“Listen!” said the scout. “There seems to be plenty of life in one of the buildings.”
A roar of voices broke fitfully from a large log structure in the midst of the huddled cabins. The roar died away in silence, and then rose again, proving that there was excitement of some sort going on in the place.
“If Lawless is in this camp,” observed Buffalo Bill, “that’s where I shall find him. I want you to stay with the horses, Dell,” he added, as he dismounted, “and, if I need you, ride at once to that cabin. We may have to get out of the gorge in a hurry.”
“Look well to yourself, pard,” adjured Dell, reaching forward and taking hold of Bear Paw’s bridle-reins.
“I always do that,” said he. “The crack of a revolver will be your cue to gallop into the camp.”
Sitting anxiously in her saddle, Dell watched Buffalo Bill stride rapidly in among the log cabins.
No one appeared to ask the scout questions or to dispute his progress, and it was quite evident that every miner who was not at work in the gorge was at that moment in the structure toward which the scout was laying his course.
This fact, of itself, held a portentous significance. Had Lawless gathered the men of the camp in that building in order to harangue them and take his pick of those willing to join his gang?
As the scout came nearer the structure, he noted the massive logs used in its walls; the wide, high door, the gaping loopholes, cut at intervals at shoulder height, and the strong oaken shutters swinging at the windows.
“It has the appearance of a fort,” he said to himself. “I wonder if the people of Pima take refuge there when the Indians are up, or if they fear the military more than they do the reds?”