The message of the chief to the colonel was pretty fully given, leaving out some of the animals, birds, and insects he had put into it, and a council of war was called to consider the matter.
The council was unanimous. Without the supplies that had been lost it was out of the question to chase Apaches. Without a good guess as to precisely where Kah-go-mish had gone, they knew that he was away beyond the desert somewhere, either in Mexico or the United States, and they might as well give him up. It was therefore decided that all possible hunting and fishing should be done at once, and that the entire command must find its way to the nearest Mexican settlements as fast as it could go.
So far as Colonel Romero's Mexicans were concerned Kah-go-mish already felt pretty safe, but he was by no means sure what other forces of the same nation might or might not be out in search of him.
As for the blue-coats and cowboys, the chief knew something about a boundary line. There was one around the Mescalero Reservation, and he had broken it, but he was sure that pale-faces never did such "bad medicine." He was safe from the Americans until he should see fit to re-enter the United States. That is, however, that he was proud to feel and say that so great a chief as himself could not long be entirely safe anywhere. Too many army-men wanted to see him.
In the camp at Cold Spring, Colonel Evans and all his friends felt that they would give a great deal to know the exact circumstances under which Cal had written his cactus-leaf letter. It passed from hand to hand, for every man to take a look at it. The cavalry company was short of officers, not having brought along even one lieutenant. The orderly sergeant, therefore, was the man next in rank to the captain, but there was another sergeant and two corporals, and they each had much more to say than could rightly have been said by mere private soldiers.
All agreed that it was a remarkable letter; all were glad to hear that Cal was safe, and all were glad that there was to be no more need of bushwhacking and bugle-work in the hot chaparral.
The cowboys had opinions of their own, and most of them looked a little blue.
"Staked out!" exclaimed Sam Herrick. "Colorado! To think of Cal Evans staked out!"
"Wall, now, they let him up again," said Bill. "Looks as if they didn't allow to torter him, leastwise not right away. What a lot of wooden-heads we were, though, to let that there 'Pache that brought the leaf slip out of reach the way he did."
"The cavalry had him," said Sam. "I took my eyes off him just a second, and when I looked again he wasn't thar."