"Nonsense!" exclaimed Harry.
"Bill!" I said, "do you think the Major would have been such an idiot as to get trapped by the red skunks?"
"Why not? 'E mightn't be h'as thundering cute as you h'are, Cap!"
Unfortunately, as we soon discovered, my English friend was right in his supposition.
The sun had just risen when we started on our return, and before we reached the place where we had picketed our horses under guard the preceding day, we fell in with two of the survivors of the ill-fated party, and learned from them the details of the massacre, for which we had unwittingly just taken so large and wholesale a vengeance. This information completely obliterated every trace of compunction, for the morning's even more wholesale slaughter, which I had previously felt.
Crossing over to the south side of Honey Lake Valley, we followed it up to Captain Bird's old ranche.
After passing it, we found every house and farm empty and stripped of all that was in any way portable. The whole of the stock had also been driven off. But for the tramp of our hoofs, this portion of the valley would have been as silent as a desert.
"I'd say, Cap!" exclaimed Butch', "the cuss'd red devils had been here, too—only there are no dead men, laying round promisc'ous like."
Upon reaching Epstine's Ranche, we discovered the meaning of this. The owner, Joe, here informed us, the news of Ormsby's death, and that of most of the men with him, had reached the upper end of the valley on the day before. A complete terror had seized upon the whole of those then dwelling in it, and a general stampede had taken place amongst them for Dr. Slater's Ranche, above what is now the town of Janesville.
"Howev'r I guess'd I'd wait a bit, and see what turn'd up."