LITTLE CAYUSE ON THE WAR-PATH.
The Piute boy had an easy time of it, compared with the strenuous
experience fate had marked out for old Nomad.
Bernritter did not linger long in the hotel. When he came out he made
directly for the corral, to which Jacobs was later followed by the
trapper.
Little Cayuse, shadowing along on the super’s trail, knew at once
that the man he was watching must have gone to the corral for his
horse.
The boy, therefore, made rapidly for Nickerson’s, and got his bridle
and riding-blanket on his pinto cayuse.
“Take um Black Cañon trail to Three-ply Mine?” he queried, of one of
Nickerson’s men.
“Thet’s ther way ye go, ef ye go direct,” answered the man.
Little Cayuse galloped to the Five Points, and then along the dusty
thoroughfare known as Grand Avenue. His sharp eyes were always
straight ahead, keenly scrutinizing the road for some sign of
Bernritter.
The boy was several miles down the Black Cañon trail before he
glimpsed the man he was looking for. Although Cayuse could see only
Bernritter’s back, yet the form of the man, and the clothes he wore,
were indelibly impressed upon the little Indian’s mind, and he knew
he could not be mistaken.
From that point he followed slowly and cautiously, keeping his
distance and hugging the trail-side, and the cottonwood-trees.
Yet Bernritter did not seem to have the least idea he was being
followed. Not once, so far as Cayuse could discover, did he look back.
Quite probably Bernritter was deep in his nefarious plans for the
next day, and had no time to watch his back trail. Be that as it
might, Cayuse found the trailing easy; and it grew easier when the
sun went down and the evening shadows began to lengthen.
At sunset Bernritter had crossed the Arizona canal, eighteen miles
out of Phœnix. From there on the trail led across several miles of
flat desert, and directly into the scarred and cactus-covered hills.
The twilight favored the boy while crossing the level ground, and
when they drew into the hill valleys he needed no favoring of any
sort.
The Indian instinct, born in him, made him as wary as a fox, and as
quick and certain in his movements as a wildcat.
Cutting pieces from his riding-blanket, he tied them about his
pinto’s hoofs, thus muffling the noise of his own travel, and
bringing out distinctly the ringing fall of the hoofs ahead.
His trailing, through the gloomy gullies, was almost entirely by ear
alone. Whether Bernritter was galloping, or trotting, or walking he
knew at any moment, and he kept a distance that gave the hoof-beats
in the lead the same volume of sound.
Suddenly he heard the hoof-strokes come to a halt. On the instant
Little Cayuse drew rein and backed silently into a cranny of the
hills.
Was Bernritter coming back to see whether he was being followed?
He did not show himself, however; nor did the hoofs of his horse
resume their clatter.
Cayuse dismounted and slipped forward along the gully to investigate.
Before he had gone far he heard voices, one voice Bernritter’s, and
the other unmistakably that of an Indian.
The Piute had no love for the Apaches, and a thrill shot through him
as he realized that this redskin with whom the superintendent was
talking must be one of the hated people.
Then Cayuse had another thought: Why was Bernritter talking with an
Apache--holding with him a pow-wow that had already lasted several
minutes?
Little Cayuse crawled closer, slipping through the loose stones like
a snake.
When he paused again, he was as near the two men as he dared to go.
One was an Apache, and the boy was not slow to realize that his
danger was greater than if he had been lying in the vicinity of two
white men.
From his last position Cayuse was able to see the dark form of
the horse, and the upright figures of the men. While he watched,
Bernritter turned to his horse and thrust his foot into the stirrup.
“You _sabe_, eh?” Cayuse heard Bernritter ask the Apache. “Round up
the warriors and wait for word from Bascomb. You’ll hear from him in
two, three hour, mebbyso.”
“Me _sabe_,” grunted the Indian.
Bernritter, without speaking further, rode on up the gully. The
Apache, whisking up the gully-bank like an antelope, vanished over
the rim.
Little Cayuse returned to his waiting pinto, kicked the pony with his
heels, and rode on after Bernritter.
When he caught the tinkling sound of the hoofs ahead, he slowed his
pace with a grunt of satisfaction.
Then, from the beaded medicine-pouch that swung from his belt, he
took some yellow pigment, dabbed one of his fingers into it, and ran
a wavering line up and down either side of his face.
This was Cayuse’s war-paint. He put it on, now that he knew he was to
take the war-path against foes of his own color.
White men like Bernritter and Jacobs were not worth the trouble of
dipping into his medicine-bag. Besides, Cayuse’s grievance against
them was not yet well defined.
Pa-e-has-ka had set him on Bernritter’s trail, but that was all.
Recent developments had given a fresh twist to the course of events.
Who was Bascomb? And why was the Apache to round up more warriors?
Little Cayuse did not like the prospect.
As he followed along after Bernritter, he became suddenly aware that
the hoofs in the lead were being drowned out by a steadily increasing
roar.
The mill-stamps! Ah! At last they were coming close to the Three-ply
Mine.
The gully the two were following suddenly opened out into a wide
valley.
At the entrance to the valley Cayuse drew rein; then, dismounting, he
sat down on a boulder and watched Bernritter ride down into the camp
and lose himself among the twinkling lights in mill, bunk-house, and
chuck-shanty.
For a long time the boy sat there, watching the trailing plume of
smoke from the mill, and listening to the clamor of the stamps.
Suddenly he was startled. Another horseman galloped past him. Cayuse
and his pinto were a little to one side of the trail, and somewhat in
the shadow. Fortunately they had not been seen.
The man was Jacobs. In spite of the darkness, the boy instinctively
recognized the galloping horseman.
If the man was Jacobs, then Nomad must be somewhere near.
Eagerly the Piute waited, straining his eyes back along the gully.
But no Nomad appeared. Had Wolf-killer lost the trail? It was not
like him to do that, for Wolf-killer could follow a trail like an
Indian.
Mounting his pinto, Little Cayuse retraced his course through the
gully.
When he had reached a place where the drumming of the stamps sounded
low in his ears, the echoes were taken up by more hoof-beats. Cayuse
drew aside, and McGowan, owner of the mine, swung past.
The boy had thought, at first, that it might be Nomad and only his
native caution had kept him from giving a shout from the trail-side.
A moment later he had recognized McGowan as instinctively as he had
recognized Jacobs.
He recalled that McGowan had told Jacobs to return to the mine with
Bernritter, and both to go at once. And here Jacobs had preceded his
employer into the camp by only a few minutes!
The boy plagued himself with questions in an attempt to account for
this, and for Bernritter’s meeting and talking with the Apache.
Above these things, which mightily puzzled the Piute, was the more
important question as to what had become of old Nomad.
Still riding and hoping, Cayuse drew well away from the croon of the
stamps.
Then he heard a sound, far in the distance, that sent a chill to his
heart.
The sound was a pistol-shot!
Just the one report, and no more. Cayuse listened breathlessly, but
only deep and ominous silence followed the faint but incisive note of
the six-shooter.
The boy’s fears leaped to Nomad. He had met with treachery, of some
sort, on the trail!
Setting the pinto to a rapid gait, the Piute rode like the wind along
the gully, the pony, with his muffled hoofs, carrying him onward like
a darting shadow.
All roads, that night, seemed to lead to the Three-ply Mine. At least
it seemed so to Little Cayuse.
And, for the young Indian, the way seemed wrapped in profound and
forbidding mystery.
As he made in the direction of the pistol-shot, he believed he had a
clue to at least part of the puzzle.
Bernritter had told the Apache to round up more warriors and wait for
Bascomb. This had been done; and Wolf-killer, galloping along the
trail after Jacobs, had fallen into a snare laid by Bascomb and the
Apaches.
This is what the boy thought, but he was soon to be undeceived. A
snare had been laid, but not for Nomad.
A few minutes of swift riding brought Little Cayuse into a zone where
a sixth sense told him of danger.
Turning from the gully into a small defile that broke through its
left-hand bank, he halted, secured the pinto to a white-thorn bush,
and carried out his further investigations on foot.
Proceeding onward along the gully, keeping in the shadow and dodging
from boulder to boulder, Cayuse presently came upon a scene that made
him congratulate himself that he had not plumped into it full tilt on
his pinto.
At the point where the scene unrolled before the boy’s eyes the gully
widened, and the starlight sifted brightly downward and dispelled
much of the gloom.
He saw two horses quite near him. They were riderless, had been roped
together, and the riata tethering them had been wrapped about a stone.
Beyond the horses were many Apaches; just how many the boy could not
tell, but certainly there were a dozen, at the least.
The Apaches were working over some objects lying on the ground, and a
white man was moving about among them, hurrying them about their work
with gruff oaths.
Presently the Apaches started up the eastern bank of the gully in two
groups, each group apparently carrying a burden.
What those burdens were Cayuse could guess.
Without doubt they were the men who had ridden the two horses that
now stood bound together and secured to the stone.
Up and up the steep slope toiled the Apaches, the white man swearing
and urging them on. In a little while the whole villainous crew
disappeared over the top of the gully-bank, each group still carrying
its helpless burden.
Cayuse ran to the horses. He felt them over with his hands; felt of
their legs, their heads, and, lastly, groped his fingers over the
saddles.
One horse he could not recognize, either by sight or touch. The
other, unless his reasoning deceived him, belonged to Pa-e-has-ka!
Pa-e-has-ka! The Piute caught his breath.
Was Buffalo Bill one of the prisoners just captured by the white man
and the Apaches?
It was a startling thing for Cayuse to come looking for Nomad and
find Buffalo Bill.
That was not a time for useless thought, however, but for action.
Hurrying to the eastern wall of the gully, Cayuse climbed the slope.
Its top gave him an outlook over a small, flat plain, stretching
eastward and lying distinctly under the starlight.
The Indians and the white man were carrying their prisoners across
the level ground toward a little hill of stones. A black opening
yawned in the top of the stone hill, and Cayuse knew it to be an old,
and probably abandoned, mine.
The boy dared not go farther, and he knelt where he was and continued
to watch. Owing to the distance, he could trace the movements of the
white man and the Apaches but indistinctly; yet he saw enough to
convince him that the two prisoners were being lowered down into the
old mine.
The white man and his red helpers clambered up the ore-dump, hovered
together there for several minutes, all busily engaged, and then came
back down the ragged little hill. And on their return Cayuse could
see that they were carrying no one.
Facing about, the boy scrambled back into the gully, untied the
riata that tethered the two horses to the stone, jumped into the
saddle of Buffalo Bill’s mount, and galloped toward the place where
he had left his pinto, with the other of the two horses in tow.
This move was characteristic of Little Cayuse. The white man and the
Apaches were Buffalo Bill’s enemies, and Cayuse considered them his.
It is always the proper thing to get away from an enemy everything
you can. On this principle, partly, Cayuse was taking the horses.
Then, again, he was looking forward to the time when Buffalo Bill and
the man with him should be taken out of the old mine and need their
mounts.
On reaching the defile where he had left his pinto, Cayuse pulled the
pinto’s thong from the thorn-bush, changed his seat to the pony’s
back, and raced up the defile, leading the animals picked up in the
gully.
The boy was now in his element. He understood very well that the
white man and the Apaches would miss the horses, and would imagine
that they had broken away. Search would be made for the missing
animals, but Cayuse would make it his business to see that the search
was not successful.
If the Apaches caught him, Cayuse knew that a bullet or a knife would
settle his earthly account.
But the Piute was not intending to let himself be caught. He was an
Indian no less than the Apaches, and fully as able to take care of
himself.
The defile the boy was following led out onto the flat desert.
Leading his horses, he circled to the south over the plain, found a
place where he could descend into the gully, and was just crossing
to the western wall, when a rider spurred out from behind a pile of
rocks and laid his horse lengthwise across his path.
A revolver gleamed feebly in the starlight, leveled straight at the
Piute’s breast.
“Ugh!” grunted Little Cayuse.
“Waugh, ye pizen varmint!” growled a voice. “Whar ye goin’ with them
cabyos?”
“Wolf-killer!” muttered Little Cayuse.
“Snarlin’ hyeners ef et ain’t Cayuse? Waal, blazes ter blazes an’ all
hands round! Say, I thort ye was told ter foller Bernritter?”
“All same,” answered Cayuse. “You no follow Jacobs, huh?”
“I’m follerin’ him now. But look hyar, son, what ye doin’ with them
two hosses? One of ’em looks like Buffler’s, blamed ef et don’t.”
“Wuh! All same Pa-e-has-ka. We no stay here. Heap Apache right ahead.
Cayuse steal um cayuses from Apaches.”
“What’s thet ye’re tellin’? Apaches loose in this part o’ ther range?
I reckons, Cayuse, ye must be shy a few, ain’t ye?”
Nomad was himself keeping a sharp lookout for redskins. In fact, when
he saw Little Cayuse coming over the eastern wall of the gully with
the two led horses, he had felt sure that he was one of Bascomb’s
Apaches, and had screened himself behind the rock-pile.
The question he had put to the boy was for the purpose of making
certain the Piute had made no mistake.
“Heap Apache,” insisted Cayuse; “one white man.”
“Jumpin’ tarantelers!” breathed the trapper, “I was gittin’ warmer’n
I thort. Ye’ve got Buffler’s hoss, an’ ther baron’s. Aire ye meanin’
ter tell me thet Buffler an’ ther baron hev been captered?”
“Wuh! Me see um take Pa-e-has-ka and Dutch brave and put um in old
mine.”
“Ole mine? What ole mine?”
“Him little way from here; not far. We get out of gully, so Apaches
no find us when they come looking for horses. _Sabe?_”
“I’m savvyin’ like er house afire. But tell me fust off ef Buffler
was hurt?”
“No can tell, Wolf-killer. Him carried to old mine; and Dutch brave,
him carried to old mine, too.”
“Ain’t this er piece o’ thunderin’ mean luck for ye?” grumbled the
old trapper. “Thar was me, knowin’ all erbout this hyar trap in ther
hills, layin’ in ther closet o’ thet hotel like er trapped rat, an’
not able ter do er thing ter keep Buffler from runnin’ inter thet
ambush. Things sartinly does turn out all-fired queer sometimes.”
While the old man was spluttering, he and Cayuse were climbing up the
steep slope, each with one of the led horses.
They reached the top, went a little way down on the other side, and
then dismounted to watch for some sign of the Apaches.
But no Apaches showed themselves.
While they were waiting, Cayuse told of his trailing, of the way
Jacobs and McGowan had passed him, of his search for Nomad, of his
hearing the pistol-shot, discovering the two horses, and watching the
white man and the Indians carry Buffalo Bill and the baron to the old
mine. He finished with an account of how he had taken the two animals
and rode off with them.
Cayuse never wasted words. His recital was terse yet graphic, and
Nomad listened with profound admiration for the little Piute’s pluck
and resourcefulness.
“Ye’ve done well, Cayuse,” said Nomad, when the boy had finished.
“From what ye say, Buffler an’ Schnitz aire in some ole mine-shaft
whar this hyar Bascomb fixes ter keep ’em pris’ners all durin’
ter-morrer. But you an’ me’ll fool Bascomb an’ his reds, Cayuse.
Jest as soon as we’re shore the Apaches hev given up lookin’ fer the
missin’ cabyos, we’ll make headway to’rds thet ole mine an’ snake
Buffler an’ ther baron out o’ et quick.”
“Wuh!” said Little Cayuse.
For half an hour longer they watched the gully, and as the Apaches
failed to appear, they reasoned that the redskins had given up the
horses and had gone away about their own business, whatever that
might be.
“I reckon we kin hike out now, Cayuse,” said Nomad, “an’ feel purty
safe about Bascomb an’ his Injuns. Straddle yer pinto, boy, an’ lead
ther way ter this hyar ole mine. Ye don’t reckon any o’ Bascomb’s
reds aire watchin’ et, do ye?”
“All come away,” answered Cayuse. “Me see um.”
“Kerect. Mount an’ ride, Cayuse, an’ we’ll soon put Pard Buffler
inter ther game ag’in.”