Gradually, or with less difficulty than would be suspected, the ranger brought all his men together, or they gathered around the families whom they had set out to escort to the block-house. Although they could hardly see each other's forms in the darkness, a few minutes sufficed to prove none were missing. All were there, but, ah! for how long should this be said of them? "We are so near Rattlesnake Gulch," explained Hastings, "that if we go a hundred yards further, we'll walk straight into the ambush the varmints have set for us."
"What is to be done?" asked Mr. Altman, in a guarded undertone.
"We'll move a little further down the slope to the edge of the river, and wait for Kenton or Boone; one of them will be here purty soon."
Mr. Ashbridge now made known what Jim Deane had declared in his broken way. Before he could be questioned, the fellow, who was still nearer sobriety, said:
"Boys, you think I don't know what I'm saying; I'm not as sober as I oughter be, but I give it to you straight; you've made a big mistake, and I'll prove it to you."
CHAPTER XI.
WATCHING AND WAITING.
Deane had rapidly regained control of his senses during the past few minutes. The open air, the continued action of his body and the growing consciousness of the imminent peril of the company, combined to give him mastery over the insidious enemy that he had taken into his mouth to steal away his brains.
By this time, too, his friends were convinced that he was not talking at random, and that when he spoke of the "fort" near at hand he had ground for his words.