SHORT STORY.

Auckland Star, Volume XXVI, Issue 307, 29 December 1898, Page 3

SHORT STORY.

' OCHB.'

The colonel was in command, and it was our business to obey orders. His mouth was straight and firm, sad his small, gray eyes were set unusually close together. His chin was clean shaven, and on either cheek he wore a thin and formal whisker. Perhaps it was to this severe exterior that Lolonel Bailey owed his appointment las deputy sheriff of Guthrie District; but be this as it may, everybody knew him to be capable and fearless, and so when an elusive young Chickasaw bandit was seen in* the vicinity of Lehigh, it was the colonel who was chosen to run him down. Colonel Bailey selected me as one of his associates. For the other he picked out an unsociable fellow, known in the community as 'Frozen Pete.' I suspect that he had no great confidence in our ability to catch the thief. For when we reached Lehigh and found the outlaw under lock and key, he seemed very well satisfied. It merely remained for us to bring the prisoner safely to Guthrie, and lodge him in the county gaol. After a short delay, we started on our return journey, and so it- happened that one breezy autumn evening we four encamped in a hollow of the Washita Hills, Oklahoma, with more than half our ride behind us. Our prisoner's name was Oche—a Chickasaw word meaning , 'all right.' Never was name less appropriate. Except in his youth, his vigour and the marvellous quickness of his motions, Oche was anything but 'all right.' Though he stood sft lOin in his moccasins, his extraordinary leanness left his weight scarcely a hundred pounds. Ife spoke little English, and was wholly without education, but his high reputation for cunning had been thoroughly earned. A pair of frayed buckskin trousers and a dingy blanket made up his simple costume. He looked a typical Indian outlaw, but his face was kind, and there were men who said his gratitude for a favour was keen and lasting. As a professional horse thief Oche had small claim upon the kindness of honest men, and he must have expected the severest justice at official hands. But at the outset the Indian had reason to be surprised, for contrary to his appearance, Colonel Bailey was generous to. a fault, and his kind consideration for a prisoner was invariable. Frozen Pete and I followed his example. We had no wish to be discourteous, and it seemed only natural and right to offer Oche such little attentions as were within our power to bestow, y I remember in particular that last night when the Indian was shivering beneath his scanty blanket, how the colonel drew off his heavy weather-coat, and spread it carefully over him. Oche merely raised his head and stared hard into the rugged face of the sheriff. The hollow in which we had halted was a natural basin situated on the west bank of a branch of the Washita River. Eastward between us and the stream a very narrow wall of shaly earth rose precipitously to the height of full thirty feet. To the north and west, the low hills were almost perpendicular. Thus on three sides the basin was entirely shut in by cliffs. On the fourth alone io the southwest the view was open, and through the gap we could see stretches of the illimitable prairie:

The tall prairie grass grew abundantly on the floor of our campingground, and here and there along the hard, dry walls clung an occasional patch of stubby buffalo grass or ■ a sickly cluster of yellow cacti. Certainly, it was not a pretty spot, but the tall banks were rampart against the chill breezes of the northwest, and the basin had long since been a favourite halting ground for travellers. On this night, however, the wind had veered round until it swept unresisted through the mouth of our three-walled flat. All night long its violence steadily increased, and when the colonel wakened us by loud shouts of 'House! House!' it was blowing .a gale. I started up and began to draw on my heavy boots. The colonel was already making coffee over a glowing heap of brush sticks. By chance my eyes wandered to the opposite side of the basin, where we had picketed our four broncos. They were gone.

In blank amazement, I pointed to the sp6t. The colonel followed the direction of my gaze, and understood. Then by a common impulse we ran to where his overcoat lay. He snatched it from the ground. Beneath were a blanket, a piece of heavy rope, and a pair of locked handcuffs. Oche had gone, too. ■ Had the blow been less severe, the colonel might have given expressive vent to.his feelings, but as it was, he merely dropped upon the blanket and began to examine the discarded menacles. ■ . . " , 'There are times,' he muttered, weakly, 'when a man who calls himself a man insists on being a, mule. This is one of the times, and I m the man.' ■ 'How was it done?' I asked, kneeling opposite him on Oche's blanket. . TDone!' he replied; 'there wasnt anything to be done about it. All he had to do was to get up and walk. You know how slim he was? Well, he's turned out to be one of those fellows whose hands aren't a_particle broader than their wrists. What do you suppose they care about things like these?' he added, rattling the handcuffs viciously. 'While we were sleeping here, like the gentle lambs we are, he slipped his hands out, untied the rope from his ankles, and left taldng the broncos along as mementos of a pleasant trip with tools. 'Then let's follow him!' I exclaimed, leaping up; but the sheriff gripped me by the trousers. 'I'm -thankful,' he said, earnestly, 'that I am not the only idiot in this camp Why, you dummy, can t you comprehend the difference between people on horses and people on foot; ■^Frozen Pete had bean quietly but rapidly pulling on his boots buttonJiff his jacket and tightening his belt, TCis manner was generally so deliberate that now we both stared at him m surmise. My view embraced _ the mouth of our camping-ground, and between the black walls I saw, with horora long, unbroken line of leaping flame. Extending the entire width of the bottom, its dancing yellow crest was "just visible as it rose over.a long knoll lyine- in its path. How the-fire started^ I do not know to this day Perhaps campers on the prame had get it o-oing accidentally. ~ It could not have been burning long, for else we should have noticed the Sare in the night sky Co. m Pletf^ h dden by our walls until within the last-few moments, the terrible danger had crept upon us unobserved.

, The fire was already within three hundred yards of us; and the rough wind was sweeping it nearer with frightful rapidity. There was no time to start a counter fire. The sheer walls on* three sides of us blocked our retreat, , A death of torture was rushing straight at us. Pete and I stared at Colonel Bailey, while in that awful moment the sheriff stood, with bent head, thinking how to save us. '

'This way, boys,' he cried suddenly, and ran straight across the canon toj wards the creek. We followed, and i quickly reached the narrow bluff op-- | posite. The sheriff glanced rapidly along its base. He had seen such formations before, and honed to find a hole through, the wall, i; I was by his side when he reached a spot where the tall grass.had been worn down. He stopped, dropped on one knee, and then pulled me bodily to the ground. To my astonishment, I found, myself looking into a wolfburrow, perhaps eighteen inches in diameter. At its other end, scarcely fifteen feet away, I could see light. Some enterprising coyote had dug a passage through the narrow wall to the creek beyond. ■ 'See if it's wide enough for you, boy,' cried the colonel; 'maybe we can get through, maybe not. If we can't I lost the rest of the sentence as with both arms' extended in front of me, I thrust my head and shoulders into the opening, and digging my toes violently into the ground I shoved myself forward almost my length. There I stuck fast. With no room to bend my arms or use my knees, I was helpless. Writhe and squirm as I would, I could make no progress. In despair I struggled back into the basin. 'I feared it,' said the sheriff, huskily. 'If we could use our elbows we could make it; but as it is, God help us.' For some seconds we stood motionless. The fire had advanced full fifty yards, and the infernal roar was buzzing in my ears when Pete suddenly thrust out his hand towards the west. The colonel and I looked simultaneously. Opposite us, on the verge of the bluff, was the rascally bandit, Oche. We could see him.distinctly in the increasing light. There he sat astride the colonel's pony, stolidly watching us, and apparently finding a ferocious joy in our approaching destruction. We had hardly time for thought, however, before Oche dropped to the ground. Holding- the lariat coiled in his hand, he cut it from the bronco's neck, and sprang to the edge of the bluff at a point where the wall was slightly less steep. Instantly he squatted down, lurched his weight, forward, and slid down the bank into the basin below. The descent was almost as rapid as a fall, but Oche reached the bottom unharmed, and springing to his feet he came bounding towards us, his lank, wiry body shooting far through the air at every leap. The act of the bandit in dropping from safety to apparent death utterly bewildered us. In the nature of things it would not be to attack us. The roaring of the flames grew louder, we could hear the crackling- of the tell, crisp grass, yet we could only stand and stare.

The Indian presently reached us. ■ 'Throw away guns—hats!' he cried. 'Do it boys,' commanded the colonel, and as Frozen Pete threw down his belt, pistol and sombrero, Oche pushed him prostrate to the earth. Pete fell just in front of the burrow, and Oche, sliding past him, strung the lasso on the grass. Pete understood, and grasped the rope near its centre, while Oehe, dropping full length upon the ground, wriggled his naked body into the burrow. Thanks to his extreme slenderness a.nd to his Indian blood he crawled through the tunnel with all the dexterity of an animal. Holding one end of the lariat at his back he drew the slack rapidly after him, and in less than a minute he stood on the narrow strip beside the creek. Pete crawled into the tunnel as far as his own exertions would permit, and now the Indian, drawing the rope taiit, pulled him along with all the strength of his lithe body. Twisting and turning the cowboy scraped safely through. • i The colonel grabbed the end of the rope which had almost disappeared in the burrow, and running back with it fifteen feet, he ordered me to go before him. The fire was within fifty yards of us. The wind drove sparks and smoke against our faces. It was no time for chivalrous deference. „ Dropping to the earth I grasped the lariat as Pete had done, and was trying to compress my bulk just a little when I felt myself jerked forward with a vigour which told me that Oche and Pete were hauling together at the rope. In half a minute I was by their side, and our united strength dragged Colonel Bailey rapidly through the tunnel. But just as the sheriff's head emerged from under the bluff Oche sprang from us, and running along the bank of the stream stopped some five rods away. It was hardly strange that neither Pete nor I thought of him as a; prisoner. Colonel Bailey got on his feet, and took a step towards Oche. The outlaw stood motionless. The sheriff made another step. The Indian shook his head, then turned and walked slowly away, conscious of.his perfect security. He had seen us throw down our holster pistols on the other side of the hole, and as an Indian he did not fear our pursuit on foot. The sheriff watched Oche until he had passed a bend in the ridge, then turned and. walked towards us in silence; Halting at the, wolf-burrow he bent down and peeped through it. As he did so his trousers were drawn tight across his hips, and I perceived the outline of a hard object in his rear pocket. It was the butt of a derringer pistol; but I am not the man to criticise the colonel. TIL TILFORD.