Buffalo Bill, with the glasses again in his hands, turned them full on the man whom the red-feathered Indians lassoed.
“The baron!” broke from his lips. “Baron von Schnitzenhauser!”
“Thunder, and carry one!”
“Waugh! It cain’t be; it jes’ cain’t be, Buffler!”
But there was no doubt about it. Buffalo Bill knew the baron too well. There was the round body and the slender legs, like a pippin on a pair of toothpicks; there was the characteristic clothing; even the baron’s frightened face could be seen distinctly with the glasses as the lariats threw him down.
There was but one thing strange and puzzling—the shoes the baron had on his feet; they bobbed up into full view as he fell forward under the pull of the ropes.
Then even that mystery was solved; the baron was wearing Dutch wooden shoes.
That explained the gigantic tracks in the sand. The baron, wearing those monstrous wooden shoes, had been the man following the tracks of the pony.
He had reached the spot where he now was, had been detected there by the red-feathered Indians, and was now their prisoner.
It was impossible to help him, though near enough to be distinctly seen, he was still too far off to be reached quickly.