"MY GOD! WHAT CAN HAVE HAPPENED? IT'S CAPTAIN GWYNNE!"
In an instant the young officer commanding the party came running to the scene and bent breathlessly over the senseless form.
"It is Captain Gwynne," he said; "bring more water. Go to my pack, one of you, and get the sponge you'll find there. Fetch me my flask, too. Which way did he come? Did none of you see?"
"None, sir. The first we knew he was right over us. He never spoke a word, but fell like a log."
And then the rough-looking, bearded, anxious faces hovered about the prostrate man. His heart-beats were so faint that the young officer was terribly alarmed. No surgeon was with the little party and he hardly knew what to do. The whiskey forced down Gwynne's throat seemed powerless to revive him. Full an hour he lay almost motionless, then little by little the pulse grew firmer and respiration audible. At last there was a long, deep sigh, but still he did not open his eyes. Consciousness returned only very slowly, and when Mr. Hunter had called him by name time and again and begged him to speak, he sighed even more deeply than before, the lids slowly drew back, and the almost sightless eyes looked feebly around. Then, with sudden flash of memory, the poor captain strove to rise. "My babies!" he moaned; "my babies!"
"Where did you leave them, captain? Tell us. I'll send for them instantly," said Hunter. "Sergeant, saddle up right off. This means something."
More whiskey, a long draught, and more cold water, presently revived him so that he could speak collectedly.
"I left them with Pike—in the Pass. My Mexican ran away with the mules—followed and found your trail—my horse fell on me and then rolled over a precipice—killed. I've come on foot ever since."
"Thank God, you're here safe anyhow! Now lie still. I'll leave a guard with you and we'll go as fast as we can through the darkness and find Ned and Nellie."
"No! no! I must go. I will go, too. See, I can stand. Give me a horse."
And so, finding him determined and rapidly regaining strength, Hunter made the captain eat all he could bear to swallow then, and, stowing more food in their saddle bags, away went the gallant little troop hurrying through the starlit night for Sunset Pass and rescue.
But the way was long; road or trail there was none. Over rugged height, through deep ravine, they forced their way, but not until all the sky was blushing in the east did they come to the old Wingate road, and the gloomy entrance to the Pass. Up they rode at a steady trot, Gwynne and Hunter leading, and, at a sudden turn of the road, far in towards the western side, their horses recoiled, snorting with fear, from a heap of smouldering embers, in the midst of which lay a fearful something,—the charred and hissing body of a human being. Gwynne groaned aloud at the sight and then drove his horse up a rocky pathway to the left, the others following. There lay the smoking ruins of an ambulance with scraps of clothing heaped about on every side, and here the stricken father's waning strength left him entirely. With one heartbroken cry, "My babies—my little ones. They are gone! gone!" he was only saved from falling by the prompt action of two stalwart troopers.
In ten minutes, supporting the fainting soldier as best they could, the detachment was marching rapidly westward.
"Sieber with the scouts can't be farther away than Jarvis Pass. We'll meet him," said Hunter to his sergeant, "and trail these Scoundrels to their holes."
His words were true. Before ten o'clock they had met, not only Sieber, but Turner's troop from Verde, coming full tilt, and Gwynne was now turned over to the doctor's care.