IT was a few days after this little hoax practiced on the sharpers by Colonel Crockett that the steamboat “General Morgan” tied up at the wharf and Walter Jordan and Ned Chandler got on board.
“This’ll get you into New Orleans in a little while,” said the genial backwoodsman as he shook hands with them. “And like as not you’ll get your business over and be on your way home before I leave this section.”
“You’ll stay a while, then,” said Walter.
“Cumby tells me it’ll be to my advantage,” said Crockett. “They are raising money to put a regiment into the Texan service, and he thinks I ought to join it.”
“Then,” said Ned, “as we come up the river we’ll stop off and see if you’re still around.”
“Good!” cried Crockett, and he shook hands with them again. “Do that, sure. And I’ll be glad to see you.”
When the “General Morgan” steamed out into the river, they saw him waving his coonskin cap to them; and they stood at the rail as long as they could see the wharf, replying.
“Now that,” said Ned, putting his hat firmly upon his head, “is one of the finest men I ever saw.”
“I think so, too,” said Walter. “He’d do anything to serve any one he took a fancy to, or any one in need of help.”
The “General Morgan” was one of the swiftest steamers on the river; and it was not a great while before the boys found themselves in the city of New Orleans. Here the war rumors from Texas were thicker than further up the river. The recruiting of volunteers was openly going on. Upon posts and dead walls were loud sounding placards calling for volunteers. All this interested the boys greatly; but they were naturally still more interested in the finding of Ethel Norton.
The address given them by Dolph was not at all difficult to locate. But when they reached it and talked to the people who lived there they received some shattering intelligence.
The girl had gone back to San Antonio!
“But why?” asked Walter, amazed. “Why should she go back there at such a time? Texas is expected to be in a blaze of war.”
“I know it,” said the woman to whom they spoke. “And she knew it. But she saw a newspaper, from Louisville, I think, and it had something in it about a relative dying and leaving her some money. She was afraid she couldn’t establish her identity without some papers which she’d left behind at San Antonio.”
“Surely,” said Ned Chandler, “she didn’t go alone.”
“No,” said the woman. “My two sons went with her.”
A little questioning showed that the girl’s party had gone almost a week before; they had a wagon and a number of saddle horses; the woman had been told the way they’d take, but she had forgotten.
“Well,” said Walter, a short time afterward when the two had talked the matter over from all sides, “the best thing I can think of is to go back up the river, if we can get a boat, and go down into Texas with Colonel Crockett.”
“Good,” said Ned Chandler, his blue eyes snapping with pleasure. “We’re going to get down there after all. For a while I thought we’d be cheated out of it.”
As Walter reasoned the matter out, while they’d probably reach San Antonio after the rival party of Sam Davidge, those gentlemen would be so far ahead that it would work against them rather than in their favor.
“They’ll get into the town before Miss Norton gets back there,” said the boy to Ned. “And they’ll be told that she left with Dolph months ago. Then they’ll head for New Orleans, and so miss her altogether. If Colonel Crockett’s ready to start soon, we’ll reach Texas not much, if any, behind a party that’s traveling overland with a wagon. They’ll have the trails to contend with all the way; also they’ll have to go slow and save their horses.”
They inquired about boats; and to their gratification there was one that very evening. They boarded her, counting themselves in great luck. She was the “Arkansas City,” a strong, bustling little craft, which steamed against the dark waters of the Mississippi with much valor.
Reaching Montgomery’s Point again, they went ashore. Once more luck was with them. Crockett was still at the Cumby plantation, but upon the eve of starting for Texas.
“I’m ’tarnal glad to see you,” said the backwoodsman, heartily, as he clasped their hands, “and I’m also sorry about what’s happened. But if the girl’s gone to Texas—all right. We’ll find her there, if it can be done any way at all.”
While the two boys had been traveling up and down the Mississippi upon their hunt for Ethel Norton, Colonel Crockett had been working industriously. A great sum of money had been subscribed by numerous southern gentlemen to what was known as the “Crockett Fund.” This was to be devoted to the liberation of Texas.
The backwoods orator had made good his reputation; his speeches for the Texan cause had drawn great throngs of people; his words had a wide appeal, and people to whom the cry of the new country for aid had been faint and far away now heard it plainly for the first time. So, in consequence of all this, Crockett had grown much in reputation and influence.
Crockett had arranged to travel into Texas with a small party which was then ready for the journey. The recruiting was to go on, and the parties of volunteers were to be sent after them into the new country as they were armed and equipped.
As Walter and Ned saw a long journey ahead of them through a dangerous region, they set about preparing themselves for it. First they purchased, with the aid of Dolph, a couple of saddle horses of that small, tough breed common to the southwest.
“Those ponies,” said the old Texan, valuing the purchases with an expert eye, “will give you good service and are worth all you’ve paid for them. They are of the kind that without much corn will stand hard riding and still not be any the worse for it.”
Next the lads bought themselves a rifle each. Both knew the use of the weapon, having hunted in the Kentucky mountains and woods many times. Also they purchased good, heavy, broad-bladed hunting knives and a couple of small hatchets, such as are used by woodsmen.
“And don’t forget a derringer each,” said Colonel Crockett. “It’s a small thing, has very little weight, and can be carried in the pocket without trouble. It’s a weapon that’s saved more lives at time of sudden danger than any other I know of.”
And so, with their derringers, hunting knives, hatchets and rifles, the two young fellows felt themselves very well armed indeed. Mounted upon their ponies, attired in fringed hunting shirts and broad brimmed hats, they looked very well fitted to cope with both the savage region and savage men ahead of them.
It was early one morning that the word was given; and off they started across Arkansas to Fulton, where they were to get the steamboat. The state of Arkansas was at that time very well settled; its hospitable people never failed to do what they could for the travelers on their way to the war; good food and good beds were to be had without trouble. At Fulton, which they made without any mishap, they boarded a boat which was to take them down the Red River as far as Natchitoches.
This latter proved to be a small place on the south bank of the river; the party spent one night in the town, and then set off toward the Texan town of Nacogdoches, which lay a hundred and twenty miles away over the old Spanish trail.
This latter lay through a wild country in which ranged great herds of buffalo, and droves of small, active mustangs, wild for many generations.
“Tough little critters,” said old Dolph as he rode with the boys in advance of the party. “You never felt such hard mouths in your lives. Don’t care no more for a bit than if it was of soft rubber.”
“Oh, they are caught, then, and broken!” said Ned, looking at the hardy little fellows as they tore away over the prairies like the wind, their tails flying like banners.
“Lots of Mexicans and some Americans make a business of it,” replied old Dolph. “Them two you boys are riding now once raced, wild, on these very plains.”
It took three days between Natchitoches and Nacogdoches; they camped by the side of the old trail at places where they could get water; the air was bracing, the game they shot during the day was dressed, cooked and eaten, and the lads enjoyed every moment of the time.
About sundown upon the third day they sighted Nacogdoches and were warmly greeted by the people of the town. Nacogdoches lay a day’s ride west of the Sabine River. At that time it had a population of about a thousand people; but as it was a trading place and a stopping point for the flow of northern emigration into Texas, there was usually two or three times that number upon its streets. There was an old French fort, built more than a hundred years before to guard against the attacks of the Indians.
But there were now Indians a-plenty in the town. All the tribes for many miles into the wilderness came there to trade, and on the evening of the arrival of the party under Davy Crockett there were scores of them to be seen in the streets. Their nodding eagle feathers, their fringed buckskin leggings and beaded moccasins, their quivers of arrows and their long bows and sheathed knives gave them a wild and savage look. There were also many Mexicans in Nacogdoches, and their picturesque costumes, huge, jingling spurs, great sombreros, and viciously careening horses, contrasted strongly with the red or blue shirts of the American adventurers, their long boots, and modern equipment of arms and horse gear. Also there were a number of men in the backwoods garb of Crockett and the boys. These stood in quiet places, as a rule, leaning on their long rifles and looking bewildered at the bustle all around them, so different from the solitude of their native forests.
“Rather a lively sort of a town,” said Crockett, after they had put up their mounts at the tavern and were about to go in to supper. “Didn’t expect to see anything quite so stirring, Dolph.”
“You’ll not see another for some time again,” said the old Texan. “This country is not given to towns of any size, though I dare say we’ll grow some as we go along.”
They had a good supper, a good night’s rest and an excellent breakfast at Nacogdoches; and then they took horse and started upon the long journey toward the San Antonio River and the seat of war.
“Take it easy, youngsters,” said old Dolph. “Don’t wear out yourselves or your ponies. You have a good bit of prairie to cross, and it’s not to be done in a hurry if you hope to keep yourselves in condition.”
At high noon the party stopped at a hurrying little stream that moved through a grove of tall trees. Here they rested and ate and drank. Away in the distance, across the level plains, could be seen a herd of grazing buffalo; and Crockett watched them, reclining upon his elbow.
“There hasn’t been no such critters as them in Tennessee for many a year,” said he. “And I’d like pretty well to have a shot or two at them before we leave this country behind.”
Both Walter and Ned eagerly assented to this. The mighty bison appealed to them as a worthy subject for the chase.
“Let’s have a try at them now,” said Ned.
But Crockett smiled in his droll fashion.
“It’s not so easy as you seem to think, youngster,” said he. “It won’t do to mount horse and ride out after game like that. They know what a horseman is, and they know what a rifle means when it speaks. And they are as shy as antelope, for all their size. You’ve got to get to windward of them or they’ll scent you; and once they do that they are off like sixty.”
Crockett had no sooner uttered the last words than there came a queer shrilling sound such as neither of the boys had ever heard before, followed by a sudden shock of one body striking against another.
“Indians!” cried Davy Crockett as he threw himself flat upon the ground, his rifle in his hands, his keen eyes searching the green of the noonday prairie.
“Look!” said Ned Chandler, as he and Walter crouched low.
Walter looked in the direction indicated by his friend’s pointing finger. There, quivering in the trunk of a tree, was a long Indian arrow.
“So that’s what it was,” said young Jordan, drawing in his breath sharply. “Look, Ned, it’s sunk an inch into the wood. It’s good the red rascal made a bad shot of it.”
“Down all,” warned old Dolph. “There’s quite a party of them; and they have rifles as well as bows.”
“What do you think they are, Dolph?” asked Crockett, coolly, looking to his rifle.
“Comanches,” replied the Texan. “I can tell by their head-dress.”
There came a rattle of rifle shots and a cloud of arrows; and the boys saw a line of savage horsemen lift out of the long dry grass and come dashing toward the grove.