Mayne Reid - The Desert Home - The Adventures of a Lost Family in the Wilderness

“I rose to my feet, and succeeded in drawing out the spear. I saw that the struggle had ceased around the fires; and, believing that my comrades, as well as my wife and child, were all dead, I turned my back upon the fires, and stole off into the thicket, determined to get as far as possible from the camp. I had not gone more than three hundred yards when I fell, exhausted with the loss of blood and the pain of my wound. I had fallen near some rocks at the bottom of a precipice, where I saw there was a small crevice or cave. I had still strength enough left to enable me to reach this cave, and crawl into it; but I fainted as soon as the effort was over.

“I must have lain insensible for many hours. When I came to consciousness again, I saw that daylight was shining into the cave. I felt that I was very weak, and could scarcely move. My ghastly wound stared me in the face, – still undressed, but the blood had ceased flowing of its own accord. I tore up my shirt, and dressed it as well as I was able; and then, getting nearer to the mouth of the cave, I lay and listened. I could hear the voices of the Indians, though very indistinctly, in the direction of the camp. This continued for an hour or more; and then the rocks rang with a terrible explosion, which I knew to be the bursting of a shell. After that I could hear loud shouts, and soon after, the hurried trampling of many horses; and then all was silence. I thought at the time that the Indians had taken their departure; but I knew not what had caused them to go off in such a hurry. I found out afterwards. Your conjecture was right. They had thrown one of the bombs into the fire, and the fuse catching, had caused it to explode, killing several of their number. As they believed it to be the hand of the Great Spirit, they had hastily gathered up such plunder as was most desirable to them, and ridden away from the spot. I did not know this at the time, and I lay still in my cave. For several hours all was silence; but, as night drew near, I fancied I again heard noises about the camp, and I thought the Indians might not yet be gone.

“When darkness came, I would have crawled toward the camp, but I could not; and I lay all night in the cave, chafing with the pain of my wound, and listening to the howling of the wolves. That was a terrible night.

“Morning dawned again, and I could hear no sounds. I was now suffering dreadfully, both from hunger and thirst. I saw a well-known tree growing in front of the cave. I knew it, because the same tree is found upon the mountains of the Mimbres, near our mine. It was a species of pine, called by the Mexicans ‘piñon,’ whose cones afford food to thousands of the miserable savages who roam over the great western Desert from the Rocky Mountains to California. If I could only reach this tree, I might find some of its nuts upon the ground; and, with this hope, I dragged myself painfully out of the cave. It was not twenty paces from the rocks where the tree grew; yet, with my weakness and the pain of my wound, I was nearly half an hour in reaching it. To my joy, I found the ground under it covered with cones. I was not long in stripping off the rinds of many of them, and getting the seeds, which I ate greedily, until I had satisfied my hunger.

“But another appetite far more terrible was craving me – I was tortured with thirst. Could I crawl as far as the camp? I knew that there I should find water in the stream; and, from the position of the cave, I knew I could not find it nearer. I must either reach it or die; and, with this thought to spur me on, I commenced the short journey of three hundred yards, although I was not certain I might live to see the end of it. I had not crawled six paces through the underwood, when a bunch of small white flowers attracted my attention. They were the flowers of the sorrel-tree – the beautiful lyonia – the very sight of which sent a thrill of gladness through my heart. I was soon under the tree, and, clutching one of its lowermost branches, I stripped it of its smooth, serrated leaves, and eagerly chewed them. Another and another branch were successively divested of their foliage, until the little tree looked as if a flock of goats had been breakfasting upon it. I lay for nearly an hour masticating the soft leaves, and swallowing their delicious and acid juice. At length my thirst was alleviated, and I fell asleep under the cool shadow of the lyonia.

“When I awoke again, I felt much stronger, and with new appetite to eat. The fever which had begun to threaten me was much allayed; and I knew this was to be attributed to the virtue of the leaves I had eaten – for besides relieving thirst, the sap of the sorrel-tree is a most potent febrifuge. Gathering a fresh quantity of the leaves, and tying them together, I again set out for the piñon-tree. I took the leaves with me, so that I should not have to make the return trip to the sorrel that night again. In a few minutes I had reached the end of my journey, and was busy among the cones. You laugh at my calling it a journey; but I assure you it was a most painful one to me, although it was not ten paces from one tree to the other. The slightest motion agonised me.

“That night I passed under the piñon, and in the morning, having made my breakfast of the seeds, I collected my pockets full, and set out again for the sorrel-tree. Here I spent the day; and with a fresh cargo of leaves returned at night to the piñon, where I again slept.

“Thus, for four successive days and nights, I passed between these two brave trees, living upon the sustenance they afforded. The fever was luckily warded off by the leaves of the friendly lyonia. My wound began to heal, and the pain left it. The wolves came at intervals; but, seeing my long knife, and that I still lived, they kept at a wary distance.

“Although the leaves of the sorrel assuaged my thirst, they did not satisfy it. I longed for a good draught of water; and, on the fourth day, I set out for the stream. I was now able to creep upon my hands and one knee, dragging the wounded limb after me. When I had got about half-way through the underwood, I came upon an object that almost congealed the blood in my veins. It was a human skeleton. I knew it was not that of a man – I knew it was – ”

Here the voice of the miner became choked with sobs, and he was unable to finish the sentence. Nearly all in the room – even the rude hunters – wept as they beheld his emotion. After an effort he continued: —

“I saw that she had been buried; and I wondered at this, for I knew the Indians had not done it. I was never certain until this hour who had performed for her that sacred rite. I thought, however, it must have been you; for after I had recovered I went back upon the trail; and, not finding your wagon anywhere, I knew you must have come on to the camp, and gone away again. I looked in every direction to find which way you had gone; but, as you will remember, there was a heavy fall of rain shortly after, and that had obliterated every track. All this happened after I was able to get upon my feet, which was not for a month after the night of the massacre. But let me go back in my narrative to where I had found the remains of my poor wife.

“The wolves had torn the body from its grave. I looked for some vestige of my child. With my hands I dug down into the loose mould and leaves, which you had thrown over her body; but no infant was there. I crawled on to the camp. I found that, just as you have described it – except that the bodies were now bleaching skeletons, and the wolves had taken their departure. I searched around, on all sides, thinking I might find some traces of my little Luisa; but in vain. ‘The Indians have either carried the child away,’ thought I, ‘or the fierce wolves have devoured it altogether.’

“In one of the wagons I found an old mess-chest lying hid under some rubbish. It had escaped the hurried plunder of the savages. On opening it, I saw that it contained, among other things, some coffee and several pounds of jerked meat. This was a fortunate event, for the meat and coffee nourished me, until I was able to gather a sufficient quantity of the piñons.