"His back was turned to me, and he was watching the house. I pulled in my pony and kept my eye on him for several minutes.
"Then I saw Mrs. Graham come out of the house and stand for a moment on the back porch.
"The Indian rose up and brought a rifle to his shoulder. At that I let out a yell, and he turned to me like a flash, and pulled his trigger. But he was in too much of a hurry, an' the ball whistled over my head.
"I had my gun out, an' blazed away. The Indian yawped as if he had been hit, and disappeared. I got to the coulee as fast as I could, but he had disappeared."
"Was he the only one?" asked Ted.
"I reckon not, for there were any number of moccasin tracks in the coulee, and the footprints of white men or Indians who wore boots. There was a splotch of blood where the Indian had been, and a red trail leading to where there had been ponies. Then I came on to the house."
Ted was thinking deeply. At last he raised his head.
"This has been a day full of things that may mean a great deal to us," he said. "Follansbee has been shot by a member of the Whipple gang, Sol Flatbush was killed after mutilating our cattle, more Whipple gang; and an Indian prowler has been shot, some more of the Whipple gang. Boys, the war is on, and it depends on us whether it is going to last all winter and cause us to lose all our cattle, or whether we are going to be able to stamp it out right now. Which shall it be?"
"I reckon we'd better get busy. It'll be easier ter do the job now than fuss along with it all winter," said Pike Bander, who was an old Northern cow-puncher, and had had lots of experience with the Indians in Montana, the Dakotas, and Wyoming.
"I think you're right, Pike," said Ted. "And now off to bed with you. There'll be something doing to-morrow."