All unconscious of her narrow escape, Rosebud headed away to the northeast. She had no elaborate scheme of route. With the instinct of her prairie training she knew her direction. She would make her destination as the crow flies, chancing everything, every danger, so that she could make the best 311 time; no personal considerations entered into her calculations.
She could see the reflections of the camp-fires in the sky in every direction, but, with a reckless courage, she cared nothing for this. A more calculating mind might well have shrunk from the dangers they suggested. To her they meant no more than obstacles which must be confronted and overcome. She knew nothing of strategy in warfare; of cover there was none in the direction she was taking.
Like the line of great soldiers from whom she was descended she understood riding straight only. Let the fences and pitfalls come, let them be what they might, she would not swerve. Whatever the emergency, she was prepared to confront it, and, like a thorough sportswoman but a bad general, to take her chance, relying only on her good horse and the darkness, and the proverbial luck of the reckless.
Though this was her general idea she did all she could to help. A featherweight, she still strove to ride lighter. Then she had her firearms, and she steeled her heart to their use. After all she came from splendid fighting stock.
She allowed herself no thought of failure. She must not fail, she told herself. They were waiting for help in the stockade behind her; patient, strong, a man of lion heart, who knew defeat only when the last shot was fired, the last blow struck, and he was left helpless to defend himself and those others, he was waiting. Her thoughts inspired her with the 312 courage of a brave woman whose lover is in grave peril, than which there is no greater courage in the world.
Now the moment of her peril drew near. Every raking stride of her willing horse cut the brief seconds shorter and shorter. The lurid reflections of the camp-fires in the sky had given place to the starlike glow of the fires themselves, and every yard of the distance covered showed them larger and plainer against the sky-line.
She was riding straight for the middle course of the black space dividing two of the fires ahead. There was little to choose in any direction, so complete was the circle around the farm, but she had been quick to see that that little lay here.
She measured the distance she had to go with her eye. It was not far, and instinctively she reined her horse up to give him breathing for the great effort to come; an effort which she knew was to be very real indeed. Approaching steadily she made her preparations. Freeing her right arm from her blanket she drew one of her revolvers and saw that it was fully loaded. Then she closely scrutinized the fires. She could make out the general outline of two vast camps away to the right and left of her. The fires were in the midst, and right to the limits of the lurid light, she could see the dim outlines of innumerable tepees, and crowds of moving figures. It was a sight to put fear into the heart of a daring man, then how much more so into the heart of a frail woman? 313
The black stretch before her seemed devoid of tepees, but she was not sure. Of one thing she felt convinced, even if the camps were confined to the fires there was no likelihood of these wide intervals being left unguarded.
Her horse refreshed, she put him into a strong gallop, and in a few minutes had entered the danger zone. Almost on the instant her surmise proved correct. The air directly ahead of her split with a fierce yell. She knew it. It was the Sioux war-cry. The supreme moment had come. It must be now or never. Clinching her moccasined heels into her horse’s barrel she sent him racing headlong. And as he rushed forward she gripped her revolver ready for immediate use.