A Drift from Redwood Camp | Page 4

some impending
martyrdom. Then he began to dread that his innocent deceit--if deceit it
was--should be discovered; at last, partly from meekness and partly
from the animal contentment of present security, he accepted the
situation. Fortunately for him it was purely passive. The Great Chief of
the Minyo tribe was simply an expressionless idol of flesh and blood.
The previous incumbent of that office had been an old man, impotent
and senseless of late years through age and disease. The chieftains and
braves had consulted in council before him, and perfunctorily
submitted their decisions, like offerings, to his unresponsive shrine. In
the same way, all material events--expeditions, trophies,
industries--were supposed to pass before the dull, impassive eyes of the
great chief, for direct acceptance. On the second day of Elijah's
accession, two of the braves brought a bleeding human scalp before
him. Elijah turned pale, trembled, and averted his head, and then,
remembering the danger of giving way to his weakness, grew still more
ghastly. The warriors watched him with impassioned faces. A
grunt--but whether of astonishment, dissent, or approval, he would not
tell--went round the circle. But the scalp was taken away and never
again appeared in his presence.
An incident still more alarming quickly followed. Two captives, white
men, securely bound, were one day brought before him on their way to
the stake, followed by a crowd of old and young squaws and children.
The unhappy Elijah recognized in the prisoners two packers from a
distant settlement who sometimes passed through Redwood Camp. An

agony of terror, shame, and remorse shook the pseudo chief to his crest
of high feathers, and blanched his face beneath its paint and yellow
ochre. To interfere to save them from the torture they were evidently to
receive at the hands of those squaws and children, according to custom,
would be exposure and death to him as well as themselves; while to
assist by his passive presence at the horrible sacrifice of his countrymen
was too much for even his weak selfishness. Scarcely knowing what he
did as the lugubrious procession passed before him, he hurriedly hid his
face in his blanket and turned his back upon the scene. There was a
dead silence. The warriors were evidently unprepared for this
extraordinary conduct of their chief. What might have been their action
it was impossible to conjecture, for at that moment a little squaw,
perhaps impatient for the sport and partly emboldened by the fact that
she had been selected, only a few days before, as the betrothed of the
new chief, approached him slyly from the other side. The horrified eyes
of Elijah, momentarily raised from his blanket, saw and recognized her.
The feebleness of a weak nature, that dared not measure itself directly
with the real cause, vented its rage on a secondary object. He darted a
quick glance of indignation and hatred at the young girl. She ran back
in startled terror to her companions, a hurried consultation followed,
and in another moment the whole bevy of girls, old women, and
children were on the wing, shrieking and crying, to their wigwams.
"You see," said one of the prisoners coolly to the other, in English, "I
was right. They never intended to do anything to us. It was only a bluff.
These Minyos are a different sort from the other tribes. They never kill
anybody if they can help it."
"You're wrong," said the other, excitedly. "It was that big chief there,
with his head in a blanket, that sent those dogs to the right about. Hell!
did you see them run at just a look from him? He's a high and mighty
feller, you bet. Look at his dignity!"
"That's so--he ain't no slouch," said the other, gazing at Elijah's muffled
head, critically. "D----d if he ain't a born king."
The sudden conflict and utter revulsion of emotion that those simple
words caused in Elijah's breast was almost incredible. He had been at

first astounded by the revelation of the peaceful reputation of the
unknown tribe he had been called upon to govern; but even this
comforting assurance was as nothing compared to the greater
revelations implied in the speaker's praise of himself. He, Elijah Martin!
the despised, the rejected, the worthless outcast of Redwood Camp,
recognized as a "born king," a leader; his power felt by the very men
who had scorned him! And he had done nothing--stop! had he actually
done NOTHING? Was it not possible that he was REALLY what they
thought him? His brain reeled under the strong, unaccustomed wine of
praise; acting upon his weak selfishness, it exalted him for a moment to
their measure of his strength, even as their former belief in his
inefficiency had kept him down. Courage is too often only the