THE GARRISON OF SANTA LUCIA.
Fully six miles from the threatened home of the Evans family there was a
deep, round sink-hole, shaped like a funnel. Nobody knew exactly when or
how it was made, but down at the weedy bottom of it lay the body of an
Indian pony, and over that there leaned a very tall man.
Up at the margin of the sink-hole were four horses, and three of them
had riders.
"Well, colonel, how does it pan out?" asked one of the mounted men.
"Either Cal or Sam Herrick did it. Hit him right between the eyes.
'Tisn't two hours since it was done. The critter rolled down here.
Joaquin, you and Key ride for the ranch. Tell Mrs. Evans I'll scout a
little and be right there."
"All right, colonel," shouted one of the horsemen.
"Si, senor," responded the other.
The first was a brawny, freckled old fellow, with nothing to mark him
for notice but a jaunty sort of roll and swagger, even in the saddle.
The second speaker was an American, of the race that fought with
Hernando Cortes for the road to the City of Mexico. He may or may not
have been a full-blooded Tlascalan, but there was a fierce, tigerish
expression on his face as he glanced at the dead pony. His white teeth
showed, also, in a way to indicate the state of his mind towards the
tribe the pony's owner belonged to, but the words he uttered carried a
surprise with them. Who would have thought that so sweet and musical a
voice could come from such a thunder-cloud face?
Key and Joaquin galloped away, and Colonel Evans climbed up out of the
sink-hole.
"Somebody coming," suddenly exclaimed the remaining horseman.
"Reckon it must be Sam."
"Looks like him, Bill," said the colonel. "Coming on the run."
"We'll know now!" and Bill's words came out in a harsh, rasping voice
that matched exactly with his long, thin body and coarse yellow hair.
The colonel stood by his horse waiting for Sam. Nobody who saw him once
was likely to forget him. His eyes and hair were like Cal's, but the
likeness did not go much further. There was silver in his heavy beard
and mustache, and his eyebrows were bushy, giving him a stern, and, just
now, a threatening expression. More than that, Colonel Abe Evans, old
Indian trader and ranch owner, stood six feet and seven inches, although
he was so well proportioned that at a little distance he did not seem
unusually large. As to his strength, his men may have exaggerated a
little, now and then, but they declared that whenever a horse tired
under him he would take turns and carry the horse, so as not to lose
time. He hated to lose anything, they said, but most of all he hated to
lose his temper.
There were signs that he was having some difficulty in keeping cool just
now, but his voice was steady, as yet.
"Is that your work?" he asked, as Sam reined in and stared down at the
dead pony in the sink-hole.
"Colorado!" exclaimed Sam. "That's where that 'Pache went to. Hit the
pony, did I? 'Peared to go out of sight powerful sudden."
He paused for a moment, and he wiped his forehead, but there was a
steely light beginning to dance in the eyes of Colonel Evans, and the
cowboy continued: "No manner of use blinking it, colonel. The lower
drove's gone. Took me by surprise. Reg'lar swarm. I reached the upper
drove in time and stampeded it across Slater's Branch. Every hoof."
"Did they follow you?"
"Oh, yes, a gang of 'em, but Cal and I stood 'em off."
"Cal!" exclaimed his father, with a start and a shiver, but Sam went
steadily on in a rapid sketch of the morning's adventures.
"Sam Herrick," said the colonel, "keep the gray you're on. It's your
horse. I can read the whole thing like a book. Of course they wanted
beef and horses, but they may go for the ranch. Come on!"
There was an angry shake, now, in the deep, ringing tones of his voice,
and the veins in his forehead were swelling. He sprang to the saddle of
the broad-chested, strong limbed thoroughbred held for him, and that
seemed just the horse for the strongest man in southern New Mexico.
"Sam," said he, as they rode away, "what's your opinion?"
"Cal got there safe, long before the redskins could. We can do it, too,
if they worked long enough over their beef. If we get there first, we
can hold Saint Lucy against twice as many. But if we don't--"
Neither of those horsemen said another word after that. Sam knew no more
than the rest did of what was actually going on at the ranch.
More than a little had been going on, and with quite remarkable results.
Hardly had Cal disappeared through the gateway of the stockade before
the two in the veranda turned and looked wistfully at one another.
"Mother," said Victoria, "do you think there is really any danger?"
"Terrible danger, my dear," said Mrs. Evans, with a quiver in her firm
lips.
"Then what made you send Cal away? Oh, mother!"
"We are as safe, almost, without him as with him, and the whole valley
is in danger until the army officers are warned. They believe that
everything is quiet."
"How I wish they were here! And father!"
"Victoria," exclaimed Mrs. Evans, with a face that grew very pale, "he
went to look at the lower drove, the one that the savages have
captured."
"Sam didn't see him, or Cal would have said so. Mother, you don't
believe they killed him?"
There was a strange look in the resolute face of Mrs. Evans.
"Vic," she said, "I don't believe they have touched him. He's not the
man to be caught. We must work, though, for they'll be here pretty
soon. We must bar the gate, first, and any prowling Indian needn't be
told that there are only women behind the stockade."
Vic's quick dash for the gate expressed her feelings fairly, but she put
up the bars of the gate with more strength and steadiness than might
have been expected of her. But for the reddish tint of her hair she
would have looked even more like Cal than she did when she turned and
said: "There, mother, that's done. Now, what?"
Mrs. Evans studied the gate for a moment.
"Vic," she said, "everybody must help. I think we can hold the ranch.
Come with me."
In half a minute more they were standing in the courtyard of the adobe,
explaining the terrors of the situation to a group of five startled and
frightened women. Seven in all, they were the only garrison of Santa
Lucia, and Kah-go-mish and his warriors were coming to surprise it. How
long could they hold out?