It was horrible to see how that devoted little band continually diminished in numbers.
There were hardly forty left now, and in ten minutes these had become less than twenty. The end was near at hand.
Yates still lived, although the only commissioned officer.
His face was very white, and streaked with blood, so that old Pandy, still fighting like a hero, hardly recognized the man who touched his arm.
"Old friend, try to escape and carry the news to Crook and Reno. If you succeed, tell them to let my folks know how I died, and that my last were of them. The old seventh has made a record that——"
It was never finished; the fatal bullet came, and as brave a man as ever presented his face to the foe succumbed to the inevitable.
Pandy seemed to hesitate an instant, then his powder-begrimed face lit up.
"I'll do it, bust my buttons. Might az wal die tryin' it az hyar. Good-bye, boys; I'm in fur death, or ter carry ther news ter Crook. Nancy, away wid ye," and the knife point sent the animal bounding among the Indians.
Ten minutes later and all was over. The ravine looked like a slaughter-pen in the daylight, and even when the Sioux, glutted with blood, searched among the heaps of slain for any who might live, the sun sank out of sight as if ashamed to look upon such a horrid scene, and a merciful darkness hurried to close over the ravine of death.