“Where are their ponies?”
“They haven’t any,––leastways he was the only one that had, which is why I said he was some kind of a chief. We shall hear from ’em agin.”
“Why?”
“I mean after they find out about that little row.”
“Why need they find out about it?”
“They can’t help it; they’ll miss their chief; they’ll run across that horse of his and that’ll give ’em the clue.”
This unexpected discovery put a new face on matters. Five mountain Indians, the bravest and most implacable of their race, were almost within stone’s throw of the party. But for the occurrence of a brief while before, they probably would have permitted the white 220 men to continue their journey unmolested, since the strength of the two bands, all things considered, was about equal, but when the hostiles learned of the death of their leader, they would bend every effort toward securing revenge. They would dog the miners, watchful, alert and tireless in their attempts to cut them off from the possibility of ever repeating the deed.
“But that chief, as you seem to think he was,” said Captain Dawson, “is gone as utterly as if the ground had opened and swallowed him. They will never have the chance to officiate at his funeral, so how are they to learn of the manner of his taking off?”
“It won’t take ’em long,” replied Adams; “his pony will hunt them out, now that he is left to himself; that’ll tell ’em that something is up and they’ll start an investigatin’ committee. The footprints of our horses, the marks on the rocks, which you and me wouldn’t notice, the fact that we met the chief on that narrer ledge and that he’s turned up missing will soon lay bare the whole story, and as I remarked aforesaid, we shall hear from ’em agin.”
“It looks like a case of the hunter hunting the tiger,” said the parson, “and then awaking to the fact that the tiger is engaged in hunting him; it is plain to see that there’s going to be a complication of matters, but I don’t feel that it need make any difference to us.”