Fred Munson felt that he had been extremely fortunate, not only in
securing a good, substantial supper, but in getting a rifle. With it
he could guard against danger and starvation. In that country, and
especially among those mountains, was quite an abundance of game, and he
had learned how to aim a gun too well to prevent his throwing any shots
away.
By this time the night was well advanced, and he concluded that the
wisest thing he could do was to hunt up some place where he could sleep
until morning. This did not seem to be difficult in a country so cut up
and broken by rocks, and he moved away from the camp-fire with a sense
of deep gratitude for the extraordinary good fortune that had followed
him from the time Lone Wolf had withdrawn him from the main party.
“Now, if I could only get a horse,” he said to himself, “I would be set
up in business. I could find the way back to New Boston in a day or two,
shooting what game I want, and keeping out of the way of all Indians. I
wonder what has become of Sut Simpson? I expected he would be somewhere
around here before this. It would be very handy to come across him just
now and have him help me home. And there's Mickey Rooney. He went off on
one of the best horses; and if he could pick me up and take me along,
it wouldn't need much time for us to get back home. Ah, if I only had
Hurricane here,” he sighed. “How we would go back through that ravine,
leaving behind us the best horses in the country; but there's no use of
thinking of that. Hurricane is at home, and so he can't be here, and I
must trust to Providence to get back. I have something now that is of
more use than a horse. If I miss with one charge, I can--”
He stopped suddenly in amazement, for at that juncture he recalled a
piece of great stupidity which he had committed. He had secured the
rifle, and yet he had left without one thought of the indispensable
ammunition that was required to make the weapon of any use. He did not
know whether the gun in his hand was loaded or not, in which latter case
it was of no more account than a piece of wood.
“Well, if that don't beat everything,” he muttered, at a loss to
understand how he could have committed such an oversight. “I never once
thought of it till this minute, and now it's too late!”
The reflection of his great need inclined him to return to the camp-fire
and incur the risk involved in the effort to repair the blunder that he
had committed.
“_That_ Indian cannot hurt me, and I don't suppose that any of the
others have come back. It won't take me long to get what I want; and I
will do it, too.”
He was but a short distance from the place, and, having decided upon the
proper course, he moved rapidly back upon the path he had just trod, and
in a few minutes was beside the rock, which was becoming familiar in a
certain sense. Mindful of the danger to which one was always exposed
in that section, Fred peered around the rock with the same silence
and caution as before. The result was a disappointment. The Kiowa had
disappeared.
“Now it can't be that he was only pretending he was asleep all the
time,” thought the puzzled lad. “And yet, if he wasn't, how was it he
managed to get away?”
A few minutes' reflection convinced Fred that it was impossible that
there should have been any such thing as he had imagined at first. The
more reasonable theory was that some of the Kiowas had returned and
taken the body of their comrade away, fearful, perhaps, that some of
the Apaches might put in an appearance again and rob him of his scalp.
However, whatever the explanation was, Fred saw that his expedition was
a failure. There was nothing to be gained by remaining where he was,
while there was unmistakable risk of being detected by some of the
copper-colored prowlers.
He noticed that the camp-fire bore very much the same appearance as when
he last saw it, and the probabilities were that the Kiowas were some
distance away at that very time; but the young fugitive had already run
enough risk, without incurring any more, and he resolved to spend an
hour or two in getting out of the neighborhood altogether.
There was little choice of direction, but it was natural that he should
prefer the back-trail, and, clambering down into the ravine again, he
turned his face to the southward, directly through the ravine that he
had traversed during the day upon the back of Waukko's mustang.
“I can tell when I reach the place where Lone Wolf and his men left us,”
he said to himself. “That will take me a good while, but when I do find
it, the trail will be so much larger and plainer that there will be no
trouble about following it, but it will take me several days to do it,
and it is going to be hard work. I need all the time possible, so I
guess it will be best to keep going all night.”
There was not so much amusement in this as he fancied, but he kept it up
bravely for some two or three hours, during which he made good headway.
The walking was comparatively easy in the ravine, which was one of those
openings encountered at intervals among the mountains in the West, and
which are known under the name of passes. In many places it would be
utterly out of the question for parties to force their way through the
chains but for these avenues, which nature has kindly furnished.
The moonlight was just sufficient to make the boy feel uneasy. He could
discern objects, although indistinctly, nearly a hundred yards away, and
where the character of the gorge was continually shifting to a certain
extent there was abundant play for the imagination.
He had been walking but a short time when he abruptly halted, under the
impression that he had seen an Indian run across the gorge directly in
front of him. This caused a wilder throbbing of his heart, and another
examination of his gun, which was loaded, as he had assured himself some
time before, and ready at any time to do him one good turn, if no more.
“He wouldn't have skipped over in that style if he had known I was so
near,” was the reflection of the boy, as he sheltered himself in the
shadow of the rocks and looked and listened. “How did he know but what
I might have picked him off? What was to hinder me? If he did n't know I
was here, why, it ain't likely that he would loaf along the side of the
ravine.”
By such a course of reasoning, he was not long in convincing himself
that the way was open for his advance. He hurried by on tiptoe, and drew
a long breath of relief when certain that he had passed the dangerous
spot. But he was only a short distance beyond when his hair fairly arose
on end, for he became certain that he heard the groan of a man among the
boulders over his head.
“I wonder what the matter is there?” he whispered, peering upward in the
gloom and shadow. “It may be some white man that the Indians have left
for dead, and that still has some life in his body, or it may be an
Indian himself who has met with an accident--helloa!”--
Just then it sounded again, and a cold shiver of terror crept over him
from head to foot, as he was able to locate the precise point from which
it came. The frightful groaning did not stop as suddenly as before, but
rose and sank, with a sound like the wail of some suffering human being.
As Fred stood trembling and listening, his shuddering fear collapsed;
for the sound which had transfixed him with such dread, he now
recognized as the whistling of the wind, which, slight in itself,
was still manipulated in some peculiar fashion by a nook in the rocks
overhead.
“That does sound odd enough to scare a person,” he muttered, as he
resumed his walk. “It must be a regular trumpet-blast when the wind is
high, for there isn't much now.”
The two incidents resulting so harmlessly, Fred was inspired with
greater confidence, and advanced at a more rapid walk along the ravine,
suffering no check until he had gone fully a mile further. Just then,
while striding along with increasing courage, he came to a place where
the side of the ravine was perpendicular for two or three hundred feet.
He was close to this, so as to use the protection of the shadow, and was
dreaming of no danger, when a rattling of gravel and debris caused him
to look up, and he saw an immense mass of rock, that had become loosened
in some way, descending straight for his head.