Our plan was simple. It had to be. We advanced until we could descry the figures of two of the herd-guards against the faint starlight, unkempt, naked striplings, lances wandlike in their right hands. On this, the village side, the task was easier, and so most of the guards were on the flanks and opposite to our position. Beyond the two guards was the restless mass of horses, some hundreds of them, grazing, fighting, rolling, sleeping.
Tawannears and I stripped off our shirts and breeches, and so assumed the general aspect of Comanche warriors, crawled back a short distance and then ran forward openly, as though we were carrying a message from the village. The two guards heard the patter of our moccasins and rode in to meet us, quite guileless, probably taking us for certain of their comrades. When they called to us, we answered with grunts, puffing mightily. They never suspected us. I was beside my man, had one hand on his thigh, before he guessed aught was wrong, and as he opened his mouth to cry a warning I had him by the throat and throttled the life out of him. His cry was no more than a gurgle in the night. Tawannears was even more expeditious.
To our left we heard another pair of guards talking together. They may have detected the choked cry of the one I killed. At any rate, we could not afford to pause to establish a plan for meeting them. Tawannears softly called up Kachina and Peter, and I rode into the herd, whistling for Sunkawakan-kedeshka. He answered me at once. A long-drawn-out whinny of delight, and he battered his way to my side with flying hoofs. I swung from the herd-guard's horse to his back, and trotted over to my friends.
"Quick, brother!" hissed Tawannears.
He pointed at two mounted figures that loomed perilously close. One of them hailed at that moment, mistaking me for a brother guard. I growled something indistinct in my throat, and heaved Kachina up in front of me, holding her in my arms and twisting my fingers in the stallion's mane in place of reins. He did not tremble under the extra weight, only tossed his head and wickered—much to my gratitude, for I was by no means sure how he would regard a double load, and I could not leave the girl by herself, considering she had never ridden before, nor to one of the others who were scarcely less ignorant of horsemanship.
Tawannears and Peter climbed gingerly on the horses of the slain guards, and we plunged into the center of the herd.
"Ha-yah-yah-yaaaa-aaa-aa-ah-hhh-yeeee-eee-ee!"
The war-whoop of the Long House split the silence of the night. I excited Sunkawakan-kedeshka to a frenzy. Tawannears and Peter thrust right and left with their captured lances. Half-tamed at best, these horses were restless of all restraint, and they reacted immediately to the turmoil. A shrill scream from the spotted stallion produced a chorus of responses. Mares fought to reach his side. Other stallions fought to keep them away. The herd went wild. Kicking, biting, neighing, screaming, it smashed aside the efforts of the herd guards to stop it and pelted southeast into the open prairie.
And in the midst of it my comrades swayed in their seats, in danger at any instant of being knocked to the ground. And Kachina and I clung desperately to the bare back of the stallion, his great muscles lifting him along at a stride which soon placed him in the fore of the stampede.
I saw one boy go down in the path of the mad rush, he and his mount trampled to a pulp. Others rode wide, shouting the alarm. The village behind us rocked to the thunder of hoofs; a cry of dismay rose to the stars that blinked in the dim vault overhead. Then teepees, herd-guards, warriors, trees and river were gone in the darkness. We were alone with our plunder on the prairie, all around us tossing heads and manes, flirting hoofs, lean barrels stretched close to the ground, tails flicking the grass-tips.