Well, tears glistened on the eyelids of some of the bronzed veterans at the sight of the tiny lock of hair. We had barely escaped taking the wrong trail.
"God bliss the darlint," said grizzled Tom Clary. "There's not a ridskin can bate her with their tricks. We'll bring her back to her frinds, b'ys, or it'll go hard wid us."
Clary's remarks were subscribed to by many hearty exclamations on the part of his fellow-soldiers. We had no difficulty in understanding that the Apaches had expected to be pursued and had dropped the ribbon to mislead us, and that Brenda had dropped her "sign" to set her friends right.
I asked the guides if it was not probable the Apaches had set a watch on the overlooking heights to see which road we should take at this point.
"It's sartin', liftinint," answered Weaver; "they're watchin' us sharp jest now."
"Then we had better continue on the northern trail awhile and mislead them, you think?"
"That's it, liftinint. That's th' best thing to do. We needn't reach their camp until after midnight, an' we might 's well spend th' time misleadin' em."
"Yes, and it'll be better to reach them a few hours after midnight, too," added Cooler; "they sleep soundest then."
"Then we will go on as we began for some time longer," I replied, and the soldiers again moved at a brisk canter over the northern trail.
An hour passed, and a halt was made in a grassy nook, where the horses were turned out to graze until dusk. Our route was then retraced to the fork and the march resumed over the southern branch.