“I’ll get that gold, and then off for some other country!”
The girl moaned as he threw her brutally on the back of the horse and took the reins of the other horses. Climbing into the saddle he held the girl in front of him, and permitted the horses to walk quietly out of the little trees and away over the soft grass, which was so like a carpet that their hoofs made hardly a sound.
Yet this sound Buffalo Bill heard, as he left Smallpox Dave and started again in pursuit of Barlow.
But crafty Barlow, drawing rein and sitting in silence, also heard the scout, and he drew the girl closer to him.
“My dear, now we’re going to have a ride such as you read about!”
She shivered as she came back to consciousness, or at least partial consciousness.
“Where am I? And where are you taking me?”
“My dear May, you are with your ever-devoted servant, and we are off for a little ride. We’ll make it a pleasure trip, and perhaps there will be a wedding come of it very shortly. You don’t know me? Well, just at present I’m Reckless Joe, known hitherto as Lieutenant Joel Barlow. And here we go!”
He drove his spurs into the flanks of the horse he was riding, lashed the others, and was soon riding at wild speed away from the fort and straight out into the deep darkness of the night.
He heard the whiplike report of a revolver, and knew that Buffalo Bill had fired it to rouse the fort.