"Listen well!" warned Salezar, his beady eyes aglint. "There are two kinds of men who do not speak; the wise ones, and the ones who have no tongues!" He made a significant gesture in front of his mouth, glared down at the two muleteers and, wheeling, dashed down the trail to overtake the carreta, where he gloated aloud that his prisoner might hear, and know where she was going, and why.
The two Pueblos listened until the hoofbeats sounded well down the trail and then scrambled up the mountain side like goats, reaching the little nook as Pablo dragged the seriously wounded Mexican over the edge. They worked over him quickly, silently, listening to his broken, infrequent mutterings and after bandaging him as best they could they put him on a blanket and carried him to the trail and along it until they reached an Indian hovel, where they left him in care of a squaw. Returning to the atejo they had to repack every mule, but they worked feverishly and the work was soon done and the little train plodded on down the trail. At the foot of the mountain Pablo said something to his companions, left the trail and soon was lost to their sight.
Meanwhile the carreta, after a journey which was a torture, mentally and physically, to its helpless occupant, reached the town and rumbled up to Salezar's house, scraped through the narrow roadway between the house and the building next door and stopped in the windowless, high-walled courtyard. Three soldiers quickly carried a blanket-swathed burden into the house while the others loafed around the entrance to the driveway to guard against spying eyes. In a few moments the captain came out, briskly rubbing his hands, gave a curt order regarding alertness and rode away in the direction of the palacio, already a colonel in his stimulated imagination. This had been a great day in the fortunes of Captain Salezar and he was eager for his reward.
The sentry at the door of the palacio saluted, told him that he was waited for and urgently wanted, and then stood at attention. Salezar stroked his chin, chuckled, and swaggered through the portal. Ten minutes later he emerged, walking on air and impatient for the coming of darkness, when his task soon would be finished and his promotion assured.
And while the captain paced the floor of his quarters at the barracks and dreamed dreams, an honest, courageous, and loyal Mexican was fighting against death in a little hovel on the mountain side; and a Pueblo Indian, stimulated by a queer and jumbled mixture of rage, gratitude, revenge, and pity, was making his slow way, with infinite caution, through the cover north of town. Sanchez in his babbling had mentioned the caravan, a gringo name, and the urgent need for a warning to be carried. Salezar's name the Pueblo already knew far too well, and hated as he hated nothing else on earth. The mud-walled pueblos of the Valley of Taos were regarded by Salezar as rabbit-warrens full of women, provided by Providence that his hunting might be good.
CHAPTER XXII
The encampment of the returning caravan was in a little pasture well outside the town and it was the scene of bustling activity. Its personnel was different from either of the two trains from the Missouri frontier, for it was made up of traders and travelers from both of the earlier, west-bound caravans. Some of the first and second wagon trains had gone on to El Paso and Chihuahua, a handful of venturesome travelers were to try for the Pacific coast, and others of the first two trains had elected to remain in the New Mexican capital. While in the two west-bound caravans there had been many Mexicans, their number now was negligible. But this returning train was larger than either of the other two, carried much less freight, a large amount of specie, and would drive a large herd of mules across the prairies for sale in the Missouri settlements, which would fan the fires of Indian avarice all along the trail.
Uncle Joe and his brother had been busy all day doing their own work, catching up odds and ends of their Santa Fe connections, and helping friends get ready for the long trip, and they had not given much thought to Patience, whom they believed to be saying her farewells to friends she had made in the city. As the afternoon passed and she and her escort had not appeared, Uncle Joe became a little uneasy; and as the shadows began to reach farther and farther from the wagons he mounted his horse and rode back to Santa Fe to find and join her. It was nearly dark when he galloped back to the encampment and sought his brother, hoping that Patience had made her way to the wagons while he had sought for her in town. He knew that she had not called on any of her friends and that she must have stolen a last ride through the environs of the town. The two men were frankly frightened and hurriedly made the rounds of the wagons and then started for the city. It was dark by then and as they rode by the last camp-fire of the encampment, four villainous Indians loomed up in the light of the little blaze and Uncle Joe recognized them instantly. He drew up quickly.