"They're making a stand down there!"
"Come on!" cried Captain Marshall, and, a few minutes later the fight against the Yaquis began.
CHAPTER XX
THE WHITE FLAG
The boy ranchers—at least two of them,—were much disappointed at the manner in which this fight against the Yaquis started. And I think I need not say that the two I mean were Dick and Nort. Bud, while he had never before taken part in a fight against Indians, did not expect so much of the romantically picturesque and so was not so disappointed.
But like most healthy lads Nort and Dick, in their early days, had read many books about the west, stories of adventures among the cowboys, miners and Indians—especially the latter. And all the stories had to do with the dashing manner in which the redmen fought, when they fought in the open. Of course, when they had the chance, the Indians preferred to sneak up on their victims and take them unawares. It was easier than standing up against gunfire.
But when the Indians had fought there was a dash and spirit about their attack that made the blood run faster in the veins. The redmen would begin circling about the band they were to attack, riding their ponies faster and faster as they approached, leaning over on the far side, to bring the animal's body between themselves and the hail of bullets. Then the doughty Indian, hanging to his saddle blanket by one moccasined foot would fire from under his pony's neck, dashing away in time to escape the white man's bullet.
That was warfare to make any real lad wish to toss aside his school books and hike for the great WEST!
And it was by anticipating such scenes as this that Nort and Dick were disappointed. But, in a way they had been prepared for it by seeing what manner of Indians the Yaquis were. No warpaint, no feathered headdresses, no necklaces of bears' claws, and of course no bows and arrows.
It must be admitted that the stories on which Nort and Dick had fed their imaginations were true enough about the time they were written. But the romantic Indians died off, or were confined on reservations, and those who occasionally sneaked over the border from Mexico, to make raids by which they gathered in cattle, ponies and weapons, were not of this class.