More than once the old scout was forced to slacken his pace, so as to avoid distancing the jaded horses, and an uneasy light filled his eyes as he noted how rapidly the savages were coming up with them, lessening the intervening distance with every bound. And yet not more than one-half the distance to the hill had been covered.
"Make haste, Ed—dog-on it, man, put the critters down to it!" he hissed, impatiently, at one of these slackenings. "Use your knife fer a spur."
"Where are you going? They're overtaking us fast!" apprehensively cried the old settler, glancing backward over his shoulder.
"To the hill yander—ef they let us. Use the knife, I tell ye—ef you don't, we're goners!"
Under the impulse of this novel spur, the horses dashed forward with considerably-augmented speed, and now the hills loomed up quite near. But so were the red-skins, who now began sending their compliments after the fugitives, in the shape of sundry leaden bullets, but as the Indians feared to pause in order to secure a good aim, lest the fugitives should thus be able to distance them, there was little to dread save from some random missile.
Tobe Castor then cried out:
"Foller right on through the openin' thar; then turn to your left, right sharp."
As he uttered these words, the old scout dashed ahead at an astonishing rate of speed, and entered a narrow defile or pass, that here cut through the range of hills. As his comrades could see, he turned to the left, as he had directed them to do.
With anxiously-beating hearts, the fugitives dashed through the pass, and then, guided by a loud cry in the voice of their friend, turned to the left and reached the spot where he was standing.
"'Light—quicker'n thunder! You wimmen run into them bushes thar, an' lay close. Ed, you an' Jack stan' by me. We'll sicken the imps fer good, this time!" hurriedly muttered the scout, as he lifted Jennie Stevens from his horse's back; then striking the animal violently with his hand, it dashed off at full speed along the hill's foot.