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Headless Horseman
Chapter Seventy Four. A Solitary Stalker
The singular spectacle described — extraordinary it might be termed — was too grave to appear grotesque. There was some thing about it that savoured of the outre-monde. Human eyes could not have beholden it, without the shivering of a human frame, and the chilling of human blood.
Was it seen by human eyes in this fresh phase — with the wolves below, and the vultures above?
It was.
By one pair; and they belonging to the only man in all Texas who had arrived at something like a comprehension of the all-perplexing mystery.
It was not yet altogether clear to him. There were points that still puzzled him. He but know it was neither a dummy, nor the Devil.
His knowledge did not except him from the universal feeling of dread. Despite the understanding of what the thing was, he shuddered as he gazed upon it.
He gazed upon it from the “shore” of the prairie-island; himself unseen under its shadows, and apparently endeavouring to remain so.
And yet, with all his trembling and the desire to keep concealed, he was following it round and round, on the circumference of an inner circle, as if some magnetic power was constraining him to keep on the same radius, of which the point occupied by the Headless Horseman was a prolongation!
More than this. He had seen the latter before entering the island. He had seen him far off, and might easily have shunned him. But instead of doing so, he had immediately commenced making approach towards him!
He had continued it — using the timber as a screen, and acting as one who stalks the timid stag, with the difference of a heart-dread which no deer-stalker could ever know.
He had continued it; until the shelter of the motte gave him a momentary respite, not from fear, but the apprehension of a failure.
He had not ridden ten miles across the prairie without a design; and it was this that caused him to go so cautiously — guiding his horse over the softest turf, and through the selvedge of the chapparal — in such a way as neither to expose his person to view, nor cause a rustle among the branches, that might be heard to the distance of ten yards.
No one observing his manoeuvres as he moved amid the timber island, could have mistaken their meaning — at least so far as related to the object for which they were being made.
His eye was upon the Headless Horseman, his whole soul absorbed in watching the movements of the latter — by which he appeared to regulate his own.
At first, fear seemed to be his prevailing thought. After a time, it was succeeded by an impatience that partially emboldened him. The latter plainly sprang from his perceiving, that the Headless Horseman, instead of approaching the timber, still kept at a regular distance of two hundred yards from its edge.
That this chafed him was evident from a string of soliloquies, muttered half aloud. They were not free from blasphemy; but that was characteristic of the man who pronounced them.
“Damn the infernal brute! If he’d only come twenty yards nearer, I could fetch him. My gun won’t carry that distance. I’d miss him for sure, and then it’ll be all up. I may never get the chance again. Confound him! He’s all of twenty yards too far off.” As if the last was an ambiguity rather than a conviction, the speaker appeared to measure with his eye the space that separated him from the headless rider — all the while holding in hand a short Yäger rifle, capped and cocked — ready for instant discharge.
“No use,” he continued, after a process of silent computation. “I might hit the beast with a spent ball, but only to scare without crippling him. I must have patience, and wait till he gets a little nearer. Damn them wolves! He might come in, if it wasn’t for them. So long as they’re about him, he’ll give the timber a wide berth. It’s the nature of these Texas howes — devil skin them!
“I wonder if coaxing would do any good?” he proceeded, after a pause. “Maybe the sound of a man’s voice would bring the animal to a stand? Doubtful. He’s not likely to ’ve heard much of that lately. I suppose it would only frighten him! The sight of my horse would be sure to do it, as it did before; though that was in the moonlight. Besides, he was chased by the howling staghound. No wonder his being wild, then, ridden as he is by hell knows what; for it can’t be — Bah! After all, there must be some trick in it; some damned infernal trick!”
For a while the speaker checked his horse with a tight rein. And, leaning forward, so as to get a good view through the trees, continued to scan the strange shape that was slowly skirting the timber.
“It’s his horse — sure as shootin’! His saddle, serapé, and all. How the hell could they have come into the possession of the other?”
Another pause of reflection.
“Trick, or no trick, it’s an ugly business. Whoever’s planned it, must know all that happened that night; and by God, if that thing lodged there, I’ve got to get it back. What a fool; to have bragged about it as I did! Curse the crooked luck!
“He won’t come nearer. He’s provokingly shy of the timber. Like all his breed, he knows he’s safest in the open ground.
“What’s to be done? See if I can call him up. May be he may like to hear a human voice. If it’ll only fetch him twenty yards nearer, I’ll be satisfied. Hanged if I don’t try.”
Drawing a little closer to the edge of the thicket, the speaker pronounced that call usually employed by Texans to summon a straying horse.
“Proh — proh — proshow! Come kindly! come, old horse!”
The invitation was extended to no purpose. The Texan steed did not seem to understand it; at all events, as an invitation to friendly companionship. On the contrary, it had the effect of frightening him; for no sooner fell the “proh” upon his ear, than letting go the mouthful of grass already gathered, he tossed his head aloft with a snort that proclaimed far greater fear than that felt for either wolf or vulture!
A mustang, he knew that his greatest enemy was man — a man mounted upon a horse; and by this time his scent had disclosed to him the proximity of such a foe.
He stayed not to see what sort of man, or what kind of horse. His first instinct had told him that both were enemies.
As his rider by this time appeared to have arrived at the same conclusion, there was no tightening of the rein; and he was left free to follow his own course — which carried him straight off over the prairie.
A bitter curse escaped from the lips of the unsuccessful stalker as he spurred out into the open ground.
Still more bitter was his oath, as he beheld the Headless Horseman passing rapidly beyond reach — unscathed by the bullet he had sent to earnestly after him.
Chapter Seventy Five. On the Trail
Zeb Stump stayed but a short while on the spot, where he had discovered the hoof-print with the broken shoe.
Six seconds sufficed for its identification; after which he rose to his feet, and continued along the trail of the horse that had made it.
He did not re-mount, but strode forward on foot; the old mare, obedient to a signal he had given her, keeping at a respectful distance behind him.
For more than a mile he moved on in this original fashion — now slowly, as the trail became indistinct — quickening his pace where the print of the imperfect shoe could be seen without difficulty.
Like an archaeologist engaged upon a tablet of hieroglyphic history, long entombed beneath the ruins of a lost metropolis — whose characters appear grotesque to all except himself — so was it with Zeb Stump, as he strode on, translating the “sign” of the prairie.
Absorbed in the act, and the conjectures that accompanied it, he had no eyes for aught else. He glanced neither to the green savannah that stretched inimitably around, nor to the blue sky that spread specklessly above him. Alone to the turf beneath his feet was his eye and attention directed.
A sound — not a sight — startled him from his all-engrossing occupation. It was the report of a rifle; but so distant, as to appear but the detonation of a percussion-cap that had missed fire.
Instinctively he stopped; at the same time raising his eyes, but without unbending his body.
With a quick glance the horizon was swept, along the half dozen points whence the sound should have proceeded.
A spot of bluish smoke — still preserving its balloon shape — was slowly rolling up against the sky. A dark blotch beneath indicated the outlines of an “island” of timber.
So distant was the “motte,” the smoke, and the sound, that only the eye of an experienced prairie-man would have seen the first, or his ear heard the last, from the spot where Zeb Stump was standing.
But Zeb saw the one, and heard the other.
“Durned queery!” he muttered, still stooped in the attitude of a gardener dibbing in his young cabbage-plants.
“Dog-goned queery, to say the leest on’t. Who in ole Nick’s name kin be huntin’ out thur — whar theer ain’t game enuf to pay for the powder an shet? I’ve been to thet ere purayra island; an I know there ain’t nothin’ thur ’ceptin’ coyoats. What they get to live on, only the Eturnal kin tell!”
“Wagh!” he went on, after a short silence. “Some storekeeper from the town, out on a exkurshun, as he’d call it, who’s proud o’ poppin’ away at them stinkin’ varmints, an ’ll go hum wi’ a story he’s been a huntin’ wolves! Wal. ’Tain’t no bizness o’ myen. Let yurd-stick hev his belly-ful o’ sport. Heigh! thur’s somethin’ comin’ this way. A hoss an somebody on his back — streakin’ it as if hell war arter him, wi’ a pitchfork o’ red-het lightnin’! What! As I live, it air the Headless! It is, by the jumpin’ Geehosophat!”
The observation of the old hunter was quite correct. There could be no mistake about the character of the cavalier, who, just clearing himself from the cloud of sulphureous smoke — now falling, dispersed over the prairie — came galloping on towards the spot where Zeb stood. It was the horseman without a head.
Nor could there be any doubt as to the direction he was taking — as straight towards Zeb as if he already saw, and was determined on coming up with him!
A braver man than the backwoodsman could not have been found within the confines of Texas. Cougar, or jaguar — bear, buffalo, or Red Indian — he could have encountered without quailing. Even a troop of Comanches might have come charging on, without causing him half the apprehension felt at sight of that solitary equestrian.
With all his experience of Nature in her most secret haunts — despite the stoicism derived from that experience — Zeb Stump was not altogether free from superstitious fancies. Who is?
With the courage to scorn a human foe — any enemy that might show itself in a natural shape, either of biped or quadruped — still was he not stern enough to defy the abnormal; and Bayard himself would have quailed at sight of the cavalier who was advancing to the encounter — apparently determined upon its being deadly!
Zeb Stump not only quailed; but, trembling in his tall boots of alligator leather, sought concealment.
He did so, long before the Headless Horseman had got within hailing distance; or, as he supposed, within sight of him.
Some bushes growing close by gave him the chance of a hiding place; of which, with instinctive quickness, he availed himself.
The mare, standing saddled by his side, might still have betrayed him?
But, no. He had not gone to his knees, without thinking of that.
“Hunker down!” he cried, addressing himself to his dumb companion, who, if wanting speech, proved herself perfect in understanding. “Squat, ye ole critter; or by the Eturnal ye’ll be switched off into hell!”
As if dreading some such terrible catastrophe, the scraggy quadruped dropped down upon her fore knees; and then, lowering her hind quarters, laid herself along the grass, as though thinking her day’s work done — she was free to indulge in a fiesta.
Scarce had Zeb and his roadster composed themselves their new position, when the Headless Horseman came charging up.
He was going at full speed; and Zeb was but too well pleased to perceive that he was likely to continue it.
It was sheer chance that had conducted him that way; and not from having seen either the hunter or his sorry steed.
The former — if not the latter — was satisfied at being treated in that cavalier style; but, long before the Headless Horseman had passed out of sight, Zeb had taken his dimensions, and made himself acquainted with his character.
Though he might be a mystery to all the world beside, he was no longer so to Zebulon Stump.
As the horse shot past in fleet career, the skirt of the serapé, flouted up by the wind, displayed to Stump’s optics a form well known to him — in a dress he had seen before. It was a blouse of blue cottonade, box-plaited over the breast; and though its vivid colour was dashed with spots of garish red, the hunter was able to recognise it.
He was not so sure about the face seen low down upon the saddle, and resting against the rider’s leg.
There was nothing strange in his inability to recognise it.
The mother, who had oft looked fondly on that once fair countenance, would not have recognised it now.
Zeb Stump only did so by deduction. The horse, the saddle, the holsters, the striped blanket, the sky-blue coat and trousers — even the hat upon the head — were all known to him. So, too, was the figure that stood almost upright in the stirrups. The head and face must belong to the same — notwithstanding their unaccountable displacement.
Zeb saw it by no uncertain glance. He was permitted a full, fair view of the ghastly spectacle.
The steed, though going at a gallop, passed within ten paces of him.
He made no attempt to interrupt the retreating rider — either by word or gesture. Only, as the form became unmasked before his eyes, and its real meaning flashed across his mind, he muttered, in a slow, sad tone:
“Gee-hos-o-phat! It air true, then! Poor young fellur — dead — dead!”
Chapter Seventy Six. Lost in the Chalk
Still continuing his fleet career, the Headless Horseman galloped on over the prairie — Zeb Stump following only with his eyes; and not until he had passed out of sight, behind some straggling groves of mezquite, did the backwoodsman abandon his kneeling position.
Then only for a second or two did he stand erect — taking council with himself as to what course he should pursue.
The episode — strange as unexpected — had caused some disarrangement in his ideas, and seemed to call for a change in his plans. Should he continue along the trail he was already deciphering; or forsake it for that of the steed that had just swept by?
By keeping to the former, he might find out much; but by changing to the latter he might learn more?
He might capture the Headless Horseman, and ascertain from him the why and wherefore of his wild wanderings?
While thus absorbed, in considering what course he had best take, he had forgotten the puff of smoke, and the report heard far off over the prairie.
Only for a moment, however. They were things to be remembered; and he soon remembered them.
Turning his eyes to the quarter where the smoke had appeared, he saw that which caused him to squat down again; and place himself, with more impressement than ever, under cover of the mezquites. The old mare, relishing the recumbent attitude, had still kept to it; and there was no necessity for re-disposing of her.
What Zeb now saw was a man on horseback — a real horseman, with a head upon his shoulders.
He was still a long way off; and it was not likely he had seen the tall form of the hunter, standing shored up among the bushes — much less the mare, lying beneath them. He showed no signs of having done so.
On the contrary, he was sitting stooped in the saddle, his breast bent down to the pommel, and his eyes actively engaged in reading the ground, over which he was guiding his horse.
There could be no difficulty in ascertaining his occupation. Zeb Stump guessed it at a glance. He was tracking the headless rider.
“Ho, ho!” muttered Zeb, on making this discovery; “I ain’t the only one who’s got a reezun for solvin’ this hyur myst’ry! Who the hell kin he be? I shed jest like to know that.”
Zeb had not long to wait for the gratification of his wish. As the trail was fresh, the strange horseman could take it up at a trot — in which pace he was approaching.
He was soon within identifying distance.
“Gee — hosophat!” muttered the backwoodsman; “I mout a know’d it wud be him; an ef I’m not mistook about it, hyurs goin’ to be a other chapter out o’ the same book — a other link as ’ll help me to kumplete the chain o’ evydince I’m in sarch for. Lay clost, ye critter! Ef ye make ere a stir — even to the shakin’ o’ them long lugs o’ yourn — I’ll cut yur darned throat.”
The last speech was an apostrophe to the “maar” — after which Zeb waxed silent, with his head among the spray of the acacias, and his eyes peering through the branches in acute scrutiny of him who was coming along.
This was a man, who, once seen, was not likely to be soon forgotten. Scarce thirty years old, he showed a countenance, scathed, less with care than the play of evil passions.
But there was care upon it now — a care that seemed to speak of apprehension — keen, prolonged, yet looking forward with a hope of being relieved from it.
Withal it was a handsome face: such as a gentleman need not have been ashamed of, but for that sinister expression that told of its belonging to a blackguard.
The dress — but why need we describe it? The blue cloth frock of semi-military cut — the forage cap — the belt sustaining a bowie-knife, with a brace of revolving pistols — all have been mentioned before as enveloping and equipping the person of Captain Cassius Calhoun.
It was he.
It was not the batterie of small arms that kept Zeb Stump from showing himself. He had no dread of an encounter with the ex-officer of Volunteers. Though he instinctively felt hostility, he had as yet given no reason to the latter for regarding him as an enemy. He remained in shadow, to have a better view of what was passing under the sunlight.
Still closely scrutinising the trail of the Headless Horseman, Calhoun trotted past.
Still closely keeping among the acacias, Zeb Stump looked after, till the same grove, that had concealed the former, interposed its verdant veil between him and the ex-captain of cavalry.
The backwoodsman’s brain having become the recipient of new thoughts, required a fresh exercise of its ingenuity.
If there was reason before for taking the trail of the Headless Horseman, it was redoubled now.
With but short time spent in consideration, so Zeb concluded; and commenced making preparations for a stalk after Cassius Calhoun.
These consisted in taking hold of the bridle, and giving the old mare a kick; that caused her to start instantaneously to her feet.
Zeb stood by her side, intending to climb into the saddle and ride out into the open plain — as soon as Calhoun should be out of sight.
He had no thoughts of keeping the latter in view. He needed no such guidance. The two fresh trails would be sufficient for him; and he felt as sure of finding the direction in which both would lead, as if he had ridden alongside the horseman without a head, or him without a heart.
With this confidence he cleared out from among the acacias, and took the path just trodden by Calhoun.
For once in his life, Zeb Stump had made a mistake. On rounding the mezquite grove, behind which both had made disappearance, he discovered he had done so.
Beyond, extended a tract of chalk prairie; over which one of the horsemen appeared to have passed — him without the head.
Zeb guessed so, by seeing the other, at some distance before him, riding to and fro, in transverse stretches, like a pointer quartering the stubble in search of a partridge.
He too had lost the trail, and was endeavouring to recover it.
Crouching under cover of the mezquites, the hunter remained a silent spectator of his movements.
The attempt terminated in a failure. The chalk surface defied interpretation — at least by skill such as that of Cassius Calhoun.
After repeated quarterings he appeared to surrender his design; and, angrily plying the spur, galloped off in the direction of the Leona.
As soon as he was out of sight, Zeb also made an effort to take up the lost trail. But despite his superior attainments in the tracking craft, he was compelled to relinquish it.
A fervid sun was glaring down upon the chalk; and only the eye of a salamander could have withstood the reflection of its rays.
Dazed almost to blindness, the backwoodsman determined upon turning late back; and once more devoting his attention to the trail from which he had been for a time seduced.
He had learnt enough to know that this last promised a rich reward for its exploration.
It took him but a short time to regain it.
Nor did he lose any in following it up. He was too keenly impressed with its value; and with this idea urging him, he strode rapidly on, the mare following as before.
Once only did he make pause; at a point where the tracks of two horses converged with that he was following.
From this point the three coincided — at times parting and running parallel, for a score of yards or so, but again coming together and overlapping one another.
The horses were all shod — like that which carried the broken shoe — and the hunter only stopped to see what he could make out of the hoof marks. One was a “States horse;” the other a mustang — though a stallion of great size, and with a hoof almost as large as that of the American.
Zeb had his conjectures about both.
He did not stay to inquire which had gone first over the ground. That was as clear to him, as if he had been a spectator at their passing. The stallion had been in the lead, — how far Zeb could not exactly tell; but certainly some distance beyond that of companionship. The States horse had followed; and behind him, the roadster with the broken shoe — also an American.
All three had gone over the same ground, at separate times, and each by himself. This Zeb Stump could tell with as much ease and certainty, as one might read the index of a dial, or thermometer.
Whatever may have been in his thoughts, he said nothing, beyond giving utterance to the simple exclamation “Good!” and, with satisfaction stamped upon his features, he moved on, the old mare appearing to mock him by an imitative stride!
“Hyur they’ve seppurated,” he said, once again coming to a stop, and regarding the ground at his feet. “The stellyun an States hoss hev goed thegither — thet air they’ve tuk the same way. Broken-shoe hev strayed in a diffrent direkshun.”
“Wonder now what thet’s for?” he continued, after standing awhile to consider. “Durn me ef I iver seed sech perplexin’ sign! It ud puzzle ole Dan’l Boone hisself.”
“Which on ’em shed I foller fust? Ef I go arter the two I know whar they’ll lead. They’re boun’ to kim up in thet puddle o’ blood. Let’s track up tother, and see whether he hev rud into the same procksimmuty! To the right abeout, ole gal, and keep clost ahint me — else ye may get lost in the chapparal, an the coyoats may make thur supper on yur tallow. Ho! ho! ho!”
With this apostrophe to his “critter,” ending in a laugh at the conceit of her “tallow,” the hunter turned off on the track of the third horse.
It led him along the edge of an extended tract of chapparal; which, following all three, he had approached at a point well known to him, as to the reader, — where it was parted by the open space already described.
The new trail skirted the timber only for a short distance. Two hundred yards from the embouchure of the avenue, it ran into it; and fifty paces further on Zeb came to a spot where the horse had stood tied to a tree.
Zeb saw that the animal had proceeded no further: for there was another set of tracks showing where it had returned to the prairie — though not by the same path.
The rider had gone beyond. The foot-marks of a man could be seen beyond — in the mud of a half-dry arroyo — beside which the horse had been “hitched.”
Leaving his critter to occupy the “stall” where broken-shoe had for some time fretted himself, the old hunter glided off upon the footmarks of the dismounted rider.
He soon discovered two sets of them — one going — another coming back.
He followed the former.
He was not surprised at their bringing him out into the avenue — close to the pool of blood — by the coyotés long since licked dry.
He might have traced them right up to it, but for the hundreds of horse tracks that had trodden the ground like a sheep-pen.
But before going so far, he was stayed by the discovery of some fresh “sign” — too interesting to be carelessly examined. In a place where the underwood grew thick, he came upon a spot where a man had remained for some time. There was no turf, and the loose mould was baked hard and smooth, evidently by the sole of a boot or shoe.
There were prints of the same sole leading out towards the place of blood, and similar ones coming back again. But upon the branches of a tree between, Zeb Stump saw something that had escaped the eyes not only of the searchers, but of their guide Spangler — a scrap of paper, blackened and half-burnt — evidently the wadding of a discharged gun!
It was clinging to the twig of a locust-tree, impaled upon one of its spines!
The old hunter took it from the thorn to which, through rain and wind, it had adhered; spread it carefully across the palm of his horny hand; and read upon its smouched surface a name well known to him; which, with its concomitant title, bore the initials, “C.C.C.”
