“I wish you would remain here until I signal for you to join me. It may be that if there is anything of the kind in the air, it will be best to let it alone, and there is more chance of that with one of us than with both. If I find myself in need of you I will call.”
Freeman could make no objection to this, and he sat down in the stunted undergrowth near the spring, reflecting that with the fervid heat he was likely to feel a renewal of thirst every fifteen minutes or less, and was favorably located for quenching the same without any trying delay.
“Listen for the signal,” whispered the lieutenant again, “and don’t join me until you hear it. I will make it as soon as I am convinced the way is clear.”
The space between the spring and the rock where they meant to await the return of Mendez was but little more than a hundred yards. It was broken by boulders, a number of depressions, with here and there a dwarf pine, one of those sturdy trees which seem to have the power of the moss to extract the needed nourishment where most plants would die for lack of it. Though the moon was almost overhead, it was impossible for either of the men to discern objects for a third of the distance which separated them. The lieutenant had not taken more than a dozen steps in his guarded manner, with his body in a crouching posture and all his senses alert, when the watchful Freeman was as much alone as if the nearest man were miles distant. The brave young officer was swallowed up in the gloom and gone.
“Now,” thought the elder, finding himself alone, “the Apaches must know about this spring; those people I suppose understand what hunger and thirst are, though they have less trouble from it than any persons I ever met, and it isn’t impossible that some of them may take a notion to drink from the same spring. That being the case, the prudent thing for me to do is to imbibe freely while I have the chance.”
Having drank deeply only a few minutes before, Freeman felt as if he must make excuse to his conscience for his dissipation, but the water was delicious and the supply all-sufficient. He quaffed his fill, and then replacing his hat stole softly from the spot and assumed a crouching posture behind a convenient boulder, where there was little likelihood of an enemy stealing upon him unawares.
“The lieutenant is full of pluck,” he reflected, “but the pluckiest man that ever lived sometimes needs the help of a child. There isn’t anything he wouldn’t do for me, and I will stand by him to the last extremity.”
Meanwhile, Lieutenant Decker was alert and guarded in every step he took. His principle that while in the Apache country every indication of possible danger, no matter how slight, should be accepted as the reality, was the right principle. Its disregard has brought death to many a brave soldier on the frontier. Lieutenant Decker welcomed a lively brush with the hostiles, but he would have been the idiot which he was not, to disregard the experience of those that had fought these fierce people before he was born, while brief as was his own experience, its lesson was too impressive to be forgotten.
For perhaps a fourth of the distance he advanced almost on his hands and knees, stealing from boulder to boulder, at times almost flat on his face, then raising his head, peering here and there, looking and listening with the utmost keenness at his command.
“There is no wind blowing though I heard a rustle once or twice; I don’t think there has been enough to move a leaf for the last half hour. Now and then we meet wild animals in this part of the world, but that slight noise—if there was a noise—wasn’t made by any of them. It looks as if some of the Apaches are hereabouts.”