Unto a Good Land (43 page)

“And . . . was it your thought to travel alone to California?”

“No. That’s what I wanted to tell you: the two of us should go together.”

There should be two, because the road was so awfully long. And two would find the gold much more easily than one. True enough—gold glittered and shone, but four eyes could see twice as much as two; and two would be safer against robbers and thieves.

“Are you coming with me, Arvid?”

It was the same question Robert had once before asked his friend, one night long ago in a stable room in their homeland. Then it had concerned North America, and so great had been Arvid’s surprise at Robert’s daring and ingenuity that he had been speechless for a long moment. Now the question concerned a journey to the land of gold in North America, and that land also lay so far away that the sun needed extra hours to reach it in the mornings.

Robert repeated his question: “Are you coming with me, Arvid?”

“I want to—that you must know. But I’m in Danjel’s service.”

“He cannot keep you here! Not in America.”

“But I owe my master for the journey here.”

Danjel Andreasson had paid the expense for his servant’s emigration, and Arvid felt it would be dishonest to leave him before he had repaid Danjel through his work. But he too knew full well that no master could keep him longer than he wanted to stay; no servant law was in force here, no sheriff fetched runaway farm hands.

“You can pay Danjel what you owe him when you come back from California!” said Robert. “You can just hand him a chunk of gold.”

Yes, returning from the gold fields Arvid would be so well-to-do that he need never again lift his hand in work, neither with ax, hoe, nor any other tool. He had only to carry his gold to the bank and each month withdraw sufficient interest to pay his expenses; there would be plenty of money to pay Danjel.

Moreover, the two youths had once and for all promised each other to stick together in America.

“I haven’t forgotten that promise,” said Arvid, deeply moved. “I want to follow you, that you must know. But I must talk to Danjel before I shake your hand on it.”

Robert already felt sure he could persuade Arvid to go with him to California.

“You mustn’t whisper a word to anyone! I don’t intend to tell Karl Oskar until the day before I leave!”

He had already figured out the way to take: They would board the
Red Wing
next time the packet steamer came to Stillwater, then the boat would carry them down the Mississippi to St. Louis, the same way they had traveled last summer. By helping to load wood and wash dishes, they would not have to pay a cent for their transportation on the
Red Wing.
From St. Louis they could walk dryshod all the way to California, following the great highways that led to the West.

“Isn’t there any—any ocean in between?” Arvid asked with some concern.

Robert assured him there was not; only solid land, mostly dry, sandy stretches where they could walk comfortably to the home of the gold in the New World.

Robert had long been listening to his left ear, its persistent humming and ringing urging him on:
Come! Come!
A new land far away called him again, and having obtained his friend’s promise of company, he would soon follow the call.

But the winter was to interfere with his plans; the frost grew in intensity, soon the whole St. Croix River was covered with solid ice. The
Red Wing
’s
bell no longer was heard in Stillwater; indeed, no craft would be seen on the river until next spring when the ice had broken up; the inhabitants of the St. Croix Valley were separated from the outside world by the frozen river.

For the rest of the winter Robert was shut up in Minnesota Territory.

—3—

Early one Sunday morning, Robert picked up his brother’s gun and went into the forest. New-fallen snow, three or four inches deep, covered the ground; it was fine hunting weather. Not far from the cabin he came on the tracks of an elk, and hunting fever seized him. The elk could not be very far away—Karl Oskar had not yet shot an elk—think if he could shoot this big animal and be the first one to bring home all the meat!

The elk tracks led past the Indian-head, and Robert stopped a moment to look up at the cliff. The stone Indian stared back at him with his unchanging, black eye holes. As long as this cliff had existed—for thousands of years—those deep, inscrutable eyes had looked out over the forest; the Indian stood guard for his brown-skinned people, an eternal watchman over the hunting grounds hereabouts. But his green wreath was now withered, the bushes on top of his head had lost their leaves, the wind whipped the naked, dry branches; only above the Indian’s left ear some limbs still carried their leaves—like eagle feathers stuck behind his ear.

Every time Robert looked at the enormous face of this cliff, a strange sensation of uneasiness stole over him; there was something threatening in the stone Indian’s eternal immobility; he felt like a sneaking intruder on the age-old hunting grounds of the savages.

Suddenly he crouched, holding his breath: he had discovered a living Indian close by.

Below the cliff, hardly a gunshot from where he stood, a human figure huddled in the top of a small birch. His face was turned away from Robert, but he could see skinny legs, partly covered by tattered skins which fluttered in the wind. And near his hands Robert could clearly see a bent branch—the Indian’s bow!

For a long minute he grew cold and hot in quick succession. An Indian lurking in the tree, with his bow and sharp arrows! Whom could this sly brownskin be waiting for? White intruders who trespassed on his hunting grounds? Was he waiting for Robert? Was that why he had climbed the birch? The Indians were said to surprise their prey from treetops. . . .

Robert held on to his gun butt with trembling fingers. Apparently he had discovered the Indian before being seen himself; why not fire first? But if he missed? An Indian could shoot a score of arrows in a minute. And already Robert could feel them penetrate his body—twenty arrows all over his body! Hadn’t he seen one single Indian arrow kill a huge buck? If he should miss—he could see himself dead.

But perhaps the Indian too was after elk. Perhaps he too had seen the fresh tracks? If he were waiting for game, then Robert might be able to sneak away before being seen. As yet there had been no threatening move.

Robert threw himself down in the snow and began hitching himself away on his elbows, his gun above his head. In this way he moved some twenty yards until he reached a thicket, behind which he crouched cautiously; now the man in the tree could not see him. He wasn’t sure if an arrow had pursued him—a bow did not give a report like a gun, and he didn’t hear too well.

He waited a few minutes but nothing happened. Carefully he separated the branches to peek through: the Indian was still sitting in the tree, he didn’t seem to have moved the least bit, he still held his bow in the same position. Indians could sit for hours in a tree, as immobile as stones; he must still be waiting, watching the trail below the cliff.

Robert was now sure the Indian had not yet seen him, and if he could get away a little farther he would be beyond reach of an arrow.

As he began to steal away he heard a rustle in the thicket. He listened. Was it the wind? Or a rabbit? Or was it an arrow? He heard the sound again; some branches moved close by his head where he lay on the ground. It must have been an arrow striking in the thicket, the Indian must have discovered him when he peeked through a moment before.

For a third time there was a rustle in the bush, the branches quivered; now he could clearly hear the whizz of an arrow through the air!

He grew panicky; his heartbeats throbbed in his ears, he felt choked. He aimed the gun in the general direction of the Indian and fired. The report echoed loudly against the cliff, the shot must have been heard for miles. It was so loud that it deafened him and echoed inside his eardrums. What had he done? He had fired the gun in fright, without exactly knowing why. Now all the Indians in the vicinity would be warned, now they would all come after him!

Seized by an overwhelming fear, Robert took to his heels. He ran as if the devil were after him. He ran toward the cabin the shortest way he knew, he slunk between the trunks of a thick stand of timbers; he was conscious of leaving tracks behind for his pursuers to follow, but he was too scared to look back; the Indians could run twice as fast as white men, and they had fresh snow tracks to follow. But Robert dared not look to find out if they followed him; he did not stop to consider that if an Indian had pursued him he would immediately have been overtaken.

He didn’t even slow down as he reached the lake shore and saw the cabin, he rushed panting in through the door and sank down on his bed. It was some time before he recovered his breath sufficiently to speak, and Karl Oskar and Kristina watched him and wondered what had happened.

Robert had brought back no game. But Karl Oskar knew that he often missed with his shots and as he now looked at the gun he could see that it had been fired; a little annoyed at this waste of powder and bullet, he asked: “What have you been shooting at?”

“I shot—an Indian.”

“You lie!”

“No. No. But he shot at me first.”

And by and by Robert breathed easier and could stammer out his story: He had almost been shot to death, near the Indian cliff. A brown-skin had been sitting in wait for him in a tree. Robert had sought protection behind some bushes, but the Indian had shot several arrows at him. He had had to defend himself and he had fired a shot at the Indian. Then he had run home as fast as he could.

“Did no one come after you?”

“Not as far as I could see. That’s why I’m sure I shot him.”

Karl Oskar grew more concerned. But he controlled himself, he didn’t want to say anything that might frighten Kristina. He took Robert outside and questioned him in detail about everything that had taken place below the cliff.

Since the Indian had not pursued him, Robert was sure his bullet had hit him, he had seen him fall down from the tree like a fat woodcock.

“Did you really sec him fall?” asked Karl Oskar.

“Well—I ran as fast as I could. . . .”

“But you don’t know for sure if you hit him? I hope to God you didn’t!”

And Karl Oskar told his brother what he had not wanted to say in Kristina’s presence: If he had shot an Indian, he had brought disaster on all of them.

He had many times admonished Robert to avoid the Indians and never in any way to disturb them. All had been well so far, they had lived in peace with the Chippewas. If it was true that Robert had been waylaid and attacked with arrows, and had defended himself, then he was within his rights. But if he had wounded or killed a peaceful Indian, then revenge-hungry tribe members would make them all pay for it; then their copper-colored neighbors would soon come and call on them.

“I only hope you missed him!” Karl Oskar repeated.

The next few days Karl Oskar went in constant fear that the Indians would appear at the cabin for revenge. He tried to figure out how he might summon help in time. He had heard of Fort Snelling, near St. Paul, where the Americans kept a company of soldiers to protect the whites. But it was thirty miles to the fort, and long before a message could reach there the Indians would have had time to murder them and burn down their house. There was this about the savages, they could never be relied on; no one could predict what they would do.

But then one day something happened to allay his fears: The Indians on the island in Lake Ki-Chi-Saga broke up their camp and moved away; brownskins no longer lived in their vicinity. It was the custom of the Chippewas to live in winter quarters some forty or fifty miles to the south.

—4—

Some weeks went by, and Karl Oskar had almost forgotten about Robert’s encounter with the Indian in the tree. Then one day, having picked up his gun to follow some forest birds, he happened to pass the Indian cliff. Snowdrifts had now piled on the Indian-head, giving him wintry eyebrows, and a crown of glittering snow. In summer this Indian had a green wreath, in winter a white crown. But Karl Oskar’s alert eyes espied something else: A birch tree grew below the cliff, and something was fastened to the top of the birch.

He walked toward it to investigate; someone was hanging in the treetop, a human being, an Indian. This Indian could not move, however, he was frozen stiff. The wind had swept away the snow, but no odor tainted the air—the frost was protecting the corpse from decay.

Robert’s Indian was still hanging in his tree. He had hung there for weeks; he was stone dead. The shot had hit him then, the calamity Karl Oskar feared had taken place. But the rest of the tribe must not have discovered what had happened to one of their members, they must not have found his body. Or why hadn’t they come for revenge?

Then he discovered something else in the treetop, something he couldn’t understand at first. He walked around the tree, looking up; he climbed a stone to see better, and suddenly the mystery was solved; now he knew why they had been spared a visit from revengeful neighbors:
The Indian in the tree had been hung there!
His neck was pierced through by the top of the birch, which had been sharpened and stuck through the neck like a spear. The top of the young tree was bent like a bow, the Indian was strung up through his neck, like a dead fish on a forked stick.