"Load, boys! Quick!" shouted Bowie. "They haven't surrounded us, but that's what they're up to. There's another!"
The third Comanche was galloping too fast to be made a good mark of, but three bullets followed him and his pony dropped. Then it was not one of the Texans but Tetzcatl on his mule who now spurred forward. He had not gone to help anybody, for his machete was in his hand.
"Red Wolf, halt!" commanded Bowie. "Tell! Talk fast!"
It was not easy to obey an order that kept him from striking an enemy, but Bowie was his chief just then, and the story of the pond, the adobe, the four Comanches, and all other points worth telling, were rapidly told.
"Good!" said Bowie. "Tetzcatl's coming. That fellow can't give Great Bear any information. Now for the pond. What we want next is water."
The entire party wheeled away behind Tetzcatl as guide, and Red Wolf fell back among the men. He did not yet feel free to question so great a man as Big Knife, but he learned from the rangers as they rode on that their whole party had narrowly escaped a collision with "too many Comanches" at the spot where they had met the Tlascalan. "We'd ha' been wiped out sure," they said.
After that they had dodged and lurked in the chaparral, while he went for a scouting trip to the pond. It now seemed fairly safe to go there, but there was no certainty as to what had become of the main body of the Comanches. Of course, after having broken his agreement to go home, Great Bear felt it to be his military duty to destroy a squad of Texans who might otherwise report him and bring a stronger force to punish his misdoings.
If the pond had hitherto been one of the secrets of the chaparral, it was one no longer now. Loud, however, were the exclamations of surprise uttered by the Texans when they rode out into the open.
"There's no telling what 'll be found if ever the chaparral is cleared," said Bowie. "We don't know much anyhow. Texas must be free first, and settlers must come in."
"Colonel," said a ranger, "jest so; but no settler's goin' to clar chaparral as long as thar's loads o' clean prairie to feed stock on. This 'ere brush 'll stay whar it is."