Around the corner of the house they looked out and back across the plain. The Mexican rider had reined in at long rifle range. His Indians were dismounting and creeping out through the bushes to right and left while one of them held all their horses by a handful of halter ropes. Finally the Mexican also dismounted and joined them in the ambush attack. Their idea was evidently to creep up close and then carry the house by a simultaneous rush.
“Fooled ’em, all right!” grinned Big John. “They shore think that Niltci got hurt in the shootin’ an’ we brought him in hyar lashed to his saddle. Let ’em come! You an’ I mought’s well be a-sprinklin’ the sage, Scotty, so as to make it more excitin’. Don’t shoot nobody—tain’t wuth it.”
He went to the other corner of the house and opened fire with the .35. Nothing loath, Scotty tore loose with the monstrous shout of his big .405. It made a fine noise, and its bullets ripped and ricochetted across the sand, throwing up small shell-spouts like a naval gun. Answering shots and the whizz and smash of lead bullets striking the building told the youth that this was not all play. Whatever story Vasquez, if it was he, had told the Papagoes it had evidently aroused them to an unwonted fury. It all seemed incredible, preposterous to Scotty. The Bean-Eaters were the most peaceful of red men. Were it not corn time he could not have believed that they were really fighting in earnest.
“Got them hosses watered, Sid?” called out Big John presently. “Bring ’em hyar; show’s comin’ off, pronto.”
Sid led the horses back under the shelter of the house and ran to help in the defense. Shots rang out in the sage, coming from both sides on their flanks. It was getting high time to move on, before one of the horses should be hit. Sid aimed carefully behind a puff of white smoke that rose from a creosote bush at his right, and let go with his .30 army carbine. Before he could watch the result a yell and a shout of laughter from Scotty spun him around. Out there on the plain a funny thing was happening. The Indian in charge of the Papagoes’ horses had now apparently mounted one of them and was riding off with the entire bunch!
It was several seconds before Sid realized the truth—that that white rider with the red bandanna about his forehead could be none other than Niltci himself! While Sid had been shooting, the Navaho boy had crept up through the sage, knocked down the Papago holding the horses and ridden off with all of them!
At sight of this disaster a chorus of vengeful whoops rose out of the desert all around them and two or three Papagoes leaped from cover in a futile spurt to catch the runaways. Sid could have bowled them over easily but he was instantly recalled by Big John’s shout.
“Mount and ride, boys!” the big cowman was yelling. He himself leaped up on the white mustang and the boys followed hard after, riding along the banks of the red pond. A flock of teal rose in a great flutter of wings and there were yells and imprecations behind them from out in the creosote bushes, but they waited not to hear them. Big John was guffawing so that he could hardly keep his saddle. “Sing, redskins!—Yell, ye pisen horned toads! Ain’t it a grand an’ glorious feelin’ to be set afoot though!” he shouted back at them. “Gosh durn it, boys, I ain’t hed so much fun since we made Apache Sam eat a rattlesnake! Niltci an’ I, we cooked up thet hoss-thievin’ stunt whilst ridin’ out hyar. Blaze, he jest nat’rally helped!”
As for Niltci, he was now making a wide circle around the other side of the pond, leaving behind him the screaming and fist-shaking Vasquez, who stood in the sage searching his soul for Spanish expletives that would relieve his feelings! Niltci rode in to join them shortly after, with all the Papago ponies following him and a broad grin on his face.
“Mucho bueno!” he grunted. “What do with pony?”