A deep hubbub as of bees around the hive was audible over and above the bellowing of these fiery cattle, and a vivid glare seemed to encircle the hacienda.
All at once, a yellow streak rose up in the sky, and a white star shone over the buildings and enclosures, and the multitude surging up against the pickets. Then the sky was striped luminously once more, but, this time, a rosy glare surrounded a red star.
"Now we come whooping!" shouted Oliver, participating, like even the Englishman, in the excitement of this frantic race at the heels of the terrified bearers of the flames, forming a line of fire of continuous aspect to the Yaquis in the hollow. "Level your lance—no! Draw rein! Draw rein! And swerve to the left! What in thunder is that cry behind us—on the sword hand? Great Jehosaphat! whar the Old Harry have they sprung up from! Apaches, by the living thingumbob! Apaches!"
In plain earnest, the "hugh-ug-hugh!" of the Apaches rang out of the pine forest, with an intonation of joy as if the sight of the rockets and the disclosures thereby of the farm which had already been their mark for massacre and pillage, had delighted them beyond control.
Then was heard, too, in a voice quite as gleeful and fiendish, the vociferation of a number of white men, in Spanish and in English.
"¡Viva! The Rustlers! Los Ruidores of Captain Pedrillo forever!"
"The Rustlers!" repeated Oregon Ol., in perfect stupefaction. "Open your airth and swaller me! The 'Pache' and the skunks they exchanged shots with—that shed their blood—'malgamated, by gum! Take me into a gully an' bury me! I'm licked!"
Meanwhile, not having the reasons for a halt that had checked the Mexicans in the very commencement of a charge, the cattle infuriated with the falling sparks from the wood beginning to become detached from their horns, and blinded with the smarting smoke, tore down the incline into the very vale where the Yaquis were crowded. Certainly their onset would create a consternation, preventing any attention being bestowed upon Oliver's little party, as it obeyed his earnest injunction and wheeled off into an island of trees.
In ten minutes, as the dawn grew upon the scene, they could very well discern, boldly emerging from the piney woods, not only some of the stragglers of the column the Mexicans had discomfited, but two bodies of mounted men, together over their own number, whom Oliver recognised as the Apaches and the banditti, whom they had left at daggers drawn, or, more exactly, at long shots with each other.
To explain this unparalleled occurrence in border records, the union of two hostile forces in brotherly ties for active operation, we must turn back a few pages.