LITMIR.BIZ

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’bout de place.”

      “Are you sure?” asked the planter, seriously stirred by the intelligence.

      “Satin, shoo, Mass’ Woodley. Dar’s no hoss doins in dat ere ’table, ceppin de sorrel ob Massa Cahoon. Spotty am in de ’closure outside. Massa Henry hoss ain’t nowha.”

      “It don’t follow that Master Henry himself is not in his room. Go instantly, and see!”

      “Ho – ho! I’se go on de instum, massr; but f’r all dat dis chile no speck find de young genl’um dar. Ho! ho! wha’ebber de ole hoss am, darr Massr Henry am too.”

      “There’s something strange in all this,” pursued the planter, as Pluto shuffled out of the sala. “Henry from home; and at night too. Where can he have gone? I can’t think of any one he would be visiting at such unseasonable hours! He must have been out all night, or very early, according to the nigger’s account! At the Port, I suppose, with those young fellows. Not at the tavern, I hope?”

      “Oh, no! He wouldn’t go there,” interposed Calhoun, who appeared as much mystified by the absence of Henry as was Poindexter himself. He refrained, however, from suggesting any explanation, or saying aught of the scenes to which he had been witness on the preceding night.

      “It is to be hoped he knows nothing of it,” reflected the young Creole. “If not, it may still remain a secret between brother and myself. I think I can manage Henry. But why is he still absent? I’ve sate up all night waiting for him. He must have overtaken Maurice, and they have fraternised. I hope so; even though the tavern may have been the scene of their reconciliation. Henry is not much given to dissipation; but after such a burst of passion, followed by his sudden repentance, he may have strayed from his usual habits? Who could blame him if he has? There can be little harm in it: since he has gone astray in good company?”

      How far the string of reflections might have extended it is not easy to say: since it did not reach its natural ending.

      It was interrupted by the reappearance of Pluto; whose important air, as he re-entered the room, proclaimed him the bearer of eventful tidings.

      “Well!” cried his master, without waiting for him to speak, “is he there?”

      “No, Mass’ Woodley,” replied the black, in a voice that betrayed a large measure of emotion, “he are not dar – Massa Henry am not. But – but,” he hesitatingly continued, “dis chile grieb to say dat – dat – him hoss am dar.”

      “His horse there! Not in his sleeping-room, I suppose?”

      “No, massa; nor in de ’table neider; but out da, by de big gate.”

      “His horse at the gate? And why, pray, do you grieve about that?”

      “’Ecause, Mass’ Woodley, ’ecause de hoss – dat am Massa Henry hoss – ’ecause de anymal – ”

      “Speak out, you stammering nigger! What because? I suppose the horse has his head upon him? Or is it his tail that is missing?”

      “Ah, Mass’ Woodley, dis nigga fear dat am missin’ wuss dan eider him head or him tail. I’se feer’d dat de ole hoss hab loss him rider!”

      “What! Henry thrown from his horse? Nonsense, Pluto! My son is too good a rider for that. Impossible that he should have been pitched out of the saddle – impossible!”

      “Ho! ho! I doan say he war frown out ob de saddle. Gorramity! I fear de trouble wuss dan dat. O! dear ole Massa, I tell you no mo’. Come to de gate ob do hashashanty, and see fo youseff.”

      By this time the impression conveyed by Pluto’s speech – much more by his manner – notwithstanding its ambiguity, had become sufficiently alarming; and not only the planter himself, but his daughter and nephew, hastily forsaking their seats, and preceded by the sable coachman, made their way to the outside gate of the hacienda.

      A sight was there awaiting them, calculated to inspire all three with the most terrible apprehensions.

      A negro man – one of the field slaves of the plantation – stood holding a horse, that was saddled and bridled. The animal wet with the dews of the night, and having been evidently uncared for in any stable, was snorting and stamping the ground, as if but lately escaped from some scene of excitement, in which he had been compelled to take part.

      He was speckled with a colour darker than that of the dewdrops – darker than his own coat of bay-brown. The spots scattered over his shoulders – the streaks that ran parallel with the downward direction of his limbs, the blotches showing conspicuously on the saddle-flaps, were all of the colour of coagulated blood. Blood had caused them – spots, streaks, and blotches!

      Whence came that horse?

      From the prairies. The negro had caught him, on the outside plain, as, with the bridle trailing among his feet, he was instinctively straying towards the hacienda.

      To whom did he belong?

      The question was not asked. All present knew him to be the horse of Henry Poindexter.

      Nor did any one ask whose blood bedaubed the saddle-flaps. The three individuals most interested could think only of that one, who stood to them in the triple relationship of son, brother, and cousin.

      The dark red spots on which they were distractedly gazing had spurted from the veins of Henry Poindexter. They had no other thought.

      Chapter 38

      The Avengers

      Hastily – perhaps too truly – construing the sinister evidence, the half-frantic father leaped into the bloody saddle, and galloped direct for the Fort.

      Calhoun, upon his own horse, followed close after.

      The hue and cry soon spread abroad. Rapid riders carried it up and down the river, to the remotest plantations of the settlement.

      The Indians were out, and near at hand, reaping their harvest of scalps! That of young Poindexter was the firstfruits of their sanguinary gleaning!

      Henry Poindexter – the noble generous youth who had not an enemy in all Texas! Who but Indians could have spilled such innocent blood? Only the Comanches could have been so cruel?

      Among the horsemen, who came quickly together on the parade ground of Port Inge, no one doubted that the Comanches had done the deed. It was simply a question of how, when, and where.

      The blood drops pretty clearly, proclaimed the first. He who had shed them must have been shot, or speared, while sitting in his saddle. They were mostly on the off side; where they presented an appearance, as if something had been slaked over them. This was seen both on the shoulders of the horse, and the flap of the saddle. Of course it was the body of the rider as it slipped lifeless to the earth.

      There were some who spoke with equal certainty as to the time – old frontiersmen experienced in such matters.

      According to them the blood was scarce “ten hours old:” in other words, must have been shed about ten hours before.

      It was now noon. The murder must have been committed at two o’clock in the morning.

      The third query was, perhaps, the most important – at least now that the deed was done.

      Where had it been done? Where was the body to be found?

      After that, where should the assassins be sought for?

      These were the questions discussed by the mixed council of settlers and soldiers, hastily assembled at Port Inge, and presided over by the commandant of the Fort – the afflicted father standing speechless by his side.

      The last was of special importance. There are thirty-two points in the compass of the prairies, as well as in that which guides the ocean wanderer; and, therefore, in any expedition going in search of a war-party of Comanches, there would be thirty-two chances to one against its taking the right track.

      It mattered not that the home of these nomadic savages was in the west.

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