“Good deal like the foothills of th’ Snake Range, pop,” put in President Tyler Pine.
“We been riding purty nigh every minute sence we left here,” agreed Bagsby. “That rancheree was hard to find.”
Little by little the tale developed. No one man, in the presence of all the others, felt like telling us the whole story. We gathered that they had ridden the cañon for several hours, past our first camping grounds, and finally 241 out into the lower ranges. Here they lost the trail left by the Indians when they had first visited our camp; but in casting in circles for it had come on fresher pony tracks. These they had followed persistently for many miles.
“I couldn’t see the sign of a track for a mile at a time, on that hard ground,” interpolated Johnny.
At length the tracks had struck into a beaten trail.
“And then we knew we were on the way to the rancheree,” said Bagsby.
The village they found located in a flat by the side of a stream, and they halted to determine just what to do. It was finally decided that while an attack on horseback would undoubtedly strike more instant terror, yet the difficulty of shooting accurately from a gallop would more than offset this effect. Therefore nine of the party crept up afoot, leaving three to lead forward the horses some distance in the rear.
“I was one of them,” said Johnny. “They evidently have seen me shoot. I seem to be always out of it.”
The men had wormed their way to within a hundred yards of the flimsy huts, or tepees, when they were discovered by the dogs. The Indians immediately rushed out pell-mell, in a crowd, and were met by a deadly volley from the white men’s rifles. Caught absolutely by surprise, they turned and fled. Some few loosed random arrows. Their horses coming up at a run in convoy of the rear guard, each man threw himself into his saddle and started in pursuit, shooting right and left with the Colt’s revolvers whenever they caught up with the fugitives. Johnny told 242 admiringly how the backwoodsmen had reloaded their rifles while galloping.
“All I could do to shoot mine off, let alone loading!” he confessed.