Chapter XXXI.
PULL STICK AND THE HURRICANE.
Ping and Tah-nu-nu had had no good reason for complaining of their captivity. They had been well fed, they had each a magnificent handkerchief and a looking-glass medal, they had heard any number of new stories from the old Chiricahua, and they had seen how high the old manitou could make the spring jump when he heard good news. They were almost conscience-smitten to find how friendly were their feelings towards all those wicked cowboys and blue-coats, but they were sure that they could get over it all and be good Apaches again as soon as they should get out of that camp.
One thought came, every now and then, to trouble Tah-nu-nu. Colonel Evans had said that he meant to take Ping home with him and make a farmer of him, and Tah-nu-nu's mind drew a humiliating picture of The-boy-whose-ear-pushed-away-a-piece-of-lead come down to work in a cornfield with a hoe.
She spoke about it to Ping, and he replied with some awful reminders of stories he had heard of the cruel manner in which little Indian girls were sometimes treated by hardhearted pale-face squaws. She might have felt worse but for a memory she had of a beautiful ribbon given her by a white lady at the Reservation headquarters.
Both of them knew that the cowboys and the blue-coats intended to march away early the next morning, and it added more than a little to their respect for the Apache manitou who managed the Cold Spring water-works. They believed that the great jump of the fountain had produced such an effect upon the pale-faces that their chiefs had determined to give up the pursuit of Kah-go-mish. The old Chiricahua was still detailed to watch the movements of the chief's children, but they were not tied up that night.
Neither had Cal been all day in the camp where he had been staked out the night before. He had seemed to listen so attentively to the stern warnings given him against any attempt at running away, and he had shown such good sense that very morning, that he was allowed to walk around as he pleased. He did so, and he succeeded in putting on an air of easy unconcern, although he knew that his movements were all closely noted by the keenest kind of human eyes. He could hardly for a moment be beyond the range of those of the dog-soldier police, but their watch was blindness itself compared to that of the squaws and the young people.
The boys, of all sizes, avoided coming too near him, but it was not long before he made up his mind that every large tuft of weeds around that camp contained a Mescalero in his teens or under them. Little six-year-olders stepped away from behind trees, or sauntered out of bushes, or seemed to have errands which led them right past him. All of his own faculties were in a state of strained wakefulness, and he did not allow such things to escape him.
"I'll see the whole camp, anyhow," he said to himself, somewhat late in the day, after he had become accustomed to the queer sort of freedom given him. "I won't give them any excuse for piling fire upon me, but I want to know all about this place."