LOCOED APACHES.
Sometimes there is more in the telling of a story than there is meat
in it. But there was meat in Nomad’s recital, and, profoundly stirred
as he was, he told it with a simple effectiveness that made Dell and
the scout live over with him his night’s trailing.
“That’s good, Nick,” remarked the scout, after a brief silence, “as
far as it goes.”
“Sufferin’ catermounts!” exclaimed Nomad. “Don’t et go fur enough ter
suit ye, Buffler?”
“It doesn’t go back far enough. How did you get away from that ambush
in which Bascomb’s soldier escort was slain?”
“Thet’s another kink in ther twist o’ events,” said Nomad gloomily.
“At ther fust fire my hoss was shot down under me. As soon as I could
kick clear o’ ther stirrups I hiked. Thet’s what I done, Buffler.
Never thinkin’ o’ thet leetle pard o’ ours, Cayuse, I hiked like
er express-train plumb out o’ thet smotherin’ batch o’ ’Paches.
Cayuse”--and Nomad’s voice rolled in his throat--“was killed er took
pris’ner, an’ I wasn’t thar ter lend him er hand. I ain’t hardly
fit ter look ye in ther face, Buffler, arter thet. Ther idee o’ me
turnin’ away from er pard! My on’y excuse is thet I was rattled. When
I got cl’ar o’ ther ’Paches, an’ had time ter think, I ricollected
Leetle Cayuse, an’ went back ter whar ther ambush was pulled off.
But I couldn’t find him. From thet I jedged thet Cayuse was took
pris’ner.”
Here was an odd situation, and no mistake. Both Dell and Buffalo Bill
saw it immediately, and exchanged humorous looks.
Little Cayuse had blamed himself for not risking death and remaining
in that ambush just to help Nomad, and here was Nomad likewise
blaming himself for not staying to help Cayuse. By a queer process
of reasoning, both Cayuse and Nomad had labored under the impression
that the other had been captured by Geronimo’s men.
“Cayuse wasn’t captured, Nick,” said Buffalo Bill. “He got away, and
has been finding fault with himself because he didn’t stand by you,
just as you are all gloomed up because you didn’t stand by him. You
think he’s a prisoner, and he thinks you are. Well, well!”
“An’ ther kid is all right, is he?” said Nomad, in a tone of deep
relief.
“He is.”
“Whar is he, Buffler?”
“He was in the place where Dell and I got locoed. Cayuse got locoed,
too. It was in a little valley, where there was a dribble of water
and a pool. The pool was drugged. All three of us, as well as our
horses, fell victims to the drug.”
“Whar is this hyar valley, Buffler?”
“I don’t know. Dell and I didn’t know what we were doing when we left
it; consequently, we can’t find our way back.”
“Blazes ter blazes an’ all hands ’round!” gulped the old trapper.
“Tork erbout doin’s! Say, ain’t this ther banner play o’ all ther
doin’s thet ever happened?”
“It is.”
“Tell me more, Buffler. I’m hungry ter hyer everythin’ that ye kin
remember thet happened to ye.”
The scout and the girl, between them, relieved the old trapper’s
mind. When they came down to Cayuse’s report about Tonio Pass and the
cave, Nomad pricked up his ears.
“Thet cave whar I seen ther ’Pache at ther entrance,” cried the old
trapper, “must hev been ther same one Cayuse was tellin’ ye of! An’
Bascomb is thar, hey?”
“I don’t know, Nick, whether you’ve got the right place or not,”
returned the scout. “You spoke of a blind gully----”
“Et’s thar, all right.”
“Well, by an odd coincidence, then, Tonio Pass has a blind gully as
well as Tres Alamos Gulch. A force from Bonita, under Markham, has
gone to Tres Alamos Gulch in the hope of picking up Geronimo’s trail.
The fact that you found a cave would seem to indicate that you had
found the very place where Cayuse saw Bascomb and Geronimo. How far
is the place from here?”
“An’ hour’s walk, I reckon.”
“Could you take us there?”
“I could, sure; but hadn’t ye better git yer hosses fust, Buffler?”
“You overlook the fact, Nick, that it is impossible for us to get
our horses until we can locate that valley with the drugged pool. To
do that, we’ll first have to find some one who knows the lay of the
land better than we do. Meanwhile, we can go to this cave in Tonio
Pass and get Bascomb. If there are Apaches in the place, there will
be food and water there, too; and if there is not too strong a force
of Apaches, we can get the whip-hand of them and have the run of the
cave--to say nothing of recapturing Bascomb.”
“I reckon yore head is level, as per usual, Buffler,” said the old
trapper. “When d’ye want ter start fer this hyar Tonio Pass?”
“At once. The quicker we start, the quicker we can wind up the
affair with Bascomb and get something to eat and drink. This road, I
suppose, must lead to Bonita or Bowie?”
“I pass. Et’s er road, an’ thet’s erbout all I knows. Ter git ter
Tonio Pass an’ ther place whar I seen ther cave”--here Nomad got up
and squinted around--“et’ll be necessary ter go down ther road ther
same as how them two ’Paches went. Ef ye’re ready, we’ll lope.”
The start along the shelf and down the trail was made immediately,
the initial movement carrying the pards toward the turn around which
the two Apaches had vanished a little while before.
“I been hoofin’ et all night, Buffler,” complained Nomad; “an’ when
a feller gits bow-legged from saddle-work, et’s plumb hard fer him
ter navigate on anythin’ but er hoss. Now, ef we knowed whar thet
thar valley with ther pizened spring was, we could hev things er heap
easier, an’----”
The trapper broke off his talk with a wild yell. He, and the scout,
and the girl had rounded the turn and had come plump upon a full
dozen Apache warriors.
No wonder Nomad was startled. The scout and the girl likewise
realized that they were face to face with unforeseen peril. All hands
leaped to revolver-grips. The scout and the girl hesitated, but Nomad
was on the point of pulling both triggers when the scout gripped his
arm sharply.
“Wait, Nick!” he cautioned.
“Why ever d’ye want ter wait?” demanded Nomad. “Et’s er wonder ther
pizen whelps hevn’t shot us down afore this.”
“Watch them! If I’m any judge, the entire outfit is locoed.”
The Indians were on foot, and in full war-paint. The appearance of
the three whites, against whom they had taken the war-path, did not
appear to cause them the least surprise, or to arouse the slightest
sign of hostility.
The Apaches began chanting some song of their own, and eleven of them
clasped hands and started dancing around the twelfth, who stood in
the center of the circle.
“Sort of er ring-eround-a-rosy,” muttered Nomad.
When they had danced around the central Indian for a minute, there
came a gap in the outer cordon, and the buck who had been in the
center stepped to the edge of the precipice, and hurled first his
rifle, then his bows and arrows, then his scalping-knife and hatchet,
into the chasm.
Having thus relieved himself of his arms, the buck returned, took his
place among those who were clasping hands in a circle, and another
armed buck got in the center.
After chanting and circling around the armed buck, the cordon broke
again, and _he_ stepped to the brink and relieved himself of his
weapons.
This strange proceeding must have been going on for some time, for
the second buck, as the pards could see, was the last one with
weapons.
When the second buck had stripped himself, he started on a lope up
the trail.
The scout, the trapper, and the girl, weapons in hand, backed against
the cliff and waited.
All the other Apaches fell in behind the one recently disarmed, and
trotted after him in single file.
Arriving opposite the whites, not an Indian paid the slightest
attention to them. With eyes glittering and head-feathers bobbing,
they kept on up the trail until the last one had vanished behind the
jutting rocks.
Old Nomad almost collapsed.
“Wouldn’t thet jest nacherly rattle yer spurs?” he said, in an awed
voice. “Whoever heerd of ’Paches actin’ like thet?”
“They have had a drink from that pool in the valley,” said Buffalo
Bill. “That lot of reds hasn’t the least idea of what’s going on.”
Nomad flung back his head and gave vent to a roaring laugh.
“This hyar is plumb comical!” he choked. “How long will ther spell
last, Buffler?”
“It lasted Dell and me all night,” replied the scout. “How much
longer it will hold the reds depends altogether on how much of the
water they drank, and when they drank it.”
“Reckon we better hike fer Tonio Pass afore they comes out from under
ther influence,” suggested the trapper; “although I ain’t skeered
none of er passel o’ unarmed reds, so long as I’ve got Saucy Susan
an’ Scoldin’ Sairy in my hands.”
“Queer, isn’t it, Buffalo Bill?” observed Dell, as she and the scout
trailed after Nomad.
“It is that,” said the scout. “If Geronimo doctored that pool, he
certainly overplayed his hand.”
“Ef Geronimo would only take er drink out o’ ther pool hisself,” said
Nomad, “mebbyso he’d walk right inter Camp Bonita er Fort Bowie an’
ask ther sojers ter put him in ther gyard-house. Thar’s er heap er
strange things in this leetle ole world thet we never know anything
erbout till we finds ’em out. Hey, Buffler?”