the years rolled by. old tragic hurts were dulled by the mists of passing time and every hour of the unfettered present came bringing some new joy. new children came to queen and in the love of each succeeding one, queen rejoiced as if it were the first and only one. carefully she led them all to the doorway of maturity and there, since life willed it so, she gave them over to the herd, to live and provide for themselves and to abide by the unwritten laws of the herd in the finest exemplification of the golden rule on earth. the friends who died or who suddenly disappeared she would miss for a long while, sometimes spending months in search of them, then she would transfer her love of them to some other member of the brotherhood, just as she transferred her mother-love from the older to the younger of her offspring.
the shadowy creatures of the receding past often came, walking into the dozing memory at nightfall. queen would remain lying, chewing absent-mindedly and watching them, her contentment undisturbed, loving the sadness that clung to them, as we love the sadness that clings to our sweetest music.
there came a spring of unusual activity on the part of man, and his daily appearance intruded so threateningly upon the herd, that they abandoned the land which had become endeared to them and journeyed north almost steadily for many days.
they came upon a pleasant valley abounding in delicious, virgin grass and many small ponds; and they took possession of it. but at midnight, while they were resting, they were suddenly aroused by a shrieking noise which was followed by a long-drawn rattle, like distant thunder.
the sound died out and did not come again, but an attenuated cloud of smoke swept across the valley. though the rest of that night was undisturbed and the air, from then on, was clear, they kept awake and fearfully restless. at dawn they abandoned the valley though they saw nothing that was alarming; and as they moved northward, they came upon a railroad track.
on the other side of the track the land stretched away silent and desolate, merging at the northern horizon in a long, narrow shadow, as of woodland. the tracks remained perfectly motionless and the herd slowly ventured near them. while some of the horses looked on curiously, some of the headstrong young colts to the dismay of their mothers, walked upon the tracks and sniffed at them. seeing that nothing happened to them, the herd started at once to cross.
half a mile north of that they came upon another elongated slough which had been hidden by a hill. always glad to see water, they trotted down in concert and took possession, once more intending to end the journey. but toward evening while the colts were expressing the joy of life in a gambol about the water, they were startled by another shriek like the one of the night before, and associating it somehow with the tracks, they tore up the slope to see what it was.
in the distant east glowed a light, like the harvest moon. it gleamed from the centre of a black, fear-inspiring object from which clouds of smoke poured into the air and streamed backward into space. they gazed upon it for a few moments as if transfixed, then when they realised that it was coming rapidly nearer, they broke down into the valley, splashing through the slough and sped up the other slope. on the top of that hill, they stopped to look back. the thing was already thundering past them, shutting away the whole of the south with a long, black line of smoke in which sparkled a thousand star-like eyes of fire.
had they remained to look at that line of smoke, they might have lost the fear of it. within a few minutes it went as it had come. the sweet evening air cleared and settled down to the silence they loved. but such is the way of destiny that a thing of smoke and illusion may wield a power greater than that of iron or mind.
they did not wait long enough to see what it really was. an impassable wall had arisen behind them. a guard of ferocious beasts had rushed across their path, shutting from them forever the old south world they knew so well. to queen it was, in the vaguest sense, somewhat more than that. the apprehensions of the moment were dispelled by the widening distance between them and this weird thing they feared; but a new anxiety crept into queen’s heart, like a snaky creature, and grew bolder there as the danger it forecast approached. it was the fear of the hunted for the cage. it was as if she had entered an enormous trap and had seen the door shut upon her.
they instinctively kept to a strip of wild prairie several miles in width. on the eastern and western horizon they saw from time to time shacks and barns and fences and huge squares of black, plowed earth; and from the distances came at long intervals the muffled barking of dogs. the feel and the smell of man was in the air, and they found that air hard to breathe. they grazed when hunger asserted itself and rested when the younger colts refused to go on, but continued their migration.
they came to a country where there were no shacks and no fences, where the evenness was broken only by promising patches of woodland. there the earth seemed destitute of living things and in the moaning of the winds as they blew through the swaying trees, the spirit of loneliness assured them of safety. the grass on the open spaces grew high as if no living thing had ever touched it, and swaying with the trees, it subtly testified to the authenticity of that assurance. in queen’s mind, however, the shacks and the fences and the barking of dogs were as yet too distinct to allow her to feel entirely secure; and she continued the flight, fear urging her to go on till the last trace of man had faded from the air and a wall of solitude and wilderness had covered it. but they came one day to a very steep slope. tall trees rose from the foot of the slope and beyond their tops queen saw the reflecting waters of the saskatchewan pouring along rapidly from west to east.
the river was very wide and the darker waters beneath the brighter surface indicated a perilous depth. the fear of the trap that had been vague in queen’s mind now became distinct as she gazed at the obscure distance from which the river came and at the shadowy spaces into which it rushed. her faith in the north had given her a decade of precarious freedom and had taken her two hundred miles from her birthplace. the sight of those impassable volumes of water staggered that faith. she grew nervous and restless and when the herd had drunk the treacherous water, she led them away to the west.
a half day’s journey brought them to where the vermillion river tearing along between high banks comes pouring down from the south and the west and breaks into the saskatchewan, with a threatening roar. again queen felt that she had come to another wall of the trap and turning, led the herd back toward the east. a few days of grazing and moving east along the saskatchewan brought them to a barbed wire fence that ran down the banks to the very edge of the river. ever as she had followed the slightly winding river, she had searched in vain for a ford. the doors of the north, too, had closed to them, and their freedom now depended upon a battle of wits, the wits of the herd in the limited wilds against the wits of man in his protecting civilisation.
they returned to the middle of the unsettled belt and there queen spent a happy week of freedom, disturbed only by the promptings of the canker within her which derived its sustenance from the frequent appearance of men on horseback.
seeding time arrived and the homesteaders who lived south of the railroad tracks went forth to hunt for the horses they had released the preceding fall. the homesteaders who lived on the outskirts of these wilds, in the hope of capturing some of the unclaimed horses, joined them. but with a cunning that exasperated the hunters, queen went from one hiding place to another, detecting every approach so long before the horsemen appeared that in the first full week of searching she was seen only on two occasions.
the homesteaders became desperate. the snows were fast disappearing and the land was in best condition for their work. they appealed to the canadian government and half a dozen members of the royal northwest mounted police came out to reinforce them in the war to the knife that was declared upon queen and her followers.
several times a day queen would run down the banks of the saskatchewan. at the river she would take a few sips of water as if she had come to drink and then she would stand and look longingly across the roaring deeps to the wilds beyond, suppressing the constantly rising impulse to plunge into the rapid waters and beat her way to the freedom of the north, which seemed, after half a lifetime of benefaction, to have abandoned her. then one day the impulse came with overwhelming suddenness and she struck out madly for the other shore. but when she felt the bottom drop away from under her feet, she became frightened. the remnants of the huge snow drifts that were still melting kept the river swollen to twice its volume. the current lifted her and carried her several rods downstream, fortunately for her, hitting a bar and depositing her there.
puffing and snorting and registering the promise that she would never try it again, queen finally clambered back upon the shore where she shook the water from her body. some of the horses who had watched the whole performance with anxiety, came trotting toward her. queen joined them dejectedly, grateful to be out of the treacherous water, but remembering that she was being hunted and realising now that there was no chance of getting across the river and that her only hope lay in her delicate legs and the cunning that many years of resistance to man had developed.
a few days passed by in which all hostilities on the part of the homesteaders and the mounted police seemed to have ceased. queen began to feel that the war had been abandoned; but she was surprised one very early morning by a formidable group of horsemen, less than a quarter of a mile to the east from where the herd was grazing, who were coming at full speed. a strong wind had been blowing from the west and had carried the scent and sound of them away. a lull in the wind apprised her of the enemy’s approach.
they had been moving along the edge of a patch of dense woodland, the wall of which stretched from the saskatchewan to a point a little more than a mile south of the river. there was no opening between the trees and the brush. the only chance for escape lay in a wild dash south and in reaching the end of the wooded wall before the horsemen could reach it. that chance they took.
the horsemen divided into groups. one group sped away southwest at an angle, while another, going straight west, spread out on a long line to prevent the herd from going back to the river.
it was a close race. every animal, pursuing or pursued, groaned in the terrible exertion of it. the younger and the stronger of the herd led the race, with queen’s magnificent head in front. behind the group of fastest runners came the mothers with their colts, and the old work-worn horses brought up the rear. though spurs dug unmercifully into wet, throbbing sides, staining them with small red spots, the forepart of the herd, unencumbered by riders, won the end of the wall and broke away to the west in safety. not until the wall point was almost out of sight did they stop to look back and when queen finally felt it safe to do so and swung round a knoll, she saw no sign of her pursuers; but the far greater portion of the herd was gone with them.
about a mile southwest of where they were, they knew of a slough. it was down in a deep hollow and though they would rather have remained on the hills where they could more easily spy any one coming after them, they were very thirsty and trotted away for water. at the rim of the hollow some of them stopped to look about before going down, others broke down on a run.
queen drank very little. she was worried and very nervous. while most of the horses walked into the pond, looking for deeper and clearer water, she took a few hasty sips of the warm, muddy stuff on the edge and then ran up the slope to take another look. there seemed to be nothing untoward on the plains, but to make sure she remained there a while and grazed.
she had not been grazing more than a few minutes when she was startled by a frantic splashing in the pond. she looked down in time to see white-black whose forelegs had sunk into a mud-hole, attempt to turn round. half a dozen of the others began to struggle just as frantically. some of them managed to reach hard ground, but white-black and two others seemed to sink deeper the harder they struggled.
at first all this violent effort to get out made her think that some awful danger had suddenly arisen in the centre of the pond, but the light grey mud on the flanks of those who did get out, apprised her of the fact that they had struck an alkali mud-hole. she had had her experience with alkali mud-holes before. they had been in the habit of drinking at the other end of the slough and had come to this end now only because the other end was somewhat nearer to the territory from which they had just escaped.
she hurried down to the side of white-black and as he resumed his struggling, she called to him anxiously. finally the three of them ceased struggling for a while and set up a helpless neighing to which those on the shore responded just as helplessly.
there was little danger of drowning for the water was very shallow, but the fear of being caught, the fear of the pursued creature still warm in their throbbing hearts, kept them struggling and their struggles tired them out and drove them down deeper into the mud. queen was perplexed. it seemed as if everything were combining for their destruction, that even the mud joined man in his effort to torture them. she called to the helpless creatures ceaselessly, running up and down the slope in a frenzy of fear.
suddenly while she was down at the edge of the pond, urging white-black to exert himself and white-black was groaning for want of strength, the wind shifted and brought from the northwest a message of danger. the horses who were free ran up the slope to the southeast. queen, who was this time behind the others, suddenly stopped half way up the slope and turning back called frantically to white-black. her life long association with white-black had endeared him more strongly to her than the other two and it seemed hard for her to leave him in distress.
she ran back to the edge of the water, stamping her foot and calling with all her strength; but white-black only weakened himself. one of the two other horses, in a violent last effort, pulled himself half way out, and dropped back, but white-black ceased trying.
the hoof beats of the free horses faded away in the distance and their rhythmic patter was followed by those of the enemy’s horses. a man’s head appeared at the rim of the hollow and with a last call to white-black, queen shot up the slope and away to the southwest. the men had seen the other horses first and had veered to go after them, when they discovered queen. trying to head her off, one man started down the slope and as he did so he discovered white-black and his two companions struggling in the mud.
as queen fled she heard the one man whistling to the others. she could not hear anyone behind her but she did not stop to find out whether she was being followed or not. in the distant west she saw the shadowy blue of a clump of trees and she made for that with every bit of strength left in her. when she reached the trees she first shot under cover, then investigating to make sure that no dangerous animal was hidden there, or that no men were coming from any other direction, she pushed her way out to a thicket of buffalo berries, and stopped to scan the plains she had covered.
not a living thing stirred on the monotonous level of the prairies. only heat waves danced above the narrow, blue strips of woodland shadows. within a few minutes she was convinced that no one was coming after her and then despite her fear and restlessness, and her anxiety to get back to the other horses that had escaped, she sank down to the ground, snorting and panting like a dog. but within half an hour she was off again in pursuit of the remnant of the herd.
all through the afternoon she hunted them, stopping often to graze and to drink, now trotting, now loping, going fast when something on the horizon made her think that she had found them or walking slowly when she realised that she had been mistaken; calling often, sometimes with all her strength as if she hoped they would hear her and sometimes calling softly and hopelessly only because she felt an urge to express the feeling that had taken complete possession of her.
toward evening when the light began fading and the shadows grew long, she trotted cautiously to the pond where she had left white-black in the mud. the desire to find him grew stronger as the evening progressed toward night and queen went at full speed.
the unruffled surface of the pond was brightly reflecting the last rays of daylight when she turned over the rim of the hollow and stopped there to make sure that the men were gone. even those thoughtless men who hated her—they were not many—if they had been able to see her as she slowly came walking over the rim a step at a time, would have admired that beautiful head in the evening silhouette with its touch of magnificence and the cunning that had kept her out of their greedy reach.
a few ducks were moving about in the glitter. immediately upon seeing her they rose into the air and flew away. queen trotted down to the muddy edge where white-black had been trapped. the mud that was not covered with water was stippled with countless hoof prints. here and there on the stippled surface she saw impressions of the whole side of a horse and she knew that the horses had fallen many times after coming out of the mud-hole. some of these impressions still bore the scent of white-black and queen excitedly read the story of his struggle with his captors. for some time she walked round the slough, stopping now and then to sniff or to break the heavy silence by long and nervous whinnies, then realising the futility of her going round the slough and feeling suddenly a sense of confinement in the hollow, she went up the slope and on the rim began to feed.
the ducks came back. they flew directly over her to see just what she was. assured that she was neither man nor coyote, they swept down to the water’s surface, touching it gracefully with a melodious splash. queen lifted her head a trifle above the grass and stared at them thoughtfully. the sight of the little black objects sailing about in the bright reflection of the sky and the occasional murmur that came from them out of the stillness, gladdened her. she felt somewhat less alone.
it was a hard night for queen. she needed rest very badly but she was much too apprehensive and too lonely to rest well. when the ducks late in the night flew away, the hollow became unbearable to her and she wandered off over the plains searching and calling and tiring herself out.
during the day she rested some, then from one end of the wilds to the other she rambled, searching for her companions and finding only fences and lifeless shacks which stood on the level distances, stony sentinels forever barring her way with threat of captivity. along the east side of her desolated domains she followed fence after fence for days without coming upon a trace of the herd. with eyes alert for the first sign of man, she stuck to the east, because she knew that her captured followers had all been taken in that direction.
she came to where the fence broke into two parts leaving an open roadway between. she entered the roadway cautiously and walked farther and farther, scanning the distances as she went. but when she had gone half a mile, the feeling of having fences on both sides and so near to her, began to worry her and she turned and raced back for the wilds.
when she saw, however, that the avenue had not closed upon her, she walked in again. she went about a mile this time and spied a group of horses in one of these wiry enclosures. she started away in great haste, but soon stopped still. there was a man’s shack only a quarter of a mile away from where the horses were and she was afraid to go. she called to them emotionally but besides raising their heads to look her way, they made no attempt to come to her, and when she called again a dog came out of the shack and started in her direction barking ferociously.
on her way out of the avenue through which she had come, she noticed half a mile from the furthest point she had reached, that the wires turned leaving her another open avenue through which she could approach the group of horses on the other side of the fence and very much farther from the shack. very cautiously and very nervously she followed that avenue, stopping very often to make sure that she hadn’t already been trapped, and when she reached the other side of the fence, some of the horses who had been watching her, came forward to meet her. here the fence ended completely and when she saw the plains stretch from there unfenced, she lost a good deal of her fear and trotted in their direction, calling eagerly as she ran.
queen was so excited when a dozen noses reached over the wires to greet her that she cut herself several times on the barbs without knowing that she had cut herself. having greeted her, however, the confined horses went on grazing; while queen capered about on the outside, calling again and again and reaching over the wires recklessly, to the consternation of the strangers who would just raise their heads a moment, look at her curiously and go on about their business.
white-black was not there and those whom she recognised were all horses that had but the fall before attached themselves to her herd. but she was happy to see them and to be with them and grazed with a better appetite than she had had for a long time. she grazed just outside of the fence, moving along as they moved within.
she spent the night there outside of the fence and though the group of horses kept walking away considerably they were yet near enough to dispel the gloom and the loneliness that had been hanging over her world since the herd had been taken from her. it was the pleasantest night she had had for some time. queen intended to remain there outside that fence; but she was discovered next morning by a man who came for some of the horses and his dog went after her. at first for fear of the man, she ran as fast as she could go, the dog at her heels; but when she got to where she was no longer afraid of the man, she turned upon the dog, striking at him with a lifted foot. she did not hit him but he did not wait for her second attempt. he fled surprised and badly frightened, yelping for help.
she experienced a good deal of satisfaction over his cowardly departure; but she was afraid of the man who seemed to be coming in her direction and who was calling loudly to the dog; and so she ran away. the experience of the night was like a clue to her in her search for her companions. from there she went to other fences. fences were hateful things but they were also hopeful affairs and she expected to find her friends in one of them. thus she penetrated farther and farther into man’s dominion. over the endless, deviating roadways, between the endless lines of fence posts and the treacherous barbed wire, always alert, she went, confident that she could find her way out in case of danger. when she would come upon a group of horses in some fence she would follow them on the outside, grazing as they grazed and lying down when they were near her.
she did not find those of her companions whom she was most anxious to find, and those that she did come upon, though they always replied to her, did not always come to her when she called. queen began to feel vaguely and painfully that her influence was gone, that her regency was over. like the dethroned leader that she was, she accepted the censure that was due her for having failed, with almost evident humility.
her loneliness became harder to bear. she wearied of the life of interminable limitations and the fence posts on all sides of her began to hurt her as if the roadways had steadily grown narrower and the barbs had penetrated her skin.
so she started back toward the west, toward the wilds she loved, hoping that there she might find the rest of the herd where the herd by the natural right of things belonged. when she was back again upon the unsettled wilds she was happier for a while; but as she went from one familiar spot to another—the pond where white-black had been trapped, the various patches and strips of woodland where they used to hide or spend their nights, and the river—the loneliness grew heavier in her heart and queen began to lose interest in life. grass and water there was plenty, but the taste could no longer derive complete satisfaction from grass and water. after every mouthful she cropped she would lift her head and look so wistfully over the spaces that she would forget to chew the grass between her teeth. she would start off and gallop away over the prairie as if she had suddenly thought of some place where she was sure she would find her companions and just as suddenly she would stop and continue to graze.
her loneliness became unendurable. it seemed to have peopled the solitudes with invisible creatures bent upon harming her. she was afraid to rest, afraid even to graze or drink. once more she took to the labyrinthine avenues between fence posts, penetrating with impassioned eagerness the very heart of the homesteading district, seeing many homesteaders’ shacks and fighting many dogs, becoming reckless as she became accustomed to them. often as these remote farmers plowed their fields, they would hear her call, sometimes finding her only a few rods behind them; and their horses fettered as they were in their harness would turn their heads and reply to her. when a farmer set his dog upon her she would fight him; but when the farmer himself started for her, she would lope away and he would not see her again for many days.
she came upon a small group of horses in an enclosed pasture, one day, among whom she spied the brown stallion and a little bay mare who had nestled close to her many a cold winter night. this pasture was farther in the area of wire fences than queen had ever gone before. as soon as she called, the group started in her direction. she was so overwhelmed by the familiar scents of those she knew that she could not control herself. first she ran along the fence a while, then she deliberately trotted away from the fence. going off for a few rods and coming back at full speed she leaped over the wires. though she was slightly cut on one of her hind legs, she landed safely in the midst of the group.
they were as happy to see her as she was to see them and the expression of their excitement and joy attracted the attention of the farmer and his dog in the shack a quarter of a mile away. she was sniffing noses with a grey horse whom she had mistaken in the distance for white-black, when she caught sound of the barking of the farmer’s dog, and turned to see him coming toward her.
he was a big, ferocious-looking, wolf-like dog, much bigger than the average coyote and many times as savage. at his approach, the other horses started away but queen, who was not ready to part from her companions again so soon, stopped to fight him. he remained a short distance away from her, barking angrily, turning his head backward now and then as if he waited for reinforcement, his eyes glaring at her threateningly. the other horses had turned about and stopped to watch the battle, and queen, feeling encouraged by their watching, waited for him to come nearer.
but suddenly, taking her eyes off the beast for just a moment, she saw two men lead two saddle ponies into the barbed wire enclosure and she made a dash for the fence, hoping to jump over it before they arrived. just as soon as she started off the dog rushed at her with a bark and a snarl. in terror of him, she turned to strike at him with her hoof, but as soon as she turned the dog sprang out of reach. when she turned once more for the fence the dog seized her tail. she struck him with a hind leg. he let go his hold of the tail and dug his fangs into her leg.
had there been no men coming, she might have fought it out with him. as it was they were already racing toward her and in desperation, queen loped after the rest of the horses who were now stampeding away to the other end of the pasture. when she reached her companions she plunged into their midst as if she expected them to protect her.
the men first drove the entire group to the corner nearest to the shack and there setting the dog upon her they separated her from the other horses. they continued to urge the dog to go at her and his ferocious teeth and the nerve wracking noise he was making so confused her that she stopped to fight him almost disregarding the two men, whose ropes, as she faced the dog, sailed over and dropped upon her head.
the ropes so alarmed her that she paid no more attention to the dog. she reared in an effort to pull her head from the loops but this only tightened their hateful grip. while she was uselessly struggling the men slipped from their saddles and fastened the ends of their ropes to a fence post on each side of the corner. then slowly they pulled the ropes in, forcing her back. despite the pain it gave her, queen tugged and pulled and reared. the men then got some more ropes from a boy who came with them from the shack and with these new ropes they first caught a front leg and after a long struggle caught a hind one, then pulling on the ropes they threw her to the ground.
she fell with a sickening thud. a spell of dizziness came upon her and she half shut her eyes as consciousness began slipping from her. but fear and assailing odours brought her to her senses. she made a violent effort to continue the struggle, but a man leaped for her head and seized her nose bone with both his hands. with a quick twist he turned her nose upward and she lay absolutely helpless. she snorted and groaned but she could not rise. she felt the bony fingers of the man gripping her nose bone and felt the other man winding ropes about her legs.
what they wanted with her she could not know. she thought of the coyote as she had seen him sitting over and feasting upon her colt. her skin quivered all over her body and she tried once more to throw off the appalling weights that kept her down; but her attempts only proved to her how hopelessly she was in their power, how easy it was for them to do just what they liked with her. she expected them at any moment to begin tearing the flesh from her body.
the smell of man was nauseating, their voices were terrifying and it seemed as if she just could not endure the pain that the man’s fingers gave her as they dug round her nose bone; yet worse than all this was the smoke and the smell of fire that suddenly filled the atmosphere, bringing terrors out of her darkened past to help in her torture.
suddenly she felt a pain that was worse than any pain she had ever experienced in her life before. they were pressing some terrible instrument into her shoulder, an instrument that penetrated the skin like the teeth of a dog but a thousand times more painfully. all her hatred, all her fear combined, and with a strength that the greedy men admired she began to struggle again. as she struggled, the man gripped tighter on her nose bone and the pain of his digging fingers took her mind off the burning pain in her shoulder.
when she least expected it, the man sprang away from her head, leaving it free. she made an attempt at once to get back upon her feet, but her legs were still tied and she fell back again to the ground. she raised her head and glared fearfully at her tormentors. in the far distance she caught a glimpse of the other horses, grazing indifferently. the two men stood a few feet away, looking down upon her and talking to each other.
the smell of her burnt flesh in the welter of nauseating odours, the pain in her shoulder growing momentarily worse, the lack of excitement on the part of the men, the cool deliberateness with which they seemed to have gone about her torture, together with the fear of what they were yet to do, bewildered queen; and out of this bewilderment emerged a feeling that was worse than fear or pain, a feeling that was an ally of both, the feeling of submission. but queen’s submission was not a servile one. rather was it like the retreat of the general who hopes for a more propitious moment in which to strike again and strike with all his rallied force.
the man who was, without any further doubt, stronger than she was might burn her flesh; he might tie her legs so that she could not get up; he might force his sharp fingers about her nose bone and torturously twist her head so that she would be helpless; but he could not control or limit her hate. and hate boiled in her blood and burned like a fever in her body, restraining itself only as the tiger restrains his desire before he springs upon his prey.
