“By heaven! the gray is mine at last!” exclaimed the renegade, in a low but exultant tone, as he fondly caressed the steed on whose back the marks of Frontier Shack’s Spanish saddle were plainly visible. “Here, Rattlesnake, hold the horse till I mount, and, Big Eyes, you take the girl.”
The Indian grasped the bridle, and Tom Kyle threw himself upon the iron-gray’s back. The next instant he gave Tecumseh the spurs, and the horse dashed away, leaving the three Indians standing beside their steeds.
They dared not follow Tom Kyle! in the last moment their courage had signally failed them, and they looked into each others’s faces with mingled shame and cowardice.
Tom was going to the Apaches, but they dared not ride into those southern wigwams. They had stolen Apache horses; they were known, and Tom, they now feared, could not protect them there. Perhaps, when they had served his purpose, he would desert them. They knew the treachery of the man they had served.
The renegade glanced over his shoulder and saw the motionless forms in the starlight.
“The greasy cowards!” he hissed. “That’s Pawnee nature, to desert a fellow when he needs help; but I don’t turn back now. I’m riding from a stake, to authority over a thousand Indians, who will not conspire for a fellow’s gaudy clothes.”
He sunk the spurs deeper than ever into Tecumseh’s rowels, and glanced down into the pale face that looked up to him with a smile of malicious triumph.
Flying from a stake to a kingdom!
It was a proud moment for Tom Kyle.
At last he reached a small tributary of the Loup fork and plunged into the water.