The Warrior's Last Ride.—Muffled Feet.—Bit Off More Than We Could Chew.—The Cunning Warriors Tricked Us.—We Carried Water in My Boots.—Captain Lee Captures Their Camp.—How Lumpkins was Killed.—The Sewall Gun Hoodooed the Comanches.—The Blood-curdling Yell, and We were Afoot.—They Sure Waked Us Up.—Gathering the Clans.
I ran down the hill. Remounting, I said, "Come on, boys." Down the cañon we went, meeting the expedition. After a brief report, Campbell said: "We must get him, or he will ride on down, strike our trail, and give the whole thing away." He added: "Say, Keyes, you are an Injun. Can't you get that fellow?" Then he ordered Freed "to go up on the hill and watch him." When he got up on the hill, which was only a few rods from us, he said to us, "Now, boys, keep perfectly quiet. He is in a fox trot, going east, and he is coming in closer to the cañon." One of the Englishmen, whose camp had been plundered and destroyed, slipped off from a wagon, ran up the hillside and said: "Where is the bloody cuss? I want to kill him myself."
Keyes had ridden back down the cañon and had gone up a side draw to intercept and kill him as he passed. By this time two of the other boys had joined Freed, and, all unconscious of his near approaching death, the Quohada Comanche was nearing the breaks.
The Englishman was armed with an express rifle, which he had brought from Europe. Keyes had daubed both of his cheeks, demonstrating the fact that "blood is thicker than water," and that the Indian blood in his veins had cropped out in his actions.
On came the Quohada. These Indians had sneaked up and stolen Marshall Sewall's life, and perhaps this same sign-rider was one of the party. He was nearer the cañon. His Winchester rifle was in a scabbard, fastened to the trappings of his saddle. The Englishman fired, and he fell from his horse. Al. Waite and I were side by side facing each other at the time. He whirled his horse and started up, and I with him. When we got up on the flat the Indian was trying to get upon his feet, and, his pony having bolted, was running on in the direction they had been going. We soon overtook him, but he would dodge us, and in a zigzag he would keep angling in closer to the breaks of the cañon.
The two trail-watchers whom Campbell left behind when we came into the cañon now hurried on up to have a hand in what was going on. The four of us finally caught the pony. I was not afraid but what Waite or I either could run ahead of him, but he was an artful dodger, and simply did not wish to be caught.
By this time we were over a mile down the cañon from the rest of the boys. When we got back to them they had taken the Indian's body down in the bottom, and left it in some tall reeds near a water-hole, so it would be out of sight for the present.
Keyes wanted to take the scalp. But some of the boys said, "No, no, Louie; we will kill them, but we must not mutilate the bodies."
Every field-glass—and there were twelve in the crowd—was now put to use. Campbell now sent ten men ahead with glasses. He sent Jim Smith in charge. They were to put out guards above the camping-place, on both sides of the cañon, and also below the same. Hosea, the Mexican, went along with them.