CHAPTER XXII
A THRILLING RESCUE IN MID-AIR
Buck, the guide, and Elmer Grissom had reached their appointed rendezvous at two o'clock that afternoon. The hot journey had been tedious and uneventful. Only at the half-breed settlement twenty miles north of Clarkeville had they seen a human being. Therefore, after they had been in camp about an hour, even the vigilant, experienced Buck was startled to observe suddenly a solitary Indian—his horse as statuesque as himself—watching them from a knoll some two hundred yards distant.
As the old scout raised both hands in signal of peace the Indian rode forward. The man was not in the Indian panoply of the old days, except that he wore moccasins and had two bands of red and yellow paint on his broad, dark face. A black wide-brimmed hat, a faded blue shirt and trousers completed his outfit.
"How?" exclaimed the Indian.
"Navajo?" answered Buck.
"Ute!" came the answer. "Where go?"
"Right here," said Buck good-naturedly, pointing to the ground.
"Ute land!" retorted the Indian without a trace of expression in his face.
"No," retorted Buck sharply, "not Ute land. Ute land there," pointing north, "in Colorado."