The scout wondered what it could mean, for he recognized the voice of an artillery piece—it was not a blast, as the uninitiated might suspect.
At mid-afternoon he was approaching a pass in a rough section of country, and the trail showed little usage. The sides of the ravine were broken and precipitous, while the banks of a small stream along which the trail ran were thickly clothed in willow. The scout, half instinctively, looked to his guns, and rode erect and alert in his saddle.
Somehow those three heavy reports had put a suspicion in his mind. Bear Paw was nervous. He pranced along the narrow trail uneasily, with sensitive ears darting forward and back to catch every sound, and nostrils breathing a half snort at every breath.
Suddenly the intelligent animal sprang forward so quickly as to almost unseat a rider who had never been thrown, and as he did so several rifle shots rang out and bullets whistled about the head of the scout.
The shots had been fired from both sides of the trail by men secreted in the dense growth. The nervousness of the horse had for the moment saved the scout’s life. The horse skimmed along the trail like a bird on the wing as the scout wheeled in the saddle with rifle ready to greet any who might try for a second shot.
In that position the scout was illy prepared for the next dastardly move of the men bent on taking his life.
A rope suddenly lifted ahead of the horse. The animal tripped over it, and plunged headlong down an embankment where river and trail veered sharply, and its rider was hurled far over, landing in several feet of muddy water and struggling to the surface half stunned by the impact.
The horse regained its feet and limped up the bank. The man swept the water from his eyes, and started to follow the horse, when four rifles clicked and a hoarse voice shouted:
“Say your prayers while I’m countin’ twenty, Buffalo Bill, for then you die.”