When the Apache tornado burst out of the cañon upon the train, Thurstane's
first thought was, "Clara!"
"Get off!" he shouted to her, seizing and holding her startled horse.
"Into the wagon, quick! Now lie down, both of you."
He thundered all this out as sternly as if he were commanding troops.
Because he was a man, Clara obeyed him; and notwithstanding he was a man,
Mrs. Stanley obeyed him. Both were so bewildered with surprise and terror
as to be in a kind of animal condition of spirit, knowing just enough to
submit at once to the impulse of an imperious voice. The riderless horse,
equally frightened and equally subordinate, was hurried to the rear of the
leading wagon and handed over to a muleteer.
By the time this work was done the foremost riders of the assailants were
within two hundred yards of the head of the train, letting drive their
arrows at the flying Mexican vedettes and uttering yells fit to raise the
dead, while their comrades behind, whooping also, stormed along under a
trembling and flickering of lances. The little, lean, wiry horses were
going at full speed, regardless of smooth faces of rock and beds of loose
stones. The blackguards were over a hundred in number, all lancers and
archers of the first quality.
The vedettes never pulled up until they were in rear of the hindermost
wagon, while their countrymen on the flanks and rear made for the same
poor shelter. The drivers were crouching almost under their seats, and the
muleteers were hiding behind their animals. Thus it was evident that the
entire brunt of the opening struggle would fall upon Thurstane and his
people; that, if there was to be any resistance at all, these five men
must commence it, and, for a while at least, "go it alone."
The little squad of regulars, at this moment a few yards in front of the
foremost wagon, was drawn up in line and standing steady, precisely as if
it were a company or a regiment. Sergeant Meyer was on the right, veteran
Kelly on the left, the two recruits in the centre, the pieces at a
shoulder, the bayonets fixed. As Thurstane rode up to this diminutive line
of battle, Meyer was shouting forth his sharp and decisive orders. They
were just the right orders; excited as the young officer was, he
comprehended that there was nothing to change; moreover, he had already
learned how men are disconcerted in battle by a multiplicity of
directions. So he sat quietly on his horse, revolver in hand, his
blue-black eyes staring angrily at the coming storm.
"Kelly, reserfe your fire!" yelled Meyer. "Recruits,
ready--bresent--aim--aim low--fire!"
Simultaneously with the report a horse in the leading group of charging
savages pitched headlong on his nose and rolled over, sending his rider
straight forward into a rubble of loose shales, both lying as they fell,
without movement. Half a dozen other animals either dropped on their
haunches or sheered violently to the right and left, going off in wild
plunges and caracolings. By this one casualty the head of the attacking
column was opened and its seemingly resistless impetus checked and
dissipated, almost before Meyer could shout, "Recruits, load at will,
load!"
A moment previous this fiery cavalry had looked irresistible. It seemed to
have in it momentum, audacity, and dash enough to break a square of
infantry or carry a battery of artillery. The horses fairly flew; the
riders had the air of centaurs, so firm and graceful was their seat; the
long lances were brandished as easily as if by the hands of footmen; the
bows were managed and the arrows sent with dazzling dexterity. It was a
show of brilliant equestrianism, surpassing the feats of circus riders.
But a single effective shot into the centre of the column had cleft it as
a rock divides a torrent. It was like the breaking of a water-spout.
The attack, however, had only commenced. The Indians who had swept off to
right and left went scouring along the now motionless train, at a distance
of sixty or eighty yards, rapidly enveloping it with their wild caperings,
keeping in constant motion so as to evade gunshots, threatening with their
lances or discharging arrows, and yelling incessantly. Their main object
so far was undoubtedly to frighten the mules into a stampede and thus
separate the wagons. They were not assaulting; they were watching for
chances.
"Keep your men together, Sergeant," said Thurstane. "I must get those
Mexicans to work."
He trotted deliberately to the other end of the train, ordering each
driver as he passed to move up abreast of the leading wagon, directing the
first to the right, the second to the left, and so on. The result of this
movement would of course be to bring the train into a compact mass and
render it more defensible. The Indians no sooner perceived the advance
than they divined its object and made an effort to prevent it. Thurstane
had scarcely reached the centre of the line of vehicles when a score or so
of yelling horsemen made a caracoling, prancing charge upon him,
accompanying it with a flight of arrows. Our young hero presented his
revolver, but they apparently knew the short range of the weapon, and came
plunging, curveting onward. Matters were growing serious, for an arrow
already stuck in his saddle, and another had passed through his hat.
Suddenly there was a bang, bang of firearms, and two of the savages went
down.
Meyer had observed the danger of his officer, and had ordered Kelly to
fire, blazing away too himself. There was a headlong, hasty scramble to
carry off the fallen warriors, and then the assailants swept back to a
point beyond accurate musket shot. Thurstane reached the rear of the train
unhurt, and found the six Mexican cattle-drivers there in a group,
pointing their rifles at such Indians as made a show of charging, but
otherwise doing nothing which resembled fighting. They were obviously
panic-stricken, one or two of them being of an ashy-yellow, their nearest
possible approach to pallor. There, too, was Coronado, looking not exactly
scared, but irresolute and helpless.
"What does this mean?" Thurstane stormed in Spanish. "Why don't you shoot
the devils?"
"We are reserving our fire," stammered Coronado, half alarmed, half
ashamed.
Thurstane swore briefly, energetically, and to the point. "Damned pretty
fighting!" he went on. "If _we_ had reserved our fire, we should all have
been lanced by this time. Let drive!"
The cattle-drivers carried short rifles, of the then United States
regulation pattern, which old Garcia had somehow contrived to pick up
during the war perhaps buying them of drunken soldiers. Supported by
Thurstane's pugnacious presence and hurried up by his vehement orders,
they began to fire. They were shaky; didn't aim very well; hardly aimed at
all, in fact; blazed away at extraordinary elevations; behaved as men do
who have become demoralized. However, as the pieces had a range of several
hundred yards, the small bullets hissed venomously over the heads of the
Indians, and one of them, by pure accident, brought down a horse. There
was an immediate scattering, a multitudinous glinting of hoofs through the
light dust of the plain, and then a rally in prancing groups, at a safe
distance.
"Hurrah!" shouted Thurstane, cheering the Mexicans. "That's very well. You
see how easy it is. Now don't let them sneak up again; and at the same
time don't waste powder."
Then turning to one who was near him, and who had just reloaded, he said
in a calm, strong, encouraging tone--that voice of the thoroughly good
officer which comes to the help of the shaken soldier like a
reinforcement--"Now, my lad, steadily. Pick out your man; take your time
and aim sure. Do you see him?"
"Si, señor," replied the herdsman. His coolness restored by this steady
utterance and these plain, common-sense directions, he selected a warrior
in helmet-shaped cap, blue shirt, and long boots, brought his rifle slowly
to a level, took sight, and fired. The Indian bent forward, caught the
mane of his plunging pony, hung there for a second or two, and then rolled
to the ground, amid a yell of surprise and dismay from his comrades. There
was a hasty rush to secure the body, and then another sweep backward of
the loose array.
"Good!" called Thurstane, nodding and smiling at the successful marksman.
"That is the way to do it. You are a match for half a dozen of them as
long as you will keep cool."
The besieged travellers could now look about quietly and see how matters
stood with them. The six wagons were by this time drawn up in two ranks of
three each, so as to form a compact mass. As the one which contained the
ladies had been the leader and the others had formed on it to right and
left, it was in the centre of the first rank, and consequently pretty well
protected by its neighbors. The drivers and muleteers had recovered their
self-possession, and were all sitting or standing at their posts, with
their miscellaneous arms ready for action. Not a human being had been hit
as yet, and only three of the mules wounded, none of them seriously. The
Apaches were all around the train, but none of them nearer than two
hundred yards, and doing nothing but canter about and shout to each other.
"Where is Texas Smith?" demanded Thurstane, missing that mighty hunter,
and wondering if he were a coward and had taken refuge in a wagon.
"He went off shutin' an hour ago," explained Phineas Glover. "Reckon he's
astern somewhere."
Glover, by the way, had been useful. In the beginning of the affray he had
brought his mule alongside of the headmost wagon, and there he had done
really valuable service by blazing away alarmingly, though quite
innocuously, at the gallopading enemy.
"It's a bad lookout for Texas," observed the Lieutenant "I shouldn't want
to bet high on his getting back to us."
Coronado looked gloomy, fearing lest his trusted assassin was lost, and
not knowing where he could pick up such another.
"And how are the ladies?" asked Thurstane, turning to Glover.
"Safe 's a bug in a rug," was the reply. "Seen to that little job myself.
Not a bugger in the hull crew been nigh 'em."
Thurstane cantered around to the front of the wagon which contained the
two women, and called, "How are you?"
At the sound of his voice there was a rustle inside, and Clara showed her
face over the shoulder of the driver.
"So you were not hurt?" laughed the young officer. "Ah! that's bully."
With a smile which was almost a boast, she answered, "And I was not very
frightened."
At this, Aunt Maria struggled from between two rolls of bedding into a
sitting posture and ejaculated, "Of course not!"
"Did they hit you?" asked Clara, looking eagerly at Thurstane.
"How brave you are!" he replied, admiring her so much that he did not
notice her question.
"But I do hope it is over," added the girl, poking her head out of the
wagon. "Ah! what is that?"
With this little cry of dismay she pointed at a group of savages who had
gathered between the train and the mouth of the cañon ahead of it.
"They are the enemy," said Thurstane. "We may have another little tussle
with them. Now lie down and keep close."
"Acquit yourselves like--men!" exhorted Aunt Maria, dropping back into her
stronghold among the bedding.
Sergeant Meyer now approached Thurstane, touched his cap, and said,
"Leftenant, here is brifate Sweeny who has not fired his beece once. I
cannot make him fire."
"How is that, Sweeny?" demanded the officer, putting on the proper
grimness. "Why haven't you fired when you were ordered?"
Sweeny was a little wizened shaving of an Irishman. He was not only quite
short, but very slender and very lean. He had a curious teetering gait,
and he took ridiculously short steps in marching, as if he were a monkey
who had not learned to feel at ease on his hind legs. His small, wilted,
wrinkled face, and his expression of mingled simplicity and shrewdness,
were also monkey-like. At Thurstane's reprimand he trotted close up to him
with exactly the air of a circus Jocko who expects a whipping, but who
hopes to escape it by grinning.
"Why haven't you fired?" repeated his commander.
"Liftinint, I dasn't," answered Sweeny, in the rapid, jerking, almost
inarticulate jabber which was his usual speech.
Now it is not an uncommon thing for recruits to dread to discharge their
arms in battle. They have a vague idea that, if they bang away, they will
attract the notice of some antagonist who will immediately single them out
for retaliation.
"Are you afraid anybody will hit you?" asked Thurstane.
"No, I ain't, Liftinint," jabbered Sweeny. "I ain't afeard av them niggers
a bit. They may shoot their bow arrays at me all day if they want to. I'm
afeard of me gun, Liftinint. I fired it wonst, an' it kicked me to
blazes."
"Come, come! That won't do. Level it now. Pick out your man. Aim. Fire."
Thus constrained, Sweeny brought his piece down to an inclination of
forty-five degrees, shut his eyes, pulled trigger, and sent a ball clean
over the most distant Apaches. The recoil staggered him, but he recovered
himself without going over, and instantly roared out a horse-laugh.
"Ho! ho! ho!" he shouted. "That time I reckon I fetched won av 'em."
"Sweeny," said Thurstane, "you must have hit either the sun or the moon, I
don't know which."
Sweeny looked discomfited; the next breath he bethought himself of a
saving joke: "Liftinint, it 'ud sarve erry won av 'em right;" then another
neigh of laughter.
"I ain't afeard av the ball," he hastened to asseverate; "it's the kick av
it that murthers me. Liftinint, why don't they put the britch to the other
end av the gun? They do in the owld counthry."
"Load your beece," ordered Sergeant Meyer, "and go to your bost again, to
the left of Shupert."
The fact of Sweeny's opening fire did not cause a resumption of the close
fighting. Quiet still continued, and the leaders of the expedition took
advantage of it to discuss their situation, while the Indians gathered
into little groups and seemed also to be holding council.
"There are over a hundred warriors," said Thurstane.
"Apaches," added one of the Mexican herdsmen.
"What band?"
"Manga Colorada or Delgadito."
"I supposed they were in Bernalillo."
"That was three weeks ago," put in Coronado.
He was in profound thought. These fellows, who had agreed to harry
Bernalillo, and who had for a time carried out their bargain, why had they
come to intercept him in the Moqui country, a hundred and twenty miles
away? Did they want to extort more money, or were they ignorant that this
was his train? And, supposing he should make himself known to them, would
they spare him personally and such others as he might wish to save, while
massacring the rest of the party? It would be a bold step; he could not at
once decide upon it; he was pondering it.
We must do full justice to Coronado's coolness and readiness. This
atrocious idea had occurred to him the instant he heard the charging yell
of the Apaches; and it had done far more than any weakness of nerves to
paralyze his fighting ability. He had thought, "Let them kill the Yankees;
then I will proclaim myself and save _her_; then she will be mine." And
because of these thoughts he had stood irresolute, aiming without firing,
and bidding his Mexicans do the same. The result was that six good shots
and superb horsemen, who were capable of making a gallant fight under
worthy leadership, had become demoralized, and, but for the advent of
Thurstane, might have been massacred like sheep.
Now that three or four Apaches had fallen, Coronado had less hope of
making his arrangement. He considered the matter carefully and
judiciously, but at last he decided that he could not trust the vindictive
devils, and he turned his mind strenuously toward resistance. Although not
pugnacious, he had plenty of the desperate courage of necessity, and his
dusky black eyes were very resolute as he said to Thurstane, "Lieutenant,
we trust to you."
The young veteran had already made up his mind as to what must be done.
"We will move on," he said. "We can't camp here, in an open plain, without
grass or water. We must get into the cañon so as to have our flanks
protected. I want the wagons to advance in double file so as to shorten
the train. Two of my men in front and two in rear; three of your herdsmen
on one flank and three on the other; Captain Glover alongside the ladies,
and you and I everywhere; that's the programme. If we are all steady, we
can do it, sure."
"They are collecting ahead to stop us," observed Coronado.
"Good!" said Thurstane. "All I want is to have them get in a heap. It is
this attacking on all sides which is dangerous. Suppose you give your
drivers and muleteers a sharp lecture. Tell them they must fight if the
Indians charge, and not skulk inside and under the wagons. Tell them we
are going to shoot the first man who skulks. Pitch into them heavy. It's a
devilish shame that a dozen tolerably well-armed men should be so
helpless. It's enough to justify the old woman's contempt for our sex."
Coronado rode from wagon to wagon, delivering his reproofs, threats, and
instructions in the plainest kind of Spanish. At the signal to march, the
drivers must file off two abreast, commencing on the right, and move at
the fastest trot of the mules toward the cañon. If any scoundrel skulked,
quitted his post, or failed to fight, he would be pistolled instanter by
him, Coronado _sangre de Dios_, etc.!
While he was addressing Aunt Maria's coachman, that level-headed lady
called out, "Mr. Coronado, your very voice is cheering."
"Mrs. Stanley, you are an example of heroism to our sex," replied the
Mexican, with an ironical grin.
"What a brave, noble, intelligent man?" thought Aunt Maria. "If they were
only all like him!"
This business took up five minutes. Coronado had just finished his round
when a loud yell was raised by the Apaches, and twenty or thirty of them
started at full speed down the trail by which the caravan had come.
Looking for the cause of this stampede, the emigrants beheld, nearly half
a mile away, a single horseman rushing to encounter a score. It was Texas
Smith, making an apparently hopeless rush to burst through the environment
of Parthians and reach the train.
"Shall we make a sally to save him?" demanded Coronado, glancing at
Thurstane.
The officer hesitated; to divide his small army would be perilous; the
Apaches would attack on all sides and with advantage.
But the sight of one man so overmatched was too much for him, and with a
great throb of chivalrous blood in his heart, he shouted, "Charge!"