"Oh, what must we do?" ejaculated Miss Maclan.
"The lady asks you what'll we best do?" repeated the half-breed sarcastically, eyeing the young man as if to "value him up."
"Cut our way through them!"
"That's good to say, but how can it be done? The gold seekers number two hundred, and perhaps half of them are crowding in off the plain now. You and I may trust these horses as far as horses can travel, but encumbered with the lady, that one will run double risk as a bigger mark of an arrow and bullet."
"I dare!" said Ulla simply.
But Dearborn shuddered at the idea.
"Take her, man! I will trust you," said he, "stranger though you are, in all senses of the word; and leave me to detain them from an instant pursuit."
"Oh, they have their own roasting pieces to spit," said Bill.
"What is your advice, sir? Your tone is that of a commander here," said Ulla, regarding the Cherokee steadily as he bore himself nobly erect and unaffected, though, better than either, he estimated the dangers of the situation aright.
"I say, in the hands of these robbers you will run no risk for the present, whilst I guarantee this man's safety if we but reach a certain point on these horses."