“Yes!” replied Carlos, looking back; “and a good start I’ve gained on them!”
“What’s best to be done?” inquired Don Juan. “Shall we scatter through the chapparal, or keep together? They’ll be upon us soon!”
Carlos hesitated a moment before making reply. Three plans of action were possible, offering more or less chance of safety. First, to scatter through the chapparal as Don Juan had suggested; second, to make off together and at once without showing themselves, taking the back track, as they had come; and, third, to show themselves in front to the pursuers, and then retire on the back path. Of course the idea of fight was not entertained for a moment. That would have been idle, even absurd, under the circumstances.
The mind of the cibolero, used to quick action, examined these plans with the rapidity of thought itself. The first was rejected without a moment’s consideration. To have scattered through the chapparal would have resulted in certain capture. The jungle was too small, not over a couple of miles in width, though extending to twice that length. There were soldiers enough to surround it, which they would do. They would beat it from side to side. They could not fail to capture half the party; and though these had made no demonstration as yet, they would be connected with the affair at the Presidio, and would be severely punished, if not shot down on the spot.
To attempt to get off through the chapparal without showing themselves at all would have been the plan that Carlos would have adopted, had he not feared that they would be overtaken before night. The Tagnos were mounted on mules, already jaded, while most of the troopers rode good and swift horses. But for that Carlos might have hoped that they would escape unseen, and thus neither Don Juan nor his people would have been suspected of having had any part in the affair. This would be an important consideration for the future; but the plan was not to be thought of. The third plan was adopted.
The hesitation of the cibolero was not half so long as the time you have occupied in reading of it. Scarce ten seconds elapsed ere he made reply, not to Don Juan alone, but to the whole band, in a voice loud enough for all to hear. The reply was in the form of a command.
“Ride through the bush, all of you! Show yourselves near the front! your heads and shoulders only, with your bows! Give your war-cry! and then back till you are out of sight! Scatter right and left!—Follow me!”
As Carlos delivered these hurried directions, he dashed forward through the underwood and soon appeared near its edge. The Tagnos, guarded by Don Juan on one side and Antonio on the other, showed almost simultaneously in an irregular line along the margin of the thicket; and flourishing their bows above their heads, they uttered a defiant war-whoop, as though they were a party of savage Indians.
It would have required a practised eye to have told from a short distance that they were not. Most of them were bare-headed, with long flowing hair; and, in fact, differing very little in appearance from their brethren of the plains. They all had bows, a weapon still carried by the Indios mansos when engaged in any hostilities; and their war-cry differed not at all from some tribes called “bravos,” “wild.” Many in the band had but a short time left aside the full practice of warfare. Many of them were but neophytes to the arts of peace.
The effect of the demonstration was just what the cibolero had calculated on. The soldiers, who were galloping forward in straggling knots, and some of whom had got within three hundred paces of the chapparal, reined up in surprise. Several showed symptoms of a desire to gallop back again, but these were restrained at sight of a large body of their comrades now issuing from the Presidio.