"Bill Williams!"
It was the Cherokee and Filditch, and his eight or ten men besides.
"What's the meaning of all this?" said Filditch, as there was a group formed around the dead robber and the guide and the servant of Captain Kidd.
"In the first place," said the hunter, "there's your son in that young man. It is a sufficient card of introduction that he has rubbed out one of the vermin anyway, though we are lucky if their confounded rattle of shots does not spoil the scheme."
"My son!"
"Yes, Rosa's brother," went on the hunter. "We won't mind you two. Well, Mr. Dearborn, out of the trap?"
"Yes. I was looking for some of you, when I found there was a horseman below, and, on descending, was in time to see him overturned by a couple of shots from that ruffian. But the boy did not require my intervention. He avenged himself."
"Good boy! Well, now, all your information."
As soon as the hunter learnt details of the arrangement of the enemy, he formed a fresh variation, or rather supplement to the plan.
"Gentlemen," said Bill, thereupon, "over there, across the canyon, are the women and children. We will go straight to their camp. The guard know Leon and Mr. Dearborn, and, anyhow, Joe, their lieutenant, will accept them and remove any doubts. They will say they came back from the captain, who requites every spare hand, and decoy them into the bushes, where they must roaster them. The remainder should be but a gulp and they're gone, to us."