“Better, though still faint and dizzy. But how— I remember falling, and then all is blank. How did you find me, and where am I? There were some Indians chasing me; where are they?” confusedly asked Clara, in a faint tone.
In a few quick words the stranger explained the part he had played in the adventure.
He was an officer of a Government train of supplies, and had started out on a scout, together with one of their guides, an Indian named Delaware Tom, but had become belated while following up a trail. They had resolved to encamp for the night, when they were aroused by wild yells and the sound of hoof-strokes.
Then they saw a woman rise the hill’s crest, and almost immediately fall from her horse, as it stumbled. He sprung forward and caught her, while Delaware Tom crept to the hill-top to learn what had so alarmed her.
He soon made out the figures of the pursuing savages, and then the two scouts had hidden in the bushes, with the unconscious maiden, until the war-party had thundered by, in hot pursuit of the riderless horse. Then they had hastened with Clara to the creek, where they succeeded in restoring her to consciousness, by the plentiful use of water, aided by a stronger fluid incased in a flask carried by the captain.
And then Clara briefly detailed her portion of the adventure, adding:
“If I do not thank you for this service, it is because I can not find words to express my feelings. I would rather die than fall into their power!”
“Thanks are not needed, believe me. I am amply repaid already for the trifle I was enabled to do, by knowing you are safe from those fiends. But you spoke of your father—is it possible that he is my old commandant, Major John Calhoun?”
“He served in Mexico, and his given name is John.”
“It must be the same, then! Did you never hear him speak of Harold Travers? He saved my life at Cerro Gordo,” eagerly added the captain.