NO TRAIL
The chase, which had been flung far, swung back towards Deadman Canyon, where the trail of the fugitives had disappeared; and with the others came the Randolphs and Isham Scarborough, riding up the creek from Tonto. Apache trailers came drifting in, drawn like vultures by the crowd; and soon, under their guidance, the search party crossed the creek and came out on the bench below the castle. Hall and Allifair could hear their shouts as they found the marks of his first turkey-trap, in the underbrush above the little spring; and then the chase led on to the cliff-dwellings below them, where Hall had made camp the first time. But the signs were all old and they came back to the spring, where they could look up and see the lost castle. Every word that they said could be heard now perfectly and Allifair trembled as she listened.
"Well, the house is there, ain't it?" argued Isham, trying to bully the Apache trailers. "How'd they git up to it? Well, busca the trail!"
"No! No tlail!" responded the Apaches, and that was the last heard of them, for the cowboys had taken sides on the matter. Some swore that the trail came down from the top, and that they could see a kind of bear-track down the cleft; and the others were just as positive that it had ascended the cliff but had been lost by a cave-off of the rock.
"No! No tlail!" repeated the Apaches when the uproar had subsided, and Isham Scarborough came back at them angrily.
"You're scairt, you black rascals!" he shouted. "Hey, Charley—you take me up that mountain? Well, there now—you see? These danged Injuns are buffaloed—they're afraid Old Man Baker will kill 'em!"
"No! No 'flaid!" grunted the Indians, but they would not go up the chasm, for no Apache ever set foot on Baker Mountain.