CHILDREN'S COLUMN.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXVI, Issue 11203, 25 October 1899, Page 3

CHILDREN'S COLUMN.

AEKICHITA: A TALE OF AN INDIAN DETECTIVE. (Continued).

The sergeant grabbed the loaded rifle at the head of his bunk, at the same time yelling, " Halt!" That yell transformed the interior of the guard-room as if at the waving of a magician's wand; instantly the reclining forms sprang into life.

The man next to the sergeant sat up on his bunk and glanced inquiringly around until his eyes focused on the point of a bayonet two inches way; back of that gleamed the dark muzzle of a Springfield rifle.

"Duck your head, quick!" But he needed no warning; he had dropped like a shot! The delay, brief as it was, had enabled Brice to pass through the door, which he closed after him. Now occurred another wonderful piece of luck for him: the man 011 the post then, named Massena, was celebrated as a rifle shot; as luck would have it, he was at the far end of his beat. At the sound of the disturbance, Massena turned. He saw Brice running through the fog, but did not recognise him. The fact that anyone was running showed him something was wrong. He was not supposed to challenge until taps —eleven o'clock. He threw his rifle to his shoulder, but being undecided, he hesitated. Just as Brice reached the gate, the sergeant threw open the guard-house door, calling, "Halt!" Massena understood now, and just as Brice passed through the gate lie fired. The bullet went through the beam at the edge of the gate, but was just a fraction of a second too late; it could not have missed by more than sis inches. Brice turned the corner, and ran for dear life out into the prairie. The sergeant- ran to the gate. He could see his man, phan-tom-like, running through the fog. He fired once, twice, three times. But Brice was too old a hand to be shot so easily. The sergeant said ho ran in a zig-zag fashion that puzzled his aim entirely—a trick he had doubtless learned in Texas. His form was soon swallowed up by the fog. As the firing constituted an alarm, everyone hurried to the scene. The daring nature of the escape took everybody's breath away. Brice had managed to free himself from his shackles, had then cut a hole in the ceiling of his cell, and crawled over to the hole in the middle of the ceiling of the guard-room, and dropped as explained. Here was a desperate man indeed! The scouts were out immediately. As soon as Arkichita understood the situation, he strolled quietly off in the direction taken by the deserter, and in a short time returned and coolly retired to his quarters. The other scouts were out ranging. the prairie. The colonel sent for Arkichita in a hurry. His complacency was unchanged. "Me get um to-morrow— no good to-night," was all he said.

You may be sure I slept but little that night, and turned out long before it was necessary, in my anxiety to be with Arkichita when he took up the' trail. Many a time before had I accompanied this wizard of the prairie when trailing, and therefore realised something of what our expedition might be, as well as of its result. There is nothing so exciting as following a desperate man, who, for all one knows, may be armed. As the old Apache chief Cochise once said to a dandy with whom he was deer-hunt-ing " Hull! You think it heap big fun hunt deer; wait till you hunt man!" Just as soon as it was light enough to follow the trail, I went over to the scouts' quarters, and found them at breakfast. While I knew tlicy were as eager and excited about the coming "hunt" as I was, yet, by their manner, one not familiar with the events of the previous night would not have thought that they expected to leave inside of a week.

The meal ended, Arkichita gave a few orders in Indian language. It was easy to see what a powerful sway ho held over the rest. They buckled on their cartridgebelts, took up their carbines, and sauntered out through the gate to catch their ponies— they all bad ponies— hardy little animals with sufficient endurance to withstand the exposure and starvation incidental to a Dakota winter, when a "feed" of cottonwood bark was a delicacy. These ponies were what the hostile Indians called " warponies." With them a saddle or bridle was not a necessity; you could guide them with your knees. In case it was necessary to leave them, all the scout had-to do was to tie one end of a long lasso around their necks, leaving the other end' free. They could be approached at any time, and would seldom wander off if there was any grass in their vicinity, and they were as indifferent to firing as though they never heard it; mi could shoot from one of these ponies, or under it, without causing it to even wink. It seemed to be the scouts' motto never to walk when they could ride; consequently their ponies were, under all conditions, their constant and faithful companions.^ After saddling his pony, Arkichita quietly hunted around until he found a long, straight, stiff grass-stem ; then lie went over the course Brice had taken until, coming to a footprint that seemed to suit his fancy, he proceeded to carefully measure it with the grass-stem, breaking off the stem until it exactly fitted some particular part of the foot. That was his invariable custom. Having measured it, he made a remark in Indian, to which the others merely said, " How It was something about humpa, which I knew was "shoe." Bubbling over with excitement and curiosity, I asked him, in Indian, "Tako?" ("What is it?") He tapped his shoe, and said, " Wanich" (" No' meaning Brice had no shoes on. He showed me the trail. "Ombadaka ota" ("Trail plenty"), he said. But my untrained eye discerned nothing; the grass was too short and wet; nothing smaller than an elephant's print would have been visible to me. Then we started out, Arkichita, with the grass-stem between his lips, in the lead, keeping off to one side of the trail, the rest quietly following him. He always carried the grass-stem between his lips, so as to leave his hands free to handle his carbine, an experience of four years before, when he was nearly shot from ambush by two deserters, having taught him always to be ready to shoot. It was his custom, when other trails intermingled with the one he was following, to measure for his particular footprint with the grass-stem; and so sharp were his eyes, and so accurate was this apparently simple process, that he had never been known to make a mistake. The trail led to the west for a trifle over a mile; then it turned north for a quarter of a mile, and we followed until we came to a tree at the edge of a slough to the northwest of the fort, called the "garden bar slough." Here Arkichita pointed under the tree, and said Brice had lain down there to rest.

The trail here led into the slough. A Dakota " slough" is a shallow lake, the water of whi?h is from six inches to three feet deep, with a soft, muddy bottom, but not generally miry. The centre of the slough is usually free from grasses or weeds, but along the edges, from twenty to sixty yards out, long tule-grass grows. This particular slough was a mile long, and varied from an eighth to a quarter of a mile in width, and there was a foot of water covering as much soft mild. During the night the wind had roiled the water up considerably. It seemed hardly possible to track anything through it, except where the tule had been broken down. Where that was the case, even I could follow the trail; on reaching open water, however, the case was different.

The eastern end of the slough reached to a point near the fort not more than a hundred and fifty yards from a brick-yard, on which was a kiln that had been built during the summer. The kiln was now ready for firing, As Arkichita did not wish too many trails made in the slough, he sent the other scouts to examine around the edge of it, to see if they could find where the trail came out. He would probably have sent me with them, if he had had the authority; as it was, I followed him into the water.

The trail was plain until we reached the edge of the tule; but here, even with my faith in Arkichita, I gave up hope. Slowly, methodically, surely, that Indian plodded through that slough — the most remirkable, turnings I ever saw. I thought at times that he was rambling at random; but every once in a . while he would come to tule bent down or broken, showing that he still held to the trail.

Krice certainly was an artist. He must have doubled, around the slough the greater part of the night-. • But he made one grave mistake; ' had lie held to the open water en-

tirely, I do not' believe even Arkichita could have puzzled backward and forward through it Once I thought ArkicLita was baffled, after all; he had come to a dead standstill near the tule. Then an inspiration struck me; perhaps by it circle I could find the trail. Happy thought! I put it into immediate execution, and found one. Rather elated at my success, I called: "Come quick; heap trail!" He came over, took one look; just the suggestion of a smile played oil his face as he said: " Cow." I did no more trailing, but understood what was bothering him. The post herd also had waded through here since Briee's escape, and it took all the scout's endless patience and wonderful eyesight to keep the trail where the cattle had passed through it. The grass-stem was of 110 use here. We had passed over half the slough in this circuitous route, when suddenly Arkichita started, straight as the crow flies, for the edge of the slough near the brick-kiln. Was he following the trail? On he went until he came to the shore nearest the kiln; here he stopped, evidently bothered again. There was a scarcely discernible footprint in the mud and water right at the edge of the slough, apparently the last step the deserter had taken before reaching hard ground. This footprint showed the toes, so the deserter was now barefooted. Another thing about this print was its direction ; it stood at right angles to the line previously followed. Either the man had taken a sideward spring for the land from his right foot, or he had turned around and started back over his own trail.

Arkichita left- the water and went out on the bank, in doing which he had to pass for a distance of eight or ten feet over a layer of small, dry pieces of driftwood, washed in at some former time, by the action of the wind. He passed the driftwood, semtinis' ig it closely, and then searched the grass beyond it. Be was evidently surprised. After carefully studying the situation from the bank awhile, without a word, he laid his carbine down, took off his blouse, rolled up his sleeves, and, stepping in his own trail, came back to tho footprint in the mud mentioned before. Here he leaned over carefully in the shallow water to the right of the' print-, and felt with his hand in the mud under the water to see if any trail led back into the water. Then he went ashore, put on his blouse, and took up his canine again. All this time I had been standing in one spot, afraid to move for fear of getting into the trail. The trail apparently ended at the water's edge! Sergeant Arkichita was placed on his mettle; a critical test confronted him; at last his great reputation as a trailer was at stake! tie went down on his knees, and inspected the grass, blade by blade. I kept a respectful distance at one side, astonished at the turn the affair had taken. Now, inch by inch, on his knees, he wrenched the secret from the apparently unwilling surface of the earth. Eighty yards from the kiln, he looked up and glanced at it. The same idea evidently instantly occurred to both of us. The trail was leading to the kiln! Then he rose, and, bending over, slowly advanced to the edge of the brickyard. This yard was about seventy yards long and forty yards wide. It had been used all summer for drying bricks on, and, while it was perfectly level, was as hard as a stone. Men had been walking on it in their bare feet and in their stocking-feet until it was like a piece of marble, and about as smooth. In the centre was the kiln, covered with a wooden roof, shaped like an inverted V, to protect it from rain until fired. This roof was supported on poles, the apex being some three feet above the top of the kiln, while its sides missed the kiln by at least a foot, the roof standing entirely clear of the kiln. Along each side of the kiln, about eight arches, five feet long and four feet high, had been built in, to place wood in for firing. The only thing in the yard besides the kiln was an old-fashioned army water-waggon, which was somewhat like an ordinary sprinkling cart and rosembled an enormous barrel on four wheels.

(To be concluded next week.)