He was a fine figure of a man, standing six feet or better in his well-cut sandals and handling his heavy Mauser as a child would swing a stick. Across his broad chest he wore a full cartridge-belt, and around his waist he had two more, filled to the last hole with cartridges and loaded clips. At his feet lay his blanket, bound into a tight roll, and a canteen and coffee-cup completed his outfit, which, so far as impedimenta were concerned, was simplicity itself.
But instead of the cheap linen uniform of the Federals he was dressed in good American clothes—a striped shirt, overalls, and a sombrero banded with a bright ribbon—and in place of the beaten, hunted look of those poor conscripts he had the steady gaze of a free man.
They stood and smoked for a few moments, talking briefly, and then, as the Yaquis closed up their ranks and marched off to make camp for the night, Bud presented his strange friend with the sack of tobacco and went back to join his pardner.
That evening the plaza was filled with the wildest rumors, and another train arrived during the night, but through it all Bud and Phil remained unimpressed. In the morning the soldiers went marching off down the trail, leaving a great silence where all had been bugle-calls and excitement, and then the first fugitive came in from down below.
He was an old Mexican, with trembling beard and staring eyes, and he told a tale of outrage that made their blood run cold. The red-flaggers had come to his house at night; they had killed his wife and son, left him upon the ground for dead, and carried off his daughter, a prisoner.
But later, when the comisario questioned him sharply, it developed that he lived not far away, had no daughter to lose, and was, in fact, only a crazed old man who told for truth that which he feared would happen.
Notwithstanding the dénouement, his story stirred the Mexican population to the depths, and when Bud and Phil tried to hire men to push the work on the mine, they realized that their troubles had begun. Not only was it impossible to engage laborers at any price, but on the following day Cruz Mendez, with his wife and children and all his earthy possessions on his burros, came hurrying in from the camp and told them he could serve them no more.
"It is my woman," he explained; "my Maria! Ah, if those revoltosos should see Maria they would steal her before my eyes!"
So he was given his pay and the fifty dollars he had earned and, after the customary "Muchas gracias," and with the faithful Maria by his side, he went hurrying off to the store.
And now in crowded vehicles, with armed men riding in front and behind, the refugees from Moctezuma and the hot country began to pour into town, adding by their very haste to the panic of all who saw them.