"They're skeered o' our rifles," he said. "We've got lightnin' that strikes at pretty long range, an' they ain't so shore that it ain't a lot longer than it is."
Will had learned the philosophy of making himself comfortable whenever he could, and lying with his hand on one arm he watched the cottonwoods, trusting meanwhile more to ear than to eye. Since the Indians in front, disappearing over the swell, had ceased to shout, the night became quiet. The wind was light and the cottonwoods did not catch enough of it to give back a song, while the creek was too sluggish to murmur as it flowed. His comrades also were moveless, although he knew that they were watching.
He looked up at the heavens, and the moon and the stars were so bright that they seemed to be surcharged with silver. The whole world, in such misty glow, was supremely beautiful, and it was hard to realize, as he lay there in silence and peace, that they were surrounded by savage foes, seeking their lives, men who, whatever their primitive virtues, knew little of mercy. He understood and respected the wish of the Sioux and the other tribes to preserve for themselves the great buffalo ranges and the mountains, but he was not able to feel very friendly toward them when they lay in the cottonwoods not far away, seeking his scalp and his life, or, if taken alive, to subject him to all the hideous tortures that primeval man has invented. The distant view of the Indian as a wronged individual often came into violent contact with another view of him near at hand, seeking to inflict a death with hideous pain.
The night did not darken as it wore on, still starred brilliantly and lighted by a full, silver moon, which seemed to Will on these lone plains of the great West to have a size and splendor that he had never noticed in the East. He and the Little Giant now faced the north, while Boyd and Brady, of the Biblical voice and speech, looked toward the south. All of them, when they gazed that way, could see the plain from which the force, intending to attract their attention by shouting and yelling, had retreated. But they knew the danger was still to be apprehended from the cottonwoods, and despite the long stillness they never ceased to watch with every faculty they could bring to bear.
The dip in which the horses and mules stood was only a short distance from the little fortification and unless the Sioux in attacking came very near their bullets were likely to pass over the heads of the animals. The four, resolved not to abandon the horses and mules under any circumstances, nevertheless felt rather easy on that score.
About three o'clock in the morning some shots were fired from the cottonwoods in the south, but they flew wild and the four did not reply.
"They came from a distance," said Boyd. "They're probably intended to provoke our fire and tell just where we're lying."
After a while more shots were fired, now from the north, but as they were obviously intended for the same purpose the four still remained quiet. A little later Will heard a movement, a stamping of hoofs among the animals, indicating alarm, and once more he crawled out of the breastwork to soothe them.
The horses and mules responded as always to his whispered words of encouragement and strokings of manes and noses, and he was about to return when his attention was attracted by a slight noise in the bushes on the farther side of the animals. Every motive of frontier caution and thoroughness inclined him to see what it was. It might be and most probably was a coyote hiding there in fear, but that did not prevent him from stooping low and entering the bushes.
The growth of scrub, watered by seepage from the stream, was rather dense, and he pushed his way in gently, lest a rustling of twigs and leaves reach the Sioux, lurking among the cottonwoods. He did not hear the noise again, and he went a little farther. Then he heard a sound by his side almost as light as that of a leaf that falls, and he whirled about, but it was too late. A war club descended upon his head and he fell unconscious to the ground.