Again the Indian shook his head. “I must get back to my tribe,” he murmured.
Again Dan restrained Old Miquel as he would have arisen.
“You must lie still,” he directed. “You’ve been hurt.”
“Hurt?” Miquel repeated parrot-fashion. “The fall from my horse?”
“A tumble into the pool of this cave,” Dan corrected. “You struck your head on a rock or something. What’s the last you remember?”
Old Miquel was silent for a long while. Dan thought he never would answer, but finally he said.
“I remember—riding through a canyon. My horse shied at a rattler.”
“And that’s the very last?” Dan demanded. “Don’t you recall anything at all about White Nose and Eagle Feather? Or the face you carved on the ravine?”
“White Nose and Eagle Feather are my brothers.”
“They’ve been after you,” Dan informed. “They came all the way from the west, picking up your trail here in Webster City.”