Buffalo Bill’s Pursuit

                                 OR,

                      The Heavy Hand of Justice


                                 BY

                      Colonel Prentiss Ingraham

  Author of the celebrated “Buffalo Bill” stories published in the
           BORDER STORIES. For other titles see catalogue.


                     [Illustration: (Colophon)]


                     STREET & SMITH CORPORATION
                             PUBLISHERS
                   79-89 Seventh Avenue, New York




                 +----------------------------------+
                 |                                  |
                 |          Copyright, 1907         |
                 |         By STREET & SMITH        |
                 |              -----               |
                 |      Buffalo Bill’s Pursuit      |
                 |                                  |
                 +----------------------------------+


              (Printed in the United States of America)

   All rights reserved, including that of translation into foreign
               languages, including the Scandinavian.




                              CONTENTS

                                                                   PAGE
                  IN APPRECIATION OF WILLIAM F. CODY                 1
          I.      THE VOICE FROM THE TREE.                           5
         II.      PIZEN JANE, OF CINNABAR.                          13
        III.      CHASED BY WOLVES.                                 20
         IV.      A STARTLING DISCOVERY.                            32
          V.      THE CAPTURE.                                      39
         VI.      ABANDONED.                                        49
        VII.      TAUNTS AND JEERS.                                 53
       VIII.      CLOSING IN.                                       62
         IX.      A DEFIANT PRISONER.                               67
          X.      MOTHER AND SON.                                   72
         XI.      THE DESERT HOTSPUR.                               78
        XII.      IN THE OUTLAW STRONGHOLD.                         84
       XIII.      PEERLESS AS A SCOUT.                              89
        XIV.      THE LIVING BARRICADE.                             96
         XV.      THE GALLANT TROOPERS.                            101
        XVI.      A WOMAN’S VENGEANCE.                             104
       XVII.      PURSUED BY BLACKFEET.                            109
      XVIII.      THE BLACKFOOT TRAILERS.                          118
        XIX.      THE TRAGEDY OF THE CABIN.                        123
         XX.      AN AMAZING DISAPPEARANCE.                        129
        XXI.      THE PRISONER.                                    137
       XXII.      WIND FLOWER.                                     146
      XXIII.      THE FLIGHT OF THE FUGITIVES.                     154
       XXIV.      THE SCOUTS’ PURSUIT.                             167
        XXV.      AGAIN A PRISONER.                                176
       XXVI.      THE WILD RANGE RIDERS.                           181
      XXVII.      AGAIN ON THE TRAIL.                              189
     XXVIII.      THE CAPTURE OF THE MEDICINE MAN.                 194
       XXIX.      THE COMING OF THE MEDICINE MAN.                  201
        XXX.      THE DEFEAT OF THE BLACKFEET.                     210
       XXXI.      RINGED IN BY FIRE.                               215
      XXXII.      THE GIRL AND THE EMERALDS.                       222
     XXXIII.      THE EAVESDROPPER.                                228
      XXXIV.      THE MUSTANG CATCHERS.                            235
       XXXV.      THE ATTACK ON THE STAGE.                         243
      XXXVI.      DISAPPOINTED ROAD AGENTS.                        251
     XXXVII.      SETTING A TRAP.                                  256
    XXXVIII.      A CAPTURE AND AN ESCAPE.                         260
      XXXIX.      THE EMERALDS GONE.                               270
         XL.      CODY AND NOMAD.                                  275
        XLI.      THE OUTLAWS TRICKED.                             283
       XLII.      A ROUGH DIPLOMAT.                                288
      XLIII.      A WHIRLWIND CHASE.                               293
       XLIV.      LAWLESS STRATEGY.                                298
        XLV.      A SNEAKING COWARD.                               305
       XLVI.      THE CAPTURE OF THE THIEF.                        311
      XLVII.      AT BAY--AT PEACE.                                316




                 IN APPRECIATION OF WILLIAM F. CODY

                           (BUFFALO BILL).


It is now some generations since Josh Billings, Ned Buntline, and
Colonel Prentiss Ingraham, intimate friends of Colonel William F.
Cody, used to forgather in the office of Francis S. Smith, then
proprietor of the _New York Weekly_. It was a dingy little office on
Rose Street, New York, but the breath of the great outdoors stirred
there when these old-timers got together. As a result of these
conversations, Colonel Ingraham and Ned Buntline began to write of
the adventures of Buffalo Bill for Street & Smith.

Colonel Cody was born in Scott County, Iowa, February 26, 1846.
Before he had reached his teens, his father, Isaac Cody, with his
mother and two sisters, migrated to Kansas, which at that time was
little more than a wilderness.

When the elder Cody was killed shortly afterward in the Kansas
“Border War,” young Bill assumed the difficult rôle of family
breadwinner. During 1860, and until the outbreak of the Civil War,
Cody lived the arduous life of a pony-express rider. Cody volunteered
his services as government scout and guide and served throughout
the Civil War with Generals McNeil and A. J. Smith. He was a
distinguished member of the Seventh Kansas Cavalry.

During the Civil War, while riding through the streets of St. Louis,
Cody rescued a frightened schoolgirl from a band of annoyers. In true
romantic style, Cody and Louisa Federci, the girl, were married March
6, 1866.

In 1867 Cody was employed to furnish a specified amount of buffalo
meat to the construction men at work on the Kansas Pacific Railroad.
It was in this period that he received the sobriquet “Buffalo Bill.”

In 1868 and for four years thereafter Colonel Cody served as scout
and guide in campaigns against the Sioux and Cheyenne Indians. It was
General Sheridan who conferred on Cody the honor of chief of scouts
of the command.

After completing a period of service in the Nebraska legislature,
Cody joined the Fifth Cavalry in 1876, and was again appointed chief
of scouts.

Colonel Cody’s fame had reached the East long before, and a great
many New Yorkers went out to see him and join in his buffalo hunts,
including such men as August Belmont, James Gordon Bennett, Anson
Stager, and J. G. Heckscher. In entertaining these visitors at Fort
McPherson, Cody was accustomed to arrange wild-West exhibitions. In
return his friends invited him to visit New York. It was upon seeing
his first play in the metropolis that Cody conceived the idea of
going into the show business.

Assisted by Ned Buntline, novelist, and Colonel Ingraham, he started
his “Wild West” show, which later developed and expanded into “A
Congress of the Rough Riders of the World,” first presented at Omaha,
Nebraska. In time it became a familiar yearly entertainment in the
great cities of this country and Europe. Many famous personages
attended the performances, and became his warm friends, including Mr.
Gladstone, the Marquis of Lorne, King Edward, Queen Victoria, and the
Prince of Wales, now King of England.

At the outbreak of the Sioux, in 1890 and 1891, Colonel Cody served
at the head of the Nebraska National Guard. In 1895 Cody took up the
development of Wyoming Valley by introducing irrigation. Not long
afterward he became judge advocate general of the Wyoming National
Guard.

Colonel Cody (Buffalo Bill) died in Denver, Colorado, on January
10, 1917. His legacy to a grateful world was a large share in
the development of the West, and a multitude of achievements in
horsemanship, marksmanship, and endurance that will live for ages.
His life will continue to be a leading example of the manliness,
courage, and devotion to duty that belonged to a picturesque phase
of American life now passed, like the great patriot whose career it
typified, into the Great Beyond.




                       BUFFALO BILL’S PURSUIT.




                             CHAPTER I.

                      THE VOICE FROM THE TREE.


Buffalo Bill drew rein and looked around. He was in a narrow and
lonely trail that ran close by the Cinnabar River.

The country was gullied and cut by small cañons. Several hundred feet
below him the river roared in its narrow, rock-bound bed. On the
sloping side of this cañon was a number of trees, some of them of
large size; and trees of the same kind bordered the trail.

The scout, having drawn rein, sat quite still in his saddle,
listening. All he heard now was the roar of the stream, the soughing
of the wind in the trees, and the restless champing of his spirited
horse.

“Help!”

A sudden cry of distress sounded near him, and once more Buffalo Bill
stared around.

The call seemed to have come out of the sky, or to have floated from
the mist that rose above the tumbling water of the river.

“Can my ears have fooled me?” was his thought.

“Hello!” he called. “What is it?”

A faint mumbling seemed to come in answer to this, but he could not
locate the sound nor distinguish the words.

He rode up and down the trail, looking over into the cañon and along
its timbered slope; he let his eyes wander over the rocky hillsides
opposite the cañon.

“The wind is fooling me!” was his thought. Yet he was not satisfied
to let it go at that; so he dismounted, tied his horse, and swung
down the incline of the cañon for a number of yards, and there
reaching a shelf of rock, he bent over the river and listened. Then
he heard it again--a cry for help.

This time it seemed to be above him, almost over his head; and it
sounded so startlingly clear that he could have fancied that the lips
that made it were at his elbow.

“Yes,” he said, starting up and staring around. “Where are you? I see
no one.”

The call rose louder and clearer, so clear that it was absolutely
startling. Apparently, the one making the cry had, for the first
time, become aware that the call for help had reached human ears.

“Here I am, right here! Help! I’m right here--in this tree!”

Buffalo Bill rose to his feet and stared hard at the tree before him.
It was within six yards of him, higher up toward the level where lay
the trail; and the voice had seemed to come from the heart of it. Yet
he could see no hole in the tree.

It was a large, stubby oak, wide branching and low; its thick boughs
extended along the cañon slope, forming there a massy shade.

“Yes!” he said, jumping toward it. “In the tree? Where?”

The voice seemed now to gurgle, and again the answer was so
indistinct that Buffalo Bill climbed up to the tree, and walked
around it, determined to find an opening, if there was one.

“In the tree?” he asked. “In this tree?”

He kicked on it and hammered on it with his knuckles.

“Yes!” the voice now screamed, seeming to be right before him.
“I’m--fast--in--this--consarned--tree! Help! H-e-l-p! H-e-l-p!”

“Yes!” said the scout again, shouting the word. “How did you get in?
And how can I reach you?”

“I--fell--in! Help! H-e-l-p! H-e-l-p!”

“Fell in? How? When----”

“Fell in at the top, you fool! Help! H-e-l-p! H-e-l-p!”

The voice had a strange, quavering sound, high-keyed and singular.

“Fell in from the top!” The scout looked at the thick top of the
tree. “Well, this must be investigated!”

He began to climb the tree, using his lariat to aid him, looping
it around the tree and around his body, thus assisting himself
materially in making the ascent. He climbed rapidly in this way, and
was soon in the lower branches.

The voice continued to call, sometimes sounding loud and clear, and
then almost falling, or seeming to fall, to shrill whispers.

He fancied these changes were due to the wind that roared through the
top of the tree, carrying the sound first one way and then another.

In a very short time he was in the matted top of the oak, hanging
over the cañon. Then, to his amazement, he saw before him a large
hole, such as a bear might have used. The calls were coming from this
hole.

He looked into it, but the hole was black as pitch, and he could see
nothing. However, the words of the person down in it seemed now to be
shot at him as if from the muzzle of a gun.

“Help! H-e-l-p! H-e-l-p! I’m in the tree; and I----”

“Yes--yes! I’m here to help you. How far down are you? I can’t see
you.”

“Something’s stoppin’ up the hole now; it’s a bear mebbe! Help!
H-e-l-p!”

“I am shutting the light out, I suppose. I want to help you. If I
lower my lariat can you get hold of it? Then perhaps I can pull you
out, or assist you to get out.”

The calls changed in their character; the person in the tree had
become aware that some one was at the opening, and that this some one
was proffering assistance.

“Drap yer rope, then!” the voice shrieked. “I kin climb it, mebbe.”

The scout lowered the noose end of his lariat into the hole.

“Just place the noose under your arms,” he instructed, “and I can
help you out.”

He felt the rope jerked, and then the voice shouted:

“All O. K. down here; now h’ist away. You’re a stranger, but a friend
in need; and a friend in need is wuth a dozen angels any day o’ the
week!”

Buffalo Bill began to haul on the rope, and was instantly aware that
the individual in the tree was ascending. There was much scratching,
sputtering, and fussing, and many singular exclamations; but slowly
the tree prisoner ascended. Then the scout beheld the top of a head,
surmounted by a queer hat, or bonnet; so that, at that first glance,
he thought he had an Indian in the loop of the lariat.

However, when the neck and shoulders, and then the body of the
prisoner appeared, he saw that he had drawn a woman out of the tree.

The fact was amazing, and this woman was as singular a creature as
he had ever seen: being a tall, raw-boned, awkward female, with a
vinegary countenance, and features as homely as if they had been
copied from some comic monthly.

“Hello!” she sputtered, as she clutched the edge of the hole and
began to draw herself out. “This here is what I calls an unfort’nit
condition fer a lady to be in. B’ jings, it is! An’ I reckon I’ve et
a peck o’ dirt and rotten wood, into the barg’in!” She spat pieces of
wood out of her mouth, revealing a row of fanglike teeth. “And I’ve
that mussed up my Sunday clo’es that I won’t be able to go to church
nex’ Sunday!”

At this she cackled in a strange way, as if she had uttered a good
joke.

With the scout’s assistance, she crawled out of the hole and dropped
down in the nest of broad limbs that were matted together in front of
the hole, forming there a sort of shelf of verdure.

“Well, may I be switched if I was ever in sich a reedicklus situation
before!” she grumbled. “I reckon you never before pulled a lady out
o’ the top of a tree?”

The scout was staring at her most ungallantly.

“I didn’t,” he admitted. “I must beg your pardon if I was rough while
hauling on that rope.”

“Oh, I ain’t as light as swan’s-down!” she cackled. “I’m purty hefty;
and heftier still when I git my mad up and git in a fight.”

“But how did you get in such a place?” he was forced to demand.

“I fell in.”

“Fell in?”

“You kin understand words, can’t ye? Yes, I fell in.”

“But----”

“Well, I clim’ up here last night, thinkin’ it’d be a safer place
to spend the night in than down on the ground, with wolves howlin’
’round, and mebbe road agents perambulatin’ along the trail. It
looked like a good sort of a nest up here, and I thought I’d try it
fer safety; fer I cal’lated that if a wild cat, er a panther, got
into the tree, I could git down, mebbe; and I wasn’t as afeard o’
them as I was o’ the wolves I heerd howlin’. And so I clim’ up.
And while mussin’ ’round here on these limbs, tryin’ to make myself
comfortable, I slipped into that hole, hurtin’ my arm some; and then,
fust thing I knowed, I was down in the holler of the tree inside, and
couldn’t git out ag’in.”

She laughed in a mirthless way.

“Well, you better believe that I was scai’t some, when I found I
couldn’t git out. I wiggled and I waggled, but it didn’t do no good;
and there I had to stay.”

She laughed again, with that singular, mirthless cackle.

“Well, I was safe enough from wolves and varmints of that kind; you’d
better believe I was. I didn’t hear a wolf, ner did a single wild cat
er panther try to pay me a visit; but when mornin’ come I couldn’t
git out.

“I reckon I hollered so much that if the breath I wasted doin’ it was
all collected, it’d fill the sails of the British navy. But it didn’t
do a mite o’ good, seemed like, till bime-by I reckon you heerd me.”

“Yes, I heard you. Your yells were enough to wake the dead!”

She glanced down into the hole and shivered.

“Now, if you’ll permit me, I’ll try to help you down to the ground,”
he said.

“Oh, law, I kin make that all right; that don’t trouble me a little
bit!”

To show that it did not, she swung down from the nest of branches,
and then, grappling the tree as if she were a man, she slid down to
the ground. The scout followed her, and soon stood beside her on the
shelving slope.

“Now I’ll help you up to the trail,” he said. “You must be pretty
well exhausted by this time, and----”

“Lawk, I don’t need no help!”

She began to scramble up to the trail.

The scout accompanied her, assisting her as much as she would let
him; and soon they stood together in the trail.




                             CHAPTER II.

                      PIZEN JANE, OF CINNABAR.


Having arrived at a position in the trail, Buffalo Bill looked more
carefully at the woman rescued from her strange prison in the hollow
oak overhanging the cañon of the river.

The woman looked as intently at him, with black eyes that snapped and
burned. She inspected him from top to toe, critically, as if trying
to size him up and determine what character of man he was. Then a
sudden fiery wrath blazed in her black eyes, her lips became pinched,
and then opened in one of her strange cackles.

“I guess,” she snapped, “that you’re the man that’s playin’ the fake
Buffler Bill trick about here. And if ye aire, then I dunno but I’d
ruther been left in the tree than to have been helped by ye. Aire you
him, er ain’t ye?”

Buffalo Bill could not repress a smile at her manner.

“I haven’t the pleasure of knowing who this fake Buffalo Bill is, but
I assure you that I am the real Buffalo Bill,” he said. “My name is
Cody, as, perhaps, you have heard, and----”

She cackled again, scoffing at his declaration.

“What’s the proof of it?” she demanded.

“I shall not try to present any proof, other than my word.”

“And if you’re the fake Buffler, yer word ain’t good furder’n a man
could sling a steer by the tail. You ain’t the fake Buffler?”

“No, madam, I am not.”

“Why do ye call me madam, and how’d ye know I ever was married, to
desarve that title? Simply because I’m oldish and have lost my good
looks? You don’t know me?”

“I haven’t the honor.”

He touched his hat again, but a smile disturbed the gravity of his
face.

“Well, I’m Pizen Jane, frum Cinnabar. Never heerd o’ me?”

“I never had the honor to----”

“Shucks! Don’t be so perlite. Perliteness is due, mebbe, to young
girls with red cheeks and yaller hair, and eyes that keeps rollin’ at
the men; but it don’t b’long in talkin’ to a woman like me, that’s
seen the world, and had all her beauty knocked off her long ago.”

“I only meant----”

“Don’t _mean_, then, when speakin’ to me; jes’ _speak_ yer thoughts.
I know I’m homely, and my temper ain’t any purtier than my face. I’m
Pizen Jane, of Cinnabar.”

He smiled.

“I’m very glad to know you, and wish to assure you again that I am
William F. Cody, known to many as Buffalo Bill.”

“Jes’ the same, I’m goin’ to watch ye!”

“That’s kind of you.”

“You mean to say by that it ain’t kind o’ me, after you yankin’ me
outer that hole? Well, I thank you fer that. Where you goin’?”

“I was on my way from Cinnabar.”

“Yisterday I was, too; but I got stuck in that hole, and that brought
my journeyin’ to a close. I reckon, if you’re goin’ on, I’ll go with
ye. You’ve got a hoss there.”

“A very good animal.”

“Glad of it; fer I’m goin’ to ride behind ye on that hoss. I don’t
reckon you’ve got anything to eat?”

“Yes, I have food in my saddle pouches. I will get it for you.”

“I’m that hungry I could eat sawdust! Fer, ye see, I didn’t have any
supper las’ night, an’ no breakfast this mornin’. If ’twasn’t so fur,
I’d git down to that river and git me a drink.”

“I have a water bottle, which you’re welcome to.”

“Law suz, you’re a reg’lar travelin’ hotel! Well, I’m glad of it;
fer I’m that hungry and dry that I can’t think straight. When I git
somethin’ to eat and drink, I’ll try to see if my hat is on straight,
and if my clothes sets right. Shouldn’t wonder if they don’t, sense
my experience in that tree.”

She continued to talk while he procured the food and the water; and
then she sat down on the ground and devoured the things he gave her.
While doing it she now and then looked at him, with covert glances,
and now and then she mumbled, as if talking to herself.

The scout was undeniably puzzled by this woman. In his experience on
the border he had encountered many strange characters. Sometimes he
had found that their eccentricity was assumed as a mask and covered
some hidden design, or concealed a scoundrelly and criminal past. In
a few cases he had found that an assumed eccentricity concealed an
officer of the law, who was masked in that way for detective work.

After brushing the crumbs out of her lap in a thoughtful manner, she
looked up.

“Was you tellin’ me the truth when you said you was the ginuine
Buffalo Bill?”

“Nothing but the truth,” he answered.

Her face still showed doubt.

“Lemme ask ye another question er two.”

“As many as you like.”

“Did you ever hear of a wuthless critter named Pete Sanborn?”

“I never did.”

“He used to run a little hash house down at Cinnabar, only he was too
lazy to run it, and his wife done the work. He liked to gamble better
than he did to work, and he’d ruther pick a man’s pockets than to git
money in any other way.”

“A fellow to keep away from.”

“Well, he was. I knowed him to my sorrow. He done things lately a
good deal wuss’n any of them things. I hope vigilantes will git him,
and finish him.”

Her blackened and straggling teeth came together with a vindictive
click.

“And you never,” she went on, “heerd of a young feller called Pool
Clayton? His reg’lar name was Bruce, but he played pool and billiards
so much that the fellers got to callin’ him Pool; and I reckon it
fit him, fer the name stuck. He’s a young man, not much more’n a boy,
and I think he knowed you!”

The final sentence she shot at the scout as if it were an accusation.

“I never happened to meet him, so far as my knowledge goes.”

“He’s a young man, and rather good lookin’; more weak than really
mean, I should say; and goin’ to the dogs fast, last accounts I had
of him.”

“I never heard of him.”

She brushed her lap again, as if there were more crumbs in it, and
looked down, as if taking time to gather her thoughts, or think of
more questions. Finally she rose, shaking out her skirt.

“Now, if you don’t ’bject, I’d like fer ye to give me a lift on yer
hoss, if he’ll kerry double. It’s askin’ a good deal, I know, but----”

“I shall be happy to let you ride on my horse, and I will walk; or
you may mount behind my saddle, if that pleases you.”

She laughed then, cackling out in the manner that had first attracted
him. It was not musical, nor even suggestive of good humor, though
the woman apparently meant that it should suggest the last.

“I’m Pizen Jane, of Cinnabar,” she said again, “and I hope you won’t
rue the day when you fust met me. You won’t, if you’re straight. But
if you’re not reelly Buffler Bill, but the fake that mebbe ye aire,
you’ll not think meetin’ me was good fer yer health.”

Then she seemed to feel that this was harsh, when the things he had
done for her were considered.

“I reckon I’d ought to beg yer pardon,” she said apologetically.
“If I say things you don’t like, fergit ’em. I’m loose-jawed, and
my tongue wags sometimes like a splinter in a windstorm. But if you
understood the things that’s made me what I am, you wouldn’t think
it a mite strange if I was tryin’ to shoot yer head off, instead of
talkin’ ca’m to you. You desarve it, if the things I’ve heerd about
ye aire true.”

“I hope to merit your good opinion,” said the scout, much amused by
the freedom with which she “wagged” her tongue.

“You’ll git it, if ye desarve it; and if ye don’t desarve it, then
you’ll git what you do desarve; and don’t you fail to recklect that!
Fer I’m Pizen Jane, of Cinnabar.”

“It seems a strange name,” he said, bringing up his horse.

“Well, I’m Pizen, to some people, ’cause I stand fer my rights and
don’t let nobody tromp on me. I’m Pizen to men who don’t do right,
you bet! And I’ll tell ye now, what mebbe I’d ought to keep to
myself, that I’m on the warpath, and that I’m standin’ ready to shoot
full of holes a certain man as soon as I meet him. Rejoice that you
ain’t him.”

“You don’t seem so very warlike,” said the scout, smiling at her. “I
don’t mind telling you that.”

“That’s a compliment, I s’pose? Well, I don’t desarve it.” She looked
the horse over critically. “Aire you goin’ right on through the
mountains?”

“Yes.”

“It’s nigh two days’ journey!”

“Yes, I know it.”

“And this trail is filled with road agents, they say; road agents
that lay fer everything that comes along, and shoots men as if they
wasn’t more than wolves.”

“Yes, it’s a dangerous trail.”

“What if you’re held up?”

“I shall defend myself; but I’m trusting not to be.”

“I reckon I can trust ye; and if I can’t trust ye I can watch ye.
Hold the hoss’ head, and I’ll sail up to his back.”

The scout held the horse by the head, and with an agility that was
surprising, disdaining his aid, she put a foot in the stirrup and
mounted to the animal’s back, seating herself behind the saddle.

“I’m spryer’n I look,” she said, “otherwise I couldn’t got into that
tree where ye found me. Now, if you’ll mount, we’ll jog along, and
you can tell me more about yerself while we’re goin’. I’ll say to you
that Pizen Jane, of Cinnabar, is searchin’ fer somebody she hopes to
find; and if she finds him, interestin’ times aire billed to foller
fer all concerned. That’s why I’m on this trail; what you’re on it
fur ain’t appeared yit, so fur as I know.”

Buffalo Bill mounted, smiling at the woman’s naïve manner of trying
to “pump” him.

Then they jogged on, as quaint a pair as the trail had seen in many a
day.




                            CHAPTER III.

                          CHASED BY WOLVES.


Because of the intense midsummer heat in that desert region, Buffalo
Bill did not journey far that morning, but relieved his horse of its
double burden long before noon, and took shelter from the burning sun
in the shady depths of the cañon, at a point where its sides were
scalable for man and beast.

Pizen Jane seemed impervious to the heat, and declared her anxiety to
go on. But she descended into the cañon, and there helped the scout
eat the food which remained after her famine feast of the morning.

Throughout the journey, and now, as she and the scout rested, she
asked strange questions without number, all tending to show that she
still did not believe he was the man he represented himself to be.

What her own intentions and plans were she cloaked with much
cleverness, though she talked all around the subject, drowning it in
a very sea of words.

Buffalo Bill gained the idea, however, that she had suffered some
wrong at the hands of some man, or men, or that some bitter grief and
disappointment had come to her; for the avenging, or righting, of
which she had set forth alone on this dangerous trail. In addition,
it seemed that she suspected him of being in some manner concerned in
the wrong done her, and that she had proofs of it she more than once
hinted.

“I begin to fear you are crazy, madam,” he said, at length, when she
had vexed him with her many hints of personal wrongdoing. “But please
remember that I never met you before, and know absolutely nothing of
any of the men you so veiledly speak of. I might know more, if you
would be more open in what you say.”

“And then you’d know too much, if you ain’t the reel Buffler!” she
cackled. “Pizen Jane may be homely lookin’, and no doubt she is, but
she ain’t no fool.”

They did not go on until the cool shadows of evening covered the
trail. They continued the journey far into the night, going forward
by the light of the moon.

The hour was late, when Pizen Jane gave a convulsive leap, and threw
her arms around the scout’s body, with a quick motion.

“Did ye hear that?” she asked breathless.

The scout drew rein.

“I heard nothing,” said he. “What did you----”

“There it is ag’in! Wolves, as I’m a mortal sinner! And they’re
answering each other, I’ll be bound. Jes’ listen at ’em!”

The scout could not fail to hear them now, for their howls swept out
in a wild chorus.

“Wolves?” she said.

“Yes.”

“Comin’ this way?”

“I don’t know, I’m sure.”

She observed that in spite of his careless reply he touched up the
horse with the spur.

The wolves were in two bands, apparently; one band on the
mountainside, off on the left, and the other behind, in the trail,
or in the river cañon. Those on the hillside were nearest, and their
howls soon became frightful.

“Chasin’ us?” she asked.

“We’ll hope not.”

“Well, I know they aire! Ye can’t fool me. I’ve had experience. This
ain’t the fust time I’ve heerd ’em.”

She put her hand into her bosom and drew out a revolver.

“This ain’t big enough to kill many wolves with,” she remarked; “but
it’s big enough to kill me, which it’ll do if the wolves should
seem about to git me. I’d ruther die by a bullet than to have them
critters tear me into giblets. Ugh! Hear ’em yellin’!”

It was not a pleasant sound, and again the scout touched the horse up
with the spur.

The country lay more open before him, a fact of which he was glad.
The moonlight and open country lessened the danger from the wolves;
for, like all evil creatures, they loved the darkness rather than the
light.

The horse was now flying along, oblivious of its double burden. It
not only heard the wolves, but had scented them, and was frightened.

The howling drew nearer, and soon the wolves, sweeping down from the
hills, were seen running along the trail just behind the fugitives,
and off on the left, beyond revolver shot. They grew constantly
bolder and bolder, so that soon they were close upon the horse. They
seemed to recognize the helplessness of the fugitives, pitted against
so many; for the wolf gains courage from numbers, and is boldest when
in big packs.

Soon the wolves became so reckless that they dashed into the trail,
partly surrounding the horse. Then they began to leap at its nose,
and sought to strike their teeth into its legs for the purpose of
hamstringing it, after the manner in which they were accustomed to
bring down deer and other game.

The scout shot one that sprang at the horse’s head; and then dropped
another that had leaped to the horse’s haunches.

“Downed ’em, ye did!” cried Pizen Jane. “Good for you! It makes me
’most love ye, Buffler, to see you drop ’em like that.”

He made no answer save a grunt of wrath.

“Buffler,” Pizen Jane cackled, “I know you’re enj’yin’ my society,
even if the wolves is chasin’ us!”

“I should feel better if you were not here,” he answered, quite
frankly.

“Why, Buffler?”

“Because of the wolves. You have no need to ask.”

He fired at another.

It fell with a yelp, being only wounded; but immediately its
ferocious comrades sprang on it, tearing it to pieces almost
instantly, being rendered savage beyond belief by the scent of its
flowing blood.

Even the bold scout shuddered as he saw that. He had seen its like
more than once, yet it never failed to impress him with a sense of
the awful ferocity of wolves when maddened in that way, and of his
terrible peril. He knew that if his horse fell, or if either of the
riders should be thrown to the ground, a horrible death could only
result.

“Buffler,” said Pizen Jane at length, as he brought down another
wolf, thus feeding it to its comrades, “I know this trail, havin’
been over it before, and you don’t know it; but there’s a ford right
ahead, where the trail dips down and then crosses the river. If you
can reach that ford, you can git in the water there and make a stand
agin’ ’em wuth while. They’ll git us, otherwise.”

She did not emit that cackling laugh now; in fact, she had begun to
appreciate her horrible danger, and was speculating as to its outcome.

“Thank Heaven for that!” said the scout. “Perhaps I can hold them off
until the ford is reached.”

He had fired every cartridge out of his revolver, and now drew
another.

“Can you reload this one?” he said, passing it back to her, with some
cartridges.

“Yes,” she said; “and shoot it, too!”

She proceeded to show that she could, by bringing down a wolf that
tried to leap upon the horse, close by her. The claws of the wolf
struck through the thick hide of the horse just as she fired, and,
contracting in a death clutch, they raked the skin open, so that
blood flowed.

The horse gave a jump that came nigh hurling Pizen Jane to the
ground; but she threw her arms round the scout and held on like grim
death.

A dozen wolves had leaped on the one she shot, and were rending and
devouring it; but others came on, more frantically determined than
ever to pull down the horse, now, that they scented the hot blood
which streamed from its flank.

Buffalo Bill brought down one of the pursuing wolves, and Pizen Jane
another.

Though the living ones stopped to rend the dead and dying, the delay
was brief enough.

Yet it enabled the sorely pressed horse to gain on its fiendish foes.

“The ford’s jist ahead of ye now!” Pizen Jane screamed in the ear of
Buffalo Bill.

In another minute he saw before him the darkly flowing waters of the
river, which had emerged from its cañon bed and here flowed through a
quiet landscape.

Buffalo Bill spurred the frantic and terrified horse into the river
until the water came up over the girth.

“Draw up your feet,” he said to Pizen Jane.

“I ain’t neither sugar ner salt, to be melted away by a little
water,” she declared; “and I dunno but I could swim if I was driv’
to it; so don’t worry about me. Jist so we git out o’ reach o’ them
screechin’ varmints, is all I ask.”

The pursuing and infuriated wolves dashed up to the edge of the water.

Buffalo Bill turned in the saddle and dropped one of them by a
well-directed shot, and then wounded another.

The ferocious survivors began to tear at the fallen wolves as soon
as they were down, so that within a few minutes nothing was left of
them but shining, dislocated bones. The sight was enough to make the
scout and the woman shudder.

Buffalo Bill urged the horse still farther out into the river, until
the water stood midway of its sides.

The wolves on the shore seemed, within a few minutes, to number
scores, and even hundreds. Their snapping teeth, fiery eyes, and
struggling movements made the shore a writhing mass of fiendish
forms. Some of them dashed into the water and began to swim out to
the horse; but they were at a disadvantage in the water; for they
could not there make the tremendous leaps that would carry them to
the horse’s back, nor could they move quickly enough to baffle the
revolver fire of the scout and Pizen Jane.

Pizen Jane was reloading and firing the revolver the scout had given
her, with a coolness and courage that would have befitted a man.

Between them they succeeded in shooting every wolf that swam close to
the horse.

The dark bodies of dead wolves bobbed in the stream below the ford,
where there were some eddies, that, catching them, whirled them
slowly round and round.

But the fate of the wolves already slain had small deterrent effect
on those still living, and their numbers seemed inexhaustible. Where
they came from could hardly be told; they seemed to spring out of the
very ground; and they ran snapping and yelping along the banks, on
both sides of the river now, while at intervals a few of the most
desperate plunged in and tried to reach the horse and its riders.

Generous as his supply of ammunition was, Buffalo Bill began to fear
it would soon be exhausted.

Suddenly, while the wolves still raved on the shores of the moonlit
river, and dashed into the water in efforts to reach the horse, a
wild scream was heard near by, which had on them a marvelous effect.
It was the scream of a panther. The big beast had scented the flowing
blood, and doubtless had come for a feast.

The leaping forms of the wolves dropped out of sight with almost
startling suddenness, as the lithe body of the panther came down the
hillside with springing leaps.

“Glory be!” cried Pizen Jane, with an almost hysterical cackle. “The
painter has druv ’em off.”

The “painter,” as she called the panther, came on toward the river,
not at first seeing the horse midway of the stream. In another moment
it would have been cracking the bones of the dead wolves, if the
horse had not been startled by its coming and began to plunge in the
water, making a good deal of noise.

The panther stopped, throwing up its head and looking down at the
horse. It was startled, and seemed too surprised for a moment to
move. Then, with a quick leap, it turned aside; and in another
instant it, too, was lost to sight in the darkness.

“Glory be!” Pizen Jane mumbled.

Buffalo Bill saw now that she was trembling, as if her nerves were
exhausted.

“Shall we ride out now?” he asked.

Before she could answer, the sharp report of a revolver, or rifle,
sounded. It was some distance away; yet the stillness which had
followed the cessation of the wolf attack made it possible for sounds
to carry a long distance. Following the first shot, came others in
quick succession.

“Some other pore critter attacked by them varmints!” Pizen Jane
interpreted.

“Yes.”

“I hope they don’t git him, if he’s honest and hon’rable; I hope he’s
nigh to the water, and can git into it, as we did.”

The scout was listening for a repetition of the shots.

“I hope a painter will come ’long to his ’sistance, as it did to
ours.”

The shots did not sound again.

“They’ve killed him, er he’s druv ’em away, er mebbe the painter
skeered ’em. I’m swearin’ by painters, frum this time on!”

Pizen Jane’s tongue would wag, no matter what happened.

“If I thought we could aid him, and he needed aid now, I’d try to go
to his help,” said the generous scout.

“But we don’t know where he is!”

“He’s out in that direction, somewhere.”

“And he may be a road agent, or even an Injun. More likely to be,
than an honest man.”

“Very true; yet I shouldn’t want any human being to be torn alive by
wolves.”

“It’d serve some of ’em right,” avowed Pizen Jane, with a grimness
that was not pleasant. “Some on ’em that I know of, and am lookin’
fer, ought to be chopped into giblets. If the wolves should kill ’em,
it’d save me the crime of murder when I meet ’em.”

When the shots did not come again, and nothing occurred to indicate
who the man was, or what had happened to him, the scout abandoned his
desire to go to his aid.

He feared the return of the wolves; and so he kept his horse in the
stream, though the beast was soon shaking from the chill of the cold
water.

“It’s a tarnal queer thing, Buffler, ther way that animiles do,”
averred the woman, dropping into a mood of philosophy. “The wolves
warn’t afeared of us, even when we laid ’em out on the shore like
chopped corn, though they was skeered o’ that painter; and the
painter that wasn’t afeared of the wolves, was afeared of us.
Varmints aire that queer there’s no knowin’ what to expect of ’em.”

For nearly an hour the scout kept his shivering horse in the stream;
but when it was seen that the wolves were not likely to return soon
he rode out of the water.

On the shore he went into camp, and there he built a fire. The fire
would help to keep the wolves at bay; and also it was needed to
enable him and Pizen Jane to dry their wet clothing.

He screened the fire as well as he could; yet he knew it might be
seen; and he was in a land where he could expect to meet enemies in
human shape as terrible as the wolves and as little given to mercy.
To guard against surprise, he for a time stood in the darkness
beyond the rim of the firelight, watching there, while the woman by
the fire dried and warmed herself.

Far away he heard wolves howling, and they may have been some of
those who had pursued him; but the man who had fired the shots did
not make himself known.

The stars and the moon swung their slow way westward, and the night
grew late. At last the scout returned to the fire, fed it with wood,
and sat down.

Pizen Jane had fallen asleep, but his return aroused her, and she
raised herself on her elbow.

“Buffler,” she said, smoothing back her tangled hair, “what aire ye
goin’ to do now?”

“In what way?” he asked. “When?”

“Why, to-morrer?”

“I hardly know.”

“Well, I know you’re lookin’ fer road agents!”

“You seem to think you are a mind reader,” he declared, with a laugh.

“I am. I kin read yer mind same’s my own.”

“What am I thinking of?”

“That you wish Pizen Jane was in purgatory, er some other furrin
country!”

He laughed again, and she laughed with him.

“Hardly that, of course.”

“You’re wishin’ I wasn’t with you?”

“Your society is very pleasant,” was his gallant statement; “but you
will admit that this is hardly the sort of country where a woman can
feel safe.”

“And that’s why I’m goin’ to hang to ye. You can’t git rid of me.
I’ll cling to ye like the bark on a tree, and you can’t help it. Fer,
ye see, you’re huntin’ road agents, and so am I. And if you find ’em,
and I’m with ye, why, I’ll find ’em, too. And that’s what I want.”

He smiled into the firelight.

“I thought you were of the opinion that I was a fake, and you meant
to cling to me for the purpose of finding out?”

“Well, that is one reason,” she admitted, with blunt frankness. “If
you ain’t the reel Buffler Bill, why, I want to know that, too. And
then I’ll be makin’ things mighty int’restin’ fer ye.”

She laughed again, sliding from her stern grimness and threatening
into laughing good humor.

“I’ll watch a while, if ye want to sleep,” she said. “I’ve had my
forty winks, and can git along now till morning.”

The scout felt sure that he could trust this woman not to harm him
in his sleep. She still mystified him, and he could not yet fathom
her purpose in being there; for he did not credit her with all the
motives she professed. However, he trusted her, and so after a while
he lay down for a time, leaving Pizen Jane on guard by the dying camp
fire.

The horse was picketed on its lariat a few yards away, and was
certain to give an alarm if wolves or other wild animals approached.




                             CHAPTER IV.

                       A STARTLING DISCOVERY.


In the morning Buffalo Bill shot a jack rabbit, and they breakfasted
on that. Bones of wolves on the opposite shore gave evidence of the
terrible night battle with those creatures.

To the woman it seemed almost a horrible dream, and not a reality,
with the sun now shining brightly, and not a wolf or other harmful
beast in sight.

“I feel as good as new,” she said, in her queer way; “only a bit
stiff in the j’ints.” She walked along the river for exercise. “Now
what ye goin’ to do?” she asked, coming back, while the scout watered
his horse at the stream.

“I’m going first to the point where those shots sounded in the night.”

“D’ye reckon ye can find it?”

“I hope so. I located the direction pretty accurately.”

“But you couldn’t tell how fur they was off.”

“No; but if we get the direction and keep going we’ll come to the
place, by and by.”

“Yes; that’s so, too. I s’pose you’re wishin’ I’d go back to the town
this mornin’?”

“Not since you said you didn’t intend to.”

He smiled at her. She interested him, and he was still studying her,
trying to determine her character and what she really meant by thus
clinging to him.

“Well, I’m goin’ to hang to ye; and if you should say I couldn’t,
I’d go anyhow. I think I’m takin’ a fancy to yer. If I was a younger
woman now----”

“What?”

“I think I’d try to marry ye, if I found out you was what ye pretend
to be, and honest.”

“You flatter me,” he said, with a smile.

“Do I? Well, I don’t mean it.”

He helped her to the back of his horse, though she said she needed
no assistance; and they rode on again, going now in the direction of
those mysterious shots.

They had progressed a mile before Buffalo Bill found what he was
looking for--indications of the presence of men.

Hoofprints of horses showed, and the tracks of men, a considerable
body of them. But the tracks were nearly a day old, and could none
of them have been made by the man who fired the shots. There was,
too, the ashes of an old camp fire. Buffalo Bill inspected that with
considerable interest.

“Ah!” he said, as he looked about. “Some one came along after these
men had left; and, finding this old camp and the ashes, he built a
new fire here; and that was last night; and, whoever he was, he did
the shooting.”

“At wolves?”

“Yes, I think so; that seems the most likely guess. Some of the
wolves troubled him, and he shot at them.”

He began to search beyond the limits of the camp, hoping to find
wolf tracks which would prove his theory.

He stopped this search on observing a soil-stained letter which had
been stepped on by a horse, whose hoofs had driven it into the earth,
half-covering it.

He took it up and looked at it. To his astonishment, the address side
of the envelope bore the name of Nick Nomad.

“Nomad!” he said, staring around as if he half expected to see his
old pard of the plains and mountains rise out of the ground there.
“Nomad! He was here.”

He looked about; then took from the envelope the letter it held; for
the envelope had already been torn open. It was merely a note, on
some matter of business of no importance.

“Nomad dropped it by chance. No; perhaps he dropped it purposely.”

He began to search the ground closely.

“What ye found?” called Pizen Jane, who was watching him.

“A letter from an old friend.”

“Funny kind of a post office to be gittin’ letters out of!” she
observed. “What’s it like?--a love letter?”

The scout ignored her question and went on with his search.

He found wolf tracks out beyond the point where the ground had been
torn by the hoofs of horses, thus establishing his belief that the
man who had camped alone there during the night had been troubled by
the wolves, and had fired upon them.

“I wonder if that man could have been Nomad?” was his thought. He
dismissed it in a moment. “No; Nomad is too wary to have gone on
without inspecting my camp by the river; and, if he had inspected it,
he would have discovered me and made himself known.”

He searched again at the point where the letter had been trampled
into the soil. This examination convinced him that the horse that
had stepped on the letter had been of the horses that were there two
nights before.

“Whoever the man was who did the shooting he was not Nomad.”

After a while he returned to where the woman had stood watching him.

“What ye found?” she demanded.

He showed her the letter.

“Nick Nomad is an old friend of mine. We have hunted and trailed
together more times than I can tell you; and he’s true as steel. I
thought at first he did that shooting. But I’m convinced he did not.
A body of men camped here two nights ago; and at that time, or before
that time, Nomad was here, and dropped this letter.”

“Some other man might have had it and dropped it,” she said.

“Yes, that is so. Some other man might have dropped it.”

“Road agents, mebbe. He might have been robbed, and they may have
tuck that letter from him, with other things.”

“You’re good at guessing,” the scout admitted. “All of that may be
true. I’m of the opinion the large party camping here two nights ago
were road agents.”

“He might have j’ined ’em?”

“Impossible. What I’m afraid of is that he was with them as a
prisoner.”

“Glory be! Ye don’t mean it?”

“He’s shrewd; and if he was their prisoner he probably dropped this
letter, to let any one who found it know the fact, or guess it. He
doubtless had no chance to write, or to drop anything else.”

“Road agents!” she said, looking about.

“And now your question of what I am going to do is answered. I’m
going to follow the trail of those road agents, even if it is two
days old.”

“And the man that camped here alone and done that shootin’ last
night?”

“He may have been a road agent, following on their trail; and, if so,
he is now riding on to overtake them. We can tell better about that
as we go on.”

“Or he may’ve been somebody follerin’ them, same as I am, and you?”

“Very true.”

The scout, though anxious now to go on as fast as possible, did not
give over the search of this camping spot until he was sure there was
nothing unfound that could aid him.

“Mebbe he’s one o’ the men I’m lookin’ fur,” said Pizen Jane, as she
mounted to go on. “I don’t reckon he is, though; ’twould be too much
good luck. Luck ain’t been rollin’ my way much lately.”

She cackled in her shrill fashion, as if she thought she had said
something funny.

No single trail was observed to leave the main trail, as they went on.

By and by the scout became convinced that Nick Nomad was a prisoner
of a gang of outlaws, though he had no solid proof on which to build
this belief.

If it had not been for the fact that the letter had been trampled
into the ground, showing by that that the horses had been there after
it was dropped, he might have thought Nomad had struck the outlaws’
trail, and was following them, for he knew that Nick Nomad was in
that country for the sole purpose of running down the road agents and
desperadoes that infested it--the same mission that had brought him
there.

Buffalo Bill talked of his beliefs and theories with Pizen Jane, for
he discovered that she possessed a good fund of hard, common sense,
and her judgments were at times valuable.

She agreed with him, when he had pointed out the hoofs, that Nick
Nomad had not been following the big trail; and, if that were so,
then that he had either been in advance of the outlaws or he was
with them. If with them, nothing was surer than that old Nomad was a
prisoner.

“We’ll follow this trail until we know the truth,” said the scout.

“Buffler,” she cackled, “I’m with ye! Ye may think that is a joke,
but ’tain’t; fer I mean that I’m with ye in spirit, as well as
otherwise. And mebbe you’ll allow bimeby that Pizen Jane is a good
deal better than she looks, and has got more sense than any man would
guess, if he jedged by the way her tongue clacks.”




                             CHAPTER V.

                            THE CAPTURE.


Nick Nomad, the old trapper and mountainman, had received word
from his famous pard, Buffalo Bill, informing him that the latter
intended to go into the desert country that lay near the base of the
Sepulcher Mountains, for the purpose, if possible, of breaking up the
road-agent organization known to exist there.

The mountains of the gruesome name deserved the title of Sepulcher.
They were barren and forbidding, and held so little water on their
desert side that it was as much as a man’s life was worth to get lost
in them there, for he was pretty certain to die of thirst. Yet the
Sepulcher Mountains held gold in paying quantities, and that lure was
drawing men from all quarters of the country.

Gold is such a magnet that, no matter where it is, men will go to get
it, even under the arctic circle; and if it could be certainly known
that gold is at the north pole, money would soon be found to equip
expeditions of such magnitude that the secret of even that hitherto
unassailable point would quickly be laid bare.

The miners and prospectors who were working in the Sepulcher
Mountains, and in the adjacent desert, locally called Death Valley,
had been shipping out a good deal of gold, by the stages, and in
other ways; and on that gold road agents had been levying heavy
tolls.

Yet, knowing this, Nick Nomad had been unaccountably careless, after
striking the trail leading into the Sepulcher Mountains. He fancied
that the road agents confined their operations rather exclusively to
another trail, and to the other side of the mountains, and to the
trails that crisscrossed the desert. Hence, he did not adopt his
usual precautions. He went to sleep in the open, with a fire burning,
curling himself up by it, and there enjoying his pipe in fancied
security.

Near by grazed his horse, the famous old Nebuchadnezzar; a horse
whose apparent age and decrepitude had to be discounted, or the
beholder would be much fooled in him; for, though it seemed that
Nebuchadnezzar had about outlived his usefulness and could run no
more than a turtle, the old beast was amazingly swift, and also
amazingly intelligent. So intelligent was he that old Nick Nomad felt
as safe, with Nebuchadnezzar grazing close by, as if the horse had
been a trained watch dog sitting guard there.

However, even old Nebuchadnezzar grew sleepy after a while, and lay
down on the grass to rest. Being tired that day, for he had journeyed
far, he slept quite as heavily as did his wearied master; so that,
though his ears were keen, trampling hoofs were almost upon the
camp before the fact was thudded by their hoofs into his dull ears,
arousing him.

Nebuchadnezzar lifted his head then, and squealed a warning, at the
same time scrambling up and snorting in alarm.

Nick Nomad opened his eyes, and bounded to his feet with the agility
of a man many years younger. As he did so, he caught up his rifle, an
ancient weapon, and swung it round his head.

“Whoa, Nebby, consarn ye!” he grunted. “What’s up?”

He knew on the instant. “Hands up!” came to him out of the darkness,
and he heard rifles clicking. Then he saw dimly the figures of
mounted men.

He ducked with lightning quickness, sliding across the smoldering
fire as he did so, trying thus to reach Nebuchadnezzar. He whistled
at the same time in a shrill way, and the knowing beast came running
toward him, until stopped by the lariat.

The horse reached the end of the lariat with a jerk, and stood
snorting.

“Whoa, Nebby!”

In another minute Nick Nomad would have cut the lariat and been on
the back of the old horse; but a rifle rang, and the bullet whistled
past his face, making its wind felt, it was so close.

Nomad stopped, then; not because he so much feared for himself, as
because he feared for the life of Nebuchadnezzar. He knew that even
in the darkness those riflemen could see well enough to shoot down
the horse; he was sure they would do it if he tried to get away on
its back; and Nebuchadnezzar was as dear to him as his own life. He
faced around, swinging his heavy rifle.

“By all ther spooks o’ ther hills, ef I don’t let daylight through
ye, ef ye shoot Nebby!” he yelled. “’Ware thar, and don’t do it!”

A man was riding toward him, and at the man’s heels came others.

“Hands up!”

“And drap my gun? Waal, ye don’t know me, if ye think I’ll do it.
Waugh!”

“Put down that gun!”

“I’ll do that, yes; and willin’, see ’t I can’t do nothin’ else. But
I shoots ther fust cuss thet lays a hand in harm on my ole hoss.”

The man drew rein, and some of those behind him snickered at Nomad’s
words.

“Who aire ye?”

“Waugh! I’m a better man than ther critter that asks ther question!”

“No foolishness! Hands up! And give your name!”

One of the man’s followers, who had ridden near enough to see Nomad,
now announced the old trapper’s name.

“Nick Nomad,” he said; “ther friend of Buffler Bill! And may the
devil roast him!”

“Put down yer gun!” the leader commanded.

The tone was so menacing that Nomad saw he must comply, if he didn’t
want to feel the lead of the outlaw’s revolver. So he laid the old
rifle on the ground, though he did it with a sigh. Then he folded
his arms on his breast, and stood erect before the outlaws, an
impressive figure, in spite of his small stature, wizened face, and
his eccentric dress.

He was a typical trapper of the old time in appearance, with his
fringed and greasy leggings, and hunting shirt of cloth and
deerskin, and the round beaver-skin cap on his head, the cap being as
greasy and soiled as his clothing.

“Now, what is it ye want of me?” he said; though the manner in which
the announcement of his name had been received told him that these
men were his enemies; and he was sure they were road agents, the very
desperadoes he had come there to seek with his old pard, Buffalo Bill.

The men sprang from their saddles and surrounded him.

Old Nebuchadnezzar backed from them to the end of his picket rope,
and snorted indignantly and fearfully.

“Aire you Nick Nomad, as he says?” demanded the leader, peering into
the trapper’s face.

Nomad fancied that lying would gain him nothing.

“Happy ter say thet I am,” he declared. “I reckon it ain’t a name ter
be ashamed on, along this hyar border; seein’ thet Injuns and outlaws
never yit liked ther sound of it.”

“Give up yer weapons.”

“Thar’s my gun.”

“But yer other weapons--yer knife and pistols.”

“And then what?” the old man asked. “Mebbe ye’ll be wantin’ me ter
give up my life next?”

“Surrender yer weapons!” was shouted at him.

Nomad was driven to the conviction that this surrender meant his
death; but, if he was to die, he preferred to do it in more heroic
fashion than that.

He sprang from the ground, as the outlaw leader bent toward him; and
his foot, catching the man under the chin, hurled him back against
the men behind him, throwing them into sudden confusion.

Nomad, the next instant, was leaping away.

He did not run toward Nebuchadnezzar, preferring to take the chances
of bullets alone, so strongly did he love his horse.

Bullets followed, whizzing through the air round his head.

The outlaws jumped in chase of him, yelling like Indians.

Nomad stumbled, as he thus leaped along, and fell to the ground.

It was a good thing for him; for bullets swept through the air over
the spot where he dropped, and some of them would have struck him if
he had remained in an upright position.

He was trying to rise, when one of the outlaws sprang on him, landing
astride of his back, and almost knocking the breath out of him. This
outlaw threw his arms round Nomad’s neck, and yelled for help; and,
other outlaws piling on him at once, the old man was forced to submit.

When he had been tied, and sat helpless on the grass, and the light
of a hastily built camp fire illuminated the scene, he stared
quizzically into the face of the infuriated leader, who stood now
before him, boiling with rage.

“If old Nebby once puts his foot in yer face,” said Nomad, “man,
you’ll know thet the little love tap I handed ye wa’n’t jes’ nothin’
at all! And what would ye expect? Was I goin’ to stand still and let
ye kill me? You’ve got me now; and so I cal’late I can’t help myself.”

Snaky Pete, for it was he, drew a knife.

“I’m tempted to slice ye into mince meat!” he gasped.

“I wouldn’t,” said Nomad coolly; “fer I’ll tell ye right now that I’m
too old and tough ter make good mince meat out of.”

The man turned around, fierce in his manner as an enraged grizzly.

“Where’s Pool Clayton?” he snarled.

A young man, a mere stripling, stepped forth from the vociferating
crowd.

“Here!” he said.

Nomad looked at him by the light of the fire. He saw a youth of
comely appearance, yet with a certain hardness of face that showed a
desperate attempt at recklessness.

“You’ve been braggin’ of yer nerve,” said Snaky Pete to the youth.
“Hyer’s yer chance to show it!”

Pool Clayton looked at his chief uneasily.

“I don’t think I understand you!” he said, in clear-cut tones that
were quite unlike the gruff, thick speech of his companions.

“Ye don’t?”

“No.”

“Well, hyer’s a chance to show yer nerve, and prove that you’re one
of us. You need hardenin’. We’ve got this old fool; but we can’t keep
him, and we can’t let him go. Git your gun, and put a bullet through
him, as he sets there. That’ll finish him, as a warnin’ to others
like him; and then we’ll go on.”

The young man became as pale as if he had seen a ghost. He looked
about appealingly.

“I--I--can’t do it!” he gasped. “It’s--it’s murder!”

Snaky Pete glared at him.

“You won’t obey orders?”

“Yes--I’m willing to obey orders, but----”

“Then, do what I tell ye!” roared the desperado leader. “Git yer
rifle, and put a bullet through this carrion, and show you’re a man,
with the nerve of a man.”

Pool Clayton whitened still more, and trembled visibly.

The outlaws pressed close about him, staring into his face, noting
this sign of what they considered weakness and cowardice.

Snaky Pete’s eyes glittered like the eyes of the basilisk.

“Do ye hear me?” he yelled.

Clayton half turned about, as if he intended to obey; then stopped.

“I--I can’t do it!” he gasped. “Don’t ask me to.”

Snaky Pete came closer to him, his huge first doubled.

“Do you obey orders?” he shouted.

“Yes--but----”

Crack! Snaky Pete’s heavy fist shot out, and struck the youth full in
the face, knocking him down.

Clayton fell, clawing at the air; and then lay still where he had
fallen.

The outlaw leader stepped toward him, as if he meant to administer a
kick in addition to the blow.

“You’re the one that’s a tarnal coward!” old Nomad muttered. “I never
seen a man o’ that kind that wasn’t.”

He was apparently the only calm person there; though it was his life
that was threatened.

Snaky Pete lifted his heavy boot to kick Clayton, then repented of
his intention.

“Let him lay!” he snarled. “He’ll come ’round all right. And we’ll
move on. He ain’t got the spirit of a skunk.”

The outlaws began to get their horses ready for moving on. Snaky
Pete walked up to his prisoner. He looked fairly fiendish in the
flickering firelight.

“Don’t git gay over this!” he growled. “You’ll go over the range in
the morning, just the same. That young skunk will come ’round bimeby
and foller on, and then will be meek as a kitten. He’ll finish you
with that bullet, and be glad to, before we git through with him.”

The sage old trapper did not answer this brutal speech. He had
learned wisdom with his years.

When the desperadoes lifted him to the back of old Nebuchadnezzar the
cords slipped from one of his wrists.

He did not try to take advantage of it, so far as attempting an
escape was concerned; but in writhing around, as he struggled to
straighten up on his horse, he contrived to drop from an inner
pocket the letter which Buffalo Bill found.

The shrewd old trapper was sure that sooner or later the keen-eyed
scout would hit that trail, and then would find that letter, and he
believed that if he could contrive to keep the breath of life in his
body until Buffalo Bill was given time to do something, his chances
of escape were yet good. Hence, he resolved to do nothing to unduly
anger this truculent outlaw chief and his men.

“I kin be as humble as a creepin’ field mouse, when I haf to,” was
his thought, “and meek and humble is my lay now; maybe it’ll pull me
through.”

When the outlaws went on they left Pool Clayton lying unconscious on
the grass, his horse lariated and grazing close by him.




                             CHAPTER VI.

                             ABANDONED.


When Pool Clayton came to himself, with the darkness about him,
except where it was lightened by the dying camp fire, he saw that he
was alone--that he had been abandoned.

His horse, grazing close by, tearing noisily at the grass, was the
only thing of life near him; but he shuddered when he heard, afar
off, the howl of wolves.

“The men have left me!” he said, staggering to his feet.

There was caked blood on his face, and on his shirt, for that blow in
the face had caused his nose to bleed freely. He was stiff and sore,
and he felt dizzy and wretchedly sick and miserable.

As full recollection came to him, his whole body burned with
uncontrollable rage against Snaky Pete and the men who constituted
his band of road-agent outlaws.

Clayton glanced round, looked at the sky, and then at the nearly
extinct fire.

“They’ve been gone some time,” he said. “And have left me out here,
thinking maybe the wolves would get me.”

Then he swore violently, raging against Snaky Pete, whom he loaded
with opprobrious names and noisy abuse. By and by he became saner and
cooler, though his new hatred of Snaky Pete did not abate.

He lighted a torch of grass at the fire, and looked for the trail of
the outlaws, finding it soon.

“Gone on,” he said; “and they’ll camp about morning at the Poplar
Bluffs.”

He knew the place, and was sure he could find the outlaws in camp
there; but he did not know whether to follow them or not.

In his searching he expected to come upon the body of the old
trapper, being fully persuaded that Snaky Pete meant his death.

“They’ll shoot him, and leave him by the trail for the wolves to
eat,” he said. “Maybe that’s what the wolves are howling over now.”
He shuddered, as when Snaky Pete commanded him to shoot the old man.
“I couldn’t do that!” was his thought. “I couldn’t do it!”

He stirred the fire into new life, for its light drove away a certain
lonely feeling that troubled him. And he began to think of what he
should now do.

“I was a fool for ever joinin’ ’em,” he assured himself, groaning
over the memory of Snaky Pete’s brutal blow. “He’ll kill me, mebbe,
if I foller ’em; and the boys will make sport of me.”

He was beginning to realize that he was not, after all, cut from the
same cloth as these outlaws.

He had been wild in the town, had gambled, and got into bad company;
and, being tempted one night, he had gone with an acquaintance and
joined Snaky Pete’s band of road agents; being assured by his new
friend--one of Snaky Pete’s men--that the life led by this band was
one long and gay carouse, with plenty of fun--altogether a desirable
life for a young man of courage and spirit; who felt the chafing
restraint of law and order.

Pool Clayton had been with the band less than a week, and was finding
the life anything but what he had pictured it. The men were rougher
and coarser and more brutal than he had imagined; and altogether the
delightful stir and excitement had not been what he anticipated.
Snaky Pete, whom he knew only too well, had been cruelly harsh, and
had told him he was a coward and a milksop, and needed “hardening.”

Already there had been several attempts to “harden” him; that is,
to brutalize him, from which he had shrunk. This last attempt,
however, had gone beyond anything he had dreamed of; when he was
ordered to kill a man in cold blood, just as if that man were no more
than a wolf. Clayton had not been able to do it; and this was the
result--struck senseless to the ground, and abandoned on the lonely
prairie.

“Mebbe I’d better go back to the town,” he said; “I ain’t fit for
this.”

But back in the town officers were watching for him for some small
offense against the law; and he abandoned the thought of doing that
when he recalled the fact.

There seemed nothing he could do except follow the outlaws and rejoin
them. He believed that long before he could overtake them the old
trapper would be murdered and put out of the way, and that murder, at
least, would not be forced on him.

“I s’pose I can bear the boys chaffing and joking me,” he mused.
“And I reckon I do need hardening, if I’m to keep with ’em, and lead
this life. I reckon I am a sort of milksop and weak.”

Yet he could not feel right toward Snaky Pete. A feeling that was
murderous burned in his very soul against the brutal outlaw leader.

“That he should treat me that way--he!--when he’d ought to be my best
friend! I wouldn’t joined ’em, but fer the fact that I learned he was
the leader; and now to have him treat me that way!”

After a while, when he felt better and stronger, he rose from the
fire and got his horse. Then he mounted, and rode away in the
direction of Poplar Bluffs, the camping place of which he knew.

His evil tendencies, and evil surroundings and past, had conquered
again; he meant to rejoin the road agents, and “face the music,”
whatever it might be.




                            CHAPTER VII.

                          TAUNTS AND JEERS.


Pool Clayton reached Poplar Bluffs, an isolated point on the river,
at the foot of a spur of the Sepulcher Mountains, after daylight,
but he did not at once venture into the camp. He could not summon up
enough courage until he saw a number of outlaws ride away from the
camp, and guessed that one of them was Snaky Pete.

When he entered the camp he found but few of the outlaws there, and
those few seemed to be under command of a young fellow not much older
than himself. This young fellow was a weasel-eyed, rat-faced youth,
named Tom Molloy, as desperate a character for his years as one could
wish to see.

Moreover, Molloy had no love for Pool Clayton. He had a feeling that
Clayton thought himself the better of the two, and it had aroused his
dislike and enmity.

“So you’ve come sneakin’ in, have ye?” he sneered, his little eyes
gleaming with vindictive animosity. “I shouldn’t think you would,
after that!”

Pool Clayton’s face flushed to a deep red, then paled. He had
expected to receive the jeers of the outlaws, but it did not please
him to have this young fellow begin the thing. Nor did it please him
to discover, as he did at once, that Molloy was leader here, in the
absence of the chief.

“Where have they gone?” he asked, ignoring Molloy’s words.

“Gone to rake in another prisoner fer you to shoot!” was the brutal
answer. One of the outlaws “ha-hahed” at this, his sympathies being
against Clayton. “And as the other one is here yit, you’ll have two
to shoot, soon’s the boss gits back.”

Clayton did not answer, but slid out of his saddle.

“The boss said that if you did come back you’d got to do what he
ordered ye to, er he’d sure shoot you!” Molloy added, with a sneer.

Clayton picketed his horse, and returned to where the outlaws were
grouped. At one side lay the prisoner, old Nick Nomad; and Nomad’s
horse was with the other horses, grazing by the stream.

“You heard what I said?” snapped Molloy.

“Yes, I heard what you said.”

Clayton felt and looked confused. His cheeks burned hot again, and he
knew he was trembling a little. Yet he tried to hide this indication
of weakness.

Some of the men greeted him, but coldly and rather surlily. He saw
that he had fallen in their estimation. It was a rule of the band
that whatever the “boss” ordered had to be done, and no questions
asked. Clayton had refused to obey orders, and that made him a marked
man.

“If you heard what I said, why don’t you answer?” Molloy demanded.

“I don’t have to,” Clayton flared, shaken by growing anger. “Who are
_you_, anyway?”

Molloy doubled a hairy red fist and stepped in front of him.

“You don’t, hey? I reckon you know I’m commander here now?”

“Yes.” Clayton eyed that hairy and threatening fist.

“Then speak with respect to me. Do you understand that? You’ve got to
speak with respect to me, or I’ll hammer your face in ag’in.”

“It wasn’t you did it.”

“You think I can’t, eh?”

Molloy shook his hairy, red fist under Clayton’s nose.

Clayton hesitated, and looked about uneasily. He knew that since
his refusal of the night he was looked on as a coward by these men.
Molloy was bullying him because of that. Molloy was himself the
coward, and Clayton felt it--yet he hesitated, merely pushing the red
fist away when it was thrust so close that it touched the tip of his
nose.

“Don’t do that!” he protested mildly; so mildly that Molloy was only
encouraged to continue his bullying.

“I’m not to, eh?” said Molloy, pushing his fist once more against
Clayton’s nose, this time with such strength it was almost a blow.

“I tell you not to do that again!” said Clayton, his tone rising.

“And what will you do? Hey--you coward, what will you do? I’m in
command here, ain’t I?”

“I haven’t said you’re not, but I tell you not to do that again.”

Some of the men rose, grinning; this was becoming interesting to them.

“Give it to him, Molloy!” one of them sang out.

Molloy pushed his fist against Clayton’s nose, this time so strongly
that it brought blood, for Clayton’s nose was still sensitive and
ready to bleed at a touch. The dripping of blood down on his shirt
caused Clayton to turn white as a sheet; his eyes glittered with a
sort of flash, and he clenched his fists.

“You’re a bully and a coward,” he said, in a low, tense tone. “And if
you think I’m afraid of you, or afraid to fight you, you’re mistaken.”

He stepped back, and began slowly to take off his coat. His head was
roaring in a queer way, and flecks of red seemed to shoot and dart
before his eyes.

The men gathered around, forming a ring, with the youths in the
middle.

“Slug him, Molloy!” said the one who had chipped in before.

Molloy could hardly believe his eyes, when he saw that Clayton was
coolly preparing to fight him. He sprang at him, but one of the men
caught and held him.

“Meet him fair,” he was adjured; “meet him fair!”

“Oh, I’ll meet him fair!” Molloy snarled, really amazed by the
discovery that he would have to fight; “and I’ll hammer him to a
pulp.”

He shook himself free of the man’s hands, and began to take off his
own coat and roll up his sleeves. His arms were big and red, covered
with freckles, and unpleasant looking.

Clayton’s arms, as he bared them, were white as a girl’s, above the
tan circles of his wrists; but, white as they were, they looked firm
and hard and muscular. His face, too pale, did not show fear now, nor
cowardice.

“Now I’m ready for you!” he said quietly.

“And here you git it!” howled Molloy, his anger flaming red in his
freckled face. “Look out, for I’m coming!”

He leaped and swung, thinking to knock Clayton down at a blow. To his
surprise, Clayton side-stepped and dodged, so that the blow, meant
for his face, went over his head.

Then--crack! Clayton’s hard white fist fell full on the freckled face
of the bully, and Molloy tumbled backward, and would have fallen if
one of the outlaws had not caught him.

Molloy was dazed by that blow; but he saw that if he did not now whip
Clayton he would lose his standing with these men.

Clayton was standing quite still, his broad chest heaving, his eyes
glittering, and his face still pale; he had his hands up, ready for
defense.

When Molloy came again, his blow missed, and so did Clayton’s; and
then they locked in a fierce grapple, each striving to throw the
other.

The men stood about, clapping their hands and urging on the fighting.
This was to them as good as a circus.

“Slug him, Molloy!”

“Stand up to him, Pool!”

“Hook him under the jaw!”

“Cave in his face!”

Such were the commands shouted, as the men hopped about in their
excitement.

The combatants came to the ground together, Clayton underneath.
Molloy had his arms around Clayton, and now tried to push his head
against the ground, and at the same time batter him in the face.

In the opinion of the watching men, Pool Clayton was as good as
whipped, but with a mighty effort he twisted round, half rising; and
then, catching Molloy about the waist and shoulders, he lifted the
young bully and threw him through the air.

Molloy fell on his head and shoulders, a crashing fall, and lay
still, after sliding out on the ground in a limp heap.

The thing was done so quickly, and was such a surprise, that the men
stood in breathless silence, staring. Then one of them came up to
Clayton and offered his hand, which Clayton took.

“I didn’t think ye’d do it, Pool,” he confessed. “But you’re a game
rooster, after all; and here’s my hand on’t!”

Molloy groaned, writhed about, and then came slowly to a sitting
position, dabbing at his face weakly with his hands, and fluttering
his eyelids. For a minute he didn’t know what had happened to him.
Then he saw the grinning faces about him, and Pool Clayton standing,
white-faced and with arms folded, near by.

At sight of that face, evoking recollections of what had happened,
Molloy uttered a scream of rage, and drew his revolver. He leveled it
quick as a flash and fired, uttering an oath as he did so. Instantly,
however, one of the outlaws sprang at him and succeeded in striking
his arm, thus turning the weapon aside. He pushed Molloy back
violently, and took the revolver from his hands.

“None o’ that!” he cried sternly. “We don’t do that kind o’ work, ye
know! If you’re licked, you’re licked; and you’d ought to take it
like a man.”

Molloy turned on him, springing to his feet.

“Gimme my revolver!” he commanded.

The man tossed it to one of his friends.

“Not on yer life. I don’t!”

“I’m boss here, ain’t I? Gimme that revolver!”

“And let ye shoot Clayton?”

“That’s none of your bizness! Gimme that revolver!”

The man stood facing him. “See here!” he said. “We reports this biz
to Snaky Pete, and Snaky Pete ain’t goin’ to like it. And we don’t
take no more orders frum you while he’s gone. Do you git that through
yer head, or do I have to hammer it into it with my fist? You’re no
longer boss of this outfit. Ben, there, takes yer place; and he’s got
yer revolver. Now go off some’eres and think it over.”

Molloy might have protested further, but that a feeling of dizzy
faintness came upon him, and he had to drop to a seat on the ground.

Pool Clayton felt bewildered, rather than exultant, and he had
forebodings. He did not know how this whole thing would be regarded
by Snaky Pete.

He walked out to his horse, after putting his coat on, and changed
the picket pin, trying to find something to occupy himself with,
while he could think. Finally he came back and sat down by the fire.

Molloy, lying on the grass, panting and dizzy, glared at him
malevolently. The men said nothing, though they steadily regarded
both him and Molloy.

“A good un fer you!” said a voice.

Nick Nomad had spoken, much to Clayton’s surprise.

“I was bettin’ on ye frum the fust jump. Whenever I hear a feller
hollerin’ and pawin’ round, tearin’ up the ground like a mad bull,
wantin’ to fight, I allus knows thet thar’s more wind in him than
courage; and so I knowed you’d do him up. And I’m congratulatin’ ye
on it.”

Molloy lifted himself on his elbow and shot a malignant glance at the
old trapper.

“Is it your cut in?” he snapped. “Shut yer head, and keep it shut, or
I’ll feed bullets into yer mouth.”

“I’m thet hungry I could eat anything,” said the old trapper, “even
bullets.”

The answer brought a laugh from the outlaws, and seemed to lessen the
tension.

Pool Clayton had dropped down near the old trapper, but he did not
now look at him. But soon he heard the trapper say, and knew that the
words were intended for him, even though they might be overheard by
the other outlaws:

“My old pard, Buffler Bill, has been sighted in this section of
kentry, yer friends has told me, and the boss has gone out ter
investigate reports about him; and he says if Buffler is caught, then
you’ll have the fun of shootin’ both him and me. I’m cal’lating that
there will be things doin’ some when they catches Buffler! He ain’t
sich a fool as me.”




                            CHAPTER VIII.

                             CLOSING IN.


Snaky Pete had in his band some of the finest trailers of the West,
some being men who had made their mark as scouts in earlier and
better days.

These men had “gone wrong” at last, and were now outlaws; but they
had not lost their skill in scouting and trailing; and on them Snaky
Pete relied for information concerning Buffalo Bill, if the latter
was really in the country.

After leaving camp, Snaky Pete’s scouts and spies broke into two
bands, one being under his command, and the other under command of a
faithful lieutenant whose cruelties had gained him the name of The
White Wolf.

It was now the night of the second day of their investigations, after
news had been received from the town confirming the information of
Buffalo Bill’s presence and mission. Word had come to Snaky Pete that
Buffalo Bill had been sighted.

As strange as anything was the statement that the great border scout
was accompanied by a woman of hatchety face and elderly aspect.

The informants brought a description of the place where Buffalo Bill
and this female had gone into camp; and, after a discussion with
his men, Snaky Pete decided to try to surround the scout there, and
capture or kill him.

Horses were left behind, lest by neighing or stamping they should
reveal their presence to the man whom the outlaws hoped to take.

At two o’clock in the morning the late moon came up, giving light;
and Snaky Pete delayed his attack until that hour, for the camp of
the scout was in a dark hollow, and light was needed to make an
attack on it successful. By the hour of midnight Snaky Pete and his
men were on the mountain slope just below this camp, and they were
creeping up the slope when the first faint light in the cast heralded
the rising moon.

Buffalo Bill had been duly diligent, yet he knew nothing of this
stealthy approach of the road agents who were determined on his
destruction. He had fallen asleep in the earlier part of the night,
but now he was awake, having been aroused at about one o’clock. At
his command Pizen Jane had lain down, dropping into sound slumber.

The scout knew he was in a dangerous country. In addition to the road
agents who had captured Nomad, Indians were known by him to be in the
neighborhood. All signs pointed to this as a particularly dangerous
locality.

The scout sat in the darkness, before the rising of the moon. His
feet were over the concealed fire in a hole in the ground, to keep
them warm, for the night was cold, and his coat was drawn tightly
about him. His rifle was by his side, and in their places were his
revolvers and knife.

The night was very dark just before the moon’s appearance, and he
observed that it also was remarkably quiet. Though some wolves howled
afar off, near at hand not a sound was to be heard.

This was to his mind suggestive, and portended danger. He thought it
meant Indians.

Whether they were crawling on him or not, he could not tell, but
that Indians were moving about seemed probable, even in the deathly
stillness.

His horse, which had been grazing peacefully, became restless.
However, after a few snorts it settled down again to nibbling at the
scanty grass, though soon it ceased to feed.

The scout rose now, undoubling his tall form and standing erect
in the darkness, with rifle in hand and head bent in a listening
attitude. He saw the dark shape where the woman lay.

“No use to arouse her,” was his thought; “she needs all the sleep she
can get.”

Pizen Jane was still an enigma to him, in spite of the vast amount
of talking she had done. The information given of herself had not
been much more informing than word puzzles, but she had clung to him,
refusing to leave him, while stoutly declaring that her mission there
was the same as his--to hunt down outlaws.

When he heard nothing, the scout walked out to his horse. He found it
with head up and ears pricked forward, as if it either saw or heard
something suspicious.

Standing by his horse, with hand on the lariat close to its nose, the
scout looked out into the silent darkness, while his imagination
pictured there crawling Indian forms. He did not think of outlaws.

The moon rose, lighting the rim of the hollow where he had pitched
camp; but the rim was covered with a thick growth of bushes and small
trees, and so concealed from his searching eyes the forms of the
desperadoes who had crept up there.

Suddenly they jumped into view, in the red moonlight, yelling as
wildly as if they were Indians; and, with revolvers cracking, they
sprang down into the hollow, where they expected to find the scout
asleep.

With one swift circling motion Buffalo Bill drew his knife and cut
the rope that picketed his horse. In another instant he was on its
back, and then, with a wild dash, he broke through the thin line of
outlaws on that side.

He knew that if he returned to assist Pizen Jane his life would pay
for it; and he preferred that she should fall into the hands of these
men, leaving him alive, so that he might aid her later; a thing he
certainly could not do if he rushed down there and fell under the
fire of their revolvers. Yet he had a certain twinge of conscience,
which seemed to accuse him of cowardice and an abandonment of Pizen
Jane.

“But she can take care of herself, if any person in the world can,
and later I can do something for her,” he thought, as he drove his
horse pell-mell through the cracking bushes and the whipping branches
of the low trees.

The outlaws near him yelled, and took snapshots at him; and soon
other shots came ripping through the brush after him.

But he had cleared the cordon which Snaky Pete was certain he had
drawn around the camp; and, with a good horse under him, he felt
secure, even though that horse had now neither saddle nor bridle.

He waved his hand grimly in the direction of the yelling outlaws, as
his horse galloped on into the open, and he saw the gray prairies at
the foot of the mountains lying before him in the light of the rising
moon.

“Catch me, if you can!” he shouted, almost gay in the thought of the
manner in which the outlaws had let him slip through the meshes of
their net.

Then he recalled that now both the woman and old Nick Nomad were
prisoners in their hands, while he had escaped by the narrowest
margin; and, realizing the delicate and dangerous work lying now
before him, he mentally girded himself anew for the desperate work
thus laid on him.




                             CHAPTER IX.

                         A DEFIANT PRISONER.


Pizen Jane was aroused from heavy slumber by the yells of the road
agents and the crackling fire of their revolvers. She sprang up in
bewilderment and momentary terror.

Men almost ran over her, as they dashed in pursuit of the scout. One
came up to her, and, catching her roughly by the arm, jerked her
round.

Her anger blazed at the insult. Drawing back her fist, she struck him
in the face.

“You don’t know me, I reckon?” she cried. “Well, I’m Pizen Jane, of
Cinnabar, and I don’t ’low no mis’rable specimen of a man to treat me
as if I wasn’t a lady.”

The astounded road agent put a hand to his tingling face. Then, as
she seemed about to give him a second blow, he ducked and stepped
backward.

“Pardon me,” he said, not without humor; “but I didn’t know I’d run
up ag’inst the hind leg of a mule!”

Other desperadoes came rushing up, and they surrounded her, asking
questions.

“It’s none o’ yer bizness who I am, er what I’m doin’ here!” she
snapped. “But I’m Pizen Jane, of Cinnabar; and what my bizness is
you’ll know ’fore you’re ready fer it, lemme tell ye! And if any
o’ you cattle thinks he can make fun o’ me, er tries to git gay
with me, he’ll mighty quick wish’t he’d gone to some school of good
manners.”

“You was with Buffalo Bill?”

“What if I was; an’ what if I wasn’t?”

“That was him that rid off on that hoss?”

“Foller him and ask him, and then mebbe you’ll find out!”

She folded her arms and looked about defiantly, not at all afraid of
them, apparently; and she made a queer figure, as she stood there,
thus surrounded, with the light of the rising moon revealing her
gaunt form and homely features.

The chase of the scout, to judge from the sounds, was of a lively
character; there was a continual popping of rifles and revolvers, as
the outlaws took snapshots at him, or at shadows which they mistook
for him.

“I reckon they ain’t goin’ to git him,” said Pizen Jane complacently,
as she cocked an ear in the direction of the uproar.

“Well, we’ve got you!” was the grim answer.

“And a lot o’ good it will do ye! Now that you’ve got me, what ye
goin’ to do with me? I ain’t got no money, and I’m too old and homely
fer any o’ ye to want me fer a wife.”

She had recovered her mental balance, if it had indeed been lost at
all. Now she sat down on the ground very deliberately, and smoothed
her tangled hair and her travel-stained dress.

Some of the pursuing road agents began to come in, breathless and
spent. They stared hard at her; and she snapped at them with
vinegary answers when they asked questions.

One of the men who soon returned from the pursuit was Snaky Pete.

When her eyes lighted on him they burned with a fiercer fire than had
been in them lately. She got up and strode toward him, her fingers
outstretched as if she meant to tear his face.

“So, it’s you, is it?” she cried. “Well, I might ’a’ knowed it
was you, and I did partly guess it! You low-lived, knock-kneed,
white-livered, flea-bitten, devil-hunted----” She stopped, gasping,
unable to find words to express her detestation and hatred; but went
on again: “Oh, you mis’rable scum of the earth! You pestiferous,
walkin’ image of a man! I’ve found you, and now I settle with you!”

She stopped, and slowly drew a revolver from the folds of her dress.
In another moment she would have shot Snaky Pete dead, if one of his
men had not knocked the weapon from her hand.

She struggled with this man, shrieking, and tearing at him,
frantically trying to regain her revolver.

When she was held, for others were forced to go to their comrade’s
aid, she stood panting and glaring at Snaky Pete, who had not said a
word, but stared at her with wide eyes that hardly blinked.

“Jane Clayton!” he gasped. “I thought----”

“You thought I’d be too much of a woman, and too big a coward to----”

“I thought you was dead,” he said; “I was told it, and I----”

“Hoped I was, eh? Well, I ain’t! I’m alive enough to make things warm
fer ye, and I’m here to do it. Leggo of me!”

This last was directed to the men who clung to her.

“Leggo of me!” she screeched at them, flinging herself to and fro.

“Search her and see if she’s got other weapons,” said Snaky Pete.

The men had been astounded on hearing her words to him; the whole
thing was to them strange and mysterious. They searched her, but not
very thoroughly.

“Now, what aire you doin’ here?” Snaky Pete demanded of her. “You was
with that man!”

“Yes, with a man callin’ hisself Buffler Bill, though I don’t know
if he tole the truth about it. What of it? He was huntin’ outlaws,
he said; and so was I. And we j’ined teams, each to help the other.
I jedge, by the way you tried to git him, that he’s the ginuine
Buffler. And may the Lord speed him in runnin’ away from ye!”

“I s’pose you know that you’ve run yerself into a good deal of danger
by yer foolishness?” said Snaky Pete. “If we’ll let you go in the
mornin’, and give ye a horse, will you cut out fer the town?”

“Will I? Not till I git through with you!”

“Then we’ll send you under escort; and if you won’t go no other way,
we’ll tie you to a horse and make you go.”

“Pete Sanborn,” she said, scorn in her voice, “of all the mean,
low-down cowards on this earth, you’re the wust! You’re afeard o’
me, and you’d better be. Oh, I kin tell these gapin’, white-livered
wretches with ye that I know you. And why shouldn’t I, sense I was
yer wife fer more’n two years, and had a chance to know how beastly
mean a man kin be when he gits down and tries? I come huntin’ ye, fer
one thing; and I’ve found ye.”

Snaky Pete seemed afraid of her.

“Shut up!” he said; but she cackled defiantly.

“I won’t! I’m goin’ to tell these men what a coward ye aire. You
remember that time you knocked the drunk man down in the street, and
then drug him into an alley and robbed him? And do ye recklect that
other time, when you stole the gold altar service from a church,
and melted it down and sold it? And do you recall that other time,
when----”

“Close your head!” he shouted. He sprang at her, wild-eyed and
fiendish; but she clawed him in the face, and he fell back.

“Take her away!” he commanded. “Kill her--do anything! Take her away!”

The men dragged her away, while she screamed and raved her hatred of
the man who had once been her husband.

Snaky Pete tried to turn the incident aside as a jest.

“Heavens!” he said, “that woman’s got a tongue worse than a whip!
She’ll kill me. I did marry her, but that tongue made me mighty sick
of my bargain, and I left her. She’s sore over that, and she----”

He stopped as if disturbed by the angry outcries of Pizen Jane,
but it was really because he realized that he might talk too much
himself.




                             CHAPTER X.

                           MOTHER AND SON.


Buffalo Bill was not captured by Snaky Pete’s road agents.

The escape of the dreaded scout annoyed them. They feared him, and
knowledge that he was in that region disconcerted and troubled them
greatly.

They returned to the pursuit after daylight, but had no better
success, and at length gave over the attempt to capture the elusive
scout.

When Snaky Pete and his band, with their woman prisoner, reached the
camp at Poplar Bluffs, Tom Molloy and Pool Clayton, with their strife
and bickering, had disrupted the band left there, and were on the
point of settling the trouble by a free-for-all fight.

“You’ll be int’rested in some one there,” Snaky Pete had said to
Pizen Jane.

That she was interested was proved by the outcry she made as her eyes
fell on Pool Clayton.

“So you’re here, Bruce, jes’ as I expected to find ye?” she
sputtered. “Right here with these pizen skunks, after you writ to me
that you had fell into the hands of a fake Buffler Bill, who was a
road agent, and that he was holdin’ you a pris’ner, and was likely to
murder ye! What did you mean by writin’ that pack o’ lies to yer own
mother?”

Pool Clayton’s face grew as red as a beet. He looked at Snaky Pete
and the road agents, and then back at the woman who had so suddenly
announced that he was her son.

On the ground lay the prisoner, Nick Nomad, who had a twinkle in his
eyes now.

“What did ye mean?” she screamed at Pool Clayton. “Here I find this
pizen scamp that used to call hisself my husband, and with him I find
you! Both o’ ye road agents--the man that was my husband and the boy
that was my son!”

Pizen Jane’s voice broke in a sort of pitiful wail, and Nomad saw the
tears come into her eyes.

Pool Clayton looked confused and sheepish; Snaky Pete looked angry
and humiliated.

“Here, shut up yer yawp!” Snaky Pete shouted to her. “You’re a
nuisance; do ye know it?”

“A nuisance is a good sight more of a credit to ther community than a
murderous wretch like you!” she retorted. “Shut up yer own yawp! The
Lord gimme my tongue, and I’ve a right to use it, and I’m goin’ to.”

She turned again to Pool Clayton.

“I’m ashamed of ye!” she said. “Why did you write me sich a pack o’
lies?”

“Just to make you think I--I was killed, or would be,” he admitted.

“You didn’t want me to know that you had turned road agent. You
didn’t want me to know that you’d j’ined forces with that measly runt
there that I heard one of these men call Snaky Pete. Well, he _is_
snaky, and he’s worse’n snaky.”

Then her voice and manner changed.

“Pool,” she said, with something of motherly tenderness in her voice,
“it hurt me to believe that you’d gone wrong; and to find you here
hurts me more than that did. Git out of it, son; leave this crowd of
villains, and try to be an honest man. I’m a pore old woman, but I’ll
work my finger nails off to git ye a start in some honest way, if
you’ll jes’ make a try to be honest.”

“Take her away,” commanded Snaky Pete, irritated and wrathful.

She suffered herself to be led away, broken in spirit now, and
sobbing. For the moment, at least, she was no longer Pizen Jane, but
a heartbroken old woman.

The stir caused by the return of the main body of desperadoes caused
the feud between Pool Clayton and Tom Molloy to be forgotten, or
overlooked, for a time.

The astonishing claim of Pizen Jane, that Pool Clayton was her son
and that Snaky Pete was her recreant husband, was enough of itself to
make the outlaws forget that Clayton and Molloy had fought, and were
threatening bloody things against each other.

Snaky Pete walked nervously about, giving orders in a tone of
irritation which masked somewhat the real feelings of his heart.
He observed the prisoner, old Nick Nomad, then he looked at Pool
Clayton, who had withdrawn to a distance, both from his mother and
from Snaky Pete, his stepfather.

Molloy had slunk away, and was busily engaged in making himself
inconspicuous.

Snaky Pete grew wrathful and murderously vindictive.

“Here!” he snarled, speaking to Pool Clayton. “You ain’t done yit
what I told ye to!” He swung his hand toward Nick Nomad, as he thus
spoke to the young would-be outlaw. “I told you to shoot that old
skunk, and git him out of the way, and you ain’t done it!”

Pool Clayton came forward when Snaky Pete shouted to him a second
time.

“You needn’t think that you and yer mother kin come here and run this
camp! If she makes trouble, I’ll lay a stingin’ quirt across her
back, and you’ve got to mind me, er I’ll put a bullet through your
head instanter, and git rid of ye!”

Pool Clayton stood before him, trembling.

“Do ye hear?”

“Yes,” said Clayton.

“Then finish up the job that you wouldn’t do when I first tole ye to;
put a bullet through that ole fool instanter. He’s a pard of Buffalo
Bill, and out he goes. We can’t keep him, and we can’t afford to let
him go.”

Old Nick Nomad never changed countenance as he heard these brutal
orders.

“Buffler,” he had said once, talking with his old border pard, “I
allus tries ter live, so that when ther eend comes I can face it
square and honest. My hand has been ag’inst wrong, and I has tried to
keep it frum doin’ wrong.”

In that confident assurance old Nick Nomad lived, and in it he could
now die, if he had to.

Yet the warm currents of life ran through his veins still, almost
as freely as when he was a youth, and he did not desire death. He
desired to live, that he might further strike at the wrongdoers of
the border; and even as he listened to Snaky Pete he was wondering
how he could escape the doom which those words seemingly foreshadowed.

Another heard Snaky Pete’s brutal and murderous commands. The other
was Pizen Jane. She stepped courageously in front of the old trapper,
brushing away the hands of the outlaws who would have restrained her.

“Aire you a friend of Buffler Bill--the ginuine Buffler Bill?” she
demanded.

“Lady,” said Nomad, “I is happy ter say thet I’m one of thet man’s
closest friends. I’ll never deny thet, even afore ther Judgment.”

She faced around toward Snaky Pete.

“Pete Sanborn,” she said, her words sharp as knives, “when you kill
this man you shoot me down, too; and as fur as lettin’ any son of
mine do a thing like that, I’ll slay him with my own hands fust!”

Snaky Pete’s eyes glittered and his face almost grew black with rage.

“Git out of my way!” he yelled, drawing a long knife. He lifted it,
and jumped with it at the fearless woman.

A rifle cracked, seeming far off on the slope of the near-by
mountain. Snaky Pete stopped in mid-air, and, throwing up his hands,
he fell to the earth, blood spurting from between his lips.

The men of the camp stood still, shocked and confused; then a yell
of wrath broke forth. Some of them threw themselves on their horses,
while others rushed to Snaky Pete, lifting him.

“Glory be!” screamed Pizen Jane, waving her gaunt arms. “If the devil
is dead, I know who killed him! ’Twas Buffler Bill!”




                             CHAPTER XI.

                         THE DESERT HOTSPUR.


Buffalo Bill had not only evaded and baffled the outlaws, but had
circled around them, struck their trail, and had followed it so
closely that, from the mountain side, he had been able to look down
into the camp and behold the scenes which have been described.

He had strong field glasses, that drew the actors close to him,
apparently. He saw them so clearly that he almost fancied he could
follow the conversation. His long-range rifle lay at his side. He saw
that Nomad was there as a prisoner, and certain actions told him that
Nomad was in peril. He also fancied that Pizen Jane’s life was being
threatened.

As he looked, lowering his field glasses occasionally, he fitted to
his rifle telescopic sights, taking them from a pocket of his coat.

On all the border there was not another rifle shot like Buffalo Bill.
He was famous as a long-range sharpshooter.

Instead of looking longer through the field glasses, he looked
now through the telescopic sights of his rifle. He saw Snaky Pete
standing before the woman, who was protecting Nick Nomad with her
body. He saw the knife raised and glittering in Snaky Pete’s hand.
Then his rifle cracked, with the sights bearing on the outlaw leader;
and the bullet speeding true, he saw Snaky Pete pitch up his hands
and roll to the ground.

“Good work!” he said, patting the rifle affectionately. “That was
about as long a shot as I ever made; but I got him.”

He saw men spring for their horses, and knew they would ride out to
the point where the rifle had sounded; yet he lingered long enough to
see Snaky Pete lifted and carried aside.

“I didn’t kill him,” he said. “The distance was too great, and I
didn’t strike a vital spot; but he’ll remember it for some time, I’ve
no doubt, and maybe it will teach him better manners.”

He removed the telescopic sight and stowed it away and placed the
field glasses in their case.

Taking up his rifle, he made his way down the hill, keeping out of
view of the horsemen who were now riding hard in his direction.

Some distance below, in a growth of aspens, his horse had been
concealed. Mounting, he rode down the slope. Then, swinging round the
projecting base of the hill, he shaped his course across the open
country. His horse was speedy, and it was seemingly untiring.

Though the outlaws saw him soon, and gave hot chase, he steadily drew
away from them, and in an hour he had lost sight even of the foremost.

That night, as darkness fell, the great scout was before the gate
at Fort Thompson, where a company of cavalry was stationed. He was
challenged; then he was admitted and conducted to the headquarters of
Major Clendenning, the commander.

Cody’s horse was in a white lather of sweat from its long run; and
the scout’s clothing was powdered with white dust, and dust streaked
his face to a grayish tinge. He showed every indication of long and
hard riding.

Clendenning sprang up, with outstretched hand, when the noted scout
was brought before him.

Buffalo Bill had saluted, but he now took the extended hand of the
officer.

“In the name of Heaven, Cody, where have you come from?” cried the
major. “I thought you were over about the Sepulcher Mountains.”

“So I was, major,” was his answer, “but now I am here. I rode from
there since this morning.”

Major Clendenning’s amazement showed in his face.

“You had a change of horses, no doubt, and you must be nearly dead!
Let me get you some wine!”

“I had only one horse. He is pretty well exhausted, but will be all
right after a rest. I need another, which I hope you can let me have.”

“Swallow the wine, Cody, and then I’ll hear your story. Straight from
the Sepulcher Mountains since morning!”

Buffalo Bill drank the wine, and then began to tell his story.

“Nomad is a prisoner,” was one of his statements, “and so is a woman
from Cinnabar who calls herself Pizen Jane. I’m not just certain
of her, but she bravely stood up before Nomad when that outlaw
threatened him.”

“She and Nomad will both be slain, if they have not been already,”
said Clendenning.

“It may be. I’m hoping otherwise. But I saw I could do no more then
than I had done, and that if I expected to aid them I must have
assistance. So I rode here to get it.”

“You shall have it, Cody.”

“I want twenty good men, well armed and provisioned. We’ll not be
able to get back there as quickly as I came from there; but we can go
as fast as possible. I shall rescue Nomad and root out that devil’s
nest. If he has been killed, there will be some desperadoes of the
Sepulcher Mountains who will pay for it with their lives.”

“You can start as early in the morning, Cody, as you like, and you
shall have the men,” said Clendenning; “I’ll give the orders right
now.”

He turned to the door.

“Stop, major; I want those men right now, without a moment’s delay.”

Clendenning turned back in surprise.

“But you’ll have to rest, Cody; you can’t go back without proper
rest.”

“I’m fit to start back this minute, Major Clendenning. It will be a
favor if you detail the men who are to go with me, and have them get
ready instantly. I should like to have you order an extra horse for
me, and while preparations are being made I’ll eat a bite, and then
go right back.”

Clendenning, amazed at the scout’s orders, proceeded, however, to
carry them out.

Twenty picked men were soon saddling horses, looking to their rifles,
packing rations, and getting ready for a hard and swift ride to the
Sepulcher Mountains.

Buffalo Bill swallowed some food hastily, ordered his saddle
pouches to be filled with more; and then dropped down on a lounge
in the major’s headquarters for a few winks of sleep. He had hardly
stretched himself on the lounge before he was sleeping soundly.

He slept less than half an hour, during which time the preparations
for his departure were being hurried; then he awoke, seemingly much
refreshed and ready for any task.

It was this astonishing ability to fall asleep anywhere and at any
time, and to awake after a brief slumber apparently as refreshed as
if he had slept through a whole night, that in part made Buffalo Bill
the wonder he was on a border trail.

He now brushed his clothing, ate more food, and then issued from the
major’s headquarters.

“Men,” he said, speaking to the troopers who greeted him, and who
were about ready to follow him, “we’ll have a hard night’s work of
it, and a part of to-morrow may be consumed if the outlaws have
changed their location; but I know you, each of you--men of the
gallant old Seventh Cavalry!--and I thank you in advance for the
success I know you will achieve. If Nick Nomad has been killed by
Snaky Pete’s desperadoes, then desperado blood will flow before we
see this fort again.”

They cheered him to the echo. Not a man there but felt proud to
follow this gallant scout, whose reputation was so closely linked
with that of the famous Seventh Cavalry.

Members of that noted regiment had died with Custer on the
battlefield of the Little Bighorn, when a handful of men were
overwhelmed and swept out of existence by a horde of Indian braves,
the flower of the Sioux nation. On almost every battlefield of the
West in which Uncle Sam’s troopers were hurled against Indians or
outlaws, the gallant Seventh had had representatives.

The troopers cheered again, saluting the flag, as they passed in the
night out through the heavy double gates of the fort.

Major Clendenning accompanied them beyond the limits of the fort and
its grounds.

“Men,” he said, as he was about to turn back, “I have a new name
for our famous scout. Hotspur usually refers to a man impetuous of
temper; but it might mean, also, I think, a man who as a horseman
rode with a spur so hot that in nine hours he covered the distance
between the Sepulcher Mountains and Fort Thompson. So I give you a
new name for him--Buffalo Bill, the Desert Hotspur.”

He lifted his hat to the scout; and again the troopers cheered, their
loud cheering rolling across the level lands in a way that, if it
could have been heard by them, would have startled the desperadoes
under Snaky Pete.

Then the troopers, with Buffalo Bill riding swiftly at their head,
to set the pace for them, galloped away through the night and the
darkness, the thundering of the hoofs of the horses reaching into the
barracks at the fort.




                            CHAPTER XII.

                      IN THE OUTLAW STRONGHOLD.


Snaky Pete’s men, when they returned, reported that no horse they had
could keep in sight of the thoroughbred ridden by Buffalo Bill.

The outlaw chief received the report, lying on a roll of blankets,
gasping and sputtering. The bullet fired by the scout had struck
him on the lower lip, laying it open, knocking out some teeth, and
bringing a spurt of blood from the wound. Snaky Pete had thought he
was killed when he fell and knew that blood was pouring from his
mouth. As a matter of fact, he was not seriously wounded, though the
pain was sharp for a time, and the character of the wound made it
difficult for him to speak.

His fright did not soon pass, however. Even after his men returned
with their report that Buffalo Bill had escaped he still lay on the
blankets, moaning and cursing.

The fact that Buffalo Bill had ridden toward distant Fort Thompson
filled him with uneasiness. Because of it he ordered the horses to
be got ready, and the entire band to move at once into the Sepulcher
Mountains.

He was filled with a sullen and savage rage against Pizen Jane and
Pool Clayton, and against Nick Nomad. He began to believe that Pizen
Jane had guided Nomad and Buffalo Bill; and he now even suspected
that Pool Clayton, in joining the band, was moved by a desire to
betray it into the hands of officers.

He refused to furnish Pizen Jane with a horse, declaring that if she
accompanied him she would have to walk.

She came up to him, as he swayed weakly on the horse to which he had
been helped.

“Git out o’ my way,” he mumbled. “If you hang ’round me I’ll kill ye!”

“But I want to know if you ain’t goin’ to send Pool away? I ain’t
goin’ away myself, but I want Pool turned loose on a horse, with
orders fer him to go back to Cinnabar. I’ve been talkin’ with him,
and he’ll do it. Aire ye goin’ to let him?”

“I’ll furnish you with a horse to clear out on,” he said, speaking
with pain and difficulty.

“Me? La, I ain’t goin’! But I want him to start now, instanter. Here
he’s like a good apple in the middle of a lot of rotten ones. So
I----”

“Go yourself!” Snaky Pete snarled at her.

“No, I stay with you!”

“Why?”

“Well, jest to please myself.”

“To help that old trapper?”

“No; jes’ to please myself. I’m yer wife, ain’t I? Er I was, before I
divorced ye. I think I’ll stay with you.”

“I’ll kill you if you do!” he fumed. “He can’t go! Go yerself, and
I’ll be glad to have you git out.”

She dropped back, to where Pool Clayton was riding.

He slipped from his horse.

“Take it, and I’ll walk,” he said, with a guilty flush.

“I want you to leave these men instanter,” she urged.

“No; I ain’t goin’ to. Why don’t _you_ go?”

“Me?” She leaned toward him. “Because I’ve swore by everything that’s
good and bad that I’m goin’ to kill Pete Sanborn soon’s I git the
chance. He ruined my life, and now he’s ruinin’ yourn.”

Her voice was low, but her face flushed as if she had swallowed fiery
liquor.

Snaky Pete saw her talking with the youth, and then saw her mount the
horse which Pool surrendered to her.

“They’re ag’inst me!” he grumbled, under his breath. “They’ve planned
to break up the band and git me captured. It’s revenge she’s after.
Well, I’ll settle her; and I’ll settle him, and that old trapper,
too! I see now why Pool wouldn’t shoot the old cuss; it was ’cause
he’s in with him. He and she aire in with Buffalo Bill and the
officers. Likely they’re to git a reward, if they land me. Well, I’ll
settle ’em!”

He brooded over this, his anger mounting and his desire to “settle
’em” growing.

“Mebbe I can git out of her what the plans of Buffalo Bill aire; er
mebbe I can git it out of Pool. I reckon that Cody will try to bring
soldiers from Fort Thompson. There’s a nasty fight comin’, I can see.
Well, I’m livin’ yit; and long’s I can straddle a horse and give
orders, I’m worth a dozen men in a fight. And if Cody thinks we won’t
fight he’ll know better when he tackles us.”

His thoughts took another turn:

“P’r’aps I might buy Cody to draw off the soldiers by sending him
word that if he didn’t I’d kill Nomad. It might work, and might be
advisable if we git in a tight hole.”

He was in a fretting and fuming mood when the Sepulcher Mountains
were entered. His wound made him feverish, and that did not add to
his good temper. He snapped and snarled at his men whenever they came
to him for orders, and conducted himself altogether in a disagreeable
way.

“He’s jes’ like a bear with a sore head,” said Pizen Jane, when she
observed these things.

She had kept with the outlaw command, and Pool Clayton had done the
same; both of them avoiding, as much as possible, personal contact
with the irascible leader.

As soon as their permanent camp was gained, in the Sepulcher
Mountains, the outlaws began to put it in order for a fight or a
siege.

The place was a cuplike hollow, with a pass running through it. If an
enemy could gain and hold both ends of that pass the outlaws could
only escape by scaling the mountains. But, on the other hand, if the
outlaws barricaded those entrances into the valley and stationed a
force of riflemen behind the barricades, the troopers who climbed
over them would have the fight of their lives to accomplish it.

Tn spite of the pain of his wound and his feverishness, Snaky Pete
personally superintended the strengthening of the barricades. He saw
that ammunition was properly distributed, and that all arms were put
in the best possible condition.

Night was approaching before all the defenses were in condition to
suit him. He looked them over carefully, as he walked from point to
point, his face swathed in bandages.

“If they climb over them,” he thought grimly, “there’ll be more dead
troopers than live ones. When Snaky Pete gits his back to the wall,
he fights, and they’ll find it out.”




                            CHAPTER XIII.

                        PEERLESS AS A SCOUT.


Buffalo Bill and the troopers from Fort Thompson struck the foothills
of the Sepulcher Mountains at daybreak, and were thus able to get
under cover of the scrub that fringed them, and out of sight of any
spies and scouts that Snaky Pete might have sent out.

It had been a hard night’s ride to accomplish this, but it was worth
the exertion.

Buffalo Bill was sure that the road agents had changed their position
since he saw them last. Hence, the first thing to do was to locate
them in their new position.

In spite of the tremendous strain he had been under for so long, he
undertook to do this himself; and he left the troopers in camp in a
grassy nest within the foothills, but close up to the base of the
Sepulcher range.

He rode his weary horse for a few miles, until he struck the trail
made by the outlaws in their retreat. Then he left the horse well
concealed, and began on foot to follow the trail. It was so fresh
looking he thought the outlaws were not far ahead. However, he went
so slowly in order to guard against surprise, that the afternoon was
well advanced before he came in sight of the cuplike hollow where
they were preparing to make their stand.

From an elevation that commanded the hollow he looked with his field
glasses right down into the camp, and saw the busy preparations
making to meet the troopers.

He was much worried, because he could not see old Nick Nomad. He
hoped, however, that the old man was being held in one of the houses.

Once he beheld Pizen Jane, but only for a brief moment or two. She
came out of a low hut, and looked about, and then went in again.

“I must know, if possible, if Nomad is there; and I wish I could do
something to protect that woman when we make our charge.”

His study of the outlaw stronghold convinced him that it would be
folly to attack it from either end of the pass. The barricades were
strong, he saw, and he did not wish to sacrifice the lives of any of
the troopers needlessly. So he began to examine the slopes of the
hills that led down into that hollow.

They were unscalable to horses, but he believed at one point men
might descend them, even in the darkness. He made careful note of
that point, and stowed its landmarks in his memory.

When the shadows of coming night filled the hollow, the scout
moved from his position, and began to work his way down toward it,
screening himself behind rocks and bushes.

Darkness came fully while he was still on the slope of the hill, and
he remained there until he felt it was safe to work still nearer in
to the outlaw camp.

Guards had been set at the barricades, and beyond them in the
passes, and guards were also stationed around the camp at intervals.

The scout approached so near to one of these guards that he heard the
tread of the fellow’s feet and caught the odor of the tobacco burning
in his pipe.

Though he desired to get still nearer in, Buffalo Bill saw the
difficulty of the attempt, for this sentry walked a beat which
crossed the line of his advance.

After working with much care to one side, he crouched in the darkness
and emitted there the well-known “cuckoo” call of the prairie-dog
owl, hoping by it to reach old Nomad, if the trapper still lived.

The guard was not disturbed at first by the call of the little owl,
for it was a familiar sound; but when it was several times repeated,
and with a variation he had never heard in the note, his attention
was attracted.

“A cussed funny dog owl,” the scout heard him mutter; and then heard
him come toward him.

Buffalo Bill desired to keep from the outlaws the fact that their
camp was being spied on, hence he crouched low in the hollow and
waited until the guard had turned back. Then he sent forth again the
“cuckoo” call, with that queer variation which had attracted the
notice of the sentinel.

Unfortunately for the immediate success of the scout’s efforts, Nomad
was at the time asleep in one of the huts, and so did not hear him.

When no answer came to his calls, the scout’s uneasiness concerning
the fate of Nomad grew.

Resolved to know, if possible, if the old trapper lived, he slipped
from his place of concealment when the sentry had walked to the
farther end of his beat, and then went sliding farther down over the
steep rocks.

The sentry was a keen-eared fellow, and heard the displacement of
a small stone, which rattled down the slope. Instantly the scout
flattened himself on the rocks and waited until the stone fell.

After a moment of silence, the sentry again came toward him; and soon
the scout could see him faintly in the dim light of the stars.

“Prairie-dog owls don’t ginerally go to rollin’ stones,” the sentinel
was muttering, as he stood staring up the slope, trying to make out
what it was had started the stone to rolling.

He could see nothing that warranted suspicion.

“Mebbe a coyote tryin’ to git at the owl,” he said to himself; “ain’t
heerd the owl fer a minute er so. P’r’aps it was scared off by a
coyote.”

As he came still farther up the slope, prying and peering, he saw
something, and, pitching up his rifle, he fired at it. What he beheld
was the recumbent form of the scout flattened against the rock.

The scout saw the rifle pointed toward him, and avoided its bullet by
a quick, sliding movement. The lead struck the rock over his head.

That sliding motion was heard and seen by the sentry. He did not
believe, then, that what he had shot at was a man, but thought it a
coyote; and, because it had not bounded away, he thought he had slain
it. He leaped forward, swinging his rifle; while a roar of excited
calls and questions were hurled up at him from the camp.

He beheld the dark ball into which the scout had doubled himself when
he knew he could not easily escape, and plunged toward it, with knife
in hand.

To his astonishment, as he bent down he was caught by the collar
of his coat and jerked flat on his face. He yelled in fright; then
wheezed, as the iron fingers of the scout settled around his windpipe.

The men below were yelling up at him.

Buffalo Bill’s choking fingers reduced him to unconsciousness, and
then flung him aside. The scout still lay where he had been lying;
but now his revolvers were out.

“That aroused the whole camp,” he said to himself, “and I’ll have to
get out of here quick.”

It occurred to him that in arousing the outlaws he had probably
aroused the old trapper, also, if he lived; so he sent forth again,
with that varying quaver, the call of the little dog owl.

Old Nomad, who had been awakened by the rifle shot and the clamor,
heard it, and recognized it at once. He sat bolt upright, listening
for its repetition.

It came again, clear and unmistakable.

“Buffler!” he said, with a thrill of recognition. Then he rolled to
the door of the hut, for he was bound; and from the open doorway
sounded a cry similar to that which had come from the hillside.

When Buffalo Bill heard it, a great load of dread rolled from his
heart.

“Nomad!” he said. “Thank Heaven he is alive!”

Pizen Jane had been standing close by the door, on the outside, when
Nick Nomad uttered that cry of the dog owl.

“That’s queer,” she said, looking at him, seeing him faintly
outlined. “Have you got a dog owl hid about ye?”

“A hull cageful,” he answered. And again he sent out the cry.

Buffalo Bill was already climbing up the slope, knowing that the
outlaws would soon be there. He was glad he had aroused old Nomad,
but he regretted that he had drawn the rifle fire of the sentry; for
he had hoped the outlaws would not guess that an enemy had gained
access to that slope of the hill overhanging their permanent camp.

But regrets were useless. The only thing to be done was to
accommodate himself to the fact.

When the outlaws, climbing up the hill, gained the point where the
sentry lay senseless, they found him, and flashed lights to discover
if he were dead or what had happened to him. By shaking the man, they
aroused him; and he sat up, staring and wheezing, clutching at his
aching throat.

“I thought it was a coyote,” he gurgled.

“And what was it?”

“Well, I dunno; but somethin’ grabbed me and choked me, and----”

“Must have been a man!”

“I thought it--it was a coyote, prowlin’ round after a dog owl,” he
explained. “I heard the dog owl, and then I thought I saw the coyote,
and----”

“Shot at a coyote? That was no way to do!”

“Well, I didn’t know but ’twas mebbe a man.”

They took him down into the camp, where Snaky Pete was nervously
awaiting their report. Snaky Pete questioned him, and inspected his
throat.

“Finger prints there, it looks like,” he said. “’Twas a man. And if
a man, then ’twas an enemy, er he wouldn’t slid out that way. Mebbe
there aire more of ’em up there. Strengthen the guards, and every man
stand to his post.”

Old Nick Nomad, lying in the doorway of the hut, was listening for
some other sound from Buffalo Bill.

“What was the meanin’ of that?” Pizen Jane asked him, after the
helpless sentry had been brought in.

Nomad was silent, and she repeated her question.

“I might say, if I thought I could trust ye.”

“I’ll prove to ye that you can,” she said; “though I’m doin’ jes’
what I have been meanin’ to do all day.” She bent over him and cut
the cords that held him, and then slipped the knife into his hands.
“Now, what was it?”

“Buffler Bill,” said Nomad. “He was out thar. Thet war his signal ter
me; and I answered it.”

“He’s got men with him?” she gasped.

“I dunno. Mebbe he has, and mebbe he ain’t. But he’s silent now, and
prob’bly has cut out, seein’ that the force hyar is too big fer him.
But you bet he’ll be comin’ back ag’in; and when he does, somethin’
will be doin’.”




                            CHAPTER XIV.

                        THE LIVING BARRICADE.


In one way, it was unfortunate that Pizen Jane had released old Nomad
at that time. A road agent who had heard the cry of the dog owl
from the hut, and wondered about it, came over to investigate, and
appeared so suddenly and inopportunely that he discovered what Pizen
Jane had done. With a yell of astonishment and wrath, he hurled the
woman aside and leaped on the old trapper.

Under ordinary conditions, Nomad might have engaged this desperado
successfully; but now his arms and legs were benumbed, and his whole
body was sore and stiff, from the long congestion of blood caused by
the bonds that had been on him.

Nevertheless, though surprised, and taken at such a disadvantage,
the old trapper put up a stiff fight. He slashed a wide gash in the
outlaw’s face with the knife Pizen Jane had given him; and then,
tripping the outlaw, he rolled with him over and over on the floor,
clawing and striking with all his might.

Pizen Jane flew to the aid of Nomad, and set upon the road agent.

How the singular combat would have ended, if there had been no
interference, cannot be stated.

There was interference. Other outlaws, drawn by the noise, ran to the
hut; and in a very little while both old Nomad and Pizen Jane were
overpowered and their weapons taken from them.

Snaky Pete came to the hut, drawn by the yells of his men, and
learned what had happened. His rage passed all bounds. He drew a
revolver, and for an instant it seemed that he meant to shoot both
old Nomad and Pizen Jane. Then another thought came to him.

“Tie ’em, and keep ’em tied,” he said; “and send Pool Clayton here. I
want to see him bad.”

That sounded ominous.

Pool Clayton was called, and came forward with fear and trembling. He
had told his mother not long before that he was willing to leave the
outlaws, and glad to do it, if she would accompany him. He had been
expecting that she would do that soon. It was delayed, he thought, by
the difficulty of getting out of the camp.

The young man had been given a good deal of time for serious
reflection. His dreams of what a road agent’s life was like had not
come true; and, besides, he had been aroused to a realization of
the enormity of the offense itself. In addition, his heart had been
touched by his mother.

But perhaps the strongest of the forces that had moved him was a
recollection of Snaky Pete’s commands to him to shoot old Nomad.
That, with his present fear of personal danger in the battle with the
troopers that seemed imminent, had made him want to get out of the
camp without delay.

It seemed to him that his talks with his mother, and even his
thoughts and desires to get away, had become known to Snaky Pete,
when the latter sent for him, commanding him sharply to appear at
once.

On arriving at the hut, he saw Nomad and Pizen Jane bound and
prisoners. A startling fear that he was to be commanded to shoot not
only Nomad but his mother came to terrify him.

“Tie him!” Snaky Pete roared.

The road agents threw themselves upon the fear-stricken youth,
quickly subdued him, and bound him. Then Snaky Pete took occasion to
explain to his men just what he meant to do.

“Buffalo Bill thinks mighty well, seems to me, of them three people,”
he said, pointing to the three prisoners. “It’s my opinion that Pool
and his mother got in here on purpose to betray the band, and lead
enemies to it. In my jedgment, they’d have done something to-night,
by way of weakenin’ the barricades, mebbe, that would have got us all
killed er captured.”

The murmurs of the desperadoes rose unpleasantly as they listened to
these accusations.

“I been watchin’ Pool ever sence he refused to shoot that old duffer
there when I ordered him to. That’s one p’int in the proof that he is
ole Nomad’s friend and Cody’s friend; and that woman I know to be the
pizenest rattlesnake in many ways that ever crawled on the earth.

“Jes’ the same, I ain’t goin’ to shoot ’em--not now! I want ’em put
up in front of the barricades, where the troopers can see ’em; and
then, if the soldiers want to shoot into the barricades, let ’em do
it.”

It was a long speech, and its utterance cost him effort and pain;
yet he felt savagely gratified by it. He had determined on the death
of Pizen Jane, and of Pool Clayton and Nick Nomad.

If the troopers, in trying to take the barricades, killed the three,
well and good; for a time he hoped their position there would hold
the soldiers back. If the prisoners were not thus slain, he would
have them shot as enemies after the coming fight was over. He still
had confidence in his men and in the strength of his position, and
was feverishly vengeful and defiant.

Pool Clayton wilted and cried out for mercy when he was dragged by
the road agents out to one of the barricades, and was lifted over it
and tied to the logs of which it was composed. His mother was tied by
his side. They were on the outside of the barricade, and looked up
the dark pass, where they half expected to see soon the flaming of
the carbines of troopers.

Placed thus, where the rain of lead could not miss them, it seemed to
Pool Clayton that his end was at hand. He cried out in bitterness and
anguish of spirit, reproaching himself for the evil course which had
led to this horrible fate.

“Pool,” said Pizen Jane, touched by his moaning outcries, “there
aire things that aire a heap worse’n to die this way; and one of the
things that aire worse is bein’ a successful road agent. Fer that is
a thing that would shore destroy you, body and soul.”

“Oh, don’t talk that way!” he wailed. “Don’t talk that way! We must
escape! We must get away!”

He threw himself to and fro in his agonies.

One of the outlaws came climbing over the barricade.

“See here,” he said, “if you don’t stop that yelpin’, I’ve got orders
to gag ye. Now, will you stop?”

Pool Clayton stopped, but lay shivering against the logs, white-faced
and wild-eyed, overcome by terror.

At the other barricade Nick Nomad had been tied in the same way.

But Nomad was showing no cowardly spirit. He believed in Buffalo
Bill’s ability to accomplish even wonders, and he therefore had hope.




                             CHAPTER XV.

                        THE GALLANT TROOPERS.


Buffalo Bill scaled successfully the slope of the mountain above the
outlaw camp and got away.

He heard the uproar in the camp, and was almost tempted to turn back,
fearing for the life of Nick Nomad; but he went on. He did not really
see how he could help Nomad without at the same time putting his own
life in such jeopardy that the risk could not be justified.

Two hours later he reached his horse, which he mounted, and then
shaped his course by the stars in the direction of the camp of
troopers.

Midnight was long past when he reached their camp and reported his
discoveries.

“I must have half an hour’s sleep,” he said, “and while I am getting
it have everything made ready for an immediate advance.”

He dropped down by one of the fires, in his clothing, and was
sleeping almost at once, as soundly as a child.

The lieutenant in command of the troopers awoke him at the end of his
brief nap. Then, once more, the redoubtable scout was in the saddle,
this time leading the troopers forth toward the discovered camp of
the desperadoes of the Sepulcher Mountains.

The men under Buffalo Bill gained the base of the mountain over
against the outlaw camp shortly before daylight, having ridden hard
to accomplish it.

There the horses were left, one man out of four dropping back to hold
them, while the other three went forward. Buffalo Bill again led the
advance, up the slopes of the mountain.

His spying of the previous afternoon had convinced him of the folly
of trying to take those barricades by assault. He did not doubt the
courage and ability of the troopers, than whom braver men never
lived, but it would have been criminal, he felt, to ask them to lay
down their lives in front of those deadly barricades when the camp
might be taken in an easier way. His plan was to climb the mountain,
and descend in the darkness just before the dawn upon the outlaw
camp, endeavoring by this descent and the suddenness of the attack to
surprise and stampede its defenders.

In spite of his strenuous efforts to get down the slope while the
darkness was densest, the very fact that the darkness was so great
kept the scout from doing this. For the descent had to be made with
caution; and, consequently, was made with wearying slowness.

The gray dawn was in the east when the troopers crouched like
mountain lions on the rocky ground that overhung the outlaw camp.

Down in the camp there was some kind of stir, though what it meant
could not be determined. In the gray light the shapes of the low huts
were almost indistinguishable. The sentries that the scout knew were
there could not be seen, for not a light flickered, and no camp-fire
glow was seen. Nevertheless, he was sure that behind the barricades
the outlaws were waiting and watching, and that alert sentinels were
making their ceaseless and vigilant rounds.

Suddenly a single revolver shot sounded down in the camp, breaking
with startling clearness on the still air of the dawn. Following it
there was an excited clamor.

Buffalo Bill did not know what that shot meant. He realized that it
might be a signal that he and the troopers had been discovered. Yet
he did not hesitate, but gave instantly the command to charge, hoping
to gain some advantage by the excitement and confusion into which the
outlaws seemed to have been thrown.

The troopers leaped, some sliding and rolling, down the bowldered
slope. Then their charging cheer rose, and their carbines flamed and
cracked as they gained the lower ground, and rushed upon the huts
they now beheld before them.

Most of the outlaws were at the moment behind the barricades which
defended the two sides of the camp, at the entrances of the pass.
Some of them, however, were in or near one of the huts, and, with
wild yells, they tried to meet the onset of the charging troopers.

At the head of the troopers was seen the tall form of Buffalo Bill,
as, with revolver in hand, he led the charge.

Desperadoes went down under the fire of the troopers, and troopers
fell, shot by desperadoes; and then the troopers were in the midst of
the huts, and the battle was on in all its fury.




                            CHAPTER XVI.

                        A WOMAN’S VENGEANCE.


The shot which Buffalo Bill and the troopers heard, and which was
followed by their advance, was fired by Pizen Jane.

Perhaps because she was a woman the cords that bound her wrists and
held her to the barricade were not knotted as securely and tightly as
those that bound her son. Men were desperate and low indeed when they
do not, consciously or unconsciously, retain some consideration for a
woman.

Pizen Jane had discovered, after a time, that she could work her
wrists about in the cords. She had said nothing of her discovery, for
outlaws were near her, behind the barricade; and out in front paced a
sentry.

But she had begun to strain and tug at the cords, finding by and by
that they gave a little.

This added to her desire to get out of them, and to that task she
bent her endeavors.

Yet a long time went by before she again felt the cords slip and give
under her manipulation.

After she was able to draw out one hand she stood for some time in
silence, considering what she could do. Apparently, she could do
nothing, because of the men near by.

She did not dare to speak of what she had done to Pool, lest she
should be overheard.

After that, as she had waited, hoping for something that would create
a diversion of which she could take advantage, the slow-moving time
had seemed interminable.

But Pizen Jane was possessed of monumental patience.

She had waited, minute by minute and hour by hour, hoping that
something would turn in her favor.

At intervals she had strained at the cords which still held one
wrist, and at last freed it. Her feet were still tied at the ankles,
and her body was still bound to the barricade.

She grew desperate when she saw the gray dawn breaking, and knew that
day was near, when inevitably what she had done would be discovered.

She began to strain at the cords on her ankles; and at length, in
her desperation, she stooped over, determined to untie them with her
hands.

The sentinel out in front saw her do this.

“Hello!” he said. “What ye doin’?”

She stood erect by the barricade, her hands behind her back once
more, her lips firmly compressed, and did not answer him.

Long before, Pool Clayton had become little better than a shaking
jelly bag, through excess of fright. He hardly knew what the man
said, and he had not discovered what his courageous mother was doing.

The man walked up to the barricade, and, stooping over, looked Pizen
Jane in the face.

“Hello!” he repeated. “What you doin’?”

Then her hands flew out, and, catching the knife from his belt, she
drove it into his shoulder, inflicting a wound that tumbled him back,
gasping and half paralyzed.

Before the outlaws on the other side of the barricade knew just
what had occurred, Pizen Jane had cut the cords that held her, had
stricken loose those that bound Pool Clayton, and was climbing over
the barricade, the knife and the sentry’s revolver in her hands.

“Git out o’ my way!” she snarled, striking at one of the men who
sought to oppose her progress.

He fell back out of the way of the knife. Then she sprang down, and
in another instant she was running toward the huts.

One of the outlaws pitched up a rifle and was on the point of
shooting her.

“Don’t do it!” a companion warned, and he knocked the muzzle of the
gun aside. “The boss would raise Old Ned wi’ ye, if ye should.”

Though they feared to shoot, a couple of them followed her; but when
they reached the huts, though they had followed close at her heels,
they could not find her.

One of them poked his head into the hut where Snaky Pete was lying,
supposedly asleep.

“Hello!” he called, in a low voice. “That woman has got away, and is
in the camp here some’eres.”

Snaky Pete came to his feet, and rushed to the door.

“Where is she?” he cried, his wounded lip cutting him like a knife as
he said it.

“Here!” was the startling answer.

Pizen Jane seemed to rise out of the ground before him. She threw up
the revolver, and fired full at him. It was the revolver shot that
the scout and the troopers heard.

As its report rang out, Snaky Pete Sanborn, the outlaw and desperado,
pitched forward on his face, falling dead in the door of the hut.

Pizen Jane had kept her vow.

The charge of the troopers came right on top of this, turning the
attention of the outlaws to the task of repulsing the invaders. The
fight that followed was sharp and hot, but it was short.

Finding that the troopers were within the camp itself, the
desperadoes stationed at the barricades deserted them, climbing them
and running for safety out through the pass.

Those within the camp, who had been trapped there, fought with a
courage and desperation worthy of a better cause. They slew some of
the troopers, and several of their own number fell.

The others tried to get out of the camp, but, being surrounded, they
threw down their weapons and surrendered.

The shrill voice of Pizen Jane was heard once, as she took part in
the fight against the outlaws; and once the scout beheld her, with
smoking pistol, confronting one of the outlaws. When the fight had
ended she was found lying dead close by the hut where she had killed
her infamous and recreant husband.

Nomad was, of course, released from his unpleasant predicament.
He received orders to remain a few hours longer at the camp,
in order to observe whether any of the deserters returned with
reënforcements--in which case he was to ride at once to Fort
Thompson. If none returned, he could rejoin Buffalo Bill and the
troopers at the fort, within the next three days.

Pool Clayton seemed genuinely grieved over the death of his mother,
and shed bitter tears when he beheld her dead body. He was not held
for the crime of being a member of the road-agent band, but was
permitted to depart from that section of the country.

That a genuine reformation in his character was effected the scout
believed, for afterward he had word of him, at a time when Pool was
residing in a mining town called Crystal Spring, where he had secured
honorable employment and seemed determined to live an honest life.




                            CHAPTER XVII.

                        PURSUED BY BLACKFEET.


“Whoa, Nebby, consarn ye! Don’t lose yer head, now, er mighty quick
you won’t have no head to lose.”

Old Nick Nomad, the trapper and famous border scout, twisted around
in his saddle, jerking at his horse’s bridle, and stared back along
the way he had come after leaving the outlaw stronghold.

Nomad was a small, dried-up specimen of a man, dressed in border
costume of ancient fashion, even to the beaver-skin cap. He held in
his right hand a long rifle. His old horse, ungainly as himself, yet
possessed of as many surprising qualities, stepped about, in spite
of the jerking rein, and showed every indication of nervousness and
fright.

“You’re skittisher’n a two-year-old, and ain’t got any more sense,
when you smells Injuns,” Nick grumbled. “Stand still, now; they’re
comin’ erlong, I know, but they ain’t nigh enough ter bite ye!”

Old Nebuchadnezzar had made a rapid run since the Blackfeet were
sighted, more than two miles back. The homely, shaggy-haired beast
had been too fleet for the Blackfeet ponies. His sides were heaving
now, and sweat trickled down his legs, dripping to the ground. Yet
he was ready to go on; and so much did he fear Indians that he would
have run until he fell, if Nomad had but given him rein and urged him
a little.

Nomad was trying to determine whether the Blackfeet were coming on,
following his trail, or whether they had left the trail and were
trying to cut him off at some narrow pass. They were more familiar
with this part of the country than he was, and he knew in that they
possessed a decided advantage.

After a time of quiet, the Blackfeet had once more become
troublesome, under Crazy Snake, whose hatred of the whites had flared
forth with sudden fury.

Nomad had, for two days, returned to the old life he loved best of
all--trapping by the headwaters of the mountain streams, leading a
carefree existence in the open and under the blue sky.

Then, on the last day--the day on which he was to arrive at the
fort--trouble and peril had descended on him when he had least
expected it.

His traps were stolen or destroyed, his little hut was broken open
and robbed, and then Paul Davis, his old-time border partner, who had
encountered him in the neighborhood of the outlaws’ stronghold, was
slain, while returning one afternoon to the hut from a hunt.

Nomad found Davis’ body in the trail that led down from the higher
mountains, and on Davis’ breast a bloody arrow, slashed there with a
scalping knife.

The scalp had been torn from Davis’ head, thus proving that the work
had been done by Blackfeet, while the bloody arrow showed that this
was another “vengeance” blow struck by the chief, Crazy Snake.

Old Nomad was not fool enough to linger there longer. He buried
the body of his old friend, protecting it from wolves by a heap of
stones placed on the grave. Then he cached his pelts, picked his few
belongings, mounted old Nebuchadnezzar, and set his face toward Fort
Thompson.

But he was not to escape so easily.

He had not gone far when he discovered that Blackfeet were dogging
his trail, for the apparent purpose of surprising him in camp, or
while he slept. He was sure these Blackfeet were led by Crazy Snake,
who had marked him for another victim.

As Nomad sat staring along the backward way, a herd of elk came in
sight, swinging down the trail he had been following. He instantly
guided Nebuchadnezzar out of the trail, and let the elk go plunging
by, for they seemed to be frightened, and were running at high speed.

“Good enough!” the old man grunted. “I think I kin puzzle them red
devils a bit now.”

Sure that wherever the Blackfeet were they did not now see him, Nomad
dismounted, and, removing a blanket he carried in a roll behind his
saddle, he tore it into strips and wrapped them round the hoofs of
his horse, so that he would leave no trail.

A trailless route would make it troublesome for even the keen-eyed
Blackfeet to follow him.

Descending the mountain now by a zigzag path, and making, besides,
several changes in his course, Nomad succeeded in reaching lower
ground. Here he mounted Nebuchadnezzar again, and rode off in a new
direction; but several times changed his course, in his efforts to
baffle the Blackfeet.

While he was thus riding on, he was astonished by hearing his name
spoken. He reined in and faced about, staring in surprise.

“By ther great jumpin’ jack rabbits, ef that ain’t ther queerest
ever!” he grunted. “Somebody callin’ ter me hyer, at a p’int whar
thar ain’t nobody!”

A pebble came rolling down the side of the hill, the suddenness with
which it bounced out at him making him jump. He saw that it had come
from a clump of aspens on the hillside not far away.

His ancient rifle swung around with a quick motion, and the muzzle
was elevated toward the aspens.

“Hi, there! Don’t shoot,” a voice called. “Like Davy Crockett’s coon,
I’ll come down.”

Then a hand appeared, pushing some leaves aside, and, following this
hand, came the body of a man.

Nomad gasped his amazement when he saw the clothing and face of this
man. Before him stood Buffalo Bill.

Though Nomad’s astonishment was deep, he did not forget the peril in
which he was placed at that time.

“Stand whar ye aire, Buffler!” he called. “The pizen reds aire
rompin’ round, and aire after my ha’r. Ole Crazy Snake is reachin’
fer me with his fangs.”

He guided his horse up to the aspens where the scout stood; the scout
asking questions, which he did not then answer.

“Buffler, I’m gladder ter see ye than ef I’d found a gold mine! Got
yer hoss hyar?”

“Yes; just back here in ther trees.”

“Then, fer Heaven’s sake, muffle him, and git out with me, ’fore
ther reds finds this spot,” the old trapper urged. “I’m huntin’ fer a
hole ter hide in, till Crazy Snake and his Blackfeet villyuns leave
this kentry; and it’ll be healthy fer you ter do ther same quick’s ye
kin.”

Buffalo Bill did not know until then that Crazy Snake had actually
taken to the warpath, though he had known there were rumors of war
trouble, and that a number of whites had been murdered. He shook
hands with old Nomad, and asked him some more questions. This time
Nomad answered:

“I’ve give ’em a good start, and balled ’em some, Buffler, but they
ain’t easy ter fool.”

“I know that, Nomad,” the scout answered; “but I think we can fool
them.”

He retreated to where his horse was tied to an aspen; and then,
taking a blanket from his roll, he made mufflers like those used by
Nomad. He looked anxiously at the trail his horse had made in coming
to this little grove--some of the hoofmarks deeply scored the soil.
But there was no help for that now.

In a few minutes he joined Nomad, mounted, and asked:

“Were you making for the cañon down there?”

“Anywhar, Buffler, ter fool ther Blackfeet. If yer knows this kentry
some I’ll let you p’int ther way, fer bur durned ef I’m any too well
acquainted with it.”

Buffalo Bill took the lead.

As the two men rode along, they discussed the pursuit of the
Blackfeet, and each learned the story of the other.

“I came here from the fort on a scouting trip,” said Buffalo Bill,
“because the Blackfeet have killed some men and have been threatening
trouble. Since I arrived, a miner was murdered and scalped on the
Baldface trail, and a sheep-herder was treated the same way over in
Los Cerillos Valley. Both were slain by Blackfeet; yet I didn’t know
whether it was simply some single Blackfoot murderer, or was the work
of Blackfeet bands of rovers. I rode out here to-day, hoping to find
out something more about it.”

“And now y’ve found, Buffler! The red devils aire risin’, and they’re
killin’ and scalpin’. Ole Crazy Snake’s bloody arrer will be on
the breasts of a good many dead men, ef ther thing continners, I’m
tellin’ ye. I thought it war time fer me ter cut sticks, and so I
did. I’m glad I met ye, Buffler.”

The scout recounted many of the things that had happened during the
past three days, especially the departure of young Clayton, and Nomad
told of his trapping experiences.

“I cached what furs I’d got tergether,” he said, “when I was ready
to slide out o’ the hills. If ther Blackfeet don’t find ’em, I’ll
git ’em some time. Ther thing jes’ now is ter take keer o’ my scalp,
which is a good deal more important than a beaver skin, handsome as a
beaver skin looks.”

He pushed back his cap and scratched at his head, as if it itched in
anticipation of a scalping knife.

They sought lower ground as they talked, and they talked in low
tones.

“Nomad, it’s providential that I met you,” the scout told his old
friend.

“I dunno about it, Buffler,” said Nomad, with a grin. “If I’d gone
straight ahead ’thout tryin’ to break my trail, ole Crazy Snake’s
band would have follered me hot-footed. And so they wouldn’t never
had a chance ter see you hyar an’ put you in danger. Now they may;
fer they’ll pick up thet trail o’ mine, if mortual man kin do it.”

With the scout in the lead, they entered the cañon.

On the rocks just by the water they removed the mufflers from the
hoofs of the horses. The animals were then ridden into the water, the
rocky bank there holding no trail; and down the stream they rode,
keeping in the water. They went on in this way nearly a mile, and
then began to follow up a tributary stream.

As the scout rode along, his keen eyes searching either shore, he saw
a grove of trees. There were a number of these groves in the lower
part of the cañon, whose floor was of soil in places, rather than
rock.

“If we can get under cover of those trees without making any tracks
doing it, we can probably lie safe there,” he remarked, while Nomad
looked at the grove.

“Ole Nebby, hyar, kin do ’most anything, Buffler, but he ain’t learnt
to fly yit. And, without flyin’, I don’t see how you’re goin’ ter
git inter the midst of them trees and leave no sign. Fer thar’s soil
hyar, and not rock.”

“But the grass, you’ll notice, come right down to the water,” said
the scout, “and is a thick, firm turf.”

“Go ahead, Buffler; I’m follerin’ ye. Mebbe we kin make it by
mufflering ther hoofs of ther hosses. But we can’t muffler ’em very
well hyar in ther water, and when we rides out of ther stream with
their hoofs bare they’re shore goin’ ter make some tracks.”

Buffalo Bill rode toward the shore.

When close to the grass, but still in the water, he rose to his
horse’s back. Standing in the saddle, with the remaining blanket from
his roll held in his hands, he threw the blanket so that it fell on
the grass at the water’s edge. It fell, folded, as he had wanted it
to; and, with a quick jump, he leaped to it from the saddle. By this
clever plan, he kept his boots from cutting into the turf and soil.

“You’ve got a blanket, in addition to the scraps you cut the other
one into,” he said. “Throw me your blanket.”

Nomad threw the blanket to him, and the scout spread it out beside
the one on which he was standing.

He kept his feet off the ground, while he arranged both blankets in
the form of a carpet, which touched the very rim of the water. Then
he spoke to his well-trained horse, and the obedient animal walked
from the water out upon the carpet of blankets. There the scout put
on the animal’s hoofs the mufflers, and then commanded it to walk on,
ordering it to stop when it had gone far enough.

“Now, Nomad,” he called, “ride old Nebby out upon this carpet, and
when we’ve put the mufflers on him I think the trick will be nearly
done.”

Nick Nomad complied, dismounting beside his horse on the blankets.
The mufflers were put upon the hoofs of Nebuchadnezzar. Then the old
man rode him on.

Buffalo Bill called his horse back to him, climbed into the saddle,
stooped from the saddle, and picked the blankets from the ground, and
called the trapper’s attention to the apparent success of the ruse.

The blankets and the muffled hoofs had prevented the showing of a
single hoofmark by the margin of the stream. More than that, they had
absorbed the water which ran from the legs of the horses, sucking it
up as a sponge would, and holding it; so that not even water remained
on the grass there to draw the attention of any eagle-eyed Blackfoot.

The scout and the trapper now rode their muffled horses into the
thick grove, where they were completely hidden from view of any one
passing along the cañon stream, or on either of its banks.

“Buffler,” said Nomad, filled with delight at the cleverness of
his old pard, “ef I’d had head enough I might have thought o’ thet
myself; but I didn’t. But I allow thet it’s ther cutest trick I ever
saw played ter try ter fool Injuns. Whar’d yer learn it?”

“I thought of it myself just now. I don’t know that any one ever
tried it before. And that’s what makes it valuable. If we used some
trick that is familiar the Blackfeet would probably be expecting
it, and so would not be fooled by it. They’ll not be expecting this
trick, I hope.”




                           CHAPTER XVIII.

                       THE BLACKFOOT TRAILERS.


Under cover of the screening trees, Buffalo Bill and old Nomad
watched the cañon and stream, while they talked of the threatened
Blackfoot war, and of their individual experiences since they had
last been together.

“It warn’t Blackfeet we war up ag’inst last time together, Buffler,
but road agents. Pool Clayton was with us then, you recomember? D’yer
think he’ll be in this hyar neighborhood soon?”

“I’m not expecting him this time.”

Buffalo Bill told his old mountain pard, however, that Pawnee Bill,
the famous dead shot, was to have joined him in the town below, but
had missed him there, and would no doubt follow.

“It’s just possible,” he had stated, “that he went round by way of
the Ferguson Trail, and, if so, he may have gained these hills in
advance of my coming; yet I think he is behind me.”

As the two friends talked thus, Buffalo Bill laid his hand with a
quick, firm motion on Nomad’s arm. Reaching out with the other hand,
he took his horse by the nose.

“Hist!” came from his lips.

Nomad understood, glanced at the stream, and patted the nose of old
Nebuchadnezzar to keep him still.

A Blackfoot warrior had come in sight on the other side of the
little cañon river. He was naked, save for a breechclout, and his
copper-colored body was smeared and striped with paint. He carried
a long rifle, and a knife, and hatchet. In his raven hair eagle
feathers fluttered, proclaiming him not only a warrior, but, with the
abundant paint, announcing that he was on the warpath.

He had come downstream, and he was scanning the river and its shores,
and the cañon walls, together with the wider expanses where the
little groves of trees were. But most he gave his attention to the
banks of the stream at the water’s edge.

It was plain to the experienced bordermen that if he had not tracked
the white men to the cañon and the river, he at least suspected they
had gone there, and he was looking for the point where they had
emerged. His presence was proof that other Blackfeet were near, and
no doubt a strong war party. They had chased old Nomad, and were
ready for scalps and plunder.

The concealed friends and their horses stood motionless, as the
Indian stepped with light feet along the farther shore of the little
river.

He was a magnificent specimen of the American Indian; lithe, as well
as muscular, his body straight as an arrow, his limbs sinewy, yet so
gracefully and evenly developed that they would have done as models
for a sculptor or a painter. Buffalo Bill looked at the Blackfoot
with admiration, regarding him at the moment merely as a fine
specimen of Indian manhood, forgetting in that momentary enthusiasm
what his appearance there meant, and what was denoted by the paint
and the floating feathers.

The Indian stared hard at the trees which concealed the scout
and the trapper. He neither saw nor heard anything there. On the
ground between the river and the grove there was not so much as an
indentation in the soil to suggest that horses had passed that way.

“Whoa, Nebby, consarn ye!” Nomad whispered to his horse; for
Nebby’s ears were pricked up and his big eyes were staring. Indians
frightened him, for which Nomad was responsible, for he had taught
the old horse to fear them.

“Nebby is better’n any watchdog,” was Nomad’s boast. “No Injun kin
come nigh him without him makin’ a hullabaloo.”

This tendency to make a “hullabaloo” when he saw an Indian had its
disadvantages at times, as at present; yet the whispered adjurations
of old Nomad, and the touch of his hand, kept the horse quiet as the
Blackfoot passed along. As for the scout’s horse, though it had not
Nebby’s peculiar tendency, there was, nevertheless, danger that it
would make a noise of some kind, hence the scout kept his hand on its
nose.

After staring hard at the grove, and scanning the soil by the stream,
the Blackfoot went on, and soon he was lost to sight in a bend of the
cañon.

“A close shave!” said the scout.

“And a healthy one fer thet red nigger, Buffler,” said Nomad
meaningly. “I’d hate fer him to ’a’ smelt us out hyar, fer then I’d
had to shot him. And that would ’a’ made a tarnal noise, too.”

“Yes; we’d have been in for a fight.”

“Thar’s more of ’em about, Buffler.”

“They may be a good deal scattered, though; so we may see only this
fellow.”

“I’m hopin’ it, Buffler.”

They saw another, in a very few seconds, on their side of the stream.
He was armed and painted like the one who had just disappeared, but
he was not so tall and handsome. His body was shorter and thicker,
his arms longer, his sheer physical strength greater. He could not
have run like the one who had just gone on, but in a rough-and-tumble
fight he would have been an enemy more to be feared.

He not only looked at the grove where the white men were hidden with
their horses, but he walked a few yards toward it, looking carefully
at the ground.

Once or twice he stooped down and inspected the grass; and the scout
and trapper thought then he had seen some faint indentations in the
soil, and guessed of the trick that had been played. But the redskin
retraced his way to the river, and went on, searching its shores.

“Phew, Buffler! I thought it war fight, shore thing, then!”

“I, too.”

“I reckon we’re safe hyar, unless they come back and take a notion to
look behind these trees. If they does it, thar will be dead Injuns,
and fun immediately afterward.”

The Blackfeet did not return. An hour passed, and then another, and
nothing was seen or heard; but Cody and Nomad could not be sure
that sharp eyes were not watching the cañon from some cliff or cañon
precipice; hence they remained concealed in the grove, keeping the
horses as quiet as possible, and talking only in low tones.

Not until darkness came did they venture to leave their secure
retreat. Even then they moved with the utmost caution, leading the
horses instead of riding them, and progressing so slowly that hours
elapsed before they came out into the open country below. There the
land lay broad and free before them, and the stars pointed the way.

Yet they did not ride toward the town. Instead, they turned back into
the hills; for the discovery that the Blackfeet had taken the warpath
under Crazy Snake made the scout fearful for the safety of a family
he knew, who lived just under the shadows of the big hills.




                            CHAPTER XIX.

                      THE TRAGEDY OF THE CABIN.


The home of John Forest was a simple and unpretentious one, but it
was lighted by the beauty of a girl whom he loved as his own life,
his daughter Lena.

Forest was lured by that witch of the world--gold. He believed he had
found gold at the foot of Big Tom Mountain, gold in quantities to pay
not only for working the mine he soon opened there, but enough to
make him rich. He had a brother who had found good ore in a region
not many miles away, and his brother’s success encouraged him to
“stick it out” even to the bitter end.

The country was forbidding, and the Blackfeet were not far away;
yet Forest established his home under the shadow of the mountain,
installed in it his daughter as his housekeeper, and set to work.

Like many mines, there was far more promise in the Lady Bird, as he
called it, than there was performance. He took out barely enough gold
to give him a living and supply him with tools and blasting powder.
Daily he kept hoping to strike the “mother lode,” or a seam of gold,
or, perhaps, a pocket of nuggets.

He paid little heed to the Blackfeet.

As for callers or visitors, he had a few; one of them being young
Bruce Clayton, who had fallen in love with the beautiful face of the
miner’s daughter, and who came there as frequently as his new “job”
permitted.

Down in the town of Crystal Spring, some miles away, on one of her
infrequent visits, Lena Forest learned of the trouble brewing with
the Blackfeet, and its cause.

It was a singular story, as she regarded it.

Some white miners had established themselves near Crazy Snake’s
village; which, to the Indian mind, was bad of itself; and then one
of the miners, falling ill of measles, and not knowing what it was,
the disease had been communicated to the Blackfeet.

Treated by Indian medicine men, whose sole idea of medication was to
rattle tomtoms and howl themselves hoarse in efforts to drive away
malignant spirits, the Blackfeet died like flies. One of the victims
of this scourge of the measles was Crazy Snake’s only son.

Believing that the white men had sent this curse on the Blackfeet for
the purpose of destroying them, that they might secure the Indian
lands for mining purposes, Crazy Snake and some of his warriors
attacked the miners’ camp, and slew all in it, including the man who
was ill of measles, but who was at the time convalescing. Not content
with this summary vengeance, Crazy Snake was now threatening the
white people everywhere.

The mark of his visitation was an arrow of blood scored with a knife
on the breast of each victim.

This was the startling story Lena Forest brought home to her father.

“The Blackfeet will not trouble us here,” said Forest. “I don’t think
they know we’re here, anyway; for not one has come near us all the
time we’ve been here. But if trouble seems threatening, we’ll cut
out in time to escape it.”

The truth is, that though Forest feared more than he would say,
he believed he was at the moment on the verge of opening up that
wonderful seam of gold, and the golden lure chained him there. Every
day, even every hour, he was sure that the next stroke or two of the
pick, or the next few scrapes of his shovel, would reveal the gleam
of the shining metal for which he had worked so hard!

No, he could not go just yet, even though Blackfeet threatened.
Besides, none had been seen near the house, nor in the hills near it.
Really, he tried to persuade himself, there was no danger.

Lena Forest, uneasy, went to the town again, to gain further news of
the threatened Blackfoot trouble.

She learned that the danger was really alarming, and that two noted
scouts had been sent for, and had arrived--Buffalo Bill and Pawnee
Bill. Her father knew these scouts, and Buffalo Bill was his personal
friend. She tried to see them, but found only Pawnee Bill, Cody
having departed for the hills.

Pawnee Bill advised her that it was foolish for her and her father to
remain in their exposed home at that time, and assured her he would
call on her father and tell him so.

The girl returned home, determined more than ever to induce her
father to go at once to the town, or to some point of greater
security.

When she rode along the path, approaching her home in the gathering
twilight, she saw before the door a form lying in a limp heap, a
sight that stilled her heartbeats and caused her to reel in her
saddle with faintness. Nevertheless, she rode up to it, and, leaping
down by it, discovered her father, dead. He had been killed and
scalped; and on his breast, where the blue flannel shirt had been
torn open, was that dreadful sight, the arrow of blood drawn with a
scalping knife.

The girl swooned at sight of it, and fell as if dead beside the dead
body.

How long she remained there unconscious she did not know. The stars
were in the sky and the wind from the mountain was cold when she
aroused and came back to a realization of the terrible thing that had
befallen her father and herself.

She threw herself on the inanimate form, and wept as if her eyes were
oceans. By and by she struggled to her feet.

Her first thought was of flight, for personal safety, and for help
for her father, whose body needed to be protected from wolves and
other wild beasts. But she discovered that she had not strength to
go anywhere; and this, with thoughts of what might happen during her
absence, held her to the dreadful spot.

She crept at length to the cabin, where she procured a candle. With
it she returned to her father’s body. Lighting the candle, she put
it upright on the ground beside him, knowing that wolves and other
wild animals fear such a light. Having done that, she returned to the
cabin, this time thinking of finding her horse, which had strayed
away, and of riding to the town with the news.

But she swooned again as she crossed the threshold, and fell to the
floor, where she lay a long while. This time when she recovered she
crawled to the bed, and laid herself down on it. She slept, then;
though how or why she did was afterward a puzzle to her.

The sun was shining in through the open door when a voice, the voice
of a man, aroused her.

She got up, wild-eyed, her dress disheveled, her face tear-stained.

The man was Pawnee Bill, whom she had seen and talked with in the
town. He had ridden out, as he had promised, leaving the town long
before dawn, and he had seen in the trail the dead body of John
Forest, mute witness of the vengeance of Crazy Snake, the Blackfoot.
The famous scout soon saw that the girl was on the verge of a
collapse from hysteria and overwrought nerves. She screamed when
she beheld him, ran toward him with outstretched hands, and in wild
phrases began to tell him of what had occurred.

“My dear girl,” he said, “you do not need to tell me, for I have
seen. But let me urge you to try to control yourself. I shall escort
you back to the town, and then----”

“But my father!” she wailed hysterically.

“All that can be done for him now will be done, let me assure you.”

The kind-hearted scout was really at a loss what to say and do in
this dire emergency, but he induced her to lie down again on the bed;
and then he went outside, thinking to get a spade and bury the body
of John Forest.

As he did so, he beheld two men coming along the trail. He stared,
then recognized them, and ran toward them, calling their names.

They were Buffalo Bill and old Nick Nomad.

It was the family of John Forest that Buffalo Bill had been anxious
to warn against the dangers of the Blackfeet.




                             CHAPTER XX.

                      AN AMAZING DISAPPEARANCE.


Lena Forest came out of the cabin when she heard Pawnee Bill talking
with the scouts and the trapper. She recognized the scout, for once
he had called on her father, and she ran toward him.

“Oh, if you had but been here sooner!” she wailed.

Buffalo Bill dismounted, and Nomad did the same.

“Yes, we came too late,” said the scout sadly. “I have been talking
with Major Lillie, and we think you should be sent at once to the
town. Major Lillie will go with you, while my old friend, Nomad, and
I will pick up the trail of the Blackfeet murderers of your father.
That’s all that can be done now, except to give your father decent
burial, which we will do at once.”

He took the girl by the hand, and his kind words caused her tears to
flow afresh.

“Now, if you will go back into the house and lie down again for a
while it will be better for you,” he urged. “There is absolutely
nothing you can do, and you need as much rest as you can get before
you start on your trip. We will find your horse; and, if you like,
Nomad will go in and prepare something for you to eat, or make some
coffee for you.”

“I couldn’t eat a mouthful,” she said.

“But you will go into the house?” he urged.

She understood, turned about with slow feet, and disappeared within.

Pawnee Bill found the miner’s spade and pick, and brought them out
for the purpose of digging a grave, which work he and the scout at
once began, while old Nomad set forth on Nebuchadnezzar for the
purpose of finding and capturing the girl’s runaway horse.

Buffalo Bill and his friend worked rapidly, and soon had a grave
hollowed out. Buffalo Bill then went to the house to get blankets in
which to wrap the body for burial.

When he entered the cabin, he was astonished not to find the girl
there. However, he thought she had but stepped out, and he went to
the door to look around. When he failed to see her, he called to her.

To his repeated calls there was no answer.

He stepped out of the house, and walked around it.

Nowhere was the girl to be seen.

There was a rear door, which was unlocked, but was not open, and a
rear window, but the window had not been disturbed.

Cody began to search the ground quickly with his keen eyes. He saw
a moccasin track by the rear door, yet he was not sure but it had
been made at the time the master of the house had been killed. The
house had been entered then, and some things had been taken, so the
girl had declared. That more had not been taken was a marvel to the
experienced scout.

“Gordon, come here!” he called from the corner of the house.

Pawnee Bill dropped the spade he was wielding and came running.

“The girl is gone,” said the scout. “I found her absent from the
house, and I fail to see her anywhere.” He looked at Pawnee Bill
earnestly. “Was her mind so affected, do you think, that she would
slip out of this back door and into the hills, there?” he asked. “If
not----”

“What?” said Pawnee Bill.

Buffalo Bill pointed to the moccasin track.

“That is suggestive, if it is new; but it’s hard to tell when it was
made. The girl is gone. You heard me call to her, and she has not
appeared, nor answered. If she did not go herself, some one took her.
That’s why I asked you that question.”

“Her mind was all right,” said Pawnee Bill anxiously. “She was
depressed and almost hysterical, but not enough so to make her run
away in that fashion, or do anything rash.”

“Then we must investigate this moccasin track at once. You’ll see
that an Indian could have slipped up to the house from the hills,
and where we were working we could not have seen him. He could have
entered by this rear door, and he could have carried off the girl.
The question is, did anything like that occur?”

Pawnee Bill was one of the best of the border trailers. He and the
scout bent together to examine that moccasin track, after they had
scanned the hills for signs there of Indians.

Soon they found another track, and then another, and still another,
all leading from the rear door in the direction of the hills.

“They’re fresh,” said Buffalo Bill, pointing to a bent grass blade,
which had been crushed so recently that sap was oozing from it.

“And look there!” said Pawnee Bill, picking up a broken feather.

Where the feather was found they discovered indications that a
struggle had taken place, for the grass was cut and torn, and the
footmarks did not go straight on; there had been an interruption of
the progress of the Indian.

“It’s clear as day now,” said the scout, rising and looking about.
“Some redskin stole to the cabin while we were busy at the grave.
He had seen her enter, and discovered that he could reach the cabin
without being observed by us. The girl had lain down on her bed, and
was perhaps half asleep, or may have had her head covered up. She
did not see him, at any rate, until it was impossible for her to cry
out; though his sudden appearance may have so frightened her that she
could not utter a sound. Then he picked her up in his arms, perhaps
choking her to make her keep still, and he carried her away into the
hills.”

His nostrils were dilating and his bright eyes had become feverish,
so strongly did this mental picture of the dastardly outrage appeal
to his sensibilities.

“You’re right,” said Lillie. “That is an eagle feather, broken, no
doubt, when at this point the girl made a fierce struggle to free
herself. She tore out the eagle feather; but she could not escape,
for he was too strong; and then, no doubt unconscious after that, she
was borne rapidly away.”

“That fellow can’t be more than half a mile from here even now,”
said the scout. “We’ll have to follow at once. I wish that Nomad----”

Even before he had finished expressing the wish that Nomad was there,
they heard his shout, and saw him riding swiftly in on his old horse.

“Injuns!” he said, before drawing rein. “They’ve captered the gal’s
hoss and lit out with it.”

“Did you see them?” Buffalo Bill asked.

“No; didn’t need to; but I seen what they done, and I seen their
tracks, and the tracks of the hoss. I follered on a ways, to make
shore I wasn’t mistaken, and then I rid ter tell ye.”

“The tracks were fresh?”

“Yes; made this mornin’. Buffler, thar’s Injuns snoopin’ round hyar,
and thet’s a fact.”

“More than the horse is gone,” said the scout; “the girl herself is
gone!”

Nomad stared at the scout, then gripped his rifle and stared round.

“Tooken by Injuns?”

“Yes; that’s what Gordon and I make of it. Here are moccasin tracks.
We think the redskin stole into the cabin while we were digging the
grave, and came on her perhaps while she was asleep. Anyway, the
thing was done so quietly we didn’t hear a sound.”

He pointed to the tracks, and to the eagle feather.

Old Nomad was for the moment almost too amazed to speak.

“We’ve got ter foller her, Buffler!”

“Yes, and at once; and I was going to say to you that if you will
finish filling in the grave of John Forest, we will follow this
trail at once. Then you can come on as fast as possible, and no doubt
you’ll soon overtake us.”

Nomad looked earnestly at the brown hills.

“Crazy Snake?” he said, voicing the name in the thought of each.

“That’s our opinion; at any rate, the rascal was a Blackfoot, as the
feather and the tracks show. I hardly think he had any warriors with
him, or, at most, he must have had only a few, or he would have tried
to tackle us and get our scalps.”

Nomad turned his horse about and rode to the grave, where he slid out
of his saddle.

They saw him at work vigorously with the spade, as they took up the
trail, after getting their horses.

The trail was not difficult to follow, until it entered the rocky
hills.

They progressed slowly, however, for they could not be sure that an
ambush had not been laid for them.

Hard as the trail was to follow in the hills, they clung to it,
finding it the tracks of but one Indian.

After a little while it bent back in a semicircle toward the river,
this showing that the redskin had merely run into the hills to get
the benefit of their cover, and that his real destination was the
river.

They followed on more rapidly, and some distance below, where hills
and trees would screen him from sight of any one at the cabin, they
found that his trail converged more, and then went straight toward
the cañon stream.

Here the trail was so plain in the soft soil that they were able
to follow it at rapid speed, and soon came to the river, where they
found water on the rocks, and other evidence to show that at this
point the Blackfoot had taken to a boat. It was certain he had gone
down the river, and not up; for to go up the river would have forced
him to pass so near to the cabin that he would have been in danger
of discovery, and, besides, the work of pulling against the current
would have been no small labor.

“We’ll have to abandon the horses,” said the scout, when they had
ridden rapidly on for a half mile or more down the river, finding the
way growing rougher, and the cañon walls contracting until the stream
became a walled torrent.

“Or go round, which may be a long journey!” said Pawnee Bill.

“And would be likely to let the rascally redskin slip through our
fingers. We’ll have to keep to the river, even if we are forced to
swim.”

As they talked, they heard Nomad approaching rapidly. He had finished
his work of burying and protecting the body of John Forest, and then
had followed hard on the trail of his friends.

It took but a few words to convey to him all that the scouts knew.

“We want you to ride to the town for help,” said Buffalo Bill to him.
“Raise a strong force, and come on as fast with it as you can. We’ll
stick to this trail. But we’re likely to get into trouble, and we’ll
need fighting men, in my opinion, before we accomplish much. The
rascal had beaten us temporarily, by taking to the water here; and
unless we can get a boat we’re going to have hard work to overtake
him.”

“I’m bettin’ it’s Crazy Snake!”

“So we think, though we don’t know it. Spread the news of the rising
of the Blackfeet, and hurry with a force to help us, or avenge us.”

The last were ominous words from Buffalo Bill, and proved that he
appreciated the dangerous character of the undertaking upon which he
now thought of entering.

Nomad wheeled old Nebuchadnezzar in the trail.

“Right ye aire, Buffler,” he said. “I’ll raise ther country, and I’ll
be follerin’ ye with a company of men ’fore another twenty-four hours
rolls over my head.” He stretched forth his hand. “Shake, Buffler;
and you, too, Pawnee! You’re startin’ on a dangerous trip, and I
knows it. Mebbe we mayn’t meet ag’in ever in this world. But whatever
happens, I know you’ll be found doin’ yer duty.”

He struck his horse with the spurs, waking old Nebuchadnezzar into
renewed life.

“Good-by!” he said. “Good luck to ye, pards!”

And then he rode away--the wise, simple, and brave old trapper, Nick
Nomad.




                            CHAPTER XXI.

                            THE PRISONER.


Lena Forest had hardly entered the cabin and stepped toward the bed,
where, in obedience to the words of Buffalo Bill, she expected to
lie down a while, when a footstep sounded softly behind her, and a
blanket fell over her head.

Startled and alarmed beyond measure, she yet would have cried out,
but that the blanket was drawn tightly about her mouth, and on top
of the blanket a heavy hand pressed back the words she would have
uttered. She struggled frantically, but uselessly; for she was caught
up in arms too strong for her to resist, and was carried quietly out
of the room.

Lena soon knew she was out of the cabin, for the feet of her captor
no longer thudded dully on the wooden floor, but descended, as if
down steps, and sank in soft grass now without a sound.

Then she began to struggle again, trying desperately to throw off the
enveloping and smothering blanket, and making so gallant a fight for
her liberty that she tore a feather from the redskin’s head. That
feather told her that he was an Indian, which was a thing she had
already guessed and feared.

She tried in vain to scream for help when this awful fear that she
was held by an Indian became certain knowledge; but again that heavy
hand kept her from making more than a few inarticulate sounds; and
she was being borne on, she knew not where.

She became unconscious soon, a result largely of the choking and
smothering blanket, and for a time thereafter she had no knowledge of
anything.

When she was put down at last, arousing at the same time, she
succeeded in whisking aside the blanket. Then she saw before her a
large Indian, almost naked, smeared with paint, who was drawing a
canoe from beneath the bank, and getting it ready, apparently, for a
journey on the river that flowed before her.

She recognized the river as the cañon stream that rolled by her home,
and she recognized this spot as one she had seen many a time, a mile
below the cabin, at a point where the walls of the cañon began to
contract on the grassy valley, in readiness for further narrowing
farther down.

The Indian saw that she had recovered consciousness, and he swung
around, lifting his hatchet menacingly.

“White girl no make noise!” he warned, speaking fair English.

The desire to cry out was frozen in her heart, which was filled with
a strange terror of this painted redskin. She stared at him, as the
bird is said to stare at the snake in whose power it has fallen.

The savage adjusted the light canoe in the water, stopping in his
work now and then to listen, as if he anticipated pursuit.

“White girl go with Crazy Snake!” he commanded, again producing the
fear-impelling hatchet, whose bright blade glanced the sunlight like
burnished silver. To her imagination that hatchet edge was red with
the blood of her murdered father.

She tried now to spring up, and to run; and she tried to cry out.
But Crazy Snake, with a single bound, caught her by the hair, and
threw her to the ground. He flashed forth a knife, now, and thrust it
before her terrified eyes.

“Injun kill!” he gurgled, in a way to make her blood run cold. “White
girl want Blackfoot kill?”

“Yes, kill me!” she said, in sudden desperation. “Nothing better
could happen to me now.”

However, he did not put his threat into execution, for he had simply
been trying to frighten her. He lifted her in his bare, painted arms,
and deposited her in the canoe, she being too helpless from fear
and weakness to do anything to prevent this. Then he stepped into
the canoe himself, pushed it off from shore, and, seating himself
deliberately, he took up the paddle and sent the light boat skimming
downstream.

The current began to race faster here, and this, with the strokes of
the paddle, hurled the canoe on at dizzying speed. Yet this speed was
as nothing compared with that which the canoe made later on, when it
was caught in the torrent that rushed in wild cataracts through the
pinched-in space of the narrowed cañon, where the black walls came
close together, and towered to a great height overhead.

Crazy Snake was skillful with the paddle. The girl’s eyes were fixed
on the water ahead, and though more than once it seemed to her that
the frail craft must surely be split on some rock, with a deft turn
he guided it past the danger point, and on down the wild and tumbling
stream.

Lena Forest tried to think with something of sanity of her condition,
and failed utterly. Horror still held her, and she came from under
its spell but slowly.

When the rapids had been passed safely, Crazy Snake began to talk.

“Brown Eyes know why the great Blackfoot chief, Crazy Snake, do
this?” he said, naming her thus from the color of her eyes.

She stared at him, as if she did not comprehend his meaning, but
really because she was still too terrified to answer him.

“Blackfeet kill man that dig for the yellow earth,” he explained.
“The yellow earth makes the white man crazy, and he steals the land
of the Indians that he may dig it. So we kill him.”

She knew that he meant her father.

“White men hunting for the yellow earth threw a bad spell on the
Blackfeet. The evil spirits were made mad, and killed the Blackfeet.
They died. The son of Crazy Snake died. For that we kill the white
men.”

She was sitting in the bow of the canoe, facing him, and he stared
at her with his shining black eyes, that looked so like the eyes of
a snake. She did not wonder that he was called, or called himself,
Crazy Snake; for those snaky eyes, to her heated imagination, seemed
like the eyes of some deadly serpent. They almost fascinated her.

“But--but why do you--take me?” she gasped at last.

Crazy Snake gave utterance to what seemed almost a chuckle.

“Brown Eyes purty squaw!” he said. “Wide Foot, the squaw of Crazy
Snake, is old; he take a young squaw, who is white. The white men
will be killed. But the Brown Eyes she will live.”

The statement roused her as nothing had done since the death of her
father.

“I would rather die!” she said. “I will kill myself rather than
become your--your wife!”

She half rose, and in another second would have leaped into the
stream; but he stretched out his long right arm with a quick motion,
catching her by her hair, which had come unbound in her struggles
with him, and jerked her flat in the bottom of the canoe.

“Ugh!” he grunted. “Brown Eyes fool! Brown Eyes drown herself? No,
no! Brown Eyes be the squaw of Crazy Snake.”

She lay there, in the bottom of the canoe, cowering.

He put the paddle into the canoe, and then lifted her to a seat,
where she sat weakly, regarding him with looks of terror and loathing.

Then he tried to make her see that he was doing her a great favor;
for he declared again that while all the white men were to be killed,
she was to be permitted to live, and would become the squaw of a
great chief.

She failed to see the beauty of the picture he tried to draw. She
preferred death to that.

A little farther down the stream Crazy Snake ran the canoe ashore,
where he tied it, after sinking it.

She had been compelled to get out, and sat on the bank watching him
sink and conceal the boat.

“Brown Eyes go on!” he said, coming up to her.

It seemed that her terror could go no further; but apparently it did,
when from the bushes just ahead there appeared now another Indian.

Crazy Snake showed surprise, thus evidencing that the appearance of
this Indian was unexpected even by him.

The Indian was a Blackfoot, and was a young man, whose head displayed
the feathers of a chief. For an Indian, he was decidedly handsome;
yet the liberal application of paint and grease to his body made him
a disgusting sight to the girl prisoner.

His black eyes opened in wide admiration, as he looked upon her.

“Lightfoot is a long way from the village?” said the chief, speaking
to the younger Indian, who was none other than the warrior whom the
two scouts had observed.

“He was with the party that followed the old trapper,” said
Lightfoot. “We lost his trail and could not find it again.”

“If the young men wish to find the old whitehead, they can do it by
going up the river.”

Crazy Snake waved his hand in the direction whence he had come. He
led the way under the cover of the trees, and then turned to the
young Indian, who had followed silently behind the prisoner.

At the first word it was plain that Crazy Snake had taken a new line
of thought.

“Can the great chief trust his son?” he said, speaking in the
hyperbole characteristic of the red men, for Lightfoot was not
related to him.

Lightfoot folded his arms upon his paint-smeared bosom and looked
Crazy Snake full in the eye.

“The son of the great chief, Crazy Snake, has but to hear and obey,”
he said. “Let the chief speak. Lightfoot is but a child, and will
learn wisdom of the great chief.”

They spoke in Blackfoot, of which the prisoner did not understand a
word.

She felt so weak and trembling that she was almost on the point of
sinking to the ground. She lifted her eyes to heaven, as if praying,
and uttered a name, the name of one who, she was sure, would follow
to the ends of the earth, to rescue or avenge her, if he but knew.
And she uttered, also, the name of Buffalo Bill.

Crazy Snake stopped the words that were on his tongue and gazed at
her in a questioning way.

“What does the Brown Eyes say?” he asked.

“Nothing!” she gasped. “Nothing!”

She shook with terror.

Crazy Snake turned again to Lightfoot.

“The young chief is wise,” he said. “Crazy Snake is the great war
chief of the Blackfeet. His red arrow burns on the breasts of many
white men already, and its bloody fire shall strike fear everywhere.
The father of Brown Eyes wears it, and his scalp is now in the belt
of Running Deer. But the girl is to be kept in the Blackfoot village.
Crazy Snake has work to do, for the white men will gather to avenge
the death of the men who wear the crimson arrow.”

Lightfoot stood with folded arms, listening.

“White men, one of them Long Hair, are now pursuing Crazy Snake. So
Crazy Snake wishes to turn back; and he wishes to gather warriors,
many warriors, to oppose the white men. He would strike the cunning
white men down when they follow--strike down the thieves that steal
the lands of the Blackfeet that they may dig in it for the yellow
earth.”

“The son of the great chief hears,” said Lightfoot, when the older
chief paused.

“The great chief will trust Lightfoot to take the white prisoner,
Brown Eyes, on to the Blackfoot village, where she is to be held
until the coming of Crazy Snake. Does my son hear with open ears?”

“Lightfoot hears what the great chief says.”

The young Indian looked at the girl, who still stood trembling before
them. A sudden admiration of her beauty shone in his black eyes, but
it was not observed either by the chief or the girl.

“Lightfoot hears, and will obey,” he repeated.

Crazy Snake returned to the canoe, and seemed to consider raising
it and resuming the voyage down the river. But he changed his mind,
apparently, and, turning from the river, he hastened away, and was
soon lost to view.

Lightfoot stood looking at the girl who had been placed in his
charge.

“Come!” he said finally. “We go to the village.”

She was listening to the retreating footsteps of the older chief.

“No, I will not go with you!” she declared.

Admiration showed in his eyes. But he was an Indian, and accustomed
to having women obey. He caught her by the wrist and jerked her along.

“Come!” he said. “Brown Eyes is very beautiful. It is too bad that
she is to enter the lodge of Crazy Snake, who has a wife already.” He
was speaking to himself, for his words were Blackfoot, and she did
not understand them. “Brown Eyes is too beautiful to be the squaw
of Crazy Snake. She should mate with a younger warrior. Is it meet
that winter should marry summer? Brown Eyes is young, and she is
beautiful.”

He stopped and stood facing her, feasting his eyes on her beauty.
There was something in his look that terrified her. She tried to
break away from him, but again he caught her by the wrist and pulled
her along when she resisted.

“Come!” he said, and this time he spoke in English. “We go fast.
Blackfoot town long, long way. Crazy Snake say we go fast.”




                            CHAPTER XXII.

                            WIND FLOWER.


Crazy Snake had told the young chief that pursuit might be expected,
and that was why he was so anxious to hurry on. He felt sure that
soon the dreaded Long Hair, as Buffalo Bill was called, would be on
his trail. Buffalo Bill’s reputation as a long-distance shot, as a
trailer, and as an enemy whose cunning and skill were marvelous, was
great among the Blackfeet.

Because of his fear of pursuit Lightfoot stopped now and then to
listen. Occasionally, where a small hill invited, he ascended it,
dragging the girl with him, and scanned the surrounding country.

Crazy Snake had disappeared, and even the river was not now visible,
though the black cliff walls of the cañon could be seen.

Finally the young chief gained the point where he had left his horse
hidden.

Lena Forest was almost exhausted by that time, through fear and
the exertions she had been forced to put forth. Lightfoot had been
merciless in dragging her on, over obstructions, across chasms and
rocky tracts, and through bushy districts where thorny shrubs tore
her clothing and lacerated her body.

Several times she had dropped down in sheer weakness and desperation;
but at such times he had assumed the ferocity of the old chief
himself, and, drawing his hatchet, he had threatened her until she
had risen and stumbled on again.

When the little grove was gained where his horse had been left,
Lightfoot was given a shock of surprise. The horse was gone.

He looked about in fear and anger, his black eyes searching for
footprints of a thief and the hoofmarks of the horse.

A rippling laugh, strange and wild, came to him from a little
distance.

Lena Forest looked toward the point whence it emanated, and was
astounded to see an Indian girl rise there from behind a rock and
come forward. The girl seemed amused when first she appeared; but a
frown was on her brown face as she approached the girl prisoner and
the young chief.

“The Wind Flower!” gasped the young chief, speaking below his breath.
“What does she here?”

“Oh, mighty chief,” she said in mockery, “where is thy horse? I see
it not. The eagles must have carried it away!”

He regarded her uneasily. “Wind Flower has taken it,” he said. “Where
has she placed it? And what does she here?”

The Indian girl laughed again, a rippling laugh that had in it
something of the music of running water, for it seemed to bubble and
gurgle in her brown throat. Yet that suspicious and questioning light
remained in her eyes.

“I found the horse of the great chief, Lightfoot! I am but a
squaw--not a mighty warrior and hunter. But I could have taken his
horse and ridden it far from here, if I had willed. The mighty young
chief is like the bear that sleeps when the winter winds blow; he
does not see, and he does not hear. An enemy might have taken his
scalp, as well as his horse.”

He shifted nervously on his feet under this rebuke, and looked at her
furtively as she turned to Lena Forest, throwing out one brown hand
in a significant gesture.

“Where is the young chief taking the white woman?” she asked, and at
the question jealousy flashed in her dark eyes.

Lena Forest understood this language of the eyes, even though she
could not understand the words. Jealousy is the same, and expresses
itself much the same way; whether it burns in the heart of a white
woman or of an Indian maid. She saw that this Indian girl loved
Lightfoot, and guessed that she was probably his promised wife. The
discovery, if it was a discovery, gave her hope.

She stretched out her hands to the Indian girl.

“Oh, tell him to let me go!” she begged, in pitiful tones. “You are a
woman and can sympathize with me. Ask him to let me go!”

Wind Flower looked at her curiously, while a red flush crept into her
brown cheeks, giving them an added beauty.

“Why white girl here?” she said, speaking English with difficulty,
and giving the words a queer pronunciation. “Why white girl with
Lightfoot?”

Lightfoot himself answered her.

“It is at the order of the great chief, Crazy Snake,” he explained.
“The white girl is the prisoner of Crazy Snake. He took her from her
cabin, after the Blackfeet had killed her father, and he has ordered
me to take her on to the Blackfoot village. She is to become the
white squaw of the great chief, Crazy Snake.”

Wind Flower looked at him so sharply that it seemed the fire of her
black eyes burned into his very soul.

“Does the young chief speak with the forked tongue of the serpent?”
she demanded. “Does he not love the white girl, and does he not take
her for himself?”

Lightfoot protested that this was not true, and repeated his
assertion that he was but obeying the orders of Crazy Snake.

“Wind Flower has concealed my horse in the glen beyond?” he asked,
finding that his protestations were not without effect.

“Perhaps it was stolen and is now far away!”

“I know it is in the glen beyond.”

He walked on into the glen, and there found not only his own horse,
but the one which the Indian girl had ridden. When he returned he
brought both with him.

Wind Flower sat on a stone, regarding the white girl distrustfully,
while the latter was appealing to her with a multiplicity of words
and gestures.

“We will go on together,” said Lightfoot, speaking to the Indian
girl. “Why is Wind Flower here, so far from the village?”

“The chief sees the bow and the arrows on my horse,” she answered. “I
hunted the deer, and he came in this direction, so that I followed.
Then I found the horse of the young chief, and from the top of the
hill I saw the young chief and his prisoner.”

“We will go on together,” he repeated.

He turned his horse about and commanded Lena Forest to mount to its
back. Then he walked beside the horse, leading it, while the Indian
girl, assisting herself to the back of her own animal, rode at his
side.

Lena Forest was buoyed somewhat with hope, since meeting this Indian
girl; she believed that one of her own sex, even though an Indian,
would be less heartless than a Blackfoot warrior.

The horses did not go fast enough to suit Lightfoot, and he dropped
behind, and lashed them on with switches, running at their heels.

He still was not traveling as rapidly as he desired. Fear of Long
Hair lay heavily on him.

“Will Wind Flower stay here with the white girl prisoner of Crazy
Snake, while Lightfoot goes to the top of the hill?” he asked at
length. He gave it as an order, though wording it as a question; and
then began to climb the hill, leaving the two girls there on the
horses. In a few moments he had disappeared from sight.

Again, with pleading words, the white girl began to beg for the
assistance of the Indian.

A strange look was in the face of the Indian maid, and Lena Forest
believed it denoted a yielding, and so her hopes rose swiftly.

Wind Flower drew nearer, forcing her horse close up against that
ridden by the prisoner. She stared with her black eyes into the
brown orbs of the prisoner.

“The paleface loves the young chief?” she said, her voice tremulous.
The words were articulated queerly, but their meaning was plain.

“No, no, no!” stammered Lena Forest. “That is a mistake. I do not
love him--I am afraid of him. I want to go to the white people--my
people. We can go now. We have the horses, and he is afoot. Let us go
now. You are a woman. Help another woman who is in trouble.”

The black eyes looking into hers burned with a dangerous fire.

“The white girl lies!” said Wind Flower.

“No, no! My father was killed, and I am a prisoner. Let me go; help
me to get away.”

“Would the white girl go to the white people?”

“I swear it! Oh, I swear it! Help me to get away. Perhaps I can pay
you in some way! Perhaps I can----”

“The white girl’s tongue is crooked as the tongue of the mother of
all serpents! She loves the young chief. She would take him from Wind
Flower. And for that she dies!”

She drew a knife and struck with sudden fury at the breast of the
swaying girl before her. But her horse chanced to shift its position,
and her blow fell short.

Lena Forest screamed in fear, and began to belabor her horse, urging
it on.

As her horse jumped into motion, the wild thought that perhaps she
could now escape came to her; and she beat the horse with her hands
and kicked his side with her heels. He started into a quick jogtrot.

The Indian girl rode after her, and again tried to get near enough to
strike with the knife. As she did so the bushes parted, and Lightfoot
came bounding upon the scene.

He shouted at the furiously jealous Indian girl in anger, and, with
quick bounds, caught the horse ridden by Lena Forest, throwing it
back, with a heavy jerk on the bridle.

“Does Wind Flower love death?” he demanded of the Indian girl,
facing her now, while holding the bridle of the horse ridden by the
prisoner. “The vengeance of Crazy Snake is keen as his scalping
knife. He will strike Wind Flower to the earth, if he knows of this.
What does my little sister mean by it?”

The anger seemed to die out of the face of the Indian girl, to be
replaced by a look of fear.

“The rough wind of the mountain blew on the head of Wind Flower, and
it made her wild,” she said. “But the wind has passed, and she is
well again.”

He shot her a keen glance.

“Be careful that the mountain wind does not strike the head of Wind
Flower again,” he warned; “it might take it off, and roll it down the
hillside!”

He glanced back along the trail, and then at the half-fainting white
girl. He drew his hatchet and waved it in her face.

“We go on!” he said. “But the mountain wind still blows!”

Then he again got behind the horses and drove them on with switches,
getting increased speed out of them.

The brown face of Wind Flower had assumed a dark, leaden hue, as wild
emotions raged and burned in her heart.




                           CHAPTER XXIII.

                    THE FLIGHT OF THE FUGITIVES.


That he might hasten along faster, and at the same time conceal
his trail in the tracks made by horses that had passed, the crafty
young chief soon left the rough and rocky hillsides, and entered the
regular mountain highway that connected the town below with some of
the mines above.

This was the trail which Lena Forest used in making her infrequent
visits to the town. And when she saw it, and knew that her captor was
intending to enter it, her hopes rose again, and gave her renewed
strength.

Lightfoot was shrewd enough to know that since the Indian scare there
was not much likelihood that any wayfarers would be encountered
on that trail. What he feared were the men whom he believed to be
following him--Buffalo Bill and his comrades, of whom Crazy Snake had
told him, and against whom he had been warned.

Lightfoot was light of foot, as his name indicated; in truth, he was
a copper-colored Mercury, so fleet of foot and untiring was he. Fast
as he could drive the horses on, he had no trouble in keeping at
their heels.

He drove them down the trail, which here curved and wound round
and over the hills, dipping and rising and losing itself in many a
charming spot.

Lena Forest looked hungrily ahead, whenever a rise of the trail gave
her an extended view, always hoping to see there white horsemen.

At first this crafty maneuver of Lightfoot’s puzzled her, for he
seemed to be going toward the town, when she naturally anticipated
that he would wish to keep as far from it as possible. But soon
she began to understand, when she saw, by glancing back, that the
hoofprints of the horses and his own moccasin tracks were lost in the
other tracks, which, in such numbers, had beaten the ground hard as
flint.

She saw, too, that it was probably his purpose to leave this main
trail at some point, after utilizing it all he could, and that he
would then strike again into the rocky hills, and hold his course
toward the Blackfoot village.

The white girl and the Indian maid talked little as the horses were
thus driven on. Lena Forest had about lost hope of being able to
persuade this Indian girl to help her; and she thought it not wise,
anyway, to express her desires when Lightfoot could hear, for he had
shown a pretty clear understanding of English.

Though the Blackfeet were now threatening a bloody war on the whites,
there had been in the recent past so much intercourse and trading
between the two races that most of the Blackfeet, men and women, had
picked up a fair smattering of the language of the white men, so that
they could understand it at least in its simpler forms.

By and by the fear of the pursuers he believed to be following became
so strong in the mind of the young Indian chief that once more he
left his prisoner in charge of the Indian girl, and stole away for
the purpose of climbing a hill, that he might look backward over the
way he had come.

The place selected for leaving the horses and the prisoner was a dark
hollow, where the trail made a quick bend round rocks, and where
bushes, growing in each side of the trail, made good cover.

Those bushes shut him from sight of the prisoner and the Indian girl
almost as soon as he started on his way.

Lena Forest was about to begin her petitions again, and was trying to
summon enough courage to try to make an escape if there was another
refusal, when the bushes near by rustled, and a young man stood
forth, leveling a revolver at Wind Flower.

“Don’t move!” he commanded.

The face of the girl prisoner became white as chalk when she saw him,
and she seemed about to slide in a faint from her horse; but she
maintained her balance, and whispered:

“Bruce! Oh, save me, dear!”

The Indian girl became rigid as stone from fear; her black eyes
opening in fright when she looked into the muzzle of that revolver.
Her lips trembled and opened, as if she meant to call for help.

“Don’t move!” came the command again.

The young white man, dressed in miner’s clothing, stepped out quickly.

“Down from the horse!” he said, his voice low but commanding.

The words were addressed to the Indian girl; and, backed by the
revolver, it seemed that she would not dare to disobey them. Yet
as she slid to the ground, she screamed aloud for help, and threw
her arms round the neck of the young white man, surprising and
handicapping him.

That scream, and the fact that her lover, Bruce Clayton, was there to
help her, and needed help now himself, aroused the dormant energy of
Lena Forest.

She caught the rein of her horse and jerked the animal toward the
combatants--for at the moment the white man and the Indian girl were
struggling in lively conflict--and then she tried to get down and go
to the youth’s assistance.

The horse gave a jump, being frightened, and she fell to the ground.
This scared the other horse. He, too, gave a rearing plunge, and
went clattering down the trail, and out of sight beyond the fringing
bushes.

“Let him go!” Lena Forest panted, as she dashed at the Indian girl.

But Clayton had caught hold of the Indian girl, and now he threw her
from him. She staggered, and then fell to the ground.

Clayton caught the half-fainting white girl in his arms, and in
another moment he was running with her along the trail, following the
course taken by the scared horses.

On the hillside sounded a whoop, showing that Lightfoot had heard the
outcry, suspected something of the character of what was happening,
and was bounding down the hill.

Clayton had a horse below, at the side of the trail, concealed in
a small grove; and for that grove he now made lively tracks. He
reached the horse, and threw his sweetheart into the saddle; then
he sprang up himself, mounting with surprising speed and agility.
Catching her close in his arms again, he drove the horse into the
trail, and sped on.

Behind him he heard another whoop--an Indian war whoop now, telling
him that the enraged redskin was pursuing, or, at least, that he
would pursue instantly.

Clayton lashed the horse; and, in spite of its double burden, it
fairly flew along the winding trail.

“We’re all right!” he said to the girl he clasped in his arms. “I
don’t understand it, but you’re safe now, Lena; and I think God must
have sent me along the trail at just that time, that I might save you
from that wretch.”

She shuddered, put her arms round his shoulders, and nestled closer
to him.

It seemed a delightful dream--this sudden transition from her
position as the prisoner of a painted Indian into the arms of the
youth she loved, and whom she had promised to marry.

“You’re all right now?” he demanded.

“Yes,” she whispered; “only--only terribly frightened!”

“Still frightened? You’re safe now as can be.”

“I mean that I--I was frightened and I’m so weak that I don’t think
I could walk; but this is heaven, after that--after I thought I was
to be taken to the Blackfoot village, and there forced to become the
squaw of an Indian.”

“That young Indian chief?”

“No; Crazy Snake!”

“The infernal villain! He was with that young chief? I didn’t see
him.”

“But he captured me--slipped on me in the house, after father was
killed, and----”

“Your father dead?” He was shocked at the sad news.

“Yes--dead--dead!” She sobbed again. “He was killed by the Blackfeet,
and----”

She choked and could not go on.

“Tell me about it,” he urged.

She told him, brokenly, and in as few words as she could.

He was silent a while, his eyes fixed on the trail, and his hearing
strained backward in anticipation of pursuit.

“I knew the Blackfeet were rising, and I heard you had been in town,”
he said. “So I thought I’d ride out, and have a talk with you and
your father; for I thought it wasn’t any longer safe for you to stay
out in that lonely place.

“That’s how I happened to meet you on the trail. I saw the Indian
coming, driving the two horses; but, truly, I didn’t know then one of
the persons riding was you.

“I didn’t know what to expect of the Indian; so I hid my horse in the
grove, and went into concealment myself at the bend in the trail; for
I didn’t know but I might be needed, seeing that the riders of the
horses seemed to be women.

“When I saw that you were one of them, I was too astonished for
anything. And then the Indian went up the hill; and----Well, you know
the rest.”

“Oh, you are so brave!” she said.

“Not I. You see, anybody would have done that; and when I saw that
it was you, I’d have died there fighting that rascal to get you away
from him.”

“If he gets those horses, he’ll follow us,” she said, glancing back
along the trail.

“He’ll follow, anyway, I think, horses or no horses; and some of
those Indians can run like antelopes. The trouble is, he’s likely to
get help.”

“He is a good runner.”

“He didn’t insult nor abuse you?”

“No; but I was dreadfully afraid of him. The girl was jealous of me.”

“Jealous?”

“The young chief is her lover, I think; and she fancied he was taking
me to his wigwam.”

He laughed then.

“It was no laughing matter,” she said.

“No, of course not; very far from it. But it’s amusing to think she
could be jealous of you.” He drew rein suddenly. “Hello! There are
Indians down below. Blackfeet, too, and they’re coming this way; but
I don’t think they’ve seen us. We’ve got to leave the trail and get
into the hills here.”

He looked for rocky ground, and drew the horse out upon it.

The knowledge that another peril confronted her served to make Lena
Forest more courageous. She released herself from her lover’s arms,
and sat upright, shifting to a position behind him, where she would
less hamper his movements. He chose rocky ground for the horse, and
went on as fast as he could.

“We’ll be all right until these Blackfeet meet that young chief. And
then they’ll learn about us, and, of course, will follow us at once.”

“They’re mounted, too!”

“Yes, on Indian ponies; and those ponies are better able to climb
about these rocky hills than this big horse is. We must get as big a
start of them as we can.”

He drove the horse on without mercy, forcing it at a swift pace over
the rough country, trying all the time to pick ground that would
leave a poor trail.

As they thus rode on they heard the wild war whoops that announced
either their discovery, or that the Indians had encountered the young
chief, Lightfoot, and learned from him what had occurred.

“Now, we must ride--ride!” said Clayton, and he bent forward in the
saddle, lashing the horse on, and using the spurs mercilessly.

Again the wild yells of the Blackfeet broke forth.

“They may be yelling for some other reason,” she said, trying to
encourage her lover.

“Yes; they may have sighted Cody and Pawnee Bill,” he assented.
“There’s no telling; but they’ve struck something, some trail or some
enemy, and, like a pack of hounds when the game is scented, they
can’t help yelping.”

The path grew rougher, if that can be called a path which was more
than half the time but a broken game trail, that played out and began
again in the most eccentric manner. They had gained a high shoulder
of the hills, and below them lay open country, that stretched on into
illimitable distances, where there was much coarse grass.

“There is one way of defeating those scoundrels--of keeping them from
seeing our trail,” said Clayton, at last; “and that is to burn it.”

“Burn it?”

“Yes; ride down into that, and fire the grass, and then make our
flight behind the fire and the smoke.”

“And have the fire overtake us and burn us to death! But try it; I’d
rather be burned to death than to fall into the hands of those awful
and merciless Blackfeet.”

He guided the horse down the slope and on toward the grassy levels
that lay beyond. Ten minutes later he was well out in the grass.

Here he stooped from the saddle, pulled a handful of dry grass, to
which he applied a lighted match, and then threw it down.

While he did this the horse stood panting, sweat dripping from it.

Young Clayton had seen that he must do something desperate, if he
escaped the Blackfeet; and this was the thing he was now to try.

The burning grass communicated fire to that surrounding the horse.
Clayton sent the animal on, and with a few leaps it left the
conflagration behind it.

The remarkable manner in which the fire spread through the dry grass
was worthy of comment. It flamed up with a roar. Seeming to create a
wind from the rising currents of heated air, the fire began to run
before the breeze, leaping along in an amazing way.

It spread round from the spot where it had been started, burning
backward toward the hills and outward in the direction taken by the
horse.

“Now, for a race!” thought Clayton, struck by a sudden fear, as he
saw how fast the fire was spreading. “Maybe that will be worse to get
away from than the Blackfeet; and if anything should happen to the
horse we’ll have to run for our lives!”

He voiced none of this to the girl.

“The Blackfeet haven’t been sighted yet,” he said to her. “They’ll
know, of course, or guess, that we’ve taken to the grass, and set it
on fire; but after that black smoke gets to rolling and the fire to
running good, it will be hard for them to tell where we have gone,
and I defy them to follow our trail after the fire has burned the
grass.”

Before he had ridden a mile the fire was flaming in high billows
behind him, and the smoke, black and thick, filled the sky.

Clayton began to be somewhat alarmed.

In desperation he had entered this grassy land and had fired the
grass, but he seemed not to have bettered his position, in spite of
the blaze. Indeed, if the fire ringed him in, or overtook him, his
situation would be worse than before.

Though his face paled, he spoke hopefully to the girl who clung to
him.

The Blackfeet were still unseen; and, indeed could hardly have been
seen now through the pall of smoke and the billowing flame, even if
they had come riding straight down from the hills in chase.

The horse was a gallant animal, and was standing up splendidly to the
work, yet the strain was beginning to tell. Its sides were heaving,
its head was sunk low, and its whole body was covered with a white
lather of sweat. Its nostrils gaped wide and red as it plunged onward.

If the horse had been fresh, the hopes of Bruce Clayton would have
mounted high, for its gait was faster than the running advance of the
fire; but the horse was becoming exhausted. It had been tired even
before he encountered the young Indian chief, and since then he had
driven it hard.

Three miles away, and lying along the rocky rim of the cañon which
held the river, was a long strip of woodland.

On the other side were the hills.

The open, grassy country lay straight ahead between these two.

The speed of the fire, as it now pursued him, admonished Clayton
that safety demanded he should not hold to the straight-ahead line.
The fire would run on indefinitely, but the horse could not do so.
The Indians were in the hills when last he heard them; and for that
reason chiefly he turned the horse toward the distant fringe of
timber.

“We can make those trees without trouble, I think,” he said,
encouraging the girl, whose terrified backward glances he had
observed.

“But the fire is coming very fast!” she said.

“And we are riding fast!”

“But it is gaining on us. The horse has lost speed in the last mile.
The poor thing is exhausted.”

“Still, I think we can reach those trees. We’ve got to do that.”

The horse stumbled, bringing a cry from the girl; but righted, and
galloped heavily on. Soon it stumbled again.

Then before them they beheld a yawning rent in the earth, like a
large and deep ditch. It was in fact a dry waterway, cut by rains
that came in some torrential storm down from the hills. It was
impossible to go round this gap in the earth.

Driven by spur, whip, and voice, the tired horse tried to leap it.
It rose in the air, making a gallant effort, but lacked strength to
carry it across, and went falling down, down, into the great gully.

Lena Forest screamed as the horse took that plunge.

Clayton gripped tightly the rein, caught hold of the horn of the
saddle, yelled for the girl to cling to him, and steadied himself for
the shock of the fall.

The horse struck with stunning force, and rolled over, throwing the
girl to one side.

Clayton was hurled from the saddle over the horse’s head, where he
lay, unconscious and white-faced.

Lena Forest scrambled up unhurt, but dazed and frightened. Then she
screamed again, as she saw Bruce lying there as if he were dead.

And on came the fire, roaring and writhing, shooting up crackling
flames that seemed to laugh in glee, as if they realized the terrible
predicament of the girl and her brave lover.




                            CHAPTER XXIV.

                        THE SCOUTS’ PURSUIT.


Buffalo Bill and Pawnee Bill, or Kulux-Kittibux, as he was known
among the Indians, after the departure of Nick Nomad, began a search
along the cañon stream. They left their horses behind them, for the
ground was too rough for a horse to get over it.

The thing for which the eagle eyes of the scout were searching was
seen by him at last, when he began to despair of finding anything of
the kind.

“There it is, Gordon,” he said, pointing.

What seemed a foot section of twisted vine rose from the water, and
was wound in the most natural manner round the root of a tree.

Buffalo Bill scrambled toward it, and soon had his hand on it.

“Yes, just as I thought,” he said, and he began to pull on the thing.

Soon it lengthened, and a sunken canoe rose into view. It had
been sunk cleverly there by its Indian owner; and the painter of
time-stained rawhide, twisted round the root in imitation of a vine,
the Indian had felt sure could not be distinguished from an actual
vine.

The canoe was drawn from the water, and the water poured out of it.
Then the two friends entered it. Buffalo Bill took up the paddle that
had been lashed to the canoe, and turned the bow down the stream.

They ran the rapids successfully.

Because of the speed with which the current hurried them on, and also
because of the cleverness of Crazy Snake, they did not see where
he had concealed and sunk the canoe in which he had gone down the
stream; but swept on past it, and soon again were in rapids that bore
them farther and farther from that spot.

Finally they abandoned the canoe, after sinking it and marking the
place, and went along the banks of the cañon stream, trying to find
the trail of Crazy Snake.

“He’s been too much for us,” the scout admitted, when, after long
searching on either shore, and for a long distance up and down the
river, they were still in the dark. “The rascal was Crazy Snake, I
don’t doubt; and he’s one of the cleverest and least crazy of all the
Blackfeet.”

As they continued this search, they saw black smoke roll up from the
wide stretch of low grassland that fell away from the foot of the
hills.

Trees and hills intervened to keep them from at once seeing the fire
which gave birth to the smoke.

When they climbed a hill, and the scout leveled on the grassland his
field glasses, the smoke and fire had attained such volume that the
fugitives riding away before the flames were not visible to him.

Nor could he and Pawnee Bill detect any Indians out there, or in the
hills adjacent.

“What’s the meaning of it, Cody?” Pawnee Bill asked.

The scout could not tell him. There were many ways in which such a
fire might have started.

The thing was so suggestive, however, that the scouts hung about the
edge of the grassland, close down by the river, a long time, looking
for Blackfeet along the slopes of the hills.

At length they were astonished by seeing a young man come staggering
out of the cañon and running toward them.

He had seen them, and was trying to reach them. As he drew nearer,
they saw that his face and hands were blackened, as if by fire or
smoke; and he not only staggered, but fell, as he came on.

“Blackfoot deviltry, I reckon!” said Pawnee Bill.

They ran to meet the young man.

Pawnee Bill now recognized him as the thoroughly reformed youth he
had met in the town the day before, and with whom he had talked on
the subject of a probable Blackfoot uprising.

“Why, it’s Clayton,” he said. “Pool Clayton. He’s hurt, I think.”

Clayton was gasping from the effects of his violent run. As soon as
he reached them he began to tell his story, and it amazed them:

“The girl whose father you were burying,” he said; “the girl who was
carried away by Crazy Snake from the cabin, she----”

He stopped, choking for breath.

“Yes; go on!” the scout begged.

“I found her in charge of a young Indian called Lightfoot, who had an
Indian girl with him; and I took her away from them. They followed
us, and other Blackfeet chased us. We took to the grass country,
which I fired, thinking thus to hide the trail of my horse. We were
both riding one horse. But the horse was weakened by the long run
from the fire, and finally fell into a deep gully, in trying to leap
it.

“I struck on my head, and didn’t know anything for a while. When
I came to myself the girl was gone. I couldn’t find any trail, or
anything; and I don’t know what became of her, or what to make of it.
The girl was Lena Forest, and she said you----”

He stopped again, coughing and out of breath, but he had told enough
to stir them into the most intense interest.

“Guide us to that gully,” said Buffalo Bill.

They started at once, Clayton, telling more of his story as they
hurried on.

His smoky, grimy appearance was caused by the fact that in reaching
them he had passed through a portion of the burned area.

He conducted them as quickly as possible down the cañon, and then out
into the burned grassland, to the spot where his horse had tried to
leap the deep gully, and had fallen into it.

The horse was found there, dead, for in its fall it had received
injuries which killed it.

Clayton and the scouts, in gaining this spot, followed the gully from
the cañon, thus remaining below the level of the grassland; a fact
they counted on to keep them out of sight of any Blackfeet in the
hills.

The young man showed them where he had fallen, and where he had
searched, after his return to consciousness.

They took up the work where he had dropped it, giving to it their
great skill.

There were no tracks visible at first in the burned grass; but when
they had gone up the gully some distance they found an Indian trail.
Two pairs of moccasins had come down from the hills to that point,
where they had entered the gully.

As they had not climbed out of the gully on the other side, it was
certain they had either gone back, or up or down it.

They had not gone back, and the scouts began to search the gully
closely.

Then they found faint traces of the moccasin tracks on the hard soil,
with the toes pointing down the gully.

Following this faint trail, they discovered that the Indians had
reached the point where now lay the dead horse.

The rest was plain. They had captured the girl and taken her on with
them; and, being in a hurry, through fear, perhaps, they had not
stopped to scalp the young white man who lay there unconscious, and
whom no doubt they thought dead.

“They went with her to the cañon,” was the declaration of Buffalo
Bill, when he had spelled this out from the dim writing in the soil
of the gully.

They hastened on to the cañon, and soon reached it.

The stream roared and raced before them.

On the opposite side was a high, unscalable wall, showing
conclusively that the Indians and their prisoner had not gone that
way.

“Gone downstream,” said Buffalo Bill; “and, of course, they went in
a canoe, for they couldn’t have done otherwise.”

There was nothing to do now but to retrace their way to where the
scouts had sunk the Indian canoe, raise it, and set out down the
river, following the blind water trail taken by the Indians and their
captive.

The mental state of young Clayton may be imagined while this search
was being made, and now when this canoe pursuit was begun. Yet he
tried to be hopeful, and he was resolutely courageous.

He crouched in the stern of the canoe, wishing that he had in his own
hands the stout ash blade which the scout was wielding so skillfully
in the bow. He felt that the speed of the canoe was slow, very slow,
though it was going as fast as the nature of the channel warranted.

Rocks jutted up in the stream here and there, and at sharp bends the
rocks at the sides threatened the canoe as it swung round them.

Buffalo Bill gave his sole attention to the stream and to the paddle.

The other scout kept his keen eyes busy in searching the walls and
the shores and the stream ahead, lest the canoe should be run into an
ambush.

Soon the speed of the canoe ought to have satisfied even the wild
anxiety of the young lover. The current had quickened again into
cataracts that tossed and hurled the little craft about as if it were
but an eggshell. The rate at which it flew on was enough to take the
breath of the canoemen.

Buffalo Bill poised and dipped his paddle with rare skill. It needed
a good eye, a strong arm, and a steady brain, and he had all three.

A rock reared itself in the center of the stream, and the current
threw the canoe at it, as if to split it in two; but the unerring
paddle swept the canoe to one side, and the dangerous rock shot past,
with the water boiling white round and over it. A swift turn of the
channel threw the canoe over against the wall of dark granite, as if
to smash it there; but again the paddle urged it back into the middle
of the boiling water, and held it there, as it sped on with arrowy
swiftness.

The cañon walls came closer together, pinching in, confining the
water, and increasing the strength of the current. The waterway grew
dark, as if enveloped in twilight; yet the white water swirling and
boiling over and round sharp, up-thrust rocks could still be seen,
wherever the rocks lifted themselves like hungry teeth. Around these,
dipping and paddling lustily, the scout guided the dancing canoe.

Clayton was hanging on as if for dear life, for now and then the
canoe rose into the air and gave a leap as it took some cataract and
shot on, the waters roaring about the canoe in a fearful din.

At last the cañon opened, brightening ahead; and soon the worst of
the perilous way was past, with smoother water opening before them.

Pawnee Bill watched keenly for some indications on the shore that
would show that the captors of the girl had left the river with her
here.

The boat moved on more slowly, to enable him to do this; but no
signs of such a disembarkation were to be seen.

Soon before the canoe loomed the darkness of another narrow reach of
the cañon.

“Shall we go into it?” the scout shouted.

“Yes,” said Pawnee Bill. “They haven’t landed here; so they must have
gone on.”

The canoe shot, with dizzying swiftness, toward the dark opening,
the current again running beneath the keel with race-horse speed,
requiring, for the safe management of the canoe, all of Buffalo
Bill’s marvelous skill with the paddle.

It was seen, when they were fairly in the dark opening, that here the
cañon roofed itself overhead; so that the river ran through a black
tunnel, making thus practically an underground river.

Neither of the three men had ever been on this part of the river
before; but Clayton recalled what some of his former associates, the
outlaws, had told him of an “underground river,” called the Bitter
Water, that cut through a cañon in these mountains. He knew now that
he was afloat on that underground stream.

What the result would be he could not foretell. But he recked not of
the danger. If Lena Forest had been taken through it, he would not
hesitate to follow; no, not even if it led him to death.

“Hold hard!” Buffalo Bill shouted, for the canoe was jumping and
bucking like a wild horse. “Hold hard!”

Pawnee Bill could not use his eyes to much advantage in a search of
the black walls; and as for the young man, he had all he wanted to
do to cling to his place as the canoe flew on.

The darkness became like ink, showing that the river was here
completely walled in; and it seemed to him that the water grew
rougher, while certainly its roar was much louder, due to its
closed-in condition. The roar was thunderous now.

But on the canoe went, through the darkness and the howling noise,
whether to destruction, or to be guided through to safety, Bruce
Clayton could not tell.




                            CHAPTER XXV.

                          AGAIN A PRISONER.


Lena Forest had been recaptured by the handsome young chief,
Lightfoot. By hard riding, he and a comrade had circled round the
eastern end of the line of fire, only to find their horses exhausted
by the terrible run and themselves driven back by the flames.

They abandoned their horses, and when the fire died down along the
edge of the rocky hills, they set out across the burned area on foot.

They had become separated from the other Blackfeet, also, in the wild
chase. Lightfoot had lost sight of the young Indian girl, Wind Flower.

His present companion was a young brave who stood ready to yield him
obedience as a chieftain of the Blackfoot nation. With this young
warrior, whose name was Red Antelope, Lightfoot came finally to the
gully.

They could not leap it because of its width, and this fact induced
the young chief to think that perhaps the horse of the white man had
not been able to get across.

To break their trail, Lightfoot descended, with his companion, into
the gully; and then they went on down, until they reached the point
where Clayton’s horse had fallen.

They saw the girl bending over the prostrate youth, and the horse
lying dead. She did not see them, so wrapped was she in her grief and
in her frantic efforts to restore life to the seemingly inanimate
form of her hero.

Under the conditions, they had no trouble in approaching her and
making her again a prisoner.

Lightfoot was on the point of lifting the scalp of the apparently
dead white man, when a sound off in the distance made him think that
enemies were near and haste was desirable; so he caught up the girl,
and, with the aid of Red Antelope, bore her hastily toward the cañon.
There they brought to light a sunken canoe, which they emptied of its
water, and set out down the cañon stream in it, taking the helpless
and almost insane white girl with them.

Of the running of the cañon river, Lena Forest had afterward no
very clear recollection. That recollection was like the memory of a
hideous nightmare. The flying canoe, the water that boiled round the
sharp rocks, the black shadows and the blacker cañon tunnel, together
with the painted faces and half-naked bodies of her Blackfeet
captors, were things and shapes of terror from which she shrank in
fright, cowering, and covering her eyes.

Her strength and the temporary heroism she had shown when with her
lover had gone. She felt that death was better than this; and once,
in her despair, she would have thrown herself into the river, if Red
Antelope had not restrained her. He threw her down in the bottom
of the canoe, with a cry of warning and anger, and then swung his
hatchet menacingly before her terrified eyes.

Lightfoot, wielding the paddle, grunted assent to this threat. In
his eyes, a squaw should be made obedient, and fear and threats were
good weapons for that purpose. If an Indian squaw was disobedient to
her lord and master, she was flogged; and he, without compunction,
would have applied a whip to this white girl, if he had thought it
necessary. Women were wholly inferior creatures, and they might be
stolen as a horse is stolen; and if so stolen, they belonged by right
to the one who thus carried them away. It was Indian custom, and to
the Indian mind that made it right.

So they gave scant attention to the tears and entreaties and the
pitiful terror of the white girl thus dragged into a horrible
captivity. Tears did not kill women. In their opinion, tears and
crying were good for them; they often made the eyes brighter and
washed the dust of the prairie from smooth brown cheeks!

After the passage of the underground river, the canoe shot out into
comparatively placid water, with green banks on each side, between
which it floated, until soon Blackfeet horsemen were seen, off on the
right bank. These horsemen brandished lances and yelled as they came
riding wildly toward the canoe.

Lightfoot stood up, waving his paddle, and then his hand.

He was immediately recognized. With a thunder of hoofs, and more
yelling, the wild horsemen drew up on the bank as the canoe was shot
to land.

Lena Forest, white-faced and fearful, regarded this array of naked
warriors with dismay. But her heart was already broken, because of
her belief that her lover was dead. If these Indians would only kill
her, she would not object, she thought. She feared captivity and
Indian cruelty more than she feared death.

The horsemen were a part of Crazy Snake’s band. As for that chief,
he was absent, and was said to be gone to get more warriors, with
whom to resist the white men in the fight that all believed would now
surely come.

Lightfoot, standing up in the canoe, with paddle raised, pointed to
the prisoner.

“She is to be the squaw of Crazy Snake!” he said, in order to settle
that matter once for all, as he saw a number of the younger warriors
regarding her with admiring looks. “Crazy Snake placed her in my
charge, to take to the village; and with Red Antelope I have got her
thus far.”

In imperfect English he now ordered her to get out of the canoe.

When she did not move quick enough to please him, he caught her by
the hair and half dragged her out.

Some of the warriors laughed, as if pleased, when this brutal
treatment brought from her a cry of pain.

“We wait here for Crazy Snake,” one of the braves informed Lightfoot.
“He was to meet us here with more warriors. What word comes from the
white men?”

Lightfoot told them as much as he knew, or as much as he cared to
tell them.

There were no lodges here, and but a temporary camping place had been
made. The girl prisoner sat on the ground, in the blazing heat of
the sun, without shelter.

The warriors gathered around her, some with blankets drawn about
their shoulders, but most of them only in war paint and feathers.
They were merely disgusting brutes to her. Whatever others might see
in them that was picturesque and attractive, she saw none of it.
They were of the men who had murdered her father, and had taken her
captive, and now held her here in their midst.

But most she thought of the fate of her lover, whose body, as she
believed, had been left in that gully in the midst of the burned
grasslands.

What the future held for her she shuddered to think, but she knew
that death would be preferable to continued captivity with these
savages.

The Blackfeet watched the shores of the stream and the cañon a while,
and also stationed warriors on the tops of the hills to report the
approach of any one. They were waiting the arrival of Crazy Snake.

When he did not come as soon as anticipated, they made hasty
preparations for departure, intending to ride farther down the stream
to the Indian village. The white prisoner was to be placed there, and
there were other reasons which now induced them to make this retreat.
So far, no white men had been sighted by them.

Lena Forest had been anxiously hoping to learn that white men were
coming, but her hope of that died away when she was placed on the
back of a pony and was again borne away.




                            CHAPTER XXVI.

                       THE WILD RANGE RIDERS.


The men whom old Nick Nomad gathered about him in the town were a
wild-looking lot, yet typical of the border, particularly in the old
days when Nomad was younger and was noted as one of the most fiery of
the frontier Indian fighters.

Luck favored him, for there had come into the town of Crystal Spring,
at the base of the mountains, a band of old-time bordermen, hunters,
trappers, and wild-horse catchers, with whom he was personally
acquainted.

It had been Nomad’s intention to pick up a company of men in the
town, merchants, clerks, school teachers, stage drivers, bartenders,
gamblers, anything he could get, even though he had small faith in
the fighting spirit of a company thus collected.

But that intention was set aside when he saw Lawler and his wild
range riders; and when they enrolled under him, as they did as soon
as they understood his need and heard his appeal, the confidence of
the old trapper rose many degrees.

“Waugh!” he said, seizing the hand of Bill Lawler himself, and
shaking it as if it were a pump handle. “This hyar makes me think er
ther time me an’ a lot of the boyees give ther Snake River Injuns
sech a hustle. Lawler, ’twar Providence, and no mistake, thet sent
you hyar now.”

He had fought Indians with Lawler, and had trapped and hunted with
him; and this was true of many of the men who had come into Crystal
Spring with Lawler.

As has been said, they were a wild-looking lot, as they gathered
round old Nick Nomad and heard his story; and they declared their
intention of “wiping out” the Blackfeet, if that were necessary.
Among their arms, old-fashioned firearms prevailed, together with
fringed hunting garments and beaver-skin caps. They carried hatchets
and knives, after the Indian fashion, and the horses they rode were
small, wiry Indian ponies.

Some of them had been drinking in the saloons, before the old trapper
arrived and made his call for volunteers, and these hilarious ones
were for riding straight to the Blackfoot village and sweeping it out
of existence with fire and pistol.

“No!” said Nomad. “We goes fust thing ter Buffler, and then we does
what he says. And I thinks we can’t git ter him any too quick ter
please him.”

Night was at hand by the time Nomad had guided these wild range
riders to the point where he had left Cody and Pawnee Bill.

Neither was there, and he had hardly expected that either would be.
Nevertheless, the fact of their absence made it impossible for Nomad
and his company of Indian fighters to push on during the darkness.
They did not wish to overrun the scouts, who were supposed to be
in advance, and Nomad was anxious to halt there, for the coming of
Buffalo Bill.

The range riders sprawled themselves for the night along the edge of
the hills, with the cañon river roaring noisily below them.

No fires were built and no lights were shown. Guards were stationed.
They were in the Blackfoot country now, and a night surprise was a
thing to be watched against. Through the night sentries kept sharp
watch; but the night passed without excitement or incident of any
kind.

When morning dawned, with no enemy in sight, many of the range riders
clamored to be led to the Indian village, which they desired to
attack in their wild Bedouin fashion. But old Nomad had been with
Buffalo Bill too much to believe that he would approve of a thing of
that kind, and he held back the eager rangers.

“Waugh! I’ll take a look round,” he said, “and see what’s ter be
seen, and mebbe diskiver what’s best ter be did. I’m lookin’ fer
Buffler now ever’ minute. Ef he don’t come, then we’ll move on down
ther stream, and try ter hit his trail and foller it.”

He rode away in the gray dawn on Nebuchadnezzar, promising to be back
soon.

“I ain’t got no use fer Injuns no more’n they have,” was his thought,
“and I’m agreein’ with ’em that ther only good Injun is a dead
Injun; but, jes’ ther same, I knows thet Buffler would git hotter’n
a limekiln ef I should let them wild men charge ther Blackfeet, as
they want ter do. Ef Buffler’s fell inter ther hands of ther cusses,
why, then thet’s diff’runt; thet puts ther responsibility and their
commandin’ onter me. I reckons ef thet _has_ happened, we’ll be
obleeged ter charge ther reds, and wipe ’em out, ’specially if
they’ve done any wickedness ter Buffler.”

He passed on down the cañon trail a long distance, looking carefully
about, and searching for “sign.”

He saw pony hoofs and moccasin tracks, but they had been made early
the day before, he judged, which indicated that the men and horses
that had made them were not near.

Yet old Nomad was mistaking and underrating Blackfoot cunning in
that; for, as he passed on, scanning the ground and glancing his
keen, old eyes along the hills, a number of Blackfeet were watching
him.

They were under the leadership of Crazy Snake, as cunning a rascal as
had ever crept, serpentlike, through the defiles of those hills.

There was nothing crazy about old Crazy Snake but his name. He
was shrewd, cunning, remarkably clear-headed for an Indian, and,
altogether, a dangerous redskin. The name had been given him because
of his ferocity in a certain battle, when, surrounded by an attacking
party of Cree Indians, he had fought his way through and escaped,
after killing and wounding many of them; he had fought as if he were
a crazy snake, and that was his name ever after.

Crazy Snake was now just back from the trip he had made a number of
miles to the northward, having made a headlong ride for the purpose
of getting help from the Blackfoot village that lay at the big sink
of the Powder River. He had secured the warriors he had gone for,
and they were with him, and he was now on his way to the lower
village--his own village--where he meant to make a mighty resistance,
if the white men came there to attack him.

When he saw, in the trail below, the old trapper jogging along on his
old horse, Nebuchadnezzar, he knew from Nomad’s manner that he was
searching for some trail, or for Indian “sign.”

Crazy Snake knew, too, that this old trapper was the friend and pard
of the wonderful Long Hair, so feared by all the Western Indians.

When he had determined the direction that Nomad would take, Crazy
Snake slipped away with several of his best warriors, and hastened
to put himself and them in front of the trapper, in an endeavor to
ambush him.

Nomad, however, turned around, as if he smelled the trap that was
laid for him; and, after jogging along a short distance, disappeared
from sight of the Blackfeet.

He had struck a trail that excited his curiosity. It was the plain
trail of a white man, and the white man seemed to be wounded, or
suffering. The tracks wavered here and there.

“Got an Injun arrer in him, I’m guessin’,” was Nomad’s opinion.
“’Tain’t Buffler’s trail, ner Pawnee’s; and I dunno who it kin be.
But whoever he aire, he aire white; and I’ll see what’s the meanin’
of it.”

The trail was fresh and plain, and he followed it rapidly.

It did not take him long to come in sight of a small hut half hidden
under a projecting ledge. The door was open, and the wavering trail
led through the grass straight up to it.

“Some fool miner’s camped down hyar, and didn’t know thet ther
cussed Blackfeet aire threatenin’ all white men’s ha’r!” was Nomad’s
conclusion, as he left the trail, dismounted, and then approached the
house carefully from the rear, looking into the hut through the one
small rear window.

A man lay on the floor by the door, seeming to have fallen there
through sheer weakness.

Nomad immediately went around to the door.

“Hello!” he said, stepping within. “Got some Injun lead in ye?” His
tone changed to astonishment. “Bill Givens!” he cried. “Waugh! Ole
pard, what’s ther meanin’ o’ this?”

The meaning of it was that Bill Givens, an old acquaintance of
Nomad’s, was ill of measles, and in a dangerous condition. He had got
home, and tried to get into the house and on his bed, but had fallen
on the floor.

Nomad knew what the trouble was as soon as he looked in Givens’
splotched and fevered face; but he had no fear of measles; and,
picking Givens up, he put him on the narrow bed, and then tried to do
something for him to make him comfortable.

“Been ground-hoggin’ out hyar by yerself, eh? Tryin’ ter git some of
the yaller gold thet everybody ’lows these hyar hills aire sloppin’
over with, eh? Waugh! You’d ought to ’a’ got out o’ this ’fore ther
measles hit ye, fer ther Blackfeet aire thick as flies round hyar,
and aire likely ter make trouble.”

He was puzzled as to what he should do.

When he had worked over Givens a while, and had poured some hot water
down his throat, water heated in the tiny fireplace, Givens came, in
a measure, to himself.

He knew that Blackfeet were around in that locality, and now, seeing
and recognizing his old trapper pard, he begged Nomad to take him
down to the town, or at least away from the cabin so surrounded by
Indian perils.

“It’s resky, but not so resky as you stayin’ hyar, even if somebody
stayed hyar with ye, Givens,” said Nomad. “I reckon I kin help ye
stick ter ther back of my ole hoss, and we’ll git ye back to whar
ther rangers aire waitin’, and then have some of ’em stay by ye, er
git ye to ther town. I never deserts an ole pard, Givens, and I’ll
not desert you.”

Nomad got Nebuchadnezzar, and with some difficulty helped the sick
man to mount to the horse’s back. Then he took the rein, and, with
Givens swaying weakly in the saddle, he set out with him, striking
the backward trail and hurrying on toward the camp of the rangers.

Meanwhile, Crazy Snake had not been inactive; he had drawn his cordon
of Blackfeet warriors and descended into the trail.

Suddenly rifle shots rang out and bowstrings twanged.

Givens fell, with a bullet in his brain, tumbling heavily to the
ground.

Bullets cut through Nomad’s clothing, and an arrow struck and stuck
in his beaver-skin cap, its feathered end projecting from the fur,
forming a strange-looking plume.

Nomad tried to turn Nebuchadnezzar around in the trail, but the
Blackfoot rush was made too quickly; and, though he went down
fighting, he was subdued, and made a prisoner, being beaten to the
earth before he submitted.

Nebuchadnezzar pawed and squealed, rushed on the Blackfeet with
his greenish teeth clicking and snapping, and lunged out with his
twinkling heels; but Nebuchadnezzar, too, was made a prisoner.

Nomad’s effort to aid a needy friend had made him a prisoner of the
Blackfeet.




                           CHAPTER XXVII.

                         AGAIN ON THE TRAIL.


Buffalo Bill and Pawnee Bill floated on down the cañon river until
they came to the open land beyond the “tunnel,” where they discovered
indications that Blackfeet had been on the shores there not long
before.

This made them wary; they could not be sure that all the Blackfeet
were gone. Accordingly, they concealed their canoe, and searched the
ground along the shore.

Bruce Clayton was with them, using his eyes as well as he could, but
unable to “read” what he saw on the ground, seeing but hoof marks of
horses, and some moccasin tracks in the damp soil by the margin of
the river.

“They have retreated toward the village,” said Buffalo Bill. “Their
village lies farther down the stream, and they have gone in that
direction. The girl was taken with them, evidently.”

Clayton wanted to hurry on and do something at once to rescue
her, but the wary scouts were not sure this was wise. They feared
ambushes, and knew, also, that they were not in force strong enough
to take the girl from the village. Whatever they did they must do by
craft.

Aside from this, Buffalo Bill was expecting soon the coming of old
Nick Nomad, who had gone for assistance.

He now sent Pawnee Bill back to meet Nomad’s force and guide it on,
and, with the anxious young lover, he began to follow the trail of
the Blackfeet.

Avoiding all ambushes and pitfalls, but making slow progress, the
scout and his young friend reached the vicinity of the Blackfoot
village by the middle of the afternoon.

From a hillside some distance away the scout surveyed it with his
glasses, and saw that the village was in a state of commotion.

“Impossible to do anything right now,” was his conclusion. “The
warriors we’ve been following are there, and the village is aroused
and is being put in readiness for a fight. It would be as much as our
lives are worth if we should try to penetrate it now. We’ll have to
await the coming of Nomad, and whatever help he has got together.”

“Perhaps I could go in after dark,” said young Clayton rashly.

“We’ll see,” was the answer. “Nomad may get here by, or before, that
time.”

But Nomad did not come.

When darkness had settled over the earth the scout tried to enter the
village, but was driven back by the keen-nosed dogs, that swarmed
everywhere, watchful and hungry as wolves.

“If only we could get some word to her!” said Clayton. “If we could
let her know that friends are near, it would encourage her.”

“My attempt kicked up a good deal of excitement. She may guess from
that that friends are near. We’ll hope so.”

“But if only some direct word could be got to her!”

Clayton’s anxiety increased as the hours went by.

“If you can’t sleep, my boy,” said the scout after a while, “keep
close watch while I take a try at it. I’ll be better to-morrow for a
little rest to-night.”

“You don’t intend to attempt again to-night to reach her?” said
Clayton.

“It’s impossible to do anything to-night, my dear fellow; the
Blackfeet are too much excited and too wide-awake.”

When Buffalo Bill awoke, less than an hour later, Bruce Clayton was
gone.

“The fool!” he said. “He’s certain to be captured, if he tries to get
into the village.”

He rose and went again toward the village, filled with fear for
his friend’s safety. He sympathized with Clayton’s anxiety to do
something for the girl who was held by the Blackfeet, but at the same
time blamed him for folly and disobedience of orders.

He had not gone far when wild yells and a noisy clamor told him that
Clayton had been captured.

The scout stood still, listening to those telltale sounds.

“Just as I feared,” he thought. “It will be a wonder if they don’t
kill him; and what good will his recklessness then do the girl?”

He moved on with quick steps, being guided by the wild clamor and by
the flashing of lodge fires that were being rebuilt, or blown into
new life.

Drums were soon booming in the council lodge, warriors were seen
hurrying to and fro by the light of the fires, and feverish activity
reigned.

The Blackfeet, having captured the young white man, were sure that he
was a scout, and that a strong force of white men were near; and they
were getting ready to meet them if they came.

The utter impossibility of entering the village without discovery was
apparent to the experienced scout. Though he wanted to aid the youth,
and also the girl, he saw that the attempt would have small chance of
success, and if it failed his own fate would, no doubt, be sealed.
Yet it required stern self-repression to remain inactive, knowing
what was going on so near him, and the peril of the prisoners.

As Buffalo Bill lay close against the ground, screened by the
darkness, he saw small bodies of Blackfeet leave the village, and
knew they had been sent out to scout about, and, if possible, to
locate the white men who were supposed to be near.

In going and coming these Blackfeet passed close to the scout; so
close that he could hear some of their low-spoken words and the soft
crunching of their moccasins. From what they said he discovered that
Crazy Snake was not in the village, but was expected soon, and that
the prisoners were being held until his coming.

“That’s good!” was his thought. “Crazy Snake wants the girl for his
squaw, and these bloodthirsty rascals believe that he will give up
Clayton to the torture as soon as he arrives. Before that time comes
perhaps I can do something.”

He slipped away from the village, and soon was hastening over the
backward way, hoping to get in communication now with Nomad’s men and
hurry them forward, and also eager to find Pawnee Bill.

However, he discovered that parties of Blackfeet were coming and
going in the trail, and to avoid running into them he left it and
entered the hills. This slowed his progress, and morning dawned
before he had gone very far. Then, as he went on, he was given a
crushing surprise.

He saw old Nomad, mounted on Nebuchadnezzar, in the midst of a body
of Blackfeet commanded by Crazy Snake.

“Nomad a prisoner!” he said, with a groan. “What in blazes will
happen next?”




                           CHAPTER XXVIII.

                  THE CAPTURE OF THE MEDICINE MAN.


Unable to do anything to aid Nomad, who was surrounded by a strong
body of warriors, Buffalo Bill continued his retreat toward the point
where he hoped to, at least, find Pawnee Bill.

That sight of Nomad borne away by the redskins inclined him to think
that the trapper had failed in his effort to get fighting men from
the town.

But when he found Pawnee Bill, he found also the wild range riders
whom Nomad had led into the hills. They had met Pawnee Bill, and had
been waiting Nomad’s return, unaware that he had fallen into the
hands of the Indians.

They greeted the noted scout with cheers. He was known personally to
most of them, and by reputation to all. But their cheers changed to
angry calls for vengeance when they learned what had befallen Nomad;
and they asked the scout to lead them toward the village at once.

Buffalo Bill was pleased with the force that had been rallied by
Nomad. As fighting men, they were the best of the border; and he
believed they would be able to whip the Blackfeet even in a stand-up
fight.

But the result to the prisoners was a thing that had to be taken into
consideration.

If the Blackfeet were defeated in an open battle and driven back, the
surviving remnant would seek shelter in the mountains. But before
retreating they would, without doubt, slay their white prisoners.
Victory at such a cost of human life would be purchased all too
dearly.

Nevertheless, Buffalo Bill now set himself at the head of the
rangers, and led them at as rapid a pace as was safe in the direction
of the Blackfoot village.

Lawler, the commander of the rangers, rode at the scout’s side, and
so did Pawnee Bill.

As they went, they discussed the situation with reference to the
safety of the prisoners, and agreed that by some strategy they should
be reached and rescued, if possible. How the thing was to be done was
the puzzle.

As the village was approached the rangers slowed their pace, and the
two noted scouts were sent ahead.

They separated when in the hills overhanging the village, going in
different directions, on the watch for Indian spies, and trying to
ascertain the state of affairs.

When he had gone some distance Buffalo Bill dismounted and descended
on foot a few yards, to where a slight rise offered a better view.
He had got his field glasses and was preparing for a careful study
of conditions in the village when he was aroused by a sound from his
horse and by a sudden patter of moccasined feet. Turning about, he
saw an Indian warrior running to get the horse.

Buffalo Bill did not wish to shoot the brave, lest the report of the
shot should carry too far; so he rushed at the redskin.

The latter tried to leap to the back of the horse, but succeeded only
in dislodging the scout’s rifle, which hung by its strap to the high
pommel.

The horse reared, shaking off the Indian, and the Indian, seeing that
he was in danger, turned about. He slipped and fell in his haste,
dropping his shield of buffalo hide, but retaining his lance; and
then he sprang away.

Buffalo Bill reached his horse, cut the lariat, bounded into the
saddle, and gave chase, almost weaponless, though he had caught up
the shield, which the redskin had dropped.

As he thus gave chase, the Blackfoot stood at bay, and when the scout
tried to ride him down he hurled the lance straight at the scout’s
broad breast.

Buffalo Bill dodged, and caught the Indian’s lance on the shield;
otherwise, it would have gone through his body. But he rode the
horse right over the warrior, and, lunging at him from the saddle,
he caught the redskin by the throat, when both came to the ground
together, the scout on top.

The fight that followed was furious and desperate, but of brief
duration. When it ended, Buffalo Bill was the victor, and the
Blackfoot brave lay panting on his back, the scout’s fingers
clutching him by the throat.

The red warrior gurgled something which he meant as a word of
submission and surrender, but the scout still held him in that
choking grasp, not daring to trust him; and then, before the brave
could get back enough strength to resist, the scout had him bound
tight and fast.

When the Blackfoot recovered sufficiently to talk, Buffalo Bill began
to ask him questions, emphasizing them by a pointed revolver.

The warrior was sullen at first; but by and by he declared that his
name was Spotted Deer, and that he was a subchief, who had been sent
out there to meet and guide into the village a certain medicine man
from another village, who was coming to drive away the evil spirits
that were causing the Blackfeet to fall sick and die. In other words,
this medicine man had been sent for in the belief that he could charm
away the measles that had attacked so many of the Indians.

“I think I want to meet that medicine man,” said the scout to
himself, when he had heard the story. Therefore, he went into hiding,
with his prisoner bound and gagged, his horse concealed some distance
away, and waited with as much patience as he could for the appearance
of the medicine man.

As he thus waited, he shaped the plan that had come to his fertile
mind--a plan that promised aid to the imperiled prisoners.

Within less than an hour the medicine man came in sight, advancing
down the trail that here descended from the higher mountains.

Spotted Deer, though bound and gagged, struggled and gurgled, in an
effort to warn the medicine man of the danger he was in, and he threw
himself about in such a manner, in spite of the scout’s warnings to
him to desist, that he attracted the medicine man’s attention. Yet
the result of his strenuous efforts was not what he had hoped.

The medicine man turned toward the bushes where he beheld the
commotion, stepping with Indian lightness of foot, and when he parted
the bushes to look in, he found himself looking into the deadly tube
of a revolver, with the dreaded Long Hair behind it threatening him.

“Do not try to turn!” the scout commanded in Blackfoot; “for, if you
do, I shall shoot you.”

The medicine man surrendered without a word, seeing that death would
be the result if he refused. Then he discovered the bound form of
Spotted Deer.

Buffalo Bill kept him covered with the revolver, and with Indian
stoicism the medicine man sat down.

“Now, your knife!” commanded the scout.

The Blackfoot produced the weapon and placed it on the ground. His
hatchet was the only other weapon he possessed, and that he also
surrendered.

Then the scout searched him.

Under his blanket the medicine man had what may be called the tools
of his trade--his medicine rattle and drum, pigments and paints of
various kinds, his medicine bag, together with plumes, beadwork, and
other adornments.

When he had possessed himself of these, Buffalo Bill tied the
medicine man, and bound him to the other captured Blackfoot. Then he
tied to the saddle on the back of the horse the articles taken from
the medicine man, and, leading his horse, he drove the two Indians
before him along the trail in the direction from which he had come.

An hour later Buffalo Bill reached the wild range riders, without
mishap, with his prisoners and spoil, finding that Pawnee Bill had
not yet appeared.

But Pawnee Bill came in soon, while the scout was explaining and
elaborating the plan he had conceived for the relief of the white
prisoners of the Blackfeet.

It was so daring, however, that when Pawnee Bill heard it even he
opposed it; for the plan was nothing less than that Buffalo Bill
should paint and disguise himself and enter the Blackfoot village,
pretending to be the medicine man whom the Indians were expecting.

But when Buffalo Bill had painted himself with the paints taken from
the medicine man, had arranged his hair in the Indian fashion and
ornamented it with plumes, had put on the clothing of the medicine
man, wrapped himself in the medicine man’s blanket and robes, and
arrayed himself, with tom-tom, medicine rattle, and other articles,
even Pawnee Bill’s skepticism vanished.

“It almost frightens me to look at you now, Cody,” he said, with a
laugh. “If you can get into the village in the night rigged out in
that way, I think you can fool even old Crazy Snake himself. But we
shall stand ready to rush the village if anything happens to you.
Give us the signal--two wolf howls from the village--and we’ll charge
the redskins, whatever the cost.”

The range riders were as enthusiastic as Pawnee Bill had now
become, and though they were themselves somewhat experienced in such
trickery, they marveled at the skill shown by Buffalo Bill in this
transformation.

With the approach of night the range riders advanced toward the
village, with scouts out in front to guard against surprise and
ambush. But they stopped in the hills above the village.

Then, as night came on, dark and cloudy, Buffalo Bill descended from
the hills. He knew the terrible danger to which he was now to expose
himself--that he was taking his life in his hands. Yet he did not
hesitate at this call of duty.




                            CHAPTER XXIX.

                   THE COMING OF THE MEDICINE MAN.


Lena Forest’s position in the Blackfoot village could hardly have
been worse, for the malignity of two jealous Indian women was turned
against her in every possible way to make her suffer.

These two women were Wind Flower and Wide Foot, the wife of Crazy
Snake. Wide Foot had been told that Crazy Snake, her lord and master,
was to install the new white squaw soon in his lodge, and that was
enough to fill her heart with bitter enmity against the inoffensive
white girl.

As for Wind Flower, she could not rid herself of the belief that
Lightfoot, the handsome young chief who had promised to marry her,
was stricken with the charms of the white girl prisoner. And as
Lightfoot would probably be made head chief in the event of the
death of Crazy Snake, Wind Flower saw herself at some future time
dispossessed, as Wide Foot seemed about to be now.

Lena Forest had been placed in Crazy Snake’s lodge in charge of Wide
Foot, who was ordered to care for her, and to see that she did not
escape; and this Wide Foot was commanded to do on peril of her own
life.

Though fear of Crazy Snake, whose anger was a thing to be dreaded,
was enough to keep Wide Foot from doing the white girl harm of a
serious character, it did not prevent her from annoying the prisoner
in many ways.

At times both Wide Foot and Wind Flower would sit in the lodge
entrance and make sport of the prisoner, grimacing, giggling at her,
making faces at her, even spitting at her, to show their hatred and
detestation.

Wide Foot even refused to give her food and water, withholding them
until the white girl was fairly famished.

When Bruce Clayton was captured by the Blackfeet and brought into
the village, Lena Forest’s prison-keeper tried to prevent her from
knowing it. But the knowledge could not be long withheld. The
Blackfeet were altogether too jubilant over the capture, and made too
great a noise about it.

Lena Forest discovered that a prisoner had been brought in. When she
tried to get out of the lodge, and was thrown back by Wide Foot, and
then heard Bruce’s loud voice raised in anger at some insult, she
hurled Wide Foot aside, and dashed out of the lodge.

She saw her lover seated on a horse, to which he was tied, with a
band of howling redskins round him, composed, in large part, of
frantic women and children.

But for a guard of warriors the angry squaws would have pulled
Clayton from the horse and hacked him to pieces with knives.

Lena Forest tried to reach Bruce, hardly knowing what she did; for
this sudden discovery that he was not really dead, but that he,
too, was a Blackfoot prisoner, nerved her to the highest pitch of
excitement and recklessness. She had no thought of what she would
do, or could do, if she gained his side; but was only possessed by
an insane desire to get to him, and die with him, if she could do
nothing else.

Wide Foot took savage delight in seizing her and dragging her by the
hair back into the lodge. But the despondent girl had come to the
knowledge that her lover was alive, when she had thought him dead,
and the cruelty and abuse of the frenzied old woman made little
impression on her now.

True, she feared now for Bruce’s life; yet while there is life there
is hope, and that he had been spared thus far gave glimmerings of
hope for the future.

When the old trapper, Nick Nomad, was brought into the village there
was further wild commotion among the Blackfeet, of which the girl
prisoner could not fail to have knowledge.

She was sure that Bruce still lived, and was held in some of the
lodges.

She saw the trapper on his rawboned horse, as he was conducted past
the lodge entrance in a sort of triumphal entry made by Crazy Snake
himself; and from the shouts she knew that some big chief had arrived
and guessed it was Crazy Snake. Then she saw Crazy Snake, and was
sure of this.

Throughout the remaining hours, until darkness came, the girl
prisoner tried to think of some means by which she might release
herself and the other prisoners.

The wariness of the old squaw had increased since the coming of Crazy
Snake. No more did Wide Foot beat and abuse the captive, a thing she
feared to do now, lest the vengeance of Crazy Snake should descend on
her.

Lena Forest listened to the thumping of the drums in the council
lodge, and to the fervid oratory of the warriors after nightfall.
She knew that things of importance were being discussed in that
big lodge, yet she could tell nothing of what was being said, even
though much of the talk reached her ears, for she knew not a word of
the language. Held close now under the eyes of the old squaw, the
girl crouched in the half-lighted prison lodge, listening to this
commotion.

Dogs barked, and papooses and squaws talked in the midst of the
lodges. Warriors hurried to and fro, and Lena believed that scouts
and spies were passing in and out of the village.

All of this made her think that perhaps white men were near, whom the
Indians feared; and she thought of Buffalo Bill and Pawnee Bill, for
whose coming she now prayed.

But when at length Buffalo Bill came she had no thought that he was a
white man.

The daring scout had made his entrance into the village in the most
natural way, riding into it on the back of an Indian pony, arrayed
in a medicine robe and blanket, painted until his features were
concealed, and with his mustache and imperial hidden beneath the
folds of the blanket which he kept muffled up around his chin.

Only the upper part of his face, wonderfully striped with paint, his
feathered hair, and his eyes could be seen.

He announced his presence, before entering, by a series of wild
yells, and a rattle of his medicine drum; and when the Blackfeet
swarmed forth to meet him, he told them briefly, and in well-chosen
Blackfoot words, that he was the medicine man who had been asked to
come to conjure away the demons that were making the Blackfeet fall
ill and die.

Peril of the most deadly sort confronted him instantly, for Crazy
Snake stepped forth, and, looking keenly at him, said:

“This is not Wandering Bear, the great medicine man of the Blackfeet
of the Sunken Lands?”

But Buffalo Bill was ready even for that.

“I am Whispering Elk, the Blackfoot medicine man from the far North,”
he answered. “Wandering Bear has gone to the Blackfeet of the
Sagebrush Valley, where there is much sickness, and I come in his
stead.”

Crazy Snake, shrewd as he was, did not doubt that this was an Indian
medicine man; but he had met Wandering Bear, and this man did not
resemble him.

Buffalo Bill, on his Indian pony, was conducted toward the council
lodge. Before it was reached, he was asked to stop at a lodge and
cure a warrior stricken with measles.

While not believing that he could do anything more, perhaps, than
give the stricken warrior hope, the scout descended carefully from
the pony and entered the lodge.

The Indian braves, the women and children, and even the suspicious
sniffing dogs came close at his heels, filling the lodge which he
entered.

The sick man, his face lighted by the leaping fire of the lodge,
which had been stirred into new life, looked appealingly at the
supposed medicine man.

For a minute, in the midst of a great silence, Buffalo Bill postured
before the sick man. Then, with a quick motion, and some shouted
words, he stooped and drew from under the skins that covered the
sick man the stuffed skin of a weasel, which he had concealed under
his robe. This he threw on the ground with a yell, and then beat and
tore it into fragments, casting the fragments into the fire, that the
Blackfeet might not too closely inspect them.

The Blackfeet yelled in hoarse joy and triumph when they beheld what
they believed to be the body of the evil spirit, taking the shape of
a weasel, that had vexed and sickened the warrior.

The warrior’s face glowed and his eyes brightened; and there was a
certainty that, believing now he would get well, much of the battle
against the disease had been already won by him.

As the scout came out of this lodge the girl prisoner, Lena Forest,
saw him again; but he was still to her but a medicine man, a horrid
and horrible creature, worse even than the hideous Indians who had
surrounded her so much of late. She saw him go on toward the council
lodge, and heard there the renewed beating of drums, and a repetition
of the sounds of Indian oratory.

Buffalo Bill, in thus desperately entering the Blackfoot village,
hoped to locate the prisoners, and, later in the night, release them.
If he was discovered, his own life would be the forfeit, he felt sure.

The risk was great, but the thing to be gained was great, for it was
no less than the release of old Nomad and the other prisoners, thus
saving their lives; for he was certain they would be slain by the
Blackfeet, if the latter were forced to retreat by an attack of the
range riders.

In the council lodge Buffalo Bill tried to conduct himself like
a true medicine man. He yelled and danced, and besought the good
spirits of the mountains to descend and assist him in driving out
the evil spirits that were vexing the Blackfeet. But he did not dare
talk too much, and much of his eloquence took the shape of pantomime,
in which he used wonderful gestures, always keeping the folds of the
blanket over the lower part of his face--which gave him an additional
air of mystery to the frenzied Indians.

He discovered that one thing the Blackfeet were anxious about was
that he should confer on them some power, by a spell or charm, that
would enable them to resist the bullets of the white men, whom they
feared.

The scout gave them whatever assurances they desired, feeling that he
could not safely do otherwise.

Finally he left the council lodge, declaring that the spirits had
told him that, concealed in some of the lodges, were little demons,
hid under buffalo robes, and even in the earth, who were working much
evil, and he must find and destroy them.

His object, of course, was to pass from lodge to lodge, in order to
locate the prisoners, and if possible communicate to them knowledge
of the thing he was trying to do.

The warriors streamed after him, and behind the warriors came
the women and children, while the barking and sniffing dogs ran
everywhere, yelping and snarling.

It did not take Buffalo Bill long to find out that Nomad and young
Clayton were held together in a lodge near the medicine lodge.

“Now, if I can locate the girl,” he said to himself.

The braves were crowding round him, and he dared not say a word in
English which would let Nomad and Clayton know who he was, and his
disguise and his acting were so good that they did not recognize him.
But he contrived to make himself known to old Nomad by a few words of
Spanish, and he saw the old man stare in confusion and astonishment.

In a little while he found Lena Forest, crouching in the lodge where
she had been held from the first.

At the entrance to this lodge stood old Wide Foot, who fell back when
the terrible medicine man appeared before her.

Lena Forest started up, frightened by the entrance of the medicine
man.

Not daring to use English, the scout said a few words in Spanish,
wondering if she would understand. She uttered a cry of amazement,
for she understood him--a cry which was fairly forced from her by her
wild astonishment.

Buffalo Bill poked and peered, said a few words more to her in
Spanish, the Indians thinking them words of invocation which they
could not be expected to understand, and then he retreated.

As he did so, coming thus out of the lodge, he heard wild yells, and
a rushing of feet. And then before him, bounding along, his eyes
blazing and his whole being wrought to a frenzy, he saw the medicine
man whom he had captured, and whom he was impersonating.

With yells of rage the medicine man rushed upon him, denouncing him,
and screaming to the warriors that this was a white man, and must be
beaten down and captured; that he was the terrible Long Hair himself!

It was like the explosion of a mine of gunpowder. Instantly, a
dozen warriors sprang at Buffalo Bill, tearing the blanket from his
shoulders, and yelling with rage as their enemy stood revealed.




                            CHAPTER XXX.

                    THE DEFEAT OF THE BLACKFEET.


Wandering Bear, the medicine man captured by Buffalo Bill, was a
shrewd old scoundrel, gifted not only with many natural qualities,
but some acquired ones, for the part he played as medicine man of the
Blackfeet.

Like most, if not all, medicine men among savage peoples, he resorted
to tricks, some of them very clever; and one of his tricks was akin
to that shown on many a theatrical stage to-day, the getting out of
tightly set cords bound about his wrists and ankles.

For a long time after darkness fell, old Wandering Bear lay twisting
quietly at the cords that held him.

He had seen Buffalo Bill paint and decorate himself and depart, and
he guessed shrewdly what that meant.

Also he saw that the white rangers were close down to the village, in
the scrub that covered the sides of the hills, and he was sure that
an attack on the village was contemplated, and that the departure of
the pretended medicine man had something to do with it and could mean
nothing but harm to the Blackfeet.

He thought most of himself and his personal peril, as was but
natural. What these white men would do to him eventually he did not
know, but he anticipated nothing less than death. As for the other
Blackfoot, the one who had come to meet him and had been captured by
Buffalo Bill, Wandering Bear paid slight attention to him; his own
safety was the thing for which he longed and now worked.

At last the cords on his wrists fell away, and by some clever
twisting he got his hands down to his ankles and untied the cords
that held them.

After thus releasing himself, he lay a while, stretching his arms and
legs, to get them in condition. Then suddenly he bounded to his feet
with a startling yell, knocked over the ranger who stood close by
him, and was gone like a shot out of a gun.

The rangers did not even fire a shot at him, for they did not wish
to announce to the Blackfeet below that they were so close to the
village. Yet they pursued the escaping medicine man, a pursuit that
was hopeless from the first.

He disappeared, to appear in the Blackfoot village, leaping on and
denouncing Buffalo Bill, to the amazement of the Blackfeet who heard
and saw him.

Buffalo Bill knew that the game was up. If he escaped with his life
he would have to move quickly, and do something desperate.

Instantly two wolf howls rose on the startled air, floating out to
the wild range riders in the near-by hills. Then the scout struck
down the medicine man, who was trying to seize him, and darted into
the lodge of Crazy Snake.

Lena Forest was in there, and at the entrance was Wide Foot.

The intruder hurled the old hag sprawling; then caught the girl by
the hand and jumped to the rear of the lodge. His knife flashed, and
a tearing sound followed, as he ripped the lodge skin from top to
bottom, opening a way through.

“Come!” he said, and he pulled the girl along, while the howls of the
Indians rose in a very pandemonium.

By diving thus through the lodge Buffalo Bill gained a slight start
of his foes, but it was only enough to enable him to get out of the
lodge and run toward the shadows of the next one, for the angry
Blackfeet came swarming around the lodge and through it, yelling for
his life.

He shaped his course toward the lodge where Nomad and Clayton were
held, and gained it a few yards in advance of his pursuers. Here he
thrust the knife into the hands of the startled and wildly excited
girl.

“They’re in there,” he said; “release them while I hold back the
Indians. Jump lively!”

She rushed into the lodge with the knife, the Indian who had been
guarding it having deserted his post.

Buffalo Bill stepped into the entrance; and, turning about there, he
drew his revolver and shot down the foremost of the oncoming redskins.

As the reports of his revolver broke forth, from the hills came the
wild, charging cheers of the range riders, who had heard and were now
answering the wolf howls.

The charging cheers of the rangers and his own revolver fire checked
the advance of the enraged Blackfeet. Lena Forest was thus given
time in which to release old Nomad and her lover.

They came to the lodge entrance hurriedly, putting themselves by the
side of the scout.

“If we had weepons, Buffler!” old Nomad panted, “we’d lay out a few
of them howlin’ red devils!”

Clayton was too astounded to speak; but he caught the girl in his
arms and seemed resolved to shield her by placing his body between
her and the angry Blackfeet.

Buffalo Bill reached under his blanket, and, pulling out a loaded
revolver, passed it to Nomad, who received it with a yell of joy.

“Waugh! Buffler, we stand tergether and we go down tergether. Whoop!”

The startled Blackfeet were not given much time in which to rally,
for already the thunder of the pony hoofs of the charging range
riders was heard beyond the village. Then the wild riders were in the
very village itself, shooting and yelling, and the Blackfeet were in
flight.

Short and sharp was that surprise and that battle.

The Blackfeet who were not killed or captured fled to the hills for
refuge. However, numbers of them were captured, and the village was
given to the flames.

Old Crazy Snake escaped, with his principal warriors, among them
the handsome young chief, Lightfoot, and the crafty medicine man,
Wandering Bear.

A week later Crazy Snake sent down a piteous petition, assuring the
white men that he was their good friend, that he had always been
their good friend, and would be their good friend forever, if they
would but stop chasing him in the mountains.

Thus ended the Blackfoot uprising, and no more the bloody arrow,
the mark of Crazy Snake’s vengeance, gleamed red on the bosoms of
men murdered by that treacherous old chieftain. He had been soundly
whipped; and a whipped Indian can be the meekest creature on the
earth.




                            CHAPTER XXXI.

                         RINGED IN BY FIRE.


Nevertheless, in spite of this welcome lull after the storm, Major
Clendenning was determined to take no chances of a minor outbreak
on the part of the surviving members of the Blackfoot band. He
had learned from Buffalo Bill something of the haughty nature and
indomitable ambition of the younger chief, Lightfoot; and he had good
reason to fear that the Blackfeet would not long remain in their
refuge among the hills. Whether they would again molest the whites,
particularly the miners, or confine their hostile attentions to their
constant foes, the Crees, was an open question, and Major Clendenning
felt certain that the great scout could solve it. He, therefore,
dispatched Buffalo Bill to the territory formerly occupied by Crazy
Snake’s tribe, with instructions to find out as much as possible.

Having left Lena Forest in charge of the kindly wife of one of the
officers at the fort, and having said farewell to Pawnee Bill, old
Nomad, and Bruce Clayton--who promised Lena that he would ride over
to the fort as often as he possibly could, and that he would work
hard and save enough money for them to be married--Buffalo Bill
mounted and rode forth to new adventures, in which his friends were
destined to share.

He shaped his course directly toward the high hills, and on the
evening of the third day of his journey he found himself entering a
thick forest of scrub oaks and pines. As the shadows of night were
deepening, he decided to camp in a favorable spot; so he tethered
his horse, climbed farther up the mountain, spread a blanket on the
ground, and, carefully building a small fire, cooked his frugal meal.
After that, he dozed peacefully and soon fell into profound slumber.

When he awoke in the morning he was startled by the smell of burning
pine needles and the sight of clouds of smoke drifting between the
trees. The ground was a solid carpet of pine needles, inches deep,
and this was now a carpet of flame. The fire climbed the trees,
throwing out red banners, wrapping the straight pines in roaring fire.

In front of the scout was the edge of a precipice overhanging the
Bitter Water that here cut through the solid rock of its deep cañon
chasm.

Yet sheer as was that precipice, and far down as were the waters of
the little river, Buffalo Bill seemed almost on the point of leaping
down.

The mountain was steep, and he had left his horse near its base,
climbing himself to the rugged spot where he now stood. He was
trapped. Where he stood there was a narrow space of rock, on the edge
of the precipice; in front of him a small space of needle-covered
ground still untouched by fire; and beyond that a very furnace of
flame and smoke. The roar of the fire was terrifying of itself, and
now and then the fall of a burned tree trunk thundered through it,
like the crash of a cannon shot.

“My own fault, too!” he said, as he looked about, searching vainly
for some avenue of escape. “I don’t know that I slept so soundly that
the fire got such a start as that. I suppose I must have thought it
the roar of the river.”

But Buffalo Bill could not be quite sure that all the fault was with
himself. For, who had started the fire? He had deadly enemies in that
country, men who would have roasted him there as coolly as they would
have roasted a plucked partridge.

But Buffalo Bill was not really troubling his mind so much about the
origin of the fire as how he could escape from it. He ran along the
edge of the precipice, looking down.

The lariat that might have helped him he had left on the saddle, with
the horse.

Twenty feet below him, on the side of the precipice, was a ledge; but
he could not get down to it, for the wall above it was as smooth as
a board, and glassy in its slipperiness. To jump down to that ledge
would be the same as deliberately committing suicide; for the ledge
was narrow, and the drop sheer, so that he would only have bounded,
or fallen, on down into the black cañon, if he had tried it. He could
see the white water roaring and racing far below; and could even see
other ledges and shelves that he might reach if he could only get
down to that first one.

Seeing that he could not climb down the sheer wall, he turned, and
again faced the fire.

Even in the few brief moments spent in inspecting the ledge, the
fire had gained in a startling way, and was now much closer and
much hotter than before. It roared and glowed in a big semicircle,
the two ends of the semicircle resting on the rim of the precipice
and traveling fast toward him. That he would be roasted alive if he
remained admitted of not a doubt; as even now, at the distance, the
heat of the fire was almost unbearable.

A strange look, perhaps never before seen on the face of the
indomitable scout, came to it, and he took out his revolver. For
the instant he felt that he preferred to shoot himself rather than
to suffer the tortures of a living death by fire. But he shook his
head, thrust back the revolver, and turned again to the rim of the
precipice.

“Perhaps I could tear up my clothes and make a rope that would reach
part way to the ledge, and I could drop the rest of the distance,”
was his thought. “I’ll try it; for I’ll die here if I don’t, and I’d
prefer to die trying to do something.”

He was about to strip off his coat, when a shout reached him. It came
so suddenly and unexpectedly that it made his heart jump.

“Yes?” he yelled, springing to the edge of the chasm and looking
about. He did not see any one. “Where are you?” he called, his heart
jumping with excitement and new hope.

“Here!” The voice had a singular sound, shrill and feminine.

He ran along the edge of the chasm, looking down, for it seemed to
come from below; and again he shouted an inquiry.

Then he saw the figure of a young woman, who was on one of the ledges
below him, and was trying to ascend the steep side of the chasm. She
had a rope, which she had flung up, with its noose hooked over a
projection.

“I’m coming!” she cried confidently, and began to climb the rope.

Her slight body swung and swayed over the dizzy chasm as she began to
climb. Slowly ascending, sometimes she slipped back, with a motion
that made him think she was falling and brought his heart into his
mouth.

He did not clearly see her face now, and he had not secured a very
good view of it, but he felt sure he knew who the young woman was.

With much difficulty, the girl climbed the rope and drew herself upon
the ledge to which the noose held. She looked up, and then he saw her
face clearly--the face of Lena Forest. Yet it seemed impossible she
could be there, as he had believed she was safe at the fort.

While the plucky girl was thus climbing the face of the dizzy
precipice, the fire was raging with wild fury, as if it knew that
help was coming to the scout and it was determined to overwhelm him
before that help could arrive. The increasing heat almost blistered
his face and hands now, and it drove him to the very edge of the
precipice, over which he soon was hanging, to escape it.

With a heroism that was beyond praise, Lena continued to mount, from
ledge to ledge, throwing up the rope and catching it on projections,
and then climbing up to the projections. At length she gained the
ledge below the scout.

When she looked up now he saw that she was on the point of
exhaustion. Her face was pale, and her eyes were big and bright. Her
breath came in gasps, as she stood up for the last cast of the rope.

“Catch it!” she said, then the rope shot from her hand, and the noose
was caught by the scout.

With a turn, he looped the noose over a point of the rock by him, and
the next instant he was sliding down the rope. It was like a rescue
from the very jaws of death.

When Buffalo Bill gained the ledge, he found Lena Forest lying there,
almost in a faint, from sheer exhaustion and intense excitement.

“Thank Heaven, I was in time!” she said, in a tremulous voice, when
she saw he had reached the ledge.

“Yes!” he echoed. “I can never thank you enough for that. It saved me
from an awful fate, though we’re not entirely secure here.”

“No, but you’re safe from the fire.”

“Yes, I think so.”

He looked down at the ledges still below him. The noose of the rope
was on the rock point above, and he had no rope now with which to
make a further descent. How he was ever to get down into the cañon
without a rope he did not know.

“We’ll hope the fire won’t trouble the noose up there,” he said to
her; “and, if it doesn’t, when the fire dies down we can climb up
the rope and get out above. It seems impossible to descend into the
cañon.”

“It seems to me I can never climb another yard,” Lena declared, so
thoroughly fatigued that she was almost crying.




                           CHAPTER XXXII.

                     THE GIRL AND THE EMERALDS.


The fire roared on the pine levels overhead, and the girl and the
scout whom she had rescued from the fire talked.

They had much to talk about beyond the fact that she had saved the
scout, and the inevitable discussion as to how they were to get off
the ledge where they now were.

“Lena,” he said finally, and his tone showed hesitation, “I suppose
you are strong enough to hear unpleasant news?”

Her face, already pale, grew paler.

“My uncle?” she gasped. “Something has happened to him!”

The scout put his hand into an inner pocket and brought out a filled
buckskin bag.

“He asked me to send, or get, this to you.”

She looked at him, trembling.

“He--he is not dead?”

“Yes, Lena,” said the kind-hearted scout, his own voice shaking. “I
am sorry to have to tell you that he died two days ago. You know
he was not well when he last saw your father. I’ve been doing some
scouting work in the mountains. Thinking to visit him, I called at
the cabin, and found him seriously ill with fever, in fact, at the
point of death. I did all I could for him, but it was little enough,
and he died. He gave me this package to give to you, or send to you;
for he thought you had started for the East long ago. He thought you
would persuade your father to give up his mine and go home--he had
never heard of John Forest’s death.”

He put the buckskin bag in her trembling hands.

When she opened it she found it filled with what seemed to be bits of
broken green glass.

“Emeralds, and as fine as you’ll ever see,” he explained. “There’s a
fortune there, and he wanted me to see that they went to you. It’s a
queer place here to deliver them, and a strange----”

He stopped, for she was not looking at the emeralds; thinking of her
father, she had begun to weep.

“There was no letter from my uncle?” she said after a while.

“No; he was too weak to write. He sent his love and the emeralds. He
was looking for gold, you know. Well, his pick broke through into a
cave, and opened up a queer place that must once have been an Indian
temple, or medicine lodge. The emeralds had been round the neck of a
stone idol. The buckskin string that had held them was decayed, so
that they had fallen to the floor, and were covered with dust. He
found one, and then, by a search, got all of them.

“His first thought was that perhaps there were many more, and he made
a thorough search. I’m afraid that in that search he got the fever
that killed him. The place was horridly damp, as I afterward found;
for, after his death, I myself made a thorough exploration of the
cave, and discovered that fact, though nothing else. The only gems
were round the neck of the idol, I am sure.”

She heard him with heartbreaking interest.

“I must think about it,” she said; “I must have time to adjust myself
to it. It seems unbelievable. Oh, my poor uncle!”

She seemed almost to have forgotten her strange position on that
ledge, the rescue of the scout, and the roaring of the fire above.

For a long time she sat crouching, regaining her strength, while
she thought over the sad thing which had thus been brought to her
knowledge, and went back in memory to the past.

For two years she had lived in the mining cabin not far from this
cañon with her father. In many ways those two years had been hard
ones for both her and her father. They had been lonely years to her,
for he had been away from home a good deal, and his brother, now dead
also, had visited them very seldom.

But the loneliness had recently been broken by the visits of the
young man, to whom she had almost from the first given her heart.
Clayton was at Crystal Spring, where he intended to make a home for
her, and he was to have met her and accompanied her on her way back
to the fort, but she had missed him, and so had come alone.

The morning after her return she had seen the fire, and then had
discovered that Buffalo Bill, the friend of her lover, was in peril
on the high precipice.

As she sat in silence on the ledge, grieving over the death of her
uncle, she paid scant attention to the beautiful emeralds lying in
her lap; but finally she looked down at them, slowly placed them in
the buckskin bag, and then gave it to the scout.

“Keep them for me a while, until we get out of this danger,” she
requested. “I wonder how we are to get out, too?” She looked up at
the smoke floating over them in a thick cloud. “Have you thought of
any way?”

Buffalo Bill, while watching the changing face of the girl, had also
been looking at the rope at intervals, fearing the noose would be
burned away above. That had not yet happened, and the fire was dying
down. There was a great deal of smoke, yet little fire.

He took the buckskin bag of emeralds and restored it to his pocket.

“I think I’d like to see how that fire is doing,” he said, rising to
his feet. He began to climb the rope, and was soon at the top.

There was still a good deal of fire in the woods beyond, where some
trees were burning, but close by the rocky point there was hardly any
blaze now, and the noose of the rope had been untouched.

He leaned over and looked down at the girl.

“It’s cool enough for one to stand it up here now,” he called to her.
“If you’d like to come up, make a noose and put it under your arms.”

She made and adjusted the noose, and the strong arms of the scout
soon drew her to the top of the precipitous wall.

“Not very pleasant up here even yet,” he said, “but better than down
there; and we have the comforting assurance that we’re out of the
cañon, and that the rope was equal to the strain.”

“If we keep close to the cañon’s edge, perhaps we can get beyond the
fire now,” she suggested. “You have a horse, you said.”

“If the poor fellow hasn’t been roasted. I’m a bit afraid the fire
reached him.”

They set out along the edge of the precipice, Buffalo Bill taking the
rope.

Though the ground was still hot and smoking in places, they were able
to make their way along, and, after a while, they passed out of the
burned area, and came into a region which the fire had not touched.

“There the clever rascal is,” said the scout. “Look at him!--as
peaceful as a lamb!”

His horse had broken the rope by which it had been tied, had run from
the fire, and was now grazing peacefully, not a hundred yards from
where the scout and the girl stood.

The girl had asked many questions about her uncle, about his illness,
and about the emeralds; but she began to talk of these matters again,
when they got beyond the burned area, showing that she had thought of
nothing else all the time, even when she seemed to be thinking only
of getting away from the fire.

The scout went over the story again, giving all the details, until,
by the aid of her imagination, Lena was able to reconstruct the whole
thing.

“About those emeralds,” she said. “What am I to do with them?”

“Whatever you please. It was your uncle’s desire for you to have
them, so that you might be freed from all want, educate yourself
to whatever extent you desired, travel, and enjoy life. It was a
satisfaction to him to believe that you would get them, and that they
would make you independent. I promised him faithfully that I would
deliver them into your hands; and if you hadn’t happened back here
as you did, and I had escaped from that fire, it was my intention to
return immediately to the fort for the purpose of delivering them to
you personally.”

“You are very kind,” she said. “You wouldn’t trust them to the
express or to the stages?”

“I should not have felt it safe to do so.”

“The country is full of road agents.”

“Yes; robbers and outlaws of all kinds.”

She seemed to be thinking of this as they walked on toward the
scout’s horse.

The animal was caught by Buffalo Bill, and he then insisted that she
should ride and that he would walk. He accompanied her to her uncle’s
cabin home, which was not far away. It was situated near the stage
trail that ran from Glendive to the railroad.




                           CHAPTER XXXIII.

                          THE EAVESDROPPER.


As Buffalo Bill and Lena Forest approached her uncle’s home, a man
who had been in the cabin slipped out by the back door.

His horse was hidden in the grove two hundred yards off, and at
first he thought of reaching it and riding hurriedly away. But he
hesitated; and then, seeing an opening, he crawled under the floor.

“I’ll just hear what that scout and the girl aire talkin’ about,” he
said. “And I’d like to know about them emeralds, if he or she has
got ’em. He was to have given ’em to her. But I’m gamblin’ he ain’t
any honester than other folks, and that he ain’t said a word to her
about ’em. I’ve got to git my fist on ’em, er know why. Great howlin’
tomcats! Them gems aire worth a fortune that would make these hyer
little common fortunes you hear about look sick. I’m bettin’ Buffalo
Bill never hints a word to her about ’em. He’d be a fool to, and he
ain’t a fool!”

He was hiding under the floor when Buffalo Bill and the girl came to
the cabin and entered it. To his surprise, they were speaking of the
emeralds which he had been sure the scout would never mention to her.

“Oh, she’s got ’em now, has she?” he thought, as he heard the talk.
He pressed an ear to the boards above his head. “Oh, ho! He thinks
there’s danger that some one will git onto the fact that she’s got
’em, and that she’s in danger with ’em in this section of the
country. I reckon he don’t dream that I’m already onto the fact that
there aire such gems; that I came on him when he was givin’ his
promise to old Gordon there in the mountains, and that I follered
him, hopin’ to git a chance to pinch ’em; and that I fired the pines,
believin’ that I could roast him, and afterward git them emeralds
from his dead body. Well, I ain’t got ’em yit, but I’ll have ’em!”

Though he so desired those emeralds, all his efforts to get them had
been sneaking and cowardly in the extreme.

“I’ll have Bruce go with me, and I’ll let him carry them,” he heard
Lena say. “I’m going East, Mr. Cody, for a little visit, and perhaps
Bruce can go part way with me, on the stage.”

“Bruce! Bruce!” the rascal muttered. “Who’s Bruce? So he’s to carry
’em, is he? He’s sweet on the girl. I’ve heard that she has a
‘steady,’ and that they’re going to marry. She’ll have him go with
her, and she’ll have him carry the emeralds, for no one will ever
think of him carryin’ ’em. That’s the game, is it? Oh, no; nobody
will ever think of that!”

The listening rascal slapped his leg so hard in his jubilant mood
that he became startled; the sound of talking ceased. He heard the
scout walk to the door, and then walk back.

“That was my horse, I guess, made that noise,” he heard the scout say.

The man crouched into as small a space as he could, and lay
shivering, fearing now to breathe. Soon he heard the talking going on
again.

“Oh! Aha!” he muttered, listening. “She’s goin’ to take the next
stage, which comes through here day after to-morrow, and go on that,
and her young man is to go with her. I reckon that when they git East
they’ll marry. He’ll be a fool not to marry her, if they git through
with the emeralds. But I reckon them gems aire due in this direction;
and, somehow, I think I’ll git ’em!”

When he had heard apparently all that was to be said concerning the
emeralds and the manner of their transmission to the East, he crawled
from under the house.

He was standing under a tree, beyond the corner of the house, when he
was surprised there by Buffalo Bill, who came on him suddenly, the
scout having issued from the front door.

“Hello!” said the scout gruffly. “What are you doing here?”

Instead of answering, the man turned about and ran.

Buffalo Bill drew a revolver; then lowered it. He did not want to
shoot the fellow, nor did he want to alarm the girl.

“The rascal was slipping up to the house for some purpose,” he said,
“but he didn’t reach it. I came out and caught him here under the
tree. Some scoundrelly scamp who thought to do a little stealing! If
I tell Miss Forest it will only frighten her. And her nerves are
gone all to pieces now. What’s the use of worrying her further?”

Buffalo Bill watched the man as he disappeared within the grove, and
saw him come out with his horse and ride off.

“The villain tried to keep his face turned away so that I wouldn’t
know him next time I saw him, but I think I’d recognize him, just the
same!”

He returned to the house, and discovered Lena contemplating the
emeralds, which she had poured out on the table.

“Good thing he didn’t get to see them,” was the scout’s thought, when
he observed that.

“It seems almost as if my uncle _must_ come again, and that I ought
to wait here for him,” she said, looking up. “It’s strange how I
can’t make myself realize that he is dead.”

She rested her cheek on her hand and looked at the scout. She was a
handsome girl, clad simply, but in good taste, and he could note her
beauty. Her brown eyes were dark and dreamy, and the flush now in her
cheeks, though it was a bit hectic, gave them the color that they
needed. The hand on which she rested her cheek was small and shapely,
though it was now rope-burned and red from the effects of her climb
that morning to save the life of the scout.

“It’s hard to realize a thing which one doesn’t see,” Buffalo Bill
assented.

“Of course, I can’t stay here,” she said; “and, really, I must go
at once; for hereafter this house will seem haunted to me. I’ll go
straight East, and have Bruce go with me. I may never come back
again. And yet I should like to look just once on my father’s grave.”

“It’s a lonely place,” he said. “We heaped a cairn of stones over it,
and set up a little wooden headboard, bearing his name and the date
of his death.”

“I shall put a costly monument there some time,” she announced.

“He was worthy of it; for he was a good man, and I’m sure his last
thoughts were of you.”

The brown eyes dimmed again with tears.

She placed the emeralds in the buckskin bag, stowed it in the bosom
of her dress, and walked to the door. Standing there, she glanced
longingly up the trail and out across the river, to the side of the
cañon she had scaled, and then let her eyes wander on to the smoking
pines that stood in blackened ranks still higher.

“I’m expecting every minute that Bruce will come,” she said.
“Something is keeping him.” She sat down again by the table. “Let me
get you some breakfast,” she urged; “and pardon me for not thinking
of it before.”

“I’ve been too busy to think of anything to eat, my dear girl. Does
Bruce know you are here?”

“Yes; I left word for him that I was going to see my uncle, and told
him how to get here. But I’m neglecting you! I have been too much
excited. I’ll get you something. And that will help to pass the time
away, too.”

She was soon busy in the little kitchen.

Buffalo Bill was thinking of the man he had seen under the tree. “I
wonder if he could have been nearer the house than that?” he began
now to question, as he left the house again and walked out to the
tree.

He began to scan the ground between the house and the tree. The color
rose in his face as he did so, for he saw that the man had been at
the door and close by the windows; also he saw the hole under the
house, which looked as if something had lately passed through it.

“Have you a dog?” he asked, returning to the house.

“No,” she said. “Uncle never kept a dog, though often I’ve though he
ought to have one, and a good, savage one, too, living out here alone
so much. But no one ever really troubled him. Several months ago a
drunken man came along the trail, and at another time an Indian tried
to get into the house to steal something; but that’s all.”

“That was enough!”

She was bustling about the kitchen, and soon she had the breakfast
ready, and they sat down to it.

“You’re expecting some one, too?” she said. “Pawnee Bill, and who was
the other?”

“Nick Nomad.”

“Oh, yes; such an odd name I couldn’t remember it. And you say he is
an odd character?”

“But with a heart of gold. Old Nick Nomad is as true and good a
friend as I ever could wish to have.”

“And all three of you are here looking for Blackfeet Indians and road
agents?”

“Yes.”

“I should think that would be dangerous?”

“It has its drawbacks--a hunter of road agents may get a bullet from
one of them at any time.”

He said it lightly, yet he meant it; the calling was peculiarly
dangerous. He preferred other work, and even scouting for Indians in
a hostile Indian country he considered far less perilous.

When the breakfast was ended, she went to the door again and looked
up and down the trail.

“Your friends are coming!” she announced.

Buffalo Bill stepped quickly to the door.

Pawnee Bill and Nick Nomad were approaching on horseback, from the
direction of Glendive, a town situated beyond Crystal Spring.




                           CHAPTER XXXIV.

                        THE MUSTANG CATCHERS.


Bruce Clayton, the lover and promised husband of pretty Lena Forest,
appeared at the cabin while Pawnee Bill and Nomad were greeting the
famous scout.

Her face flushed prettily as Buffalo Bill spoke in praise of her
heroic work in rescuing him from the fire. But it flushed even more,
with a glow of love and joy, when Bruce appeared. He had not known of
the death of the girl’s uncle, and was shocked by the news; but he
declared his entire willingness to accompany her in the stage to the
railroad station, and on East, if she wished it. There could be no
doubt that such a journey with the girl he loved would be the supreme
pleasure of his life.

Nomad drew Buffalo Bill aside at the first opportunity.

“Buffler,” he said, “we seen a feller hikin’ toward ther hills fast
as his hoss could go, and he comed from this direction; seemed ter me
he was scai’t about somethin’ er ’nother.”

The old trapper had seen the man who had fled from the cabin--the
eavesdropper whom Buffalo Bill had surprised beneath the tree.

While they talked, Pawnee Bill joined them. He was the same gallant,
debonair, handsome scout, dressed with an attention to appearance
that marked him among the careless bordermen--his velvet jacket, his
gold-mounted revolvers, and the costly saddle that was on the back of
his horse, always drawing attention wherever he went.

“What, ho!” he said gayly, as he joined the scout and the trapper.
“Cody, we’d found a band of mustangers, and we half think they are
mixed up in some way with this stage-robbery business that’s making
the land hereabout notorious. I think we’d better investigate them a
bit.”

Buffalo Bill mentioned the man he had seen, and who had been sighted
by Nomad.

“Oh, yes; he was riding as if the Old Boy was after him.” Pawnee Bill
laughed at the recollection. “He was going so fast that he was only
hitting the high places. And, come to think of it, he was heading
in the direction of the valley where those mustangers hang out at
present.”

Buffalo Bill told him what he suspected, told him of the death of the
girl’s uncle, and of the valuable emeralds with which he had been
intrusted.

“She’d better get out of here with them as quick as she can,” said
Pawnee Bill. “The knowledge of such things can’t be kept; and if she
isn’t held up and robbed of them, it will be because she moves out in
a hurry.”

After discussing the matter with these friends, the scout had another
talk with Lena, speaking also to young Clayton; and it was arranged
that she and Bruce should go that day to Glendive, and there take the
next stage for the railroad, thus getting out of the country with the
emeralds as soon as they could.

Shortly after this talk, Buffalo Bill rode away with his two pards,
disappearing from sight of the cabin, and journeying in the direction
of the camp of the mustangers.

When they reached the valley where the mustangers were, they found
that a mustang drive was in progress.

“This looks honest,” said Buffalo Bill. “Men who make a business of
robbery and road-agent work aren’t going to fool with catching wild
horses; they can make more money in the other line.”

He and his friends looked about for the man who had been seen by him
at the cabin, but failed to find him.

The “boss” of the mustangers was a dark-skinned fellow known as Black
John; a man of herculean build, whose great size did not hamper his
movements, for he was light on his feet and as quick of motion as any
man that followed him.

An extended semicircle of mustangers was closing in on a band of wild
horses. Few words were spoken. Each man understood his duty, and was
doing it.

The three pards rode close up to the line of mustangers and looked on
with interest.

In the old days, the plains and foothills held many bands of
mustangs, or wild horses, small, hardy animals, of great speed
and endurance, and their capture in large numbers was a paying
occupation. In some sections of the great West there are still
considerable bodies of mustangs, but no such bands as once existed.

The method of catching these wild horses required great patience
and persistence. They were not lassoed, after being run down in a
hot race, as many people suppose; they were too fleet for that. The
common method adopted was to walk them down. For days, and even
weeks, the mustangers would follow slowly a band of wild horses.
Always the mustangs held pretty close to a certain grazing ground
to which they were accustomed, and if driven away from it, they
invariably came back to it. Usually once a day they sought some river
or water hole to drink.

Knowing their habits, the mustangers would drive toward a band and
start the animals to moving. At first the wild horses would dash
away, running in fright. The mustangers did not pursue rapidly, but
kept their horses at a slow pace. The object was to keep the animals
continually moving. The first day or so the mustangs would run a
great deal and tire themselves.

The mustangers prevented them from stopping long enough to feed, and
herded them away from the customary watering place. At the end of
a week the mustangs began to show signs of exhaustion. Eventually,
thirst, starvation, and fatigue would do their work, when the horses
could be driven in any direction.

When this much had been accomplished, nooses were concealed in the
grass, with men hidden by them. The mustangs were driven over these
nooses, which were jerked, securing the mustangs by the legs. One
by one they were thus trapped, being driven time after time over
the hidden nooses, until all fell victims to the cunning of the
mustangers.

There were two hundred mustangs or more being driven that day upon
the nooses concealed in the grass along the little stream where the
mustangers had their camp; and Buffalo Bill and his friends, sitting
their horses near by, watched with interest the work of the capture
of these wild horses.

When a mustang was captured, a short chain was affixed to one
foreleg, and he was then released. He could not run; when he tried
it he invariably stepped on the chain with one of his hind feet and
either threw himself or gave himself such a wrench that he soon gave
up trying. Besides, the mustangs were now too tired to make much
effort to get away.

When all had been captured they were to be driven into a high-fenced
corral, and left to recuperate; after which there would be exciting
times in “breaking” them, when such stunts of wild riding and bucking
would be seen as could probably be witnessed nowhere else.

Twenty or thirty of the mustangs that were being crowded upon the
hidden nooses broke away, and made a dash to escape.

Buffalo Bill and his companions were near the point where they broke
out, and started in pursuit of them.

One of them, a handsome fellow, separated from the others; Pawnee
Bill, whirling his lariat, started in chase.

The lariat flew out, and its noose circled the head of the mustang.

But the horse ridden by Pawnee Bill set its foot in a dog hole, and
fell, throwing the dead shot to the ground. At the same instant, the
jerk on the lariat tore it from the saddle. As it flew out it became
wrapped round the body of the fallen rider, dragging him across the
plain.

Buffalo Bill shouted, and rode to the help of his friend, driving his
horse at its highest speed.

Pawnee Bill, caught in the lariat and dragged by the frightened
mustang, would have been dragged to his death if Buffalo Bill had not
ridden quickly to his rescue.

Leaning from his saddle, Buffalo Bill slashed the rope with his
knife; and the mustang raced on, leaving Pawnee Bill on the ground,
somewhat crestfallen and bruised, but practically unhurt. He sprang
up, and ran to get his horse, which had got its foot out of the dog
hole, and seemed to be uninjured.

“Cody, yours forever!” he shouted. “I’ll come to your aid likewise
and also whenever you get into trouble like that.”

Then he was in the saddle, chasing the running mustang, which was
dragging the severed end of the rope. He succeeded in riding around
it, and drove it back toward the herd, where Buffalo Bill noosed it,
and it was subdued.

“Great work, Cody!” called Black John, the leader of the mustangers.
“That is your mustang, if you want him.”

“I’ll make you a present of him, so far as my interest goes,” said
Buffalo Bill. “It seems a pity, though, that such a fine fellow has
to be subdued and turned into a work animal.”

“True enough, Cody; but we men have to work, and why not horses?
He’ll never do enough work to harm him, in my judgment. I get twenty
dollars apiece for these, after they’re a bit broken, and there’s
some money in it.”

A man was galloping across the valley.

“Some one is coming,” said the scout, drawing Black John’s attention
to the horseman. “Who is he?”

Black John looked at the man.

“That’s Toby Sam,” he said; “one of my men.”

“Why Toby Sam?” said the scout.

“Just the name we call him by, that’s all; I dunno what his real name
is.”

Toby Sam was the rascal who had been under the tree at Gordon’s
and had fled when spoken to by Buffalo Bill. He was one of the
mustangers! It was a fact so suspicious that the scout decided to
watch the mustang catchers a while longer, and to find out more about
Toby Sam.

When Toby Sam arrived, and discovered that Buffalo Bill and his
friends were there, he showed much confusion, but tried to cover it
up.

Old Nick Nomad rode up to him.

“Stranger,” he said bluntly, “I’m glad ter know ye, but I has seen
yer before, when you was ridin’ at sech a lickety-clip toward this
valley, from the direction of Gordon’s cabin, over on ther stage
trail. Thet war this mornin’.”

“You’re mistaken,” said Toby Sam. “I wasn’t over there this mornin’.”

“You were not at Forest’s this morning?” said Buffalo Bill, his sharp
eyes boring Toby Sam. “Didn’t I see you under the tree there close
by the house; and, when I spoke to you, didn’t you run and get your
horse, and ride away without answering me?”

“It’s a mistake,” said Toby Sam. “I wasn’t over there at all.”

“Then I beg your pardon,” said the scout. “It was a mistake.”

But he knew that Toby Sam had lied, and he wondered why.

In connection with the fact that Toby Sam might have seen those
emeralds, or heard talk about them, it was so suggestive that the
scout became uneasy.




                            CHAPTER XXXV.

                      THE ATTACK ON THE STAGE.


After tarrying with the mustang catchers of the Bitter Water, and
trying to study Toby Sam, Black John, and others, Buffalo Bill and
his friends departed, with no very clear conclusions, except a
deepening suspicion against Toby Sam.

They journeyed toward the stage trail, thinking to intersect it where
the stage would pass, and there get a final word with Lena Forest,
who was to take the stage that day to the railroad.

As they approached the crossing, they heard what was undoubtedly an
attack on the stagecoach.

Buffalo Bill and his companions rode rapidly toward the shots and the
tumult.

When they reached the trail they saw only a woman running about in
distraction. The stage and the outlaws were gone. The woman was Lena
Forest.

“The robbers have taken her emeralds!” was the conclusion of Buffalo
Bill, as he dashed up to her, with Pawnee Bill and Nomad at his heels.

She stared at him wild-eyed, and then rushed to meet him.

“Bruce!” she cried. “They have carried him away.”

It was not the gems she thought of, but her lover.

“And the emeralds?” said Buffalo Bill.

“They are here,” she said. “I concluded to carry them myself. The
stage was attacked right here by masked men. They took my watch and
purse, but didn’t know of the emeralds; but they carried away Bruce!
He must be--be followed at once.”

Buffalo Bill slipped out of the saddle.

“Where are the other passengers?” he said. “What became of them?”

“They went on in the stage, after the holdup. The driver whipped up
his horses and drove on; but I threw open the coach door and leaped
out. I couldn’t go on, for Bruce had been seized and carried away by
the road agents. I wanted to do something to help him; but when I got
back here the road agents were gone. They seemed in a great hurry,
and did their work quickly.”

“Did you get a look at the face of any one of them?” Pawnee Bill
asked.

“They were masked.”

“What kind of horses did they ride?”

“I don’t know; Indian ponies, it seems to me.”

“And they went south?”

“Yes; toward the mountains.”

Lena declared her belief that the road agents had taken young Clayton
because they had received word in some manner of the emeralds, and
believed he was carrying them.

“When they discover their mistake,” she said, “they may kill him!”
She looked appealingly at Buffalo Bill. “I risked my life to save you
from the fire, Mr. Cody,” she reminded; “and now I ask in return that
you help me to rescue Bruce from the hands of those men, if it can
be done. It must be done, if he is not slain by them at once, or as
soon as they find he hasn’t the emeralds.”

Buffalo Bill was ready to give her the promise asked.

“One of us will go with you to the railroad, or back to Glendive,” he
said; “and the others will follow the outlaws as fast as possible.”

“No, no!” she cried. “I am going with you!”

Altogether, it seemed to him that the situation was unique. The
outlaws had attacked the stage to get possession of the emeralds. Not
finding them, and believing that young Clayton had them, they were
carrying him away, and had gone in great haste. And now the girl who
really carried on her person the coveted gems was urging a pursuit of
the road agents, and declaring her intention of taking part in it.

“We have no horse for you,” he said, to dissuade her. “Besides, we
need a larger force, for there will probably be a fight. If one of us
conducts you to Glendive, or the railroad, he could summon help.”

“The delay will be too great,” she urged. “Those men ought to be
followed at once, and we can’t weaken your force by sending a man
away. Some chance may come to help Bruce. And I must go with you.”
She looked at the scout’s horse. “Your horse will carry double, I
think; and you’ll find me a good horsewoman. I can mount behind you.”

It was a waste of time to protest against the wishes of such a woman.
Moreover, Buffalo Bill admired her pluck and high courage, and he
knew she would be no weakling. The woman who could climb a wall
of that perilous cañon and hurl a rope to him, as she had done,
had more than the usual share of coolness and daring. In short, he
recognized in this brown-haired, bright-faced young woman the stuff
of which heroines are made.

“The emeralds!” he said, as a final objection.

“Let them go! I’d give them to the road agents willingly if they
would release Bruce. And, Mr. Cody, I confess to you that is what
I mean to do if I get the chance--offer the gems to those men for
Bruce’s release. We can’t fight them, they’re too strong; but we
might buy them, if we can get in touch with them to enter into
negotiations. That’s what I hope to do. They want the emeralds, not
Bruce.”

“Very true,” he admitted. “I think they want the emeralds much more
than they do him.”

“What I can’t understand is, how they knew I had them, or anything
about them. But they did. They searched Bruce hurriedly; and I heard
one of them tell him to hand over the emeralds. Where did they find
out about them?”

“I’ll make a confession to you,” said Buffalo Bill, “as we ride
along. Lucky this horse is big and strong, and doesn’t object to
double burdens!” he cried, as he helped her to mount to the back of
his horse, and then he swung up into the saddle.

Pawnee Bill and Nomad started their horses, and turned into the broad
trail left by the road agents when they rode away with their prisoner.

“The confession I make is,” said Buffalo Bill, “that a man who, I
believe, was in this stage holdup, was seen by me at your uncle’s
home when I was there--when I came there with the emeralds, after
the fire. I didn’t want to tell you before, and make you uneasy. But
I saw him out under the tree, and when I tried to speak with him he
ran. I have been thinking the matter over since, and am pretty sure
now that he listened at the window, or under the floor.”

“Under the floor?”

“You’ll remember that I asked you if your uncle kept a dog? That
was because I had seen a hole under the floor which appeared as if
something--some animal or man--had recently been in it. I think now
that the man I’m speaking of had really been under the floor. If so,
he probably heard our talk about the emeralds.

“Now, another thing: That man my friends and I saw with the mustang
catchers of the Bitter Water. He is called Toby Sam.”

“You think the mustang catchers had a hand in this holdup?”

“It looks it. I’m guessing a good deal, you see, and really am in the
dark; but that is my present guess.”

The horses were going at a gallop now.

Buffalo Bill drew rein, and asked the others to stop.

“We’re foolish,” he said, “to take those emeralds on with us. The
thing to do is to hide them here somewhere. Then, no matter what
happens, they will be safe.”

“But I intend to offer them for the release of my dear Bruce,” she
objected.

“It wouldn’t be right to the memory of your uncle,” said the scout.
“He gave you those emeralds for a certain purpose.”

“Yes, to make my life happy; but it can never be happy if Bruce
should be killed, especially if I had the feeling that I was to blame
because I held back the emeralds.”

Nevertheless, Buffalo Bill, Pawnee Bill, and Nomad talked her out of
the notion of attempting to make this sacrifice of the gems.

“You are wiser than I,” she said, in submitting. “Do with them as you
like.”

Accordingly, they concealed the emeralds in the buckskin bag at the
foot of a small tree, whose location it would be easy to remember.
Then they went on with the girl, following in the road agents’ trail,
and discussing the question of whether Pawnee Bill had not better
ride to Glendive for assistance.

Hardly were they out of sight of the tree where they had buried the
gems when Black John, the leader of the mustang catchers, came out
of some bushes not far off, and advanced into the open, leading his
horse.

“Now, what in thunder did they bury there?” he was saying. “I’ll jes’
take a look, and see!”

He found the place where the emeralds had been hid, and unearthed
them.

“Great Rocky Mountains!” he gasped, when he opened the buckskin bag
and saw the priceless emeralds that lay in it. “But all the fiends’
luck, if this ain’t a funny deal! Here we planned to rob the stage
and git the emeralds that Toby Sam tole us about. He said that the
young feller was to carry ’em, for safety. I was late gittin’ here;
and before I could do more’n hide they had gone for the stage, and
was kitin’ out south with the young feller a prisoner. And now here
comes along Buffalo Bill and his crowd, with the young lady, and
before goin’ furder they buries the jewels here, fer me! Waugh! I’ve
heard of mericles, and this is one of ’em!”

He held up the gems and let them slide through his greedy fingers.

“Luck--luck, such luck!” he muttered. “I’m wadin’ in luck, I’m
swimmin’ in it. I’m jes’ natcherly wallerin’ in luck! Hoop-la!
Emeralds fer a king! And now they’re right here in my fist.”

Craft and greediness came to him.

“Nobody’s seen me; the boys has gone on with Stockton; and here I’ve
got the emeralds. Nobody’s seen me!” He looked all around, and saw
not a person anywhere. “By the great tarantulas, why should I divide
’em with the other fellers? Why should I? We expected to git holt of
’em, and divide ’em up, and it would have been a handsome haul fer
each of us, even then. Toby Sam put us onto it because he was too
durn cowardly to try to make the riffle himself. But now--now they’re
mine! Why shouldn’t I hold ’em, and say nothin’? But durn ef I don’t,
too!”

He stowed the buckskin bag of emeralds somewhere in an inner pocket
of his coat. Then he mounted his horse and rode slowly in the
direction taken by the road agents, and by the men and the girl who
had pursued them.

“Luck!” he was muttering. “I’m swimmin’, I’m wallerin’, in luck. Was
there ever sech luck in the world before? I don’t believe it. Hope
to Harry I won’t wake up and find that I’m jes’ dreamin’; that I
ain’t here, and there ain’t been no holdup; and that there ain’t any
emeralds at all! Oh, gosh all fiddlesticks, wouldn’t that make me
sweat! Surely I can’t be dreamin’! Lemme take another look at ’em, to
be certain.”

He took another look, and was sure that he was wide awake, and that
the emeralds were really in his possession.

“Luck!” he cried. “Hoop-la! I’m rollin’ in the biggest luck I ever
heard of.”

Then he rode on, jubilant and excited beyond words to express.




                           CHAPTER XXXVI.

                      DISAPPOINTED ROAD AGENTS.


Black John had not come in time to lead the gang in the attack on
the stage. In his absence, Toby Sam was the leader; and the fact
that Toby Sam was the leader accounted in large measure for the
precipitate haste of the men engaged in the holdup.

They were in such a hurry that they did no very thorough job. When
they could not find the emeralds on Clayton, they simply bundled him
on a horse and rode off with him, sure he had them concealed in his
clothing, and that they could search him at their leisure, where
there was no danger of rifle bullets.

Toby Sam was a coward. That was the explanation of this singular
action. Like leader, like man; all were cowards when he led them.

When they had ridden at a sharp gallop for a couple of miles, they
stopped their headlong pace and crowded around the prisoner, whose
feet were tied under his horse’s belly, and whose hands were tied
behind his back.

Toby Sam flashed a glittering revolver and pointed it at him.

“Cough up, now!” he commanded. “We ain’t got no time to fool with
you. We want them emeralds you’re carryin’, and we’re goin’ to
have ’em. If you don’t fork ’em out, er tell us where to find ’em
quick, we’ll tear the clothes off of ye, and cut you into ribbons.
Understand, we’re goin’ to have ’em!”

Bruce Clayton smiled disdainfully.

“I haven’t got them,” he said.

“I s’pose you’ll say you don’t know anything about ’em?”

“No, I won’t say that, since you seem to know better; but I haven’t
got them.”

“You did have them!”

“Not on this stage trip.”

“No? Do you mean it?” Toby Sam howled the words, and his comrades
crowded angrily round the young man. “Who had ’em, then?”

“When I get ready, I’ll tell you that,” Bruce said coolly. “You know
so much, I shouldn’t think you’d need to ask me anything.”

“Search him!” yelled Toby Sam.

Some of the road agents threw themselves on their helpless prisoner
and searched him thoroughly, doing it in the roughest fashion.
However, they failed to find the emeralds.

“He ain’t got ’em!” they yelled.

Toby Sam threw up his revolver again. He was brave enough when his
enemy was tied, and could not possibly harm him.

“Tell us where them em’rulds aire!” he ordered. “And do it mighty
quick, er you’ll do no more talkin’ in this world.”

There was such menace in his words and tone that Bruce hesitated.

“I’ll tell you,” he said, “if you’ll let me go.”

“Boyees, you hear him?” said Toby Sam.

“After ther boss comes, we’ll let him go, if he tells the truth,”
said one of the men.

“Yes, after the boss comes!” others shouted.

“Say, you fellows,” said the young man coolly, “couldn’t you just
whisk those masks aside, so that I can see your faces? I always like
to know who I’m talking with. Strikes me this is a one-sided affair;
you know me, but hanged if I do you.”

“But you’d like to?”

“Well, yes; I’d like to.”

“Tell us where them emeralds aire!” yelled Toby Sam.

“Then you’ll let me go free.”

“We will, when the boss comes, if you speak honest. Them emeralds
aire the things we’re after.”

“That’s your solemn promise?”

“Yes. Now, where aire they?”

Toby Sam still held his revolver cocked.

“Those emeralds are in the possession of Miss Forest. I can tell you
that now, for she is on the stage, and the stage has got such a start
of you that you couldn’t overtake it, no matter how hard you might
try. She has got them; and they’re safe.”

A roar of surprise and anger arose.

“But, see here,” said Toby Sam argumentatively, “I was under her
house when she and Buffler Bill war talkin’ of how they war goin’ to
send them emeralds on; and I heard her say that she would give ’em
to you to carry, ’cause then they’d be safer, fer no one would be
expectin’ you to have ’em. What about that? Ain’t that right?”

“I don’t doubt you were sneak enough to crawl under the house and
listen in that way, since you admit it.”

“But ain’t that right? Didn’t she say that?”

“I think she did; but she is a woman, and a woman has an everlasting
right to change her mind whenever she wants to. She changed her mind.”

“And she carried ’em, instead of you?”

“That’s right; she carried them.”

“Why was you along, then?” Toby Sam howled. “Answer me that!”

“As her escort. I meant to go East with her.”

“What for, if not to carry the emeralds?”

The young man’s face flushed.

“I intended to marry her when we reached the East,” he admitted.

When some further sharp questions and threats did not change the
prisoner’s story, Toby Sam and some of his men drew aside and
discussed the matter.

“Better wait fer the comin’ of the boss.”

“But if we wait, then the chance of hittin’ the stage may be lost,”
was the answer to this advice.

After they had talked a while they came back to Clayton.

“Young feller,” said Toby Sam, “we aire fer the present believin’
what you’ve told us about them emeralds. We’re goin’ to hold you,
because, if you’ve lied, then we’ll have a happy settlement with you
later; and, further, because we wants to hear what the boss says
about it. But we’re goin’ to send a man to the railroad. He’ll manage
to git into communication with the young lady you’re sweet on; and
he’ll say to her: ‘We’re holdin’ the man you expect to marry. You’ve
got certain emeralds we’re interested in. Hand over them emeralds,
and we’ll let your feller go free. Otherwise, we cuts short his
career with a swift bullet!’”

“And now, to furnish proof to her that we have really got you, and
aire meanin’ bizness, we’re goin’ to ask ye to write her a little
letter--jes’ a few words from you to her, to that effeck. If she does
hand over the emeralds to our man, well and good fer you; but if she
don’t, then we ruther think that we’ll snuff out your life lamp in a
hurry. What d’ye say?”

Bruce took time to consider this.

“May I write what I please,” he asked, “or what I’m ordered?”

“You writes what we tells you.”

“Then I refuse to write anything.”

He set his jaws stubbornly.

Toby Sam’s big revolver appeared again, threatening him.

“That’s all right,” said Clayton. “Shoot me, if you want to, and then
you’ll never get those emeralds.”

“What’ll you write?” Toby Sam demanded.

There were harsh and angry cries from the other men.

“I’ll write to her to sell enough of the gems to get a thousand
dollars, and to pay it over only after I’m released.”

“Well, you don’t! We has all them emeralds, or we has your life!”

“Crack away!” said Clayton defiantly. “If you kill me, remember that
you won’t get anything.”




                           CHAPTER XXXVII.

                           SETTING A TRAP.


While they were still talking, Black John made his appearance, riding
up in such furious haste that his horse was white with foam. He had
circled the pursuers and got ahead of them.

“Git a move on ye!” he commanded.

“But, see here,” said Toby Sam, “does you understand ther situation?
This feller didn’t have the emeralds at all, but the girl’s got ’em,
and she’s on the stage; so we’re figurin’ about sendin’ a man to the
railroad, and tryin’ to open up negotiations with her, and sorter
trade him to her fer the emeralds. We reckon it may work.”

Black John answered, with an oath:

“She didn’t go on the stage, but jumped out; and now she’s with
Buffalo Bill, Pawnee Bill, and that old trapper, and they’re
follerin’ your trail.”

It was a study in human nature to watch the effect of this
revelation. It held singular proof of the fear which the names of
Buffalo Bill and Pawnee Bill had inspired in such men. They were
almost in a panic, some of them jerking the heads of their horses
round as if they wished to ride away as quickly as they could.

Black John had the buckskin bag of emeralds at the moment in an inner
pocket of his coat, but he did not mention that to them. He had made
up his mind to keep the emeralds for himself.

Another desire had come into his heart--the desire to rid himself
forever of the pursuit of Buffalo Bill and his companions. Buffalo
Bill had an unpleasant way of taking a trail and staying with it
until he accomplished what he set out for. To stop Buffalo Bill it
would be necessary to kill him. Of that Black John was certain. So
now he had planned to compass the death of Buffalo Bill and his
comrades, and to capture the girl.

If the girl was captured and the emeralds were not found on her, that
could not be charged to him; and if she should admit that they had
been hidden, and should point out the place, and then they were not
found, that could not be charged against him.

Altogether, he fancied he had worked out a clever plan, and at once
proposed it.

“Ride on,” he said, “and I’ve got a proposition to talk over as we
go.”

He stared at the prisoner through the holes of his black half mask,
and Bruce Clayton returned the stare with interest.

It was a strange-looking cavalcade that moved on--the prisoner bound
and tied to his horse in the midst of those masked figures.

Black John unfolded his plan:

“We can lay fer ’em and trap ’em, and git the emeralds from the girl,
and at the same time wipe out Buffalo Bill and the devils that aire
with him. It’s the trick to play.”

It did not suit Toby Sam, the coward. And others of the gang shared
his feelings and his fears. Buffalo Bill, Pawnee Bill, and old Nick
Nomad were noted as the most desperate fighters of the border, and
they were men not easy to trap. It was a certain thing that in an
attempt to “wipe them out,” some of the outlaws would meet death.
Toby Sam and those who thought as he did were not yet ready to die.

“It’d be a better and a safer plan,” said Toby Sam, “if we git word
to ’em that we’ll swap this young feller fer the emeralds. That girl
will jump at the offer, fer she’s goin’ to marry this feller. She’ll
take that bait quick; and, as far as the young feller is concerned,
we don’t want him, and if we keep him we’ll jes’ have to kill him.”

Even as he talked, Toby Sam looked backward, fearing to see the
pursuing scouts.

“If we git them emeralds,” he added, “and make a divvy, we’ll be that
well fixed fer money that we can quit this hyer other bizness we’ve
been workin’.”

He meant the mustang catching. They followed mustang catching as a
blind. As mustangers, they had an excuse for being in that part of
the country, and for shifting from point to point; and mustanging
explained the money they occasionally displayed in the gambling
resorts and saloons of the towns. They did not really care for
mustanging, though they were glad enough to sell the mustangs they
caught.

Toby Sam, being disguised and anxious to conceal his identity from
Bruce, did not say “mustanging,” yet his comrades knew what he meant.

Black John was not pleased to see so many of his men incline to Toby
Sam’s view.

“We’ve got to wipe out them cussed scouts!” he declared. “We’ll all
be in the penitentiary inside of a month if we don’t. And the thing
now will be dead easy. Jes’ lay fer ’em, as they come follerin’
on our trail, shoot ’em from ambush, and that ends ’em. Nothing
dangerous er to be skeered of about that.”

Black John’s position as “boss,” together with his arguments, won;
and the outlaws began to look for a good point for an ambuscade.

They found it soon, on a hillside that overlooked a narrow pass
through which the pursuers would be expected to go. They rode through
the pass, circuited around, and gained the hillside, and lay down
there under some scrubby trees.

Their horses were placed beyond the hill, and the prisoner was left
there in charge of two men, one of whom was Toby Sam. For Black John
knew what a coward Toby was, and feared to place him where he might
think his precious hide was in danger.




                          CHAPTER XXXVIII.

                      A CAPTURE AND AN ESCAPE.


When Buffalo Bill came in sight of the hill where the outlaws lay
waiting for him, and saw the narrow pass through which he must go, he
stopped, for he was wary and alert to discover signs of danger.

“They were in a great hurry here,” he said, “and I suppose they went
right on; but, just the same, that looks too favorable for a trap,
and I think we’ll investigate it.”

He brought out his field glasses and surveyed the sides of the hill
and the pass as well as he could, without discovering anything.

Pawnee Bill and Nomad also scanned the suspected points, and saw
nothing out of the way.

“If any one is there, they see us, or have seen us,” said the scout.

He turned his horse about and rode behind a hill, and the others did
the same.

Buffalo Bill wished heartily that Lena Forest was not with his
party. He did not doubt her courage. But she was a young woman, and
in the wild work he anticipated there was no place for a woman,
however brave she was. Yet he knew that she would not go back.
She had already refused to do that; and, of course, he could not
leave her without protection. But now he made another suggestion,
without believing she would accept it. This suggestion was for her
to accompany Pawnee Bill to the town of Glendive, where she could
remain, and Pawnee Bill could gather a force there and hurry back
with it.

Pawnee Bill stood ready to go, but Lena Forest demurred.

“I am not a child, and I’m not a weakling, if I am a woman,” she
declared. “I’ve given way to you, and have left the emeralds behind;
but I’m going on, in this trail, when you go on, if I have to walk.”

“I’ll ride for help,” said Pawnee Bill, “though you know, Cody, that
if you’re to mix in any fighting, I’d rather be in it with you than
to eat when I’m hungry.”

After a time of discussion, Pawnee Bill departed, on a swift ride for
assistance.

“I can’t go on,” said Buffalo Bill, “until I’m positive no road
agents are on that hillside. So, if you will stay here with Nomad,
Lena, I’ll make it my business to find out.”

“Look out fer yerself, Buffler, when ye do!” Nomad warned.

Black John was as wily and wary as Buffalo Bill. He had seen the
scout; and, while leaving the most of his men to guard the pass, he
was himself, with a few others, moving swiftly, for the purpose of
trapping the scout where he was.

Hence it happened that while Buffalo Bill was stealing along under
cover of the hills, intending to swing in a semicircle and get behind
the outlaws, if they were on that hillside, Black John was riding
as silently in a semicircle round in the other direction, intending
either to trap the scout and his companions in the scrubby grove, or
drive them into the pass, where they would come under the guns of the
road agents there.

When Black John came in sight of the spot where he thought to find
Buffalo Bill, both the scouts were gone. But Nomad was there, with
Lena Forest.

“Cody and his pard have rid on toward the pass,” was Black John’s
conclusion, “and the boyees will rake ’em in there. So here we go for
to rake in the two we sees before us. Now we put our hands on them
emeralds, fer here’s ther girl that’s got ’em.”

He could hardly repress a smile, for he felt the buckskin bag of
emeralds pressing in a lump against his flesh, under his coat.

But that mention of the emeralds was a bait for the men, and they
moved forward with him, making a clever sneak upon the trapper and
the girl.

Nomad was talking in a fatherly way with Lena Forest, telling her
that she was foolish in insisting on staying with Buffalo Bill, when
all she could do was to hamper him.

“Ye see, I’m older’n he is,” he was saying, “and so I’ve got past
ther p’int where I’m skeered ter say my say ter a woman because her
face is purty. ‘Purty is as purty does’ ter me now; though onct there
war a time when ther sight of a flutterin’ dress would set my heart
ter knockin’, and I wouldn’t had any more sense than a two-year-old.
Them times is gone by; I’m old, and I’m thet humly that I’m ashamed
ter look in a lookin’-glass, and I know it. So I kin afford ter speak
plain ter ye. You’re makin’ things hard fer Buffler by insistin’ on
stayin’ with him. ’Tain’t no proper place for a woman, and----”

“But how can I leave Bruce and----”

“Thar ye go; thar ye go! When a gal gits in love she loses her sense.
And that’s what ails ye. I don’t object ter ye thinkin’ proper good
and strong of ther man ye expect ter marry; but at ther same time,
hoss sense is hoss sense, and not somethin’ diff’runt. I say thet
you ought to go to ther town, and thet yer ought ter have gone when
Pawnee Bill went. And I say, furder----”

He was not given an opportunity to say anything further. Old
Nebuchadnezzar, his homely, shaggy-headed horse, thrust out his nose,
scented into the bushes, and then gave a jump and a squeal.

It was a warning; old Nebby was a veritable watchdog. But the warning
came too late.

Before Nomad could seize his rifle, three men burst through the
bushes, and each covered him with a revolver. They were Black John
and two of his men, and two more came in sight a minute later.

“Surrender!”

Nomad was almost too chagrined for words. He knew that he was to
blame for permitting these men to sneak on him undiscovered in that
way, and hold him up at the point of the revolver.

Nebuchadnezzar bared his greenish teeth, and in another moment would
have been at the throat of the nearest man.

“Whoa, Nebby!” Nomad yelled. He had seen the man pitch up a revolver,
and knew that Nebby would get the bullet. He knew, too, that a
bullet would be his own portion if he made an attempt to run.

“Ketched nappin’!” he said, lowering his rifle. “Yer aire too many
fur me. But if I hadn’t been a fool, ’twouldn’t happened.”

Lena was too startled and too frightened for words. She stared at the
masked outlaws, her eyes big and bright, her face turning white.

“Drop your gun!” Black John commanded.

Nomad looked at him hard, and let the rifle slide to the ground.

“I’m a fool, but I don’t skeer easy,” he said; “and I know who ye
aire, old hoss, which I’ll say it if I never speak another word. Why
don’t you take that devil’s han’k’cher off’n yer face?”

Black John came forward, holding his revolver in readiness.

“Keep him covered!” he called out. “Where’s the rest of your crowd?”

“Yer aire lookin’ at ther whole of them,” said Nomad. “Me and my
daughter, hyar.”

“Oh, your daughter! Where’s Cody and Lillie?”

“I hesertates ter say, not knowin’.”

“They were with you a few moments ago. I reckon they’ve gone on
toward the pass. Well, we’ll bag ’em there.”

“They ain’t sech fools as me,” said Nomad bitterly. “When I git
through with this trail, I’m goin’ ter quit, and retire ter some
quiet home fer men thet has lost their senses. If I’d had mine, you
wouldn’t ketched me like this. But it’s all right; I’m old, and ain’t
got too many years in this world, and you can’t skeer me. But I does
ax yer to be easy wi’ ther gal.”

“Search her,” said Black John, to one of his men.

The masked bandit came forward.

“You’ve got some em’rulds,” said this rascal. “Fork ’em over, and
save yerself trouble.”

“But I haven’t them!” she protested.

“Fork ’em over!” he shouted.

“I haven’t them. We left them behind; but where, I refuse to tell
you.”

“Search her!” said Black John, grinning in a knowing way.

The man sprang upon the frightened girl, and the next moment it
seemed that he would tear her clothing from her body.

It was too much for Nomad. Regardless of the revolvers leveled on
him, he leaped to Lena’s aid. With a blow of his fist he laid the
miscreant on the ground. At the same time his shrill whistle to
Nebuchadnezzar sounded, and the old horse came jumping to his side.

“Git on him!” Nomad yelled to the girl, as he fought with another
outlaw who assailed him.

Lena tried to obey, but her skirts were caught by the fallen rascal,
and she was thrown down.

Black John came to the assistance of the man who was battling with
Nomad, and in a few moments the old man was conquered; and then his
hands were bound, while he was held down.

“Shoot him!” snarled the rascal who had been bowled over by Nomad’s
gnarled fist.

“Not yit!” Black John commanded. He put up a hand for silence. “Mebbe
that’ll draw Cody and Pawnee Bill,” he said; “and if they come we’ll
have a fight, er mebbe we can capture ’em here. Listen!”

But if the sounds had reached Buffalo Bill, there was nothing to
indicate it.

Nomad looked regretfully at the girl, who, frightened and trembling,
was standing close by, one of the outlaws grasping her by the arm.

“Too bad, leetle gal,” he said; “but I’ve allus noticed thet storms
never last, and thet bright weather allus comes after they’re over.
It’s hard lines fer ye now, but better times is comin’.”

“Shut up!” commanded Black John, who was still hearkening for some
sound of the approach of Buffalo Bill, and of Pawnee Bill, whom he
thought with him.

Old Nebuchadnezzar, his bridle held by one of the masked men, was
dancing in uneasiness and anger.

“Whoa, Nebuchadnezzar!” said Nomad. The uneasy horse gave him an
idea. Nebby was within a yard of him, and on Nebby’s back was his
old, high-horned saddle. Nomad’s feet were not yet bound, though that
would come soon, he knew.

The shrill whistle, in a different key, rose from his lips. He jumped
to the horse and threw his bound hands up, so that the cords which
held his wrists together hooked over the saddle horn.

Nebuchadnezzar gave so shrill a squeal that it was almost a scream,
and at the same time gave a jump and lunge which hurled to the
ground the man who was holding the bridle.

The man tried to cling to the rein and stop the furious old horse,
but Nebuchadnezzar trod him under foot; and the next moment he was
“running away,” with old Nomad swinging along, supported by the
saddle horn.

The old man had not taken time to get into the saddle--had feared to
try that--but was hoping the horse would bear him beyond the outlaws,
and that he could in some manner escape.

Black John and some of the other outlaws pitched up their revolvers;
but instantly Black John lowered his.

“Don’t shoot!” he said, for he did not want to send such an alarm to
Buffalo Bill. He had the girl, whom he had desired, and as for old
Nomad, he did not care much about him, one way or another. Buffalo
Bill and Pawnee Bill he desired to capture, or to kill. Hence his
caution.

“Don’t shoot!” he said again.

“But he’s gittin’ away!”

“Let him go! He’s no good to us, anyhow. But Cody and Pawnee Bill
will be comin’ back here purty soon, in answer to that racket.
They’ll want to see what it means, an’ we’ll rake ’em in right here,
if the boyees down at the pass don’t do it. Down with you fellers,
and git the horses back; and don’t one of ye so much as breathe.
Here, young lady, come with me, and keep yer handsome mouth shet, er
I’ll put a knife into it, by way of a gag.”

The escape of Nick Nomad had come with such stunning suddenness that
Lena Forest could hardly credit it, and knew not what to do, or think.

When Black John seized her by the wrist and drew her back into the
bushes, she did not at first make any resistance, but she began
to struggle when she comprehended what this meant--the capture of
Buffalo Bill.

“I shall cry out and warn him,” was her thought. “They can’t scare me
enough to keep me from doing that.”

She was thinking, too, in a wild way, of Bruce, wondering where he
was, for she had been sure he was with the road agents. Though she
could not see their faces, she was certain these were the road agents
who had held up the stage, and, therefore, that they were the same
scoundrels who held Bruce a prisoner.

She forgot the torn and shocking condition of her dress, in her
desire to warn Buffalo Bill. And lest the outlaws should gag her, or
remove her to some other place, she tried to give them now as little
trouble as possible. So she crouched down, as Black John ordered her
to, and listened with the listening outlaws for some sound that would
show Buffalo Bill was returning.

However, that sound did not come, nor was anything heard from the
direction of the pass to indicate that the scout had fallen into the
ambush laid for him there.

“Cuss him!” said Black John, breathing hard. “What’s happened, I
wonder? He and Pawnee Bill ought to have heard that row, and be
comin’ back.”

“We’ve got the gal, anyway,” said one of the rascals, with a grin;
“and I’m believin’ she must have them em’rulds. If she ain’t, he has;
and we’ll git ’em, er know why.”

The “he” referred to Bruce Clayton.

Still no sound reached them indicating the return of the two scouts.




                           CHAPTER XXXIX.

                         THE EMERALDS GONE.


When Black John and his masked bandits had waited so long for the
return of Buffalo Bill and Pawnee Bill that their patience was worn
out, they left the concealment of the bushes.

It was certain that the scouts had not fallen into the trap in the
pass. If that had happened, rifle shots and the sounds of a conflict
would have notified them.

Everywhere was a silence that was trying to Black John. Nomad had
vanished as if into space; and, though they might have picked up and
followed the trail of his horse, the outlaws did not think that would
justify the loss of time necessary. They were more interested in the
two scouts.

Leaving the bushes, and circling back by the route they had come in
reaching them, taking their girl prisoner with them, they gained
again the hillside, where the other outlaws were waiting for the
scouts.

Toby Sam was much relieved when he saw his chief. He felt sure that
for a time the danger of a fight had passed.

“Seen nothin’ o’ ’em,” was Black John’s question.

“Nary a hair,” said Toby Sam. “But you seem to have struck suthin’.
We heerd a racket up there, and some of ther boys was fer goin’ ter
see what it meant; but I told ’em to stay here. Orders is orders, and
that’s what you tole us ter do.”

Clayton, who had been held in a hollow to the rear, was brought out,
and Lena could not repress a cry when she beheld her lover. She
marked his haggard face, but most she noted his bearing of courage
and reliance. She would have rushed to him, but one of the bandits
held her.

“Oh, Bruce! Bruce!” she cried.

“Cough up them em’rulds!” said one of the outlaws, “and then both o’
ye can go free.”

“Oh, do you mean it?” she cried, in a manner to make the bandits
think she intended their instant surrender.

Black John opened his eyes, wondering if there were other emeralds of
which he had no knowledge, and he listened for her further statement.

“I haven’t them,” she said, “as I’ve already told you; but I know
where they are; and if you will really release us, I’ll gladly show
you where they are. I’ll guide you to them. Oh, can I trust you? Will
you let us go?”

She clasped her hands in agitation, and looked round on the masked
faces.

“Can I trust you? Would you let us go, after getting those emeralds?”

“Young lady,” said Black John, “we would. Show us where they aire,
and as soon as we git our fingers on ’em we’ll turn you loose.”

He wanted his men to see that he was “doing all he could to get the
emeralds for them.”

He began to question the girl, and got from her a repetition of
the statement that she would show them where the emeralds were
concealed, on their promise to let her and Bruce Clayton go free.

She believed that Buffalo Bill and old Nomad could take care of
themselves; and as for Pawnee Bill, she thought he was hurrying out
of the country, on his way to Glendive. Her desire to secure the
freedom of Bruce Clayton made her selfish, perhaps, in some points.
The emeralds were as nothing to her, when compared with his safety.

Black John had taken a sudden and violent liking for the girl.

“I’ll cut loose from the others,” he told himself, “and slide; and
when I do I’ll take the emeralds, and I’d like to take her. I suppose
she’d make a rumpus, and all that, but what do I care? I can manage
her; if no other way, I can whale her, like the Injuns do their
squaws. I reckon that would fetch her to her senses. With the money
them emeralds will bring, I could hide out in Mexico somewheres, and
live like a prince, and never do no more work, ner run any more risk.”

Black John had as little knowledge of the heart of a true and refined
woman as if he were an Indian. Such women as he had known were of the
lower, coarser sort, and he judged all women by them.

“We’ll look round a bit,” he said to his men, for he had lost none of
his craftiness, “and we’ll see what’s become of Buffalo Bill and his
pard. And I wonder where that old trapper went to? That was a clever
thing he done, I’ll say! Also, it was reckless; fer if we hadn’t been
afraid to shoot we could have downed him and his horse dead easy!”

He took a couple of men and began to scout about, hoping to discover
what had become of Pawnee Bill and Cody; but he saw nothing.

“Beats my time!” he said. “They was right over there and follerin’
our trail, but soon’s we laid a trap fer ’em they dropped out of
sight. Yit I know that neither them ner their horses kin fly. And I
don’t see that old trapper nowhere. He’s a smart one, and no mistake.
I reckon he and that old horse o’ his aire hidin’ in some holler, and
keepin’ as close to the grass and bushes as if they was a pair of
rabbits.”

He spent almost an hour in this scouting trip, and returned with his
companions no wiser than when he went.

Toby Sam was talking with the prisoners when Black John returned, and
the prisoners seemed in remarkably good spirits.

Black John now moved his men along the backward way, but not on the
backward trail, and was soon leaving the hillside and the pass behind
him.

The girl kept her own counsel, and did not tell them that Pawnee Bill
had departed for Glendive.

When the spot was reached, near the stage trail, where the emeralds
had been concealed, she pointed it out to them.

Black John could not hide a grin. It was such a joke--when he had the
emeralds in his pocket!

The bandits saw the fresh earth turned there, and began to dig with
feverish energy. They reached the bottom of the hole, but found no
emeralds.

Then their rage broke bounds; for, suddenly, they conceived the idea
that from the first Lena Forest had deceived them.

If it had not been for Black John they would now have treated her
outrageously, and might have shot her, and her lover as well.

Black John did not care for Clayton, but he meant to protect the
girl. He put himself in front of her, and drew his revolver.

“Who’s the boss of this beehive?” he demanded harshly, fingering his
pistol. “You’ll know that I am, if you try any rushin’. Stand back,
there! And you, Toby Sam, shet yer yawp, er I’ll fill yer ugly mouth
with bullets. Let’s hear what the girl’s got to say.”

They clamored for her to speak, but she was mystified, puzzled,
chagrined.

“I saw them hidden there!” she said.

“Then somebody’s dug ’em up!” was the disgusted statement. “Somebody
seen ’em hid here, and dug ’em up; and where they aire now ther Lord
knows; but we’ve seen the last of them em’rulds, unless the young
lady is lyin’.”

They stared at her, and at Black John, who stood in front of her.

“Mebbe we kin hit the trail of the feller that done it?” Black John
suggested. He set to work to do that, but pointed out the trail of
the scouts, instead of his own.

He could afford to laugh at these men, now that he had the gems. He
was already wondering how he was to get away from them, and take the
girl with him.




                             CHAPTER XL.

                           CODY AND NOMAD.


Buffalo Bill had seen the movements of the outlaws under Black John,
and had discovered the ambush laid for him on the hillside. He had
heard the outcry made when Nomad escaped, and then he had caught a
glimpse of the old trapper getting away, with his shaggy-headed horse.

The great scout was too wise to show himself; he was but one man, and
the road agents numbered nearly a score. He was already satisfied
that they were the mustangers, or that some of them were, and that
the mustang catching was but a side issue, carried on chiefly for the
purpose of blinding people to their real work.

The fact that old Nomad seemed to be dragged by his horse, instead of
riding on the back of the animal, suggested trouble for the old man,
though the scout did not understand the nature of it.

Buffalo Bill now concealed his horse in a hollow that was filled with
bushes, and then on foot made his way in the direction of Nomad’s
flight. He was worried about the safety of the girl, whom he had left
with Nomad. More than ever he wished she would be tractable, and that
she had started for Glendive with Pawnee Bill.

In going forward now, Buffalo Bill used the utmost carefulness.

The thick growth of bushes that covered the land except in spots,
while offering him protection, screened as well much of the movements
of the road agents, so that he was in constant danger of blundering
into them at the most unexpected point.

His wariness, his keen eyesight, and trained hearing stood him in
good stead.

He found the hoofprints of Nebuchadnezzar, and began to follow them.
That the tracks were made by Nomad’s horse he knew from the fact that
recently Nebuchadnezzar had broken a triangular piece out of his
right fore hoof. The impression in the soil was unmistakable, to a
man trained as the scout was in the fine art of trailing.

Half an hour or more afterward the scout saw indications that the old
horse had entered a small grove, near a little stream. He could not
see the horse in there, and he began to fear that here was an ambush.
He knew Nebby might have run into a bunch of road agents in that
grove and been captured, with his owner, and the road agents might be
lying in wait for any friend of Nomad who followed his trail.

Standing off at a distance, concealed by trees and rocks, Buffalo
Bill uttered the “cuckoo” cry of the little prairie-dog owl. It was
a signal well understood by Nomad, when made in a peculiar way; and
when from the grove there came an answering cry, the scout knew that
in there no ambush existed.

“Hello!” he called, as he now boldly advanced.

“Thet you, Buffler?” came in a strained voice.

Nomad did not appear, and the thing seemed suspicious, so the scout
went on, with revolver held ready for use.

When he had penetrated the grove, he found a strange state of
affairs. Nomad lay on the ground, gasping, and almost breathless,
his hands bound together at the wrist. The ground seemed torn up by
his own efforts, for no enemy was to be seen. Close by stood old
Nebuchadnezzar, looking at Nomad, and then turning his sad eyes on
Buffalo Bill, as if to inquire the meaning of something he had not
brain enough to fathom.

Buffalo Bill hurried forward and cut the cords from Nomad’s wrists.
Nomad rolled over to a sitting position.

“Waugh!” he grunted, puffing his cheeks and blowing dirt out of his
mouth. “Buffler, talk er ground hogs! I been ground-hoggin’ in the
wust way ever. Fer an hour, seems ter me, I been kickin’ round hyar
wuss’n any cussed grasshopper. Whar’d ye come frum? And shake! I
never war so glad ter see anybody in all my bornd days!”

He extended his hand. The lines of the cords, where they had cut into
his wrists, showed red, and deeply indented.

“Who tied you?” asked the scout, mystified, and glancing all around
him. “I don’t see any trail here but yours.”

“Waugh! Let me git my wind, Buffler, and I’ll norate a tale fer
ye that’ll make yer eyes bug out. I rid hyar bound thet way, and
I didn’t ride in the saddle, nuther; couldn’t git up inter ther
saddle.”

Then he told, in his own peculiar phraseology, of how he had been
surprised and captured by the road agents, and of the manner of his
singular escape, aided by Nebuchadnezzar.

“Thar never war yit another sech hoss, Buffler, on the top o’ ther
airth!” he declared, with characteristic enthusiasm. “Whoa, Nebby,
consarn ye; don’t git bashful and restless jes’ ’cause I’m praisin’
ye! Stan’ still, thar!” He looked lovingly at the homely old beast.
“Nebby seen jes’ ther fix I war in, and he felt jes’ as bad as I did,
and war jes’ as ’shamed o’ ther way we had been caught nappin’. And
so he war ready fer somethin’ desprit, and he done it. I jes’ hooked
my two tied hands over the horn o’ ther saddle and Nebby carried
me off, same’s as if I war a bag o’ meal hooked onter him. It war
ther greatest thing I ever knowed on, Buffler, an’ no mistake. But
after Nebby’d done his part, I still seemed ter be not much better
off. I got my hands from over the saddle horn, but I couldn’t ontie
’em. I tried to gnaw ther cords loose, but my ole teeth has seen
their best days, and I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t break ther cords,
and thar I war; fer, smart as Nebby is, I couldn’t nowise git him
ter do anything. I tried ter git him ter bite at ther cords, but he
wouldn’t, and jes’ stood lookin’ at me, wonderin’ what kind of a
crazy fit I war havin’; fer I war shore pawin’ up ther ground suthin’
dreadful, in tryin’ ter git myself free.”

The old trapper told what he knew of the girl who had been left
behind in the power of the road agents, and of the road agents
themselves; though this last was little enough, and largely
guesswork, as he had not seen their faces.

The scout saw that some strenuous and perilous work was cut out for
him. At all hazards, Lena must be rescued, and her lover as well.

“We’ll have to lie low a while,” he said to Nomad. “We’ll strike
their trail after they’ve gone on, and then we’ll do what we can.”

Old Nomad made a grimace.

“Buffler, I feels like lyin’ low fer a week; fer I’m thet stiff and
sore thet every inch o’ me feels as ef it had been beat with an ox
whip. I reckon I’ve got you to thank fer my life, too; fer, try as I
would, I couldn’t git rid of them cords on my wrists. And, gee, but
them wrists aire hurtin’ yit!”

They were red and swollen, and very painful.

From the top of the nearest hill, to which he climbed with great
carefulness, Buffalo Bill viewed, as well as he could, the
surrounding country. He saw the road agents under Black John moving
off in the direction of the stage trail. It surprised him, and for a
time puzzled him; then he hit on what seemed to him the true solution.

“They’ve forced Lena Forest to tell them where the emeralds are
buried, and they’re going to get them. Too bad! But I don’t see
how it’s to be prevented now. Of course, no one can blame her for
telling, when, no doubt, she was threatened, and frightened.”

He surveyed the returning cavalcade with his field glasses; and saw
the two prisoners in the midst of the outlaws.

As he lay thus on the top of the hill, he saw on another hill, some
distance away, a horseman appear. He swung the glasses around and
pointed them at this horseman, while a cry of surprise broke from his
lips.

“Pawnee Bill!”

And Pawnee Bill was supposed to be at that moment speeding on his way
to Glendive!

Deeming it safe to do so, Buffalo Bill stood up and waved his hat
about his head. But the signal was not observed by Pawnee Bill, who
was looking at Black John’s men.

Buffalo Bill saw the horseman begin to descend from the hill, with
the apparent intention of following the road agents.

Therefore, he quickly climbed down himself, and returned in haste to
Nomad with his astonishing news.

The scout and Nomad rode out of the grove, and, following swiftly in
the course taken by Pawnee Bill, soon overtook him. He was not at all
surprised to see them.

“I’ve been looking for you,” he said. “From the top of that high
hill away over there I saw, with my glasses, that something had gone
wrong; and so I back-tracked, and here I am. What’s the news?”

They had enough to tell him, of a surprising character.

“I guess it was Nomad’s fight and capture that I saw,” he said. “As
you are both all right, perhaps I’d better go on again. I came back
because I thought likely I was needed.”

As, in pursuing the road agents now, toward the stage trail, the
scouts were really going somewhat in the direction of Glendive,
Pawnee Bill kept with them.

Before the stage trail was reached they saw the bandits returning,
still with their prisoners.

Night was at hand.

Black John had got rid of most of his men, having only six or eight
with him now, among them Toby Sam. Little by little he was reducing
his force, sending men here and there on various pretexts. In this
manner, he thought to get rid of them all, by and by, and have the
prisoners himself; when he meant to put the young man out of the way,
and fly with the young woman and the emeralds.

The fact that Black John’s force had been reduced caused a change of
plan on the part of the scouts.

It was decided that it was not necessary to send Pawnee Bill on to
Glendive for assistance, but that the wisest course now was for the
three pards to remain together, and, in the darkness, try to get at
the prisoners and release them. Therefore, when they fell in behind
Black John’s party, and began to follow this trail, they kept a
sharp outlook ahead, expecting that soon he would go into camp for
the night, when they would endeavor to put their plan of rescue into
execution.

But Black John did not go into camp. He pushed straight on in the
gathering darkness. Before coming to the region where he might expect
to encounter Buffalo Bill, he shifted his course to miss him and then
hurried on again.

Black John’s carelessness of pursuit enabled the scouts to keep
pretty close to him, after darkness fell, and still not reveal
themselves.

Hour after hour Black John and his men held on their way.

After a while he became suspicious, apparently, having heard the
pursuers, and dropped a scout back as a rear guard; thus forcing
Buffalo Bill and his companions to halt.

When this rear guard went on again, he rode rapidly for some
rendezvous, failing to rejoin Black John; and soon the scouts were
bewildered in the darkness, and almost lost the trail.

For a time after that they sat still on their horses, trying to hear
some sound indicating the direction of Black John’s retreat. Unable
to do this, they were forced to begin a search for hoofprints; but
they lost time in picking up the trail, and when it was found they
could not follow it rapidly. They held to it, however, with much
pertinacity, though falling rapidly behind the road agents.

When morning came, after an all-night ride, that, in their
experience, had few equals in weariness, they were still on the
trail, but miles behind. They ignored their weariness, when they
saw the trail stretching straight on before them, and pressed their
horses into a swift gallop, after a brief stop for water and grazing,
and for food for themselves.

“Buffler,” said Nomad, as they started on, “we hangs to this hyar
trail till ther last hoss is dead!”




                            CHAPTER XLI.

                        THE OUTLAWS TRICKED.


Black John had got rid of all but six of his men, one of those
remaining being Toby Sam. The others he had dispatched on various
missions, and in that manner he meant to dispose of them all, one by
one.

His horses were nearly exhausted now; he had ridden hard through the
night, and all through the hours of the forenoon, and the previous
day the horses had little rest.

Lena Forest was almost in a state of collapse, from exhaustion; and
Bruce Clayton was not in much better state. His hands being tied
together, and his feet tied under the belly of his horse, so cramped
him that at times he suffered not only from fatigue, but such intense
pain that it was torture.

Little Black John cared for these things. He had an iron frame that
resisted fatigue, and his men were as hardened to such things as
himself.

But the exhausted horses had reached a point where their speed was
little better than a walk, and soon they would be unable to go on.

Even Black John had a mental vision of pursuers hot on his trail. At
this juncture, it seemed to him a godsend, when he beheld a number of
horses grazing in a little valley, through which ran the trail he was
following.

“Mustangs!” he said. “What luck!”

He and his companions drew rein and looked down at the horses. More
than a dozen in number, with heads down, not apparently having seen
the horsemen, they presented a tempting sight to the eyes of Black
John and his comrades.

During the night, grown reckless and tired of wearing them, Black
John and his companions had removed the half masks that had
concealed and disfigured their countenances, and stood revealed to
the prisoners in their true persons. It was an intimation to the
prisoners that they could not hope to escape, and that death, or
worse, awaited them.

“There’s a cañon over there,” said Black John, as he studied the
mustangs and their situation. “If we could herd ’em into the mouth o’
that, and then rush ’em, and drive ’em into it, we could ketch some
of ’em. And we’ve got to have some new horses.”

He knew the region, and knew that this cañon became choked and ended
less than a mile back of its opening; so that, if the horses could be
forced into it, they would fall easy victims to the mustangers.

Acting on Black John’s suggestions, his men spread out, several
hundred yards apart, and began to move down into the valley.

Black John kept the prisoners with him, and close by him was Toby Sam.

So certain were the mustangers that the horses they saw were wild
ones that the only care they used was in endeavoring to ride upon
them in such a way as to throw them toward the mouth of the cañon.

But when the bandits had ridden so close that they began to wonder at
the fact that the mustangs did not race away in fright, there was a
sudden and startling transformation.

An Indian appeared on the back of each of the “mustangs;” an Indian
striped and painted hideously, armed with feathered lance and rifle.
These redskins charged the white men, with hideous yells.

Black John uttered an oath of amazement, and jerked his tired horse
around. He stretched forth a hand to catch the bridle rein of the
horse ridden by Lena Forest. He saw his comrades lashing their jaded
animals, in efforts to escape, and saw the redskins riding upon them.

An Indian chief rode toward him, with rifle uplifted.

Black John dropped the bridle rein of the girl’s horse, and, drawing
his revolver, he rode to meet the chief, firing upon him. He saw the
chief tumble to the ground, with a bullet in his forehead.

Black John was really a capable fighter, the natural leader of the
wild men he grouped about him.

Another Indian was coming toward him, and this Indian he shot out of
the saddle.

But by this time the horse ridden by the girl was galloping off at
its best gait, and was really going fast, for fright gave it renewed
strength.

With a running leap, Black John sprang to the back of one of the
Indian ponies, and then tried to catch the other.

Several Indians rushing upon him compelled him to abandon his attempt
to capture the second pony.

He yelled defiance at them, as they shot at him and hurled their
lances; and, with backward shots from his revolver, he rode away at a
furious pace, following the girl.

He saw that several of his men were down, that others were fighting
with Indians, while still others were, like himself, riding away for
safety.

The chase that followed was a hot one, and Black John was pressed
hard; but the pony he now had under him was fast, and he did not
spare it. He overtook the girl, shouting to her to stop. When she did
not, he rode up beside her galloping horse. Then he fairly lifted her
from its back, throwing her against his side; and, holding her there
by main strength, he galloped furiously on.

“Git up behind me!” he shouted. “If you don’t, you’ll tumble, and it
will be the worse for you.”

She was too weak to obey him; her mind, also, revolted at the thought
of going farther with him. She preferred to fall to the ground, and
meet death there.

In desperation, Black John stopped his horse, and shifted her to its
back, in front of him.

“You go with me,” he said. “D’ye want them Injuns to git ye? You’re a
fool, if ye do!”

The Indian pursuers were coming up rapidly; but again Black John
urged on the plucky mustang, and found it so superior as a runner
that it again drew away from the Indians, in spite of its double
burden.

Lena was in a fainting condition by this time. Weakened by the
terrible exertions she had been forced to undergo, and by the mental
agony she had endured, she had no strength of mind or body left.

Black John was separated now from all of his men. Some of them were
down, killed by the redskins; the others were in flight. Even Toby
Sam was no longer near him.

“’Twon’t be so bad,” was his thought, “if I can only git away from
the Injuns. Whatever turns up later, I’ll have a good excuse to give
for sep’rating myself from the boyees. I’m hopin’ I’ll never meet any
of ’em again, to make an explanation needful, but if I should I’ve
shorely got it now. But them cussed Injuns!”

He looked back, and saw several redskins still chasing him, and he
knew if they stuck to it long enough they would probably tire down
his pony, for, in the long run, the double burden would tell on it.
When that came, he knew he would have to fight the Indians.

“But they’ll think they’ve struck a rattler if they crowd me!” was
his grim thought.

He drove his spurs into the sides of the mustang. Unused to such
things, it jumped forward, with a squeal of pain, greatly adding to
its speed.

“I’ll make it,” was the thought of the ruffian. “And what more can
I want? I’ve got the emeralds and the girl, and I’ve got rid of
the fellers that might be inclined to make trouble--would shorely
make trouble if they knowed I had the emeralds. I’ll hit some trail
runnin’ into Mexican territory, and git out of the country. And then!”

He looked at the white face of the girl, who had fallen limp in his
villainous arms.




                            CHAPTER XLII.

                          A ROUGH DIPLOMAT.


When Lena Forest came to a full realization of her changed position,
she was alone with Black John.

About them were rugged hills, hemming in a little valley, where the
captured Indian pony was grazing.

Black John had gone into camp there, and was cooking some meat he had
found on the Indian pony. He was not only tired, but by this time
ravenously hungry.

“Don’t be skeered,” he said, when he discovered that Lena was taking
note of her surroundings. “I don’t mean any harm to ye, not in the
least.”

She started up, staring about; then turned to him. Her face was
corpselike in its pallor, and she swayed as she stood up.

“Then, why did you bring me here; and why keep me here?” she said.
“Why don’t you join your men?”

Black John stooped to sniff the roasting meat before replying.

“Now I’ll tell ye,” he said; “and mebbe you won’t think it’s so bad.
I was your friend from the very first, but didn’t darst show it. The
men wanted you, and wanted your emeralds. What become of the emeralds
I don’t know, and jes’ now I don’t know where the other men aire.
They was scattered in that rumpus with the Injuns. You recollect the
Injuns, and what fools we was, in ridin’ up on ’em?”

He stroked his beard, ruminating.

“The boys was scattered by the Injuns. I got one of the Injun ponies,
and we come here on it; and I reckon we’re safe enough fer a while.”

“Won’t you leave me here,” she begged, “or take me back to my
friends?”

“What friends?”

“Mr. Cody, and--and the men who were with him. You don’t know where
Bruce Clayton is?”

“Nary, I don’t. He was with our crowd, when the Injuns hit us; but
where he went, and what become of him, I don’t know no more than you
do.” He inspected the meat. “Won’t you have somethin’ to eat?” he
asked, taking it from the fire and poking into it with his knife.
“This belonged to the Injun that owned the mustang, but I reckon as
he meant to eat it himself he didn’t pizen it. You look’s if you
needed to eat somethin’.”

“I couldn’t swallow a mouthful,” she protested. “Won’t you please let
me go, and let me try to find my way back?”

“That’s foolish, don’t ye think? Better eat some o’ this meat. It’s
good, and you need the stren’th it’ll give ye. Let me carve ye out a
bit of it.”

She protested again that she could not eat.

The outlaw seemed to want to argue the matter with her. What he
really wanted was to hear her talk, for he liked her voice, and to
make her forget if possible her condition. He was wondering how he
could gain her good will, and perhaps her liking. His ideas of women
were singular. He did not see why this girl might not come to like
him as much as he now liked her.

“I’ve seen sich,” he told himself. “Put a couple o’ strange dogs
together, and they’ll fight like time; but after they git acquainted
they’re li’ble to be the best of friends. And other animals the same
way. Why not humans?”

“I’ll tell you what I’ll do,” he said, beginning to eat the roasted
meat. “I’ll try to find yer friends for ye, and hand you over to ’em.”

She sprang up and came toward him, wildly excited.

“Oh, if you will--if you will!”

He smiled into her flushed face.

“That’s what I’ll do. I dunno where they aire, and them Injuns may
have struck ’em and even wiped ’em out. I don’t think they did,
though. So, we’ll begin to look fer ’em right off. But if you’re to
try that, or try to do anything, you’ll need to do some eatin’. You
can’t go on much longer if you don’t. We’re stoppin’ here to give you
a chanct to rest, and the pony needs rest, too. The pony’s fillin’ up
on grass, showin’ how sensible he is.”

She shook her head, when he held out some of the meat to her.

“But if you don’t, why, ’tain’t no use fer you to try to do anything.
If you’re to find yer friends, you’ve got to have some stren’th, so
that you can do ridin’.”

“You’ll help find my friends?”

“Why, cert’in; ain’t I said so?”

“And Bruce?”

“Yes; we’ll look fer him, too. I see you don’t understand my
position?”

“No, I don’t,” she confessed frankly.

“Well, as I said, I was friendly toward you from the first, but
couldn’t do anything because of the other boys. I had to seem rough
to ye, on account of that.”

“You were the boss--the leader?”

“No, you’re mistaken; Toby Sam was the real boss.” He held out the
meat.

“Eat it, and you’ll feel better; and when we go on you’ll be in
better shape to do the ridin’ we’ve got to do if we strike them
friends of yours, if they’re livin’.”

She took the meat, and began to eat it.

“That’s right,” said he, smiling encouragement. “Now, as I said, I
couldn’t do anything so long as t’others was with me. But sense I’m
alone I can do as I please. You’ll find I’m not sich a bad man as
you’ve prob’bly been thinkin’.”

They rested by the stream nearly an hour. At the end of that time
Black John ascended the near-by hill to take a look over the country.
He came down hurriedly, and was much excited.

“Injuns!” he said. “We’ve got to slide out of this mighty quick, er
we won’t be goin’ at all. Wish’t I had another horse fer ye, but
you’ll have to ride in front of me, same’s before.”

He helped her to mount, and she assisted herself very materially,
for, believing him, she was anxious to get out of the valley. Then
they rode away hastily, heading once more southward.

She noted the direction.

“This takes me farther and farther from my friends!” she protested.
“We’re riding southward!”

“Yes, but when Injuns aire in the trail right behind us we ain’t much
choice as to the direction we take. The thing to do is to move as
fast as we can out of the territory. We’ve got a start of ’em; yit
I’m expectin’ to hear their yells soon.”

What Black John had really seen from the top of the hill was Buffalo
Bill and his friends, coming toward the valley at a fast gallop,
following his trail.




                           CHAPTER XLIII.

                         A WHIRLWIND CHASE.


Following hard on the trail of Black John and his companions, Buffalo
Bill, Pawnee Bill, and Nick Nomad came to the point where Black
John’s men had been fooled by the Indians.

Several bodies, scalped and mutilated, told their own story.

Indian pony tracks were numerous, and all the evidences of a surprise
and a fight.

Such “signs” were easy to read by men as experienced as Buffalo Bill
and his comrades.

While examining this small battle ground, they heard a feeble shout,
and then beheld a young man ride out of a timbered gorge and come
toward them.

The man was Bruce Clayton.

His hands were still tied behind his back, and his feet were bound
together beneath the pony’s body. He was almost paralyzed from the
constriction of the cords, and the fact that he had been in that
painful position so long.

He had been unable to guide his horse, except by pressure of his
knees, when the Indian surprise and attack came, and so the animal
had chosen its own course, dashing away in wild fright.

It bore him into this gorge, and on into the midst of a growth of
brushy timber, some distance from the mouth of the gorge. There, by
voice alone, he had been able to check it.

For some reason, perhaps because they were pursuing other men, the
Indians did not follow him, and he remained there undisturbed a long
time, wondering what he ought to do, or could do. He was unable to
release himself.

By and by the horse grazed its way back to the mouth of the gorge.
Then the unhappy prisoner was able to ride forth, guiding with his
knees, and make his predicament known.

Buffalo Bill lost no time in cutting away the cords that had held
Clayton so long to the back of the pony.

The youth had to be helped from the saddle. When he began to talk,
it was seen that his mental sufferings had been as great as his
physical. He told them of the surprise by the Indians, and of what
had followed, so far as he had been able to see it. And he also told
of his own adventures and experiences.

“Lena was with that leader when I saw her last,” he said. “But I
haven’t any idea where she is now. I fear the worst.”

In spite of their desire to hasten on, the scouts remained there a
long time, a thing which gave Black John a good start.

They could not go on with Clayton until his physical condition was
improved, nor could they hope to accomplish much until they had
gained something like accurate knowledge of what had become of the
girl.

To the task of learning this last, Buffalo Bill and Pawnee bent their
utmost skill, leaving old Nomad to minister to the needs of Clayton.

The scouts had long before picked out the individual trail of the
horse ridden by Black John; but now that he had secured an Indian
pony, they were put to their wits’ ends to know what to do.

After much searching they came on a bit of evidence that was of the
utmost value. It was a piece of cloth torn by a thorny bush from
Lena’s dress. There could be no mistaking it, nor how it came to be
there.

By this thorny bush they found pony tracks, heading southward. They
studied these tracks, until they were sure they should know them when
seen anywhere; for, to the experienced eye of the plainsman, there
is as much difference between the tracks made by different ponies as
there is between the penmanship of different men.

When they had done this much, and had followed the trail some
distance, they returned to where old Nomad was caring for Bruce
Clayton.

The brief rest had done a world of good for the young man. He had
walked by the stream, and so had got the stiffness and half paralysis
out of his body and limbs. He was still “sore as a boil,” as he
expressed it, but he had had something to eat and drink; and in his
anxiety he now declared that he was himself again, and was ready to
go on, wherever the scouts went.

He was much encouraged by the report brought in by his friends, the
two scouts. He looked anxiously at the shred of cloth which they
showed, and then asked if he might have it.

“I may never see her again!” he said simply, as he put it away in his
pocket.

Bruce’s horse was also in better condition now, and was almost as
strong as the worn horses of the scout and his pards.

Buffalo Bill was anxious to push on, now that he felt sure they had
found the trail of the pony that had borne the girl away.

Whether the man who was supposed to be with her on that pony’s back
was Black John, or some one else, they, of course, did not know.

In spite of the jaded condition of the horses, the chase that
followed was really of a whirlwind character, as the previous one had
been. If their quarry were Black John, they hoped to bring him in
sight soon, and they drove their horses on without much mercy.

As has been seen, at a time when Black John began to feel safe, he
had found that these human bloodhounds were on his track and coming
up rapidly.

On gaining the valley where Black John had stopped to rest and cook
some food, the evidences of his presence there was so fresh, and the
signs of his quick flight so plain, that Buffalo Bill was sure he was
not far ahead. Moreover, as his horse was carrying double, and was
tired, as its trail showed, they began confidently to believe that
in a short time they would be able to overhaul him and force him to
surrender his fair prisoner.

“Crowd ’im, Buffler!” said Nomad, with youthful enthusiasm. “We’re
goin’ ter drive him inter a hole now mighty quick.”

The next moment he was belaboring old Nebuchadnezzar, to get greater
speed out of him.

Thus they swept along, riding hard on the trail of the fugitive.

The Indian pony took to a rocky gorge, where its hoofprints were not
easily followed; but, as it could not have left the gorge, they rode
straight on at top speed.

“Go ’long, Nebby, you ole crow bait!” said Nomad. “Hyar I’ve allus
been braggin’ on you bein’ a reg’lar bird with wings, when it come
ter runnin’, and now you’re hurtin’ my feelin’s by turnin’ inter a
snail. Go ’long!”

They came in sight of the pony they were pursuing, at a bend in the
gorge, and they almost reeled in their saddles when they saw it, so
great was their astonishment.

The pony was riderless!

“Waugh!” Nomad roared, drawing rein and staring stupidly. “Whar’s
ther man and ther gal?”

No one could answer his question.




                            CHAPTER XLIV.

                          LAWLESS STRATEGY.


Black John was no fool. In fact, he was both shrewd and clever, and
possessed a foxlike instinct that stood him in good stead now.

When he discovered that Buffalo Bill and three other men were near
and coming on rapidly, he rode swiftly out of the valley, with
the girl before him, telling her that he had sighted Indians. His
frightened manner and frantic haste made her believe he told the
truth.

She had no desire to fall again into the hands of Indians. Her
experience with Lightfoot was vivid in her memory, causing her to
shudder at the recollection. Much as she detested her captor, to be
Lightfoot’s prisoner again would be worse; and now that Black John
was promising to convey her to her friends without delay, she was
beginning to believe in his sincerity. She did not, therefore, make
objection when he bore her away in front of him on the pony.

He turned into the gorge after a sharp run. His manner in doing it
would have shown her that the country there was familiar to him, if
she had been experienced in judging of such things.

When he had ridden at top speed some distance into the gorge, over
rocky ground which left no hoofprints, he drew rein and leaped down.

“We can baffle ’em, I think,” he said, lifting her from the horse,
“if we move lively now. Redskins aire purty hard ter fool, but I
think I can fool these red gentlemen handsome.”

He looked about a moment, then pulled a leaf of thorny cactus and
thrust it under the saddle girth.

The pain of the cactus caused the horse to rear and plunge. “Go on
with ye now!” he said. “Git!” He gave it a heavy slap, which started
it along the trail. The pricking of the cactus caused it to continue
on at a headlong gallop.

“Quick, now!” he said, taking the girl by the hand.

She yielded her hand willingly. She was trembling, frightened, and
almost breathless, and her limbs were quaking under her, so that she
could hardly stand.

“I’ll help ye!” he said encouragingly, pulling her along, up the
rocky slope.

When she stumbled, as she did, now and then, his hand sustained her
from falling; and when places were reached which she was too weak to
surmount he lifted her in his arms.

Ordinarily she would not have submitted in this way without taking
pains to verify his statements; but she had suffered so much
physically and mentally that she had lost the faculty of clear
judgment. Fear ruled her now more than anything else.

The iron frame of Black John seemed impervious to fatigue. He scaled
the rocky slope as sure-footed as a mountain goat. At times he almost
ran, even though he carried the girl and the rocks were formidable.

Before Buffalo Bill and his party reached the pony and discovered
that it had been abandoned. Black John was over the high ridge out
of sight, and descending rapidly toward a valley of which he knew.
In his work as a mustanger, and also long before, he had been all
through that region; so that he knew every hole and corner of it. He
headed now toward a deep gorge, which he followed up some distance,
and which led him by and by into a cozy nest, between green hills.
Here there was a small cave, in which more than once he had spent a
night, and below this cave, and not distant, was a spring of water.

“If we had somethin’ to eat,” he said, when they had gained this
hiding place, “we could lay by here a week, until them redskins git
tired and clear out of the country. I don’t think they’ll find us
here. The way we come was so rocky that a bloodhound couldn’t hit the
trail and stick to it.”

He laughed with cool assurance.

As for the girl, she sank down in the cave, tired out and again
hopeless.

If they should be cooped up there by Indians any length of time, she
fancied that the chance of meeting or finding Buffalo Bill and his
companions would be small. And as for Bruce--she shivered when she
thought of his possible fate, for she could not rid herself of the
fear that he had fallen into the hands of the Indians.

During the night which followed, Black John lay with his rifle out
beyond the mouth of the cave, watching for the coming of his enemies,
not daring to sleep.

He believed he was safe, but he was not sure of it. Buffalo Bill was
a hard man to shake off, when once he set out to run any one down.

During that wakeful night Black John amused and occupied himself
by planning his future with the girl whom he now believed he could
deceive. He fancied he had gained her confidence, and that she was
beginning to like him, and that promised well. He thought, too, that
the girl was soundly sleeping throughout the night; but in this he
was mistaken, for she slept very little. At the first faint light of
day she had crept to the cave entrance and looked out.

She saw Black John lying on the ground by a rock, not far off. That
he was not asleep she observed by his occasional movement; so she
slipped out to where he was, intending to ask him some questions.
Before she reached him she stopped, stupefied with astonishment.

Black John had taken the buckskin bag from his inner pocket, poured
the emeralds on the ground, and was looking them over, hefting and
scanning them, and estimating their worth.

The cry of the girl aroused him.

She had crept forward until she was right at his elbow, and now she
jumped at the gems, and tried to heap them together in her hands. Her
voice and manner were hysterical.

“You scoundrel!” she gasped. “You lied to me! You said----”

He clutched her and pushed her back with an oath, and many of the
emeralds fell to the ground.

Her act, and the fact that his duplicity had been discovered, enraged
him. He threw her to the ground, and, drawing his revolver, seemed
on the point of shooting her; but he thought better of it, and began
to pick up the fallen emeralds. She still clutched and held a few of
them.

“Gimme them!” he commanded angrily.

“You lied to me!” she said.

“What if I did? Gimme them emeralds!”

“Where did you get them?”

“That’s none of your affair; give ’em to me.”

“I won’t. They’re mine, and not yours.”

“Then I’ll take ’em!” he cried, with another oath.

He sprang upon her, threw her down, and by sheer strength and brutal
roughness took the gems from her. Then he stood off regarding her.
Dropping the gems into the bag, he closed it, and thrust it into his
pocket.

“See here!” he said, in a harsh tone, “I’m taking care of you, and I
expect to pay myself by keepin’ these, and by keepin’ you!”

“What do you mean?” she gasped.

“I dunno as I could make the words plainer. I intend to keep these,
and to keep you.” He picked up his revolver. “So you might as well
understand it fust as last. There ain’t goin’ to be any cry-baby
bizness allowed here. I saved you from them Injuns, and----”

“I believe you lied to me in that, too!”

“Well, I didn’t! If I hadn’t hustled with you, and got away from ’em,
your purty scalp would be soon dryin’ in some Injun lodge; and that
wouldn’t be pleasant for you. Now see here!”

He stood before her, large, uncouth, malevolent; a very brute of a
man, whose sheer brutal strength was enough to overawe and reduce to
subjection even a reasonably strong man.

“Now see here! I ain’t goin’ to fool with you! You’re goin’ to do the
things I say. I’ve got these emeralds, and I’ve got you. Jes’ as soon
as it’s safe, I’m goin’ to make fer the Mexican line. Once across it,
I know plenty good hidin’ places. I’ll treat you well, if you’ll let
me; if you don’t let me treat ye well, that’s your own fault, not
mine. You’re goin’ to live with me from this on as my wife.”

She uttered a scream, and drew back.

He laughed; he knew she could not get away.

“Hurts yer feelin’s, does it? Well, it needn’t. I’ve seen
worse-lookin’ men than I am.”

“But never such a villain!”

“Yes; even worse villains. I ain’t sich a bad lot. I’ve taken a
likin’ to you. You’re good lookin’, and, of course, you know it.
We’ll go together into Mexico, where we’ll hide till it’s safe to git
out somewheres else. You’ll live with me as my wife, freely if you
will, but you’ll live with me jes’ the same. And I’ll treat you well.
These emeralds will be as much yourn as mine--that is, the things
they buy will. And they’ll make us independent. I’ve done some things
that will make me want to hide away from the law for a while. By
the time we can go forth and look the world in the eye--the Mexican
world, mind ye!--you’ll not be keerin’ much whether you’re married
to me or not; for by that time you’ll think I’m a purty good sort of
a feller. I know women. What they need is a good whalin’, whenever
they think they know it all and want to be boss of the ranch. The
Injuns have the right of it. Whale a squaw and she’s obedient. And I
reckon it’s the same with a white woman.”

“Never!” she cried, starting up. “Before I would be your wife--the
wife of such a scoundrel--I’d kill myself!”

“Ho, ho!” he said, with a roar of laughter. “A tantrum like that is
what I guess I’ll like to see occasionally; it makes you purtier than
any picture.”




                            CHAPTER XLV.

                         A SNEAKING COWARD.


The terror and horror of that day with Black John at the cave was
enough to bring a shudder to Lena. He was truculent and brutal.
Having no longer necessity to make him pretend to be what he was not,
he did not hesitate to frighten her, apparently for the mere pleasure
it gave him.

One thing, however, held him somewhat in check; and that was her
screams, when he became too violent and too brutal. Unless he tied
and gagged her, the only way to keep her from screaming in terror
when he spoke too roughly to her was to keep away from her, and
permit her to have her own way. She could not escape, for he was out
in front of the cave, was armed, and possessed such strength that she
was helpless before him.

Black John’s desire for quiet in and about the cave was caused by his
fear of Buffalo Bill and his pards.

Though he still maintained to the girl the fiction that he had fled
with her from Indians, and was hiding from Indians, a thing on which
she was now skeptical, he did not believe Indians were near, in spite
of the surprising attack they had made.

His fears of Buffalo Bill mounted high. Hence, throughout nearly the
whole of that long and wearing day he lay out on the slope before the
cave, watching the surrounding hills, and the little pass from the
gorge, by which he had reached this point.

He lay almost motionless, too, knowing that to move about was to risk
being seen; while, when he remained still, his clothing blended in
with the dark rock and protected him.

Nevertheless, he was seen, as night came on, not by Buffalo Bill and
his friends, but by that sneaking coward, Toby Sam. Toby Sam knew of
this cave, and had been in it more than once with Black John; and he,
too, had fled toward it for safety after that Indian attack.

Toby Sam’s caution made him mount to an eminence and carefully
inspect the surroundings of the cave before venturing near it.

Knowing just where to look, his keen eyes saw Black John sprawled at
full length on the slope, and the little glint of sunshine which fell
on Black John’s revolver.

“Ho, ho!” he said. “Wonder who else is there? I’ll jes’ see.”

Toby Sam was afoot, having abandoned his horse after he had ridden it
nearly to death. He drew back, so that Black John could not see him,
and then carefully picked his course in roundabout fashion to the
cave.

The sun had set by that time. Still Toby Sam, being a cautious
rascal, did not make his presence known. He was by nature a sneak,
as well as a coward, and he sneaked now upon the man in front of the
cave.

When not far off and on the point of making his presence known to
Black John, who seemed to be alone, he heard Black John speak to the
girl.

It made Toby Sam’s cowardly heart jump with a queer thrill, when he
knew that Black John was speaking of the emeralds.

The girl had said something of an accusing nature, apparently, and
Black John replied:

“Shet up about the emeralds! They’re mine, and I propose to git a lot
of money out of ’em; and on that money we’ll live high.”

Toby Sam flattened himself against the rocks like a lizard when
he heard that, for he knew that Black John had the emeralds,
and he desired to get them. He remained there without movement
until darkness had set in fully; then, with infinite patience and
tortoiselike slowness, he made an advance.

Black John went into the cave and came out again. He was swearing,
and was in an ugly mood. Being hungry had made him ill-tempered.

“A cuss on the emeralds,” he said, “I’d trade the very biggest of ’em
fer a mouthful o’ somethin’ to eat! I dunno but I’d better try to
git out o’ this to-night, fer to stay here long will be to starve to
death.”

The moon came from behind a cloud while Black John sat in front of
the cave; and then Toby Sam saw that he had the precious bag of
emeralds out, and was toying with the gems, all of which he had
picked up again.

For a long time Black John sat there, sometimes muttering, sometimes
as silent as the rocks. Finally he lay down, with revolver in his
hand, again to watch, as he had done the previous night.

For another hour Toby Sam remained as still as if he had frozen into
position.

Black John’s wakefulness of the night before, and his lack of rest
for so many hours, had told on him at last; and Toby Sam heard him
snore.

The time for action had come.

With his cowardly heart knocking against his ribs, Toby Sam began a
stealthy movement toward the sleeping man. Only his wild anxiety to
possess those emeralds could thus have urged him on.

A mouse advancing could not have made less noise.

Within five minutes the deed was done; Toby Sam had felt over the
body of the sleeping man, and had possessed himself of the buckskin
bag that had bulged the inner pocket of Black John’s coat.

Black John awoke, with a snort, before Toby Sam had gone ten yards in
his sly retreat. Perhaps some dim recognition of what had happened
had come to disturb him. He rolled over, stretched out his arms,
breathed heavily, and then sat up.

Toby Sam had become as silent as the very ground on which he lay, and
his body seemed no more than a portion of it.

Black John did not at once discover the loss of the buckskin bag;
but, being uneasy, he rose and walked away from the cave, swinging
his revolver, and peering out along the slopes where the cloud-dimmed
moonlight lay.

Toby Sam took advantage of this to worm along several yards farther;
but again he lay still when Black John returned to the mouth of the
cave. Then Black John discovered that the bag of emeralds was gone.

It was so unbelievable a thing that at first he felt in his other
pockets, thinking he must have misplaced it. Then a great but subdued
oath ripped from his lips. He ran to the mouth of the cave, and
peered in.

Worn out, the girl was asleep, close by the entrance.

Black John stooped down, plucked her by the hair, and, with a jerk
that awoke her and brought from her a scream of pain and fright, he
pulled her to her feet.

Toby Sam was sliding away with eellike silence and speed.

“Hand over them emeralds!” Black John demanded of the terrified girl,
as he pulled her out of the cave, ignoring, in his rage, the danger
which would come from the screams that she uttered. He threw her down
on the ground and kicked her.

“Hand over them emeralds!” he cried, standing above her. “Hand ’em
over!”

She screamed again, and put up her hands.

“You thought you’d play a cute trick on me, eh? Thought you’d sneak
’em out o’ my pocket, and then maybe, hide ’em, and pretend to be
asleep when I looked in on ye? Hand ’em over!”

“I haven’t got them; I don’t know----”

“Oh, ye don’t!” he drew his revolver. “This’ll help you to recklect!
Hand ’em over!”

Toby Sam dislodged a stone in his sinuous flight, and it went rolling
down the hillside. Hearing it, Black John turned around with a jump
of surprise, and stared in the direction of the sound.

Suddenly he felt that perhaps he had not been robbed by the girl, but
that some one else was the thief.

With revolver in hand he began to move in the direction of that
sound, peering on before him.

But Toby Sam was still as crafty as ever. He had wormed into a black
hole, and there he lay, doubled up like an opossum shamming death,
and with no more sound.

Black John came within a yard of him, and did not see him.

“I wonder what made that noise?” he muttered. “Somethin’ started a
stone. Mebbe a cussed coyote.”

He peered long, on the slope of the hill, returning finally to the
cave, when he could discover nothing.

The girl had tried to slip away during his absence, but had become
bewildered, and found herself in a “pocket” of the rocky wall, with
her way now barred by her captor.

“Come out o’ there!” he snarled. “What you doin’ there?”

She came out, trembling.

“Now I ask ye ag’in fer them emeralds!”

“And I tell you I haven’t them!” she screamed at him. “_I haven’t
them_, do you hear, you hateful beast?”




                            CHAPTER XLVI.

                      THE CAPTURE OF THE THIEF.


As Toby Sam stole on, congratulating himself on his clever theft, he
tripped suddenly over what seemed to be a grapevine in the path.

The supposed grapevine was a lariat, as he knew when a man sprang
on him, caught him by the throat, jammed his head back against the
ground, and commanded him to keep silent on pain of having his throat
cut. The fingers of the man were like iron in their hold, and the
command was made in a hoarse whisper.

The place was a mile or less from the cave, and the capture was made
at a time when Toby Sam felt absolutely sure of getting away with the
emeralds.

The cowardly rascal coughed and gurgled, and then lay back, quiet,
staring-eyed, and weak from fear. Then he saw that this man had
comrades, two of them, at least, who came up one on each side, and
they looked at the prisoner.

“Got him, eh?” There was a chuckle. “Waugh! He’s thet pesky sneak,
Toby Sam!”

It was Nick Nomad who spoke. Toby Sam recognized that, and knew he
had fallen into the hands of Buffalo Bill’s party, which was as bad
as, or worse, than falling into the hands of Black John.

“Speak above a whisper, and you’re a dead man!”

The fingers relaxed as the threat was made; and Toby Sam, clutching
his aching throat, stared again at the men who had captured him.

“Search him, Gordon!”

Pawnee Bill “went through” the pockets of Toby Sam. “Ah!” he said, in
a tone of surprise. “What’s this?” He had found the bag of emeralds.

Buffalo Bill’s last remaining wax match illuminated the contents of
the bag, showing the nature of the find.

Then they began to question Toby Sam.

He tried to lie, at first; but the cold muzzle of Buffalo Bill’s
revolver, thrust into his face, convinced him of the wisdom of
telling the truth. Then he admitted the theft of the emeralds from
Black John, and told where Black John was hiding with his prisoner.

“Hear that, Bruce?” said Buffalo Bill.

Another man--a young man--had crept forward, and was listening. He
was shaking with excitement.

“You must lead us to the place,” he said. “Is she well, and unharmed?”

“I--I think she is; she was in there, and he was talkin’ with her,
and was cussin’ her, when I came away.”

“Tell us just where this little cave is,” Buffalo Bill commanded.

Toby Sam told as well as he could.

“You’ll show us the way now. Bruce, hand me those cords! We’ll tie
his hands, and if he starts to run we’ll shoot him.”

“I--I won’t run!” Toby Sam promised, his teeth chattering.

His hands were tied by Buffalo Bill and Clayton.

“Now lead on,” said Buffalo Bill; “and, remember, if you make any
noise, or try to warn Black John, we’ll shoot you.”

Notwithstanding that they had captured Toby Sam and had him for a
guide, Buffalo Bill and his pards did not go far.

The way was stony and rough, and they feared they could not get near
the cave without attracting Black John’s attention. Because of the
darkness Black John’s chances of getting out of the cave and away
were considerable, if he became alarmed and tried to escape. While,
if he fancied himself undiscovered and still safe, he would remain in
the cave, and could be captured in the morning.

They discussed this phase of the matter, and lay down with their
prisoner on the slope of the hill, when still some distance from the
cave.

Before that they had heard a scream from the girl, which had rendered
Clayton so frantic that Buffalo Bill’s utmost persuasions were needed
to keep him from making a blind rush through the darkness. Had he
done so he would have been shot, of course, by Black John, and
perhaps the efforts of his friends would have been balked.

The hours that followed held nothing but mental torture for him. Nor
were the scouts and his pards much less concerned for the security of
the girl. They divined the situation: that the loss of the emeralds
had been discovered, and that Black John was, as a consequence, in an
unamiable and dangerous mood.

Black John, supposed to be keeping watch by the cave, was as silent
as the men lying farther down on the bowldered slope. If he moved,
or spoke, they had no knowledge of it; and the girl made no sound,
after that scream which had reached them.

Bruce Clayton tormented himself with fears that she was dead--had
been killed by Black John; or that Black John was even then out of
the cave, and far on his way to some other point, and that Cody and
his companions were guarding what was no better than an empty bird’s
nest.

The morning came, after what seemed an interminable night; but the
faint light of the early morning did not reveal Black John; and
Bruce’s feverish fears intensified. But Buffalo Bill was not ready
yet to make a move.

Only by combined luck and good work had he and his pards been able
to follow Black John’s trail to the point where they had captured
Toby Sam; and, after all that work, the scout was not willing to
jeopardize anything by a premature movement.

Then something was seen to move on the slope.

It was Black John, rising from another night of watching.

Still Buffalo Bill and his pards maintained silence, waiting for the
light to get better.

It was seen that Black John contemplated flight. He brought the girl
out of the cave, tottering as she was with weakness; and they heard
his harsh words to her.

“Let me shoot him, the scoundrel!” begged Clayton. “I can’t stand it
any longer.”

Instead, Buffalo Bill lifted his voice. “Hello, there!” he called.

Black John wheeled as if on a pivot. He looked about, and saw no one.

“We’ve got you covered with our revolvers,” were the next words he
heard. “If you don’t throw up your hands and surrender, down you go.”

Black John did not surrender; he gave a jump for the cave, pulling
the girl backward by the hair, so that she fell in the very entrance,
and was pulled in by him, out of sight.




                           CHAPTER XLVII.

                          AT BAY--AT PEACE.


Silence reigned after that until Buffalo Bill spoke again, announcing
to Black John that he was cornered, and demanding his surrender.

“Come and git me!” yelled the desperate man. “But recklect when you
do I’ll shoot the girl.”

“We want to have a talk with you,” said Buffalo Bill. “We’ve got a
proposition to make to you. Surrender the girl unharmed, and we’ll
spare your life.”

When there was no answer to this, they began to crawl up the slope,
taking Toby Sam with them.

“We’ve got a friend of yours here,” called Buffalo Bill. “We’ll
release him, and let him come in and tell you the conditions here, so
that you’ll know how foolish it is for you to try to hold out against
us.”

“No--no!” Toby Sam gurgled; “he’ll shoot me! He’ll think I’ve turned
ag’inst him; he’ll think I took the emeralds; he’ll think----”

He twisted out of the way of Buffalo Bill, whose intention of sending
him to the cave he feared, and leaping up, he tried to run.

It was a foolish and fatal movement.

Black John’s revolver cracked, and Toby Sam fell with its bullet in
his head, being dead as he struck the ground.

Now at bay, Black John was desperate and murderous. He had thought
the man he shot at was one of Buffalo Bill’s force.

Silence followed the fall of Toby Sam’s body, and it lay on the
rocks, the face, ghastly in death, turned skyward.

There was a movement in the cave; the next moment Lena Forest
appeared.

Her hands and feet were bound, but she stood erect, while behind her,
using her as a shield, Black John crouched, like a desperate villain
and craven.

“Remember that I’m keepin’ her in front of me here in the mouth of
this cave,” he shouted, “and if you shoot at me the chances aire
you’ll hit her. Recklect it!”

Buffalo Bill’s revolver was leveled, seemingly on the girl. The next
moment its report rang out, and the body of the man behind the girl
slipped downward, and then fell, sprawling out in the cavern entrance.

It was a shot such as only Buffalo Bill or Pawnee Bill could have
made.

In shouting his words, Black John had peered, with one eye, over the
shoulder of the girl, trying to see the men who were hemming him in.
That eye and the forehead by it was a mark big enough for Buffalo
Bill. He sent his revolver bullet into the head of Black John with as
deadly an effect as Black John, but a minute or so before, had sent
one into the head of Toby Sam.

       *       *       *       *       *

Buffalo Bill and his friends remained there by the cave for almost
a week, to give Lena Forest time to regain her strength, for her
physical weakness was extreme. They shot game on the mountains and
in the valleys, and lived well.

Black John and the coward, Toby Sam, were buried at the foot of the
hill, in graves unmarked by a single stone. As for the other outlaws,
who had scattered and fled, what became of them was not known, but
the band of “mustangers,” who had made their headquarters recently in
the valley of the Bitter Water, went suddenly out of business.

When Lena had fully recovered from her exhaustion they all returned
to the fort. The day after their arrival there, Buffalo Bill resumed
his scouting expedition in the Blackfoot country. Bruce enlisted in
the regiment stationed at the fort. Later he and Lena journeyed to
the East, taking the emeralds; and there they were married and made
their home.


                              THE END.

  No. 84 of the BORDER STORIES, entitled “Buffalo Bill’s Hidden
  Gold,” is a thrilling story in which Indians, outlaws, and
  adventurers all play a big part in hunting for the treasure,
  Buffalo Bill, as usual, leading all the rest in daring and bravery.




                        WESTERN STORIES ABOUT

                            BUFFALO BILL

                        Price, Fifteen Cents

                Red-blooded Adventure Stories for Men


  There is no more romantic character in American history than
  William F. Cody, or as he was internationally known, Buffalo Bill.
  He, with Colonel Prentiss Ingraham, Wild Bill Hickok, General
  Custer, and a few other adventurous spirits, laid the foundation of
  our great West.

  There is no more brilliant page in American history than the
  winning of the West. Never did pioneers live more thrilling
  lives, so rife with adventure and brave deeds as the old scouts
  and plainsmen. Foremost among these stands the imposing figure of
  Buffalo Bill.

  All of the books in this list are intensely interesting. They were
  written by the close friend and companion of Buffalo Bill--Colonel
  Prentiss Ingraham. They depict actual adventures which this pair
  of hard-hitting comrades experienced, while the story of these
  adventures is interwoven with fiction; historically the books are
  correct.


                    _ALL TITLES ALWAYS IN PRINT_

   1--Buffalo Bill, the Border King          By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
   2--Buffalo Bill’s Raid                    By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
   3--Buffalo Bill’s Bravery                 By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
   4--Buffalo Bill’s Trump Card              By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
   5--Buffalo Bill’s Pledge                  By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
   6--Buffalo Bill’s Vengeance               By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
   7--Buffalo Bill’s Iron Grip               By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
   8--Buffalo Bill’s Capture                 By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
   9--Buffalo Bill’s Danger Line             By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  10--Buffalo Bill’s Comrades                By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  11--Buffalo Bill’s Reckoning               By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  12--Buffalo Bill’s Warning                 By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  13--Buffalo Bill at Bay                    By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  14--Buffalo Bill’s Buckskin Pards          By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  15--Buffalo Bill’s Brand                   By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  16--Buffalo Bill’s Honor                   By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  17--Buffalo Bill’s Phantom Hunt            By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  18--Buffalo Bill’s Fight With Fire         By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  19--Buffalo Bill’s Danite Trail            By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  20--Buffalo Bill’s Ranch Riders            By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  21--Buffalo Bill’s Death Trail             By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  22--Buffalo Bill’s Trackers                By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  23--Buffalo Bill’s Mid-air Flight          By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  24--Buffalo Bill, Ambassador               By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  25--Buffalo Bill’s Air Voyage              By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  26--Buffalo Bill’s Secret Mission          By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  27--Buffalo Bill’s Long Trail              By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  28--Buffalo Bill Against Odds              By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  29--Buffalo Bill’s Hot Chase               By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  30--Buffalo Bill’s Redskin Ally            By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  31--Buffalo Bill’s Treasure Trove          By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  32--Buffalo Bill’s Hidden Foes             By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  33--Buffalo Bill’s Crack Shot              By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  34--Buffalo Bill’s Close Call              By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  35--Buffalo Bill’s Double Surprise         By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  36--Buffalo Bill’s Ambush                  By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  37--Buffalo Bill’s Outlaw Hunt             By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  38--Buffalo Bill’s Border Duel             By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  39--Buffalo Bill’s Bid for Fame            By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  40--Buffalo Bill’s Triumph                 By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  41--Buffalo Bill’s Spy Trailer             By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  42--Buffalo Bill’s Death Call              By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  43--Buffalo Bill’s Body Guard              By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  44--Buffalo Bill’s Still Hunt              By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  45--Buffalo Bill and the Doomed Dozen      By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  46--Buffalo Bill’s Prairie Scout           By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  47--Buffalo Bill’s Traitor Guide           By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  48--Buffalo Bill’s Bonanza                 By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  49--Buffalo Bill’s Swoop                   By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  50--Buffalo Bill and the Gold King         By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  51--Buffalo Bill, Deadshot                 By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  52--Buffalo Bill’s Buckskin Bravos         By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  53--Buffalo Bill’s Big Four                By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  54--Buffalo Bill’s One-armed Pard          By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  55--Buffalo Bill’s Race for Life           By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  56--Buffalo Bill’s Return                  By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  57--Buffalo Bill’s Conquest                By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  58--Buffalo Bill to the Rescue             By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  59--Buffalo Bill’s Beautiful Foe           By Col. Prentiss Ingraham
  60--Buffalo Bill’s Perilous Task           By Col. Prentiss Ingraham




                         _Adventure Stories_
                         _Detective Stories_
                         _Western Stories_
                         _Love Stories_
                         _Sea Stories_


  All classes of fiction are to be found among the Street &
  Smith novels. Our line contains reading matter for every one,
  irrespective of age or preference.

  The person who has only a moderate sum to spend on reading matter
  will find this line a veritable gold mine.


                     STREET & SMITH CORPORATION,
                         79 Seventh Avenue,
                           New York, N. Y.




                         Transcriber’s Notes

  The Table of Contents at the beginning of the book was created by
  the transcriber.

  Inconsistencies in hyphenation such as “raw-boned”/“rawboned” have
  been maintained.

  Minor punctuation and spelling errors have been silently corrected
  and, except for those changes noted below, all misspellings in the
  text, especially in dialogue, and inconsistent or archaic usage,
  have been retained.

  Page 2: “A Congress of the Rough-riders of the World” changed to “A
  Congress of the Rough Riders of the World”.

  Page 111: “and wrapped them round the roofs” changed to “and
  wrapped them round the hoofs”.

  Page 119: “He was a magnificent speciment” changed to “He was a
  magnificent specimen”.

  Page 217: “He could see the white water rearing” changed to “He
  could see the white water roaring”.

  Page 291: “Now, as I said, I coudn’t” changed to “Now, as I said, I
  couldn’t”.