavern. It was agreed that, in case of danger at any point, two fires would be
built to send up twin columns of smoke and summon all men to the spot, under
arms. And the dozen men of Bear Paw Gap would take turns in ranging the woods,
to look for any hint of attackers.

 
          
“Then
let us disperse,” said Mark’s father, “and we’ll meet here at the tavern
tomorrow to begin fortification.”

 
          
The
Invaders

 
          
All
THE neighbor men gathered at Mace Hollon’s tavern shortly after sunrise next
day. Each brought his rifle and axe. They worked with vigor, though with none
of the happy spirit they had showed when building the mill and husking Seth
Ramsey’s corn.

 
          
Shelton
proposed a massive blockhouse of logs, but Leland Stoke had a counter
suggestion. “In Lincoln County, during the war’s last year, the South Fork
Rangers made a passing good defense around a country house, with an open
palisade of tall poles,” he said. “Then, when attacked, they fired from the
house windows. The enemy could not come through the stockade, and the spaces
between made any attacker a fair mark for a rifle. The Rangers made good a
stern siege, and defeated a force of greater number.”

 
          
“That’s
a sound plan,” approved Hugh Jarrett, “and one we can follow and finish without
too great labor.
Come,
let’s chop down tall, stout
saplings, of length and thickness to serve us.”

 
          
Nine
men went to fell and clear young trees among the nearby thickets, while Stoke,
Durwell and Mace Hollon paced off and marked a circle to include the tavern,
its supply and stock sheds, and its well. As the poles were cut and their
branches sliced off, the men dragged them in. Each was sharpened at both ends
and driven down, and the earth stamped firm around it. Part of the work gang
cut more poles, while others shaped and drove them, each man taking his turn at
these tasks.

 
          
Sarah
Hollon and Martha Arrington prepared a bountiful noon meal for the workmen, but
it was no holiday occasion. The men snatched pieces of bread and slices of
roast meat, washed them down with coffee and ale, and hurried back to their
labors. As the sun dropped down toward the west, eighty poles had been set in a
circle a hundred and twenty feet across. These uprights thrust their pointed
tops eight feet above the tramped earth at their bases.

 
          
“But
they’re spaced near five feet apart,” said Sarah Hollon as she gazed at the
poles while fetching out steaming platters of baked fish for supper. “Sure,
those won’t keep out savages.”

 
          
“We’ve
only begun the work,” Mark’s father said. “Tomorrow we’ll make a finish.”

 
          
Again
they gathered at sunrise, to fill in the gaps of the palisade. Between the
poles were set more, cut and sharpened. With practice, the men worked faster.
By night, the whole stockade was finished, a well-set ring of posts with less
than a foot’s interval between each two. In the last rays of the sun, they
wound stout withes from pole to pole, near the pointed tops. Only a single
opening showed, opposite the front door of the tavern.

 
          
“My
son Esau and I will make a stout-barred gate to hang tomorrow,” promised Mace
Hollon, “and we’ll split logs to fashion shutters that can close the windows
against enemy bullets. Then, friends, you shall have a refuge we can hold
against a great tribe of hostile savages.”

 
          
As
they ate in the tavern yard, Tsukala came through the
gateway,
and with him Will.

 
          
“We’ve
been scouting the woods below the river,” Will
volunteered
.
“We found sign of strangers there.”

 
          
“I’ll
have you stay out of danger, young Will,” his father scolded.

 
          
“Little
warrior is wise in the woods,” Tsukala defended the boy. “We saw Jipi’s big
moccasin tracks. And maybe others with him were not Cherokee.”

 
          
From
his belt-bag he took something and held it out on his palm. It was a piece of
wood, two inches long and broken at one end. The other end had been carefully
split, and the whole smooth surface was barred with black and orange paint.

 
          
“How,
Tsukala, what is that?” asked Mace Hollon.

 
          
“ ’Tis
a piece of an arrow shaft,” guessed Mark.

 
          
“Young
warrior says truth,” nodded Tsukala. “The man took out the head to set in
another shaft, and threw this away.”

 
          
“And
you mean it is no Cherokee arrow?” put in Bram Schneider, coming close. “You
can tell that,
nicht wahr?”

 
          
“Chickasaw
paint on it,” Tsukala said. “This
color,”
and he
tapped the orange stripe. “Chickasaws know how to mix that paint. Chickasaws
mark arrows with it.”

 
          
“But
Chickasaws don’t hunt this side of the mountains,” argued Ramsey.

 
          
“Maybe
this Chickasaw has left his tribe,” said Tsukala.

 
          
“But
you say this giant Jipi is Cherokee,” persisted Ramsey. “I’ve heard that the
Chickasaws and the Cherokees are enemies.”

 
          
“Jipi
is not Cherokee now,” said Tsukala. “His people drove him out. Maybe this
Chickasaw is
bad,
too, his people drove him out. Maybe
he and Jipi and other bad men make their own tribe.”

 
          
It
sounded sensible to Mark. From the expressions on the faces of the others, it
sounded sensible to them, too.

 
          
“How
many tracks did you and
Will
see?” asked Mr. Jarrett.

 
          
“Maybe six men.”

 
          
He
looked around the group. “We are twice that many,” he said, “and they dare not
assail us when we are together.
But they might ambush a lone
hunter, or they might strike a home where there are few.
Now, I propose
that every house be put in something like good order for defense.”

 
          
“I
was thinking that same thing,” said Ramsey. “I’ll make my own house fast. My
wife can use a rifle if there’s need, and shoot true to the mark.”

 
          
“Let
no children be left alone,” continued Jarrett. “If they, or the women, do an
errand—carrying grain to the mill or visiting from house to house—let an armed
man go along. And I’ll name a patrol to range the woods frequently, for more
sign of danger. Tsukala, will you make one?”

 
          
“Yuh”
said Tsukala readily.

 
          
Jarrett’s
eyes fixed upon Mark. “You, my son, will also be of that patrol,” he announced.
“You’ve hunted here longer than any of us white settlers. I trust your judgment
and courage.”

 
          
“Aye,
Tsukala and I will scout,” assented Mark, proud that he was chosen.

 
          
“Now,
if we’re to have trouble with Indians, I expect small chance of attack at
night,” elaborated his father.

 
          
“True
talk,” was Tsukala’s word. “Indian warrior feels safe by day. At night, he
fears.
Thinks if he is killed, his spirit goes forever to the
Night Land.”

 
          
“We
may thank heaven for that belief,” said Stoke earnestly. “The very moment of
dawn, as I’ve heard and seen myself, is the favored moment for a surprise
attack.”

 
          
“Wherefore
we’ll do well to stir awake before dawn each day, to be ready if trouble
comes,” pronounced Mark’s father.

 
          
Tsukala
turned toward Mark. “Tomorrow, you and I look for enemies,” he said. “I will
come early, wake you up.”

 
          
And
Tsukala was in the Jarrett yard a good hour before sunrise. But Mark was
already dressed and ready. He offered Tsukala a slice of the corn bread he was
munching.

 
          
“Ahi,
young warrior, you sleep lightly,”
Tsukala greeted him as he accepted the bread.

 
          
“I
woke when Celia went to milk the cow,” Mark told him. “If you’re ready, so am
I.”

 
          
“Come.”

 
          
So
often had Mark and Tsukala roamed the woods around Bear Paw Gap that they found
their way confidently, even in the gloom. They crossed the Black Willow River,
and as the first light grayed around them they approached the place where they
had found the signs of the renegade called Jipi by Tsukala. The pile of stones
was still there beside the oak where Mark had found the red feathers. Tuskala
stole into the open, bending low to the ground. He searched here and there in
the growing light.

 
          
“Two
men came here,” he reported.

           
“You mean, since we were here?”

 
          
“Two men—strangers.
I think they watched toward that place
you call the mill, there past the river. This is where they come to spy.”

 
          
Mark’s
hands clamped his rifle. “Let’s follow their tracks, Tsukala,” he urged, but
Tsukala shook his head.

 
          
“No.
We wait here. They came two times, they will come again.”

 
          
So
saying, Tsukala slid back among some bushes and squatted there.

 
          
Mark
joined his friend. Through the crisscross of twigs they could watch the open
space where the tracks showed. Tsukala neither moved nor spoke. Mark leaned his
back to a stump and tried to turn himself into a watchful statue.

 
          
The
sun rose and shed its rosy light among the trees. A bird twittered above Mark’s
head, and a squirrel scolded back at the bird. Time crept past. Mark found
himself remembering his whole life at Bear Paw Gap. Had it been only five
months long? So much had happened; difficulties met and overcome, dangers
faced, a home built, new neighbors welcomed. Those unsavory backwoods schemers,
Quill Moxley and Epps Emmondson, had said at least one true thing—Bear Paw Gap
was a point in the wilderness chosen by fate to be settled, to be known, even
to be important. Already the road through the mountain pass was traveled
constantly,
wagons rolled there every day and every hour. As
to this threat of outcast Indians, could it be a truly serious threat to so
many brave, stout, frontier people?

 
          
Then
Tsukala snapped his fingers, a soft plop of sound, to call Mark to attention.
Mark saw Tsukala lift his hand and point with its lifted heel.

 
          
Mark
craned his neck to look, across the open space, as leaves stirred in a clump of
evergreen scrub. Then a figure stole into view, huge and brown. It was an
Indian, stripped to the waist and wearing buckskin leggings, with fluffy red on
the side. In his mighty hands he bore a rifle.

 
          
Surely
this was the big Cherokee called Jipi, banished by his own tribe and slinking
around Bear Paw Gap on who knew what errand of evil.

 
          
Closer
moved the giant, peering this way and that. Here was as big a man as Mark had
seen since leaving civilized country, bigger even than Mark’s robust father.
Jipi must be six and a half feet tall from his moccasined sole to his huge head
that was wrapped in a dull-dyed scarf. His bare arms were knotted with thick
muscles, and his shoulders jutted like brown mountain crags. His dark face,
broad as a bucket, showed deep, harsh lines, and his nose hooked like a beak as
though to meet the upward curve of his massive chin. Mark could see the tufts
of feathers that made red ornamentation for his leggings, and red-feathered,
too, was the wide leather belt that carried Jipi’s knife, tomahawk and
red-feathered pouch.

 
          
Tsukala
had soundlessly notched an arrow on his bowstring and held the bow half drawn,
ready to pull and send the shaft instantly. Mark advanced the muzzle of his
rifle, his thumb on the hammer. They both watched as Jipi looked around to the
scrub from which he had come and made a beckoning motion with one giant hand.
Another Indian rose into view, also stripped to the waist and carrying a gun.
This man’s hair was roached like the mane of a mule. Chickasaws wore their hair
like that, Mark had heard, and Tsukala had found the broken shaft of a
Chickasaw arrow. As this man moved toward Jipi, Mark could see bars of paint on
his face, black and red. That was war paint, such as was donned by Indian
braves when they sought the excitement of battle, the trophies of enemy scalps.