“They must have crept under the waggon, and broken a hole through, for the brandy lay there treasured up in case of illness.”
“I’ll thrash ’em both till they can’t crawl!” cried Joses, wrathfully. “I didn’t think it of them. It’s no good though to do it to-night when they can’t understand. Let them sleep it off to-night, my boy, and to-morrow morning we’ll show the Beaver and his men what we do to thieves who steal liquor to get drunk. I wouldn’t have thought it of them.”
“What shall you do to them, Joses?” said Bart.
“Tie them up to that old post of a tree, my boy, and give them a taste of horse-hair lariat on the bare back. That’s what I’ll do to them. They’re under me, they are, and I’m answerable to the master. But there, don’t say no more; it makes me mad, Master Bart. Go back now, and let them sleep it out. I’m glad I moved that powder.”
“So am I, Joses,” said Bart; and after a few more, words he returned to the little camp, to find the two offenders fast asleep.
Bart was very weary when he lay down, after glancing round to see that all proper precautions had been taken; and it seemed to him that he could not have been asleep five minutes when he felt a hand laid upon his mouth, and another grasp his shoulder, while on looking up, there, between him and the star-encrusted sky, was a dark Indian face.
For a moment he thought of resistance. The next he had seen whose was the face, and obeying a sign to be silent, he listened while the Beaver bent lower, and said in good English, “Enemy. Indians coming.”
Bart rose on the instant, and roused the Doctor, who immediately awakened Maude, and obeying the signs of the Indian, they followed him into the shadow of the mountain, for the Beaver shook his head fiercely at the idea of attempting to defend the little camp.
It all took place in a few hurried moments, and almost before they were half-way to their goal there was a fierce yell, the rush of trampling horses, and a dark shadowy body was seen to swoop down upon the camp. While before, in his excitement, Bart could realise his position, he found himself with the Doctor and Maude beyond the narrow entrance, and on the slope that seemed to lead up into the mountains.
As soon as Maude was in safety, Bart and the Doctor returned to the entrance, to find it well guarded by the Indians; and if the place were discovered or known to the enemy, it was very plain that they could be easily kept at bay if anything like a determined defence were made, and there was no fear of that.