"Wah!" he grunted. "Cannot you send warriors to meet warriors?"
"The women who go with our band fight with our band," returned Tawannears coolly. "They sit with the warriors."
The Tonkawa eyed the wood behind us, and it must have occurred to him that no other figures were in view. But if he considered taking the offensive at that juncture, he abandoned the idea when Peter rode up beside him and clamped huge paws on two of the bundles of weapons. I took the third bundle and passed it to Kachina, intending to keep my hands free for whatever might happen. But the Tonkawa evidently decided to run no unnecessary risks. He and his men skilfully packed the twenty horses together and herded them toward the northern bank. We, on our part, headed south.
We had not reached the shore, when we heard the racket of hoofs and looked back to see the remainder of the Tonkawa streaming down to the bank, the weariest of their mounts flogged to the gallop, lances brandished overhead. Their chief, weaponless as he was, never stopped to retrieve his arms from the northern bank, but put himself at the head of his warriors as they stormed into the water. Splashing, yelling, whooping, they shoved our herd before them, those with failing ponies dropping off in the shallows to mount bare-backed the first fresh horse they could catch.
"Run, brothers!" said Tawannears curtly.
With a blind thought for some such emergency, I had picked for our mounts Sunkawakan-kedeshka and three of his mares. The stallion loved to run; his favorites, I knew, would exert every energy to keep up with him. The four fairly flew up the bank and out upon the prairie. We were a long mile in the lead when the first of the Tonkawas straggled into sight. They would capture the rest of the herd in the wood, but we could not help that. Our one purpose was to place as much distance as possible betwixt us and that demon throng.
It grew darker and darker. The afternoon was well advanced, but sunset came late these Summer days. The gloom was unnatural. Objects showed distinctly in the gray light, and behind us was formed a strangely vivid picture—a belt of open grass; then the low-lying figures of our pursuers, their ponies stretching to the furious pace; then the green bulwark of the trees; and over all the dense, smoky-black canopy of the storm-clouds, arching nearer and nearer. The sun was blanketed completely. The last patch of blue sky dwindled away in the east. A low moaning sound made me wonder if the shouts of the Tonkawa could carry so far. Kachina turned in her saddle and pointed.
"Look!" she cried.
We obeyed her. The Tonkawa had stayed their pursuit. They were yanking their horses to a halt. Some of them already were heading back toward the wood. The moaning sound grew louder. The cloud-curtain in the West stretched now from the prairie's floor to the sky's zenith, sootily impenetrable.
"They fear the storm!" cried Kachina.