Manly Wade Wellman - Novel 1966 by Battle at Bear Paw Gap (v1.1) Page B

           Mark
worked in the early morning hours to cut an inner door from the new sleeping
chamber to the living room of the house. He sawed through log after log,
setting in short chunks to support the logs where they were newly severed. When
the opening was complete, he spiked heavy split slabs within it for a jamb, then went out to chop out more planks for a door.
                Then he heard his mother and Celia,
arguing at the front door, and strolled around to see why they disputed.
                 “But
we are almost out of corn meal, Mrs. Jarrett,” Celia was explaining. “Alice and
Anthony and I shelled a full bushel of corn these last two days, and ’tis only
a short trip to the mill.”
                 “You
shall not make that trip alone,” Mrs. Jarrett decreed firmly. “Where have your
ears been, Celia, with all this talk of murdering, sneaking Indians at hand.
Let my husband or Mark carry the corn for grinding.”
                 “But
I have scarce ventured out of the yard for so long,” Celia pleaded. “I feel
like a prisoner.”
                 “But
you are safe,” Mrs. Jarrett told her. “You do not go to the mill alone.”
                 “If
Celia wants to go, I’ll go with her as a guard,” Mark suggested, looking at
Celia’s pink cheeks.
                 “And
I, let me come,” put in Will, hurrying toward them.
                 “Not
you,” Mark said. “Stay here and spike together our inner door. When I come
back, we’ll hang it.”
                 Will
grimaced, but subsided.
                 “We
can carry the corn on Bolly ,” Mark went on. “She’s a
swift runner, and Celia will ride on her next to the sack. In case of any
breath of danger, Celia will gallop back home. I’ll challenge any foe, red or
white, among these woods I know so well.”
                 “And
I will not fear to travel any path with Mark beside me,” said Celia, her eyes
bright as she smiled.
                 “Be
it so, but both of you keep your eyes and wits sharp,” Mrs. Jarrett admonished
them soberly.
                 Mark
strode to the stable yard and saddled and bridled Bolly ,
a sprightly, clean-limbed mare. He led her to the house, and fetched out the
bag of shelled corn and hoisted it across the saddle bow, then took his rifle
and horn and bullet-pouch.
                 “Here,
Mark, if you’re for an errand at the mill,” said his father from the door.
                 Jarrett
appeared, holding another rifle in his big hands. “Take this, for Simon Durwell
to add to his weapons,” he said. “One more ready shot in a hurry might be
needed there some day.”
                 “Do
you let him have one of our guns?” Mark asked. “Nay, I do not know this one,
which is it?” “You, too, have forgotten it,” his father grinned. “I myself did
not call it to mind, back there in its dark corner, when we sat yesterday and
counted the firearms we had. Why, Mark, we took this from Quill Moxley himself,
last spring when he was discovered to be an enemy and not a friend. ’Tis a right good gun, too, better and truer by far than the man
who fetched it to Bear Paw Gap.”
                He held out the gun, and Mark took
it and surveyed it with the eyes of a practiced hunter. He would have liked to
have it himself, had he not grown so used to his own rifle.
                 “And
take with it this big horn of powder and these bullets, also taken from Moxley
when we banished him,” added his father passing them over. “Tell Durwell ’tis
lent him to keep and use if need be, until times are once more peaceful and he
cares to hand it back.”
                 Mark
checked trigger action, firing pan and the spark of the flint. Then he rammed
down a charge of powder and ball. He slung Moxley’s rifle to Bolly’s