Part 14 (2/2)
The whole party moved quickly in the direction of the plantation. When they reached the rise of ground overlooking the field, Oscar, still unable to speak, turned and looked at his father with a face of grief.
Uncle Aleck, gazing on the wreck and ruin, said only, ”A whole summer's work gone!”
”A dearly bought buffalo-hunt!” remarked Younkins.
”That's so, neighbor,” added Mr. Bryant, with the grimmest sort of a smile; and then the men fell to talking calmly of the wonderful amount of mischief that a drove of buffalo could do in a few minutes, even seconds, of time. Evidently, the animals had not stopped to s.n.a.t.c.h a bite by the way. They had not tarried an instant in their wild course.
Down the slope of the fields they had hurried in a mad rush, plunged into the woody creek below, and, leaving the underbrush and vines broken and flattened as if a tornado had pa.s.sed through the land, had thundered away across the flat floor of the bottom-land on the further side of the creek. A broad brown track behind them showed that they had then fled into the dim distance of the lands of the Chapman's Creek region.
There was nothing to be done, and not much to be said. So, parting with their kindly and sympathizing neighbors, the party went sorrowfully home.
”Well,” said Uncle Aleck, as soon as they were alone together, ”I am awful sorry that we have lost the corn; but I am not so sure that it is so very great a loss, after all.”
The boys looked at him with amazement, and Sandy said,--
”Why, daddy, it's the loss of a whole summer; isn't it? What are we going to live on this whole winter that's coming, now that we have no corn to sell?”
”There's no market for free-State corn in these parts, Sandy,” replied his father; and, seeing the look of inquiry on the lad's face, he explained: ”Mr. Fuller tells us that the officer at the post, the quartermaster at Fort Riley who buys for the Government, will buy no grain from free-State men. Several from the Smoky Hill and from Chapman's have been down there to find a market, and they all say the same thing. The sutler at the post, Sandy's friend, told Mr. Fuller that it was no use for any free-State man to come there with anything to sell to the Government, at any price. And there is no other good market nearer than the Missouri, you all know that,--one hundred and fifty miles away.”
”Well, I call that confoundedly mean!” cried Charlie, with fiery indignation. ”Do you suppose, father, that they have from Was.h.i.+ngton any such instructions to discriminate against us?”
”I cannot say as to that, Charlie,” replied his father; ”I only tell you what the other settlers report; and it sounds reasonable. That is why the ruin of the corn-field is not so great a misfortune as it might have been.”
CHAPTER XVII.
THE WOLF AT THE DOOR.
Uncle Aleck and Mr. Bryant had gone over to Chapman's Creek to make inquiries about the prospect of obtaining corn for their cattle through the coming winter, as the failure of their own crop had made that the next thing to be considered. The three boys were over at the Younkins cabin in quest of news from up the river, where, it was said, a party of California emigrants had been fired upon by the Indians.
They found that the party attacked was one coming from California, not migrating thither. It brought the Indian frontier very near the boys to see the shot-riddled wagons, left at Younkins's by the travellers.
The Cheyennes had shot into the party and had killed four and wounded two, at a point known as Buffalo Creek, some one hundred miles or so up the Republican Fork. It was a daring piece of effrontery, as there were two military posts not very far away, Fort Kearney above and Fort Riley below.
”But they are far enough away by this time,” said Younkins, with some bitterness. ”Those military posts are good for nothin' but to run to in case of trouble. No soldiers can get out into the plains from any of them quick enough to catch the slowest Indian of the lot.”
Charlie was unwilling to disagree with anything that Younkins said, for he had the highest respect for the opinions of this experienced old plainsman. But he couldn't help reminding him that it would take a very big army to follow up every stray band of Indians, provided any of the tribes should take a notion to go on the warpath.
”Just about this time, though, the men that were stationed at Fort Riley are all down at Lawrence to keep the free-State people from sweeping the streets with free-State brooms, or something that-a-way,”
said Younkins, determined to have his gibe at the useless soldiery, as he seemed to think them. Oscar was interested at once. Anything that related to the politics of Kansas the boy listened to greedily.
”It's something like this,” explained Younkins. ”You see the free-State men have got a government there at Lawrence which is lawful under the Topeka Legislator', as it were. The border-State men have got a city government under the Lecompton Legislatur'; and so the two are quarrelling to see which shall govern the city; 'tisn't much of a city, either.”
”But what have the troops from Fort Riley to do with it? I don't see that yet,” said Oscar, with some heat.
[Ill.u.s.tration: A GREAT DISASTER.]
”Well,” said Younkins, ”I am a poor hand at politics; but the way I understand it is that the Was.h.i.+ngton Government is in favor of the border-State fellows, and so the troops have been sent down to stand by the mayor that belongs to the Lecompton fellows. Leastways, that is the way the sutler down to the post put it to me when I was down there with the folks that were fired on up to Buffalo Creek; I talked with him about it yesterday. That's why I said they were at Lawrence to prevent the streets being swept by free-State brooms. That is the sutler's joke. See?”
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