But for a short while does this tranquillity continue. Soon once more upon the river’s bank resound rough voices, and rude boisterous laughter, as a band of mounted men coming from the Mission side, spur their horses down into its channel, and head to go straight across. While under the shadow of the fringing timber, no one could tell who these merry riders are; and, even after they have advanced into the open moonlight, it would be difficult to identify them. Seeing their plumed heads with their parti-coloured complexions, a stranger would set them down as Indians; while a Texan might particularise their tribe, calling them Comanches. But one who is no stranger to them—the reader—knows they are not Indians of any kind, but savages who would show skins of a tripe colour, were the pigment sponged off. For it is the band of Borlasse.
They have brought their booty thus far, en route for their rendezvous.
Gleeful they are, one and all. Before them on their saddle-bows, or behind on the croups, are the boxes of silver coin; enough, as they know, to give them a grand spree in the town of San Antonio, whither they intend proceeding in due time.
But first for their lair, where the spoil is to be partitioned, and a change made in their toilet; there to cast off the costume of the savage, and resume the garb of civilisation.
Riding in twos across the river, on reaching its bank they make halt. There is barely room for all on the bit of open ground by the embouchure of the ford road; and they get clumped into a dense crowd—in its midst their chief, Borlasse, conspicuous from his great bulk of body.
“Boys!” he says, soon as all have gained the summit of the slope, and gathered around him, “it ain’t no use for all o’ us going to where I told Quantrell an’ Bosley to wait. The approach to the oak air a bit awkward; therefore, me an’ Luke Chisholm ’ll slip up thar, whiles the rest o’ ye stay hyar till we come back. You needn’t get out of your saddles. We won’t be many minutes, for we mustn’t. They’ll be a stirrin’ at the Mission, though not like to come after us so quick, seeing the traces we’ve left behind. That’ll be a caution to them, I take it. And from what our friend here says,” Borlasse nods to the half-blood, Fernand, who is seen seated on horseback beside him, “the settlers can’t muster over forty fightin’ men. Calculatin’ there’s a whole tribe o’ us Comanches, they’ll be too scared to start out all of a suddint. Besides, they’ll not find that back trail by the bluff so easy. I don’t think they can before mornin’. Still ’twont do to hang about hyar long. Once we get across the upper plain we’re safe. They’ll never set eyes on these Indyins after. Come, Luke! let you an’ me go on to the oak, and pick up the stragglers. An’ boys! see ye behave yourselves till we come back. Don’t start nail, or raise lid, from any o’ them boxes. If there’s a dollar missin’, I’ll know it; an’ by the Eternal—well, I guess, you understan’ Jim Borlasse’s way wi’ treeturs.”
Leaving this to be surmised, the robber chief spurs out from their midst, with the man he has selected to accompany him; the rest, as enjoined, remaining.
Soon he turns into the up-river trace, which none of those who have already travelled it, knew as well as he. Despite his greater size, neither its thorns, nor narrowness, hinders him from riding rapidly along it. He is familiar with its every turn and obstruction, as is also Chisholm. Both have been to the big oak before, time after time; have bivouacked, slept under it, and beside booty. Approaching it now for a different purpose, they are doomed to disappointment. There is no sign of creature beneath its shade—horse, man, or woman!
Where is Quantrell? Where Bosley? What has become of them, and their captives?
They are not under the oak, or anywhere around it. They are nowhere!