HANO
Bearing the water jug for Sid’s pony, Hano descended that sulphur-fumed
tunnel up which he had led the white boy not three hours before. It
was now late in the afternoon; it would be nightfall before he could
find the horse and ride. At the cave entrance one scout was on guard, a
young fellow like Hano himself, not yet twenty. He rose respectfully as
the chief’s son came by.
“Ai, Hano!” he greeted, for he had heard nothing of the disturbance up
in the village. He did not remark on the water jug nor question Hano
about it, for such would have been contrary to his whole training. Only
squaws asked idle questions.
Hano nodded and went on out. No one saw him from the lava basin brink,
for the entire band was gathered in the council lodge for the sheep
meat distribution. He climbed up the mountain side, following his
original course downward with Sid, and soon disappeared over the ridge.
From there Hano began tracking Sid over on the Pass side. He noted
with some surprise that the dog was now gone, but that did not matter
much. Hano’s face was set in a brown study of thought. He resembled
his father, Honanta, strongly. The face was young and keen, with the
high bony cheeks and the hard, thin facial muscles of youth, but it
would acquire the same fullness as Honanta’s with growing years.
Indianlike, Hano was considering, not his own personal interests but
his duty toward his tribe. To aid them he had broken his honor--that
honor which required him to await the judgment of the old men even
if unbound and free to go. It was repugnant to him to take the step
because of Sid’s words, but his duty to the tribe was paramount. The
main thing, as he saw it, was to keep _all_ these white men from ever
discovering Red Mesa--The Arms of the Great Mystery. The white boy had
spoken of Mexicanos coming. Hano knew them. Occasionally, not often,
small parties of them had visited this region. They usually came by
the Sonoyta River, following it until it lost itself in the sands to
the south of Pinacate. From there they generally went to Represa
Tank, from which the Camino del Diablo led them safely away from the
mountains of Red Mesa. Only once in a great while had the Apache found
it necessary to abolish one of these Mexican gentry who had become too
inquisitive.
The white boy had told him also of a hound which could track him to
Red Mesa. Hano doubted this not at all, for he had often heard in the
lodge, of a winter’s night, stories of the far-famed sagacity and the
wonderful tracking nose of this dog of the white man’s. He would like
to have a dog like that himself for tracking mountain sheep. To capture
or to kill him was one of the things that Hano decided to attempt.
Thus far Hano’s plan had reached only the point of determining to watch
both parties and to act for the best. If one party of whites killed the
other it would be a fine thing, for that would leave this white boy
alone in Red Mesa, and he would never be allowed to leave it alive.
Hano hoped that he would eventually consent to adoption into the tribe,
for he seemed a fine youth and his heart was good, too, or he would not
have remembered his pony’s thirst and brought that water jug.
His name, too, was in his favor. _Col-vin!_ How often had Hano heard
that name on his father’s lips when the story of that young white
officer of long ago had been told! It was a sacred name in the clan.
Because of it alone Honanta’s entire attitude toward this white youth
had changed, Hano knew, before he himself had been led away to the
medicine lodge. This young Colvin, too, had set _him_ free and begged
him to bring his friends to Red Mesa because the Mexicanos were coming.
That was all very well, but Hano decided that he would _not_ do that,
except as a last resort. Better let them all kill each other; then
there would be no one but the white youth to deal with.
By this time Hano had climbed down the mountain on Sid’s trail and
found the pony. It was after dusk, and the familiar plain of giant
cactus and creosote bush, of choyas and mesquites was dark in the
shadows cast by the surrounding mountains, but the pony, a piebald, was
easily distinguishable, picketed in a trampled ring of galleta grass.
He had scented Hano, for an eager whinny came from him and Hano met the
pony tugging at his lariat and thrusting out bared teeth and thirsty
lips toward him in dumb appeal.
Pinto drank the water in that jug down in one huge suck. Then Hano
untethered him, coiled the lariat and rode off, following his tracks
back to the main party. Darkness fell as he followed the pony prints to
the kill of the mule deer. Two hours of slow trailing under the stars
led him to the huge, bare craters where, up the eastern one, the tracks
now led.
Hano walked the horse up the steep slopes, listening in the dark
constantly for a sign of these other white men. He paused at the crater
edge and looked down. A vast mysterious black cistern was that crater
well!
Hano halted the pony and listened, for faint voices were coming up to
him from below. They were down there! Presently the _Hoo-ooo!_ of a
hound’s throaty challenge rang out. The dog was below and facing him,
Hano knew instinctively from the direction of that sound. He drew back
and waited. More voices; words in the white man’s tongue. After a time
he heard them climbing out slowly through the other gap. They stood on
the opposite brink, one voice talking excitedly, audible in the dead of
night even across the crater. Then they rode on.
Hano followed down into the dim cavern, crossed its sandy floor and
worked his horse up the opposite gap. There, far to the east, he
discerned a flaring watch-fire, over on the Red Tepee, as his tribe
called Cerro Colorado. So that was what these white men had become
excited about? he exclaimed mentally, as he watched the fire awhile.
“Ugh! The Mexicanos!--Those that the white youth told me of!” decided
Hano finally. As he watched, tiny flares began to move down the hill
and out northwards on the plain. Hano counted twelve of these lights,
moving slowly north apparently, though they were being carried by men
on galloping horses. Immediately he divined it. Those lights were
torches, carried by the Mexicans to see choyas ahead, and they were
moving for Represa Tank!
From there their next ride would be either up the Camino del Diablo
or--to his own mountains! And the white boy said they were coming!
What for, Hano did not know, but immediately all his plans underwent a
sudden revolution. This must not be! There were twelve of the Mexicanos
and only three of these other whites. The whole neighborhood from
here to the Pass was filled with pony tracks made by the white boy’s
friends. The Mexicans would be easily victorious over only three of
them, and then the tracks would lead them to----
His mind made up at once, Hano started the pony at once around the
crater in the direction the white men had just gone. To combine with
them, to bring them to Red Mesa and have their help in defending
his home was his people’s only salvation--just as that white boy,
Col-vin--blessed name!--had said.
But to ride on into a strange camp was entirely against Hano’s Indian
training. It might end in being shot or some other absurd mistake.
The thing to do, now, was to get in touch with this Navaho that the
white boy had spoken of. He was an Indian and both tribes spoke the
Athapascan tongue. Aided by the sign language they could understand
each other. The Navaho was the one to meet first!
Hano halted his pony. He could not be very far behind these whites now.
He sent out his voice in the challenge of the big-horn ram, for he
knew that the Navaho would understand that unnatural voice in the dead
of night as a signal. Then he waited, his eyes alert, ears listening
eagerly.
The bellow of a hound far ahead was his first reply. Then silence,
profound and unbroken. After a short wait a man rose suddenly out of
the ground before him. He pointed a rifle full on Hano: “Who are you?”
he demanded in Navaho.
“Friend!” replied Hano, giving the peace sign.
The Navaho did not lower his rifle. “That pony? Where did you get him?”
he asked sternly.
Hano explained rapidly in Apache, much of which the Navaho understood.
He had scarcely time for more when the swift click of hound nails and
the angry bellow of Ruler came out of the night. The dog rushed up
toward Hano, barking savagely, tugging along Scotty who was holding
back with all his strength on the leash. To a dog all strangers are
enemies!
“What’s all this, Niltci?” queried Scotty--“Good Lord!”
He stopped astounded and stared up at what was evidently a strange
Indian on Sid’s horse.
“Apache!” said Niltci. “Him come from Master Sid. Say all right. Must
come quick.”
“Is Sid hurt?” asked Scotty grimly.
“No. Him with Apache. Wants us to come quick,” reiterated the Navaho.
“Well, I’ll be darned! Keep your eye on him, Niltci--it may be some
damned ruse. We’ll take him in to see Big John and see what _he_ says
about it,” decided Scotty.
Walking on each side of Sid’s pinto, with rifles poised and ready for
any treachery, they took Hano back to the camp at Papago Tanks. Big
John roused out at their coming and threw a heap of brush on the fire.
“Jeemently-ding!--what you got thar!” he called out as the party came
in. “An Injun on Sid’s pony!--whar’d ye git him?--Say, fellers, I’m
just sufferin’ for the news!”
Scotty told him all Niltci had been able to learn from Hano during
their march and then added the tale of their own discovery of the
Mexicans.
“Shore’s a fine mess you’ve got yore old uncle inter!” grinned Big
John. “Them greasers is on Cerro Colorado, you say? Waal, _we_ left our
tracks on thet li’l hump, too! If it’s that Vasquez, he’s followin’ ’em
now--to see whar we went next, sabe? He won’t make fer these here lava
diggin’s nohow; he’ll make for Represa! An’ he won’t lose no time over
it, either! Then they comes inter the Pass, same’s we done. We’ll meet
’em thar, plumb bright an’ early to-morrow morning. They’ll be ridin’
all night. Thet fire ye saw on Cerro Colorado was jist a guide for
night ridin’.”
Hano nodded in confirmation. He told Niltci now that he had seen lights
moving north across the plain before he left the crater rim.
“That settles it!” exclaimed Big John. “We rolls our freight out’n
hyar right sudden pronto! An’ it’s goin’ to be a sweet fight, if we
don’t git up into the mountains before that bilin’ of greasers comes
a-fannin’ and a-foggin’ through the Pass, old-timer!”
Dynamic was that decision of Big John’s! The tent came down in a jiffy;
the horses were roped and saddled; Blaze was made comfortable up on
Sid’s pony, a bed being built for him of every available blanket piled
on the folded tent for a base. With Hano leading off through the dark,
the cavalcade started at once back across the lava.
The horses’ shoes clinked on its flinty surface; ghostly desert
vegetation and tumbled masses of petrified lava bordered their trail.
After several hours of careful riding came the huge cones of the
craters, moving by like grim phantoms past them as slowly light began
to dawn in the east. Ahead they saw spread out before them the jungled
garden of the Pass, its green poles of saguarros standing silent
sentinels all about in the dawn and the gray mountains hemming it in
all around.
“Now, fellers, we cayn’t take them hosses promiscuous up no mountains,
an’ I ain’t goin’ to leave old Blazie, nohow!” declared Big John as he
halted the train. “This white mustang’s about as easy to hide here as a
Saskatchewan swan! Thar’s shore goin’ to be some perishin’ lil’ rodero
when them spiggoty gents arrives in our midst! Two of us hev gotto stay
with these hosses.”
To hide them somewhere was the first thought of all. Big John’s
puckered eyes searched the Pass for cover. Up ahead the mountains
closed in to a narrow gap resembling a gunsight, a lone green saguarro
upstanding in the center like a front sight in its V-notch. A small,
bare rocky hillock to the right of the notch rose opposite a similar
low spur terminating the range on their left. But down under the flanks
of both of them they marked the high bushy green of mesquite.
“A feller _might_ lay low in thar hoss an’ all,” declared Big John,
sizing it up.
Scotty did not answer. He was scanning the mountain sides which towered
above them, mile on mile, shaggy and gray and covered with pale green
desert growth to a high skyline above. Somewhere, over beyond that
ridge maybe, Sid was in camp with the Apache. Either Hano or Ruler
could lead him up there. But a peculiar telepathic influence kept
whispering to him that all was not right with Sid, that he needed him
_now_, was in some sort of danger or trouble. It might have been just
his own imagination; it might have been the subtle mental bond between
the two chums, but the impulse was there and it led him to decide on
climbing up at once.
“You take Niltci and the horses and go to the notch, John. If the
Mexicans come in that way you can let them go by and then slip out
through the gap and ride around the end of these mountains and join
us. Meanwhile this Apache and I will climb up straight over the range
to their camp. I have a hunch that it’s over that mountain somewhere.
Here’s where we last saw Sid.”
“Looks that way--’scusin’ that the Injun’d knife ye as soon as he
got you alone up thar! I ain’t trustin’ no Injun. Crooked as a Mex.
gambler’s deck, they be!” swore Big John emphatically.
Hano listened and watched them pointing, uneasily. He wasn’t at all
sure about showing these people Red Mesa after all. He had been
reasoning over it silently as their party had ridden along. He had a
new plan, now, and it was this: Here were four good horses. A number of
Mexicanos, a dozen at least, were coming here after these white men.
Well, then, would it not be the best service he could do for his tribe
to induce them to lead the Mexicanos on a wild race out into the Tule
Desert along the fearful Camino del Diablo, there to lose them all
somewhere in the desert? He might die of thirst himself in the attempt.
That was nothing; the peace and safety of his tribe was everything--any
scheme to lead them all away from Red Mesa! These white men certainly
could never survive that desert!
He now grunted eagerly and began to speak earnestly to Niltci in mixed
sign language and Apache. He pointed to the notch and made the sign
of four horsemen with his fingers straddled over his left hand. He
pointed to Blaze and made signs of concealing him in some dense cover.
Then he pointed to the notch again and gave a pantomime of their party
galloping through it with other horsemen in pursuit.
“I got ye, son!” grinned Big John. “We-all give ’em a desert race,
hey? A-1 idee!” he chuckled. “Scotty, if I know human natur, that pisen
spig, that Vasquez”--Big John spat it out like a curse--“ain’t told
them guerrillas nothin’ about no mine. Stolen church property’s what
they think they’re after. They’ll be considerable peeved, an’ will
begin shootin’ soon’s they sight us. Now if this Vasquez starts gittin’
careless with his hardware--an’ I git one good poke at him with the old
meat gun--Sho!--there won’t be nobody know _nothin’_ about that mine
but us, see? Another thing: when he climbs Cerro Colorado and don’t see
no Red Mesa, what does he do? Thinks he’s disremembered what he read on
that Dago tablet, sabe? He’ll think I’m Sid, sabe, an’ he’ll chase us
clar to Yuma, aimin’ to get hold of it again. We don’t want him ’round
hyar, that’s sure! I’m strong fer the Apache’s racin’ scheme. Hyar’s
one big chance to lose him good, savvy?”
“How about Sid?” objected Scotty.
“Oh, he’s all right! Thick as thieves with these Apaches, I’ll bet. He
talks their lingo, you know.”
Still the feeling remained persistent in Scotty’s mind that all was not
right with Sid. Where _were_ these Apaches, anyhow; and why had Hano
not taken them to their encampment at once?
“I’ve got it!” he exclaimed at length. “You leave Ruler with me. Go on
with Niltci and the Apache and try your race stunt. Meanwhile I’ll slip
away, put Ruler on Sid’s track, and so find out where he’s gone myself.”
“Not so good, son! Not so good!” approved Big John whismically. “You
sorter hang back, then, an’ git away when you kin. Try along the base
of them mountains. I think Sid rode off that way when he left us. You
leave them greasers to us! They won’t bother you none! C’mon, fellers,
le’s get movin’. We ain’t got _all_ the time there is!”
Through Niltci he signified assent to Hano’s plan. They started across
the sands for the notch which now lay in plain daylight before them
glowing with the colors of the rising sun. Gradually the three ahead
urged their ponies to a gallop, twisting and turning through the
patches of choyas and spiny barrel cactus.
Scotty fell behind, Ruler on his leash loping along beside him. As
dense groves of mesquite barred their path he let himself get separated
from the others and worked over toward the mountain base, keeping
cover constantly between him and the party ahead.
In five minutes Scotty was completely lost to them. After a time he
came upon lone pony tracks in the sand. Beside them had trotted Blaze’s
footprints. Here was where Sid had gone toward the mountain. Sheep
hunting, no doubt, Scotty conjectured, for he knew that Sid liked to
hunt alone. Nearer and nearer came the abrupt flanks of the mountains.
Steep and rugged, rising in towering masses, the rocky flanks rolled up
high above Scotty. Somewhere up there Sid had climbed, he was sure.
Presently he came upon a game trail, winding along in the sand around
the rocky outcroppings. Sheep tracks! Scotty rode on hurriedly now, the
hunting ardor rising within him. Presently he came to a little patch
of galleta grass, trampled down in a ring around a picket pin, where
a pony had fed. The story was plain to Scotty. Sid’s pinto had been
tethered here and had broken away after a time, probably because of
thirst.
No; the Apache had _taken_ him away, for here were his moccasin prints!
Here were Blaze’s, too, coming from the mountains. It became more and
more a puzzle to Scotty. What had really happened to Sid? It looked
more than ever like treachery--foul play--to Scotty. Somewhere up on
the mountain Sid had encountered the Apaches perhaps. He had been held
by them, since he had not returned. But Hano had been here and had
taken his horse. What did it all mean?
For a time Scotty hesitated, thinking seriously of riding after Big
John to bring him and Niltci here to get their judgment on this
discovery. Then he saw the firm heel print of Sid’s hunting boot
leading up the mountain side. The ardent impatience of youth at once
overwhelmed him. Follow, and at once, he must!
He put Ruler’s moist nose to the print: “_Sssuey_, Ruler!--Go get
Sid!--_Sid!_” he hissed in the dog’s ear.
Ruler whined eagerly. Then, snuffing the trail, he climbed on upward,
his bony rat tail swinging in circles as occasional yelps of discovery
came from him. Scotty climbed after and was soon high in the rocks on
the mountain flank, with the green plain of the Pass spread out far and
wide below him.
* * * * *
Meanwhile Big John and the two Indians had ridden on swiftly. The Pass
narrowed and in ten minutes more they were at the base of the two low
hills guarding the gap. Hano looked around him inquiringly.
“Where is the white boy?” he asked Niltci, anxiously.
“Oh, he’s back thar a-piece--he’s a slow rider,” laughed Big John
reassuringly. Hano regarded them suspiciously a moment as Niltci
translated. Then he shrugged his shoulders, his keen eyes searching the
groves of mesquite and palo verde for signs of the laggard. A bed was
made for Blaze under the shelter of a dense bunch of creosotes and he
was tied there with a pan of water handy. Then the horses were tethered
in hiding behind that growth of mesquite under the rock base which they
had noted from down the Pass. Niltci and Big John unlimbered their
rifles and climbed to a vantage point on the low rocky spur jutting out
to the east of the main range.
They were not many minutes too soon! Over the waste of sand dunes to
the north a small white cavalcade was toiling slowly along toward them.
The guerrillas, about a dozen of them, they noted, were riding two by
two. They were clad in white, with huge white sombreros on head and the
shining bands of cartridge belts crossing their chests at a slant.
Over their backs jutted up the slender muzzles of Mausers. Dandy black
boots heavily spurred in silver gleamed through the dust along the
flanks of their horses. At the head of the column alongside the leader
rode a man clad in a striped serapé, and at sight of him Big John’s
eyes began to smoulder.
He pointed him out to Niltci. “Thar’s that Vasquez, the pisen, ornery,
li’l horned toad that’s makin’ all the trouble, Niltci!” he growled.
“The mine ain’t wuth shootin’ nobody fer, though. We’ll hev to throw an
all-fired scare into him with a leetle fancy shootin’, sabe?”
Niltci grunted understanding and they both watched the cavalcade
approaching. As they entered the Pass below, Hano’s wild eyes glared
up at them. Now was the time for his great sacrifice! In just a little
while longer these Mexicans would be through the gap and nearing those
mountains whose secret he felt bound to protect. They must never be
allowed to remain here, to trace out those tell-tale tracks! He looked
up at Big John for the signal to dash down to the ponies and begin that
race that could only end in the arid wastes of the Camino del Diablo.
Once out there, they could shoot him with those long-range rifles
if they were able. But die of thirst they all surely would! As for
himself, he trusted in his desert knowledge to survive until it would
be safe to return to Red Mesa.
But, alas for the best laid plans of mice and men! Nature has a grim
way of playing tricks that upset our best schemes--cruel tricks,
sometimes. For, hardly had the Mexican riders gotten well through
the gap with yells of delight as they followed the trail into that
beautiful desert garden, when, from up on the high mountain flanks
behind Big John’s position, came a sudden rolling of stones bounding
down the hill. The Mexicans all halted and looked up, shouting to each
other eagerly. Big John looked around inquiringly, and Hano gazed with
an expression of anguish in his black eyes. Up there ranged a band of
mountain sheep! A large band, seventeen in all, if any one had stopped
to count them. Rams, ewes and young ones, they were all clattering
along the summit of the ridge, outlined clearly against the sky and
headed for the fastnesses of the higher slopes.
At sight of them eager cries came from all the Mexicans. They began to
dismount hurriedly. Rifles were unslung, cartridges hastily torn from
the bandoliers. Then a wild race began up that mountain after those
doomed sheep.
Hano gave a grunt of dismay. That chase could only lead to one
thing--the immediate discovery of Red Mesa, the hiding place of his
tribe that lay beyond those ridges!