Chapter XXV.
A STRANGE LETTER FROM MEXICO.
Ping and Tah-nu-nu had not been staked out that first night after their capture. Precisely how to keep them safely, yet humanely, had at first been a puzzle.
"If they once got away into the brush," said Sam Herrick, "you might as well hunt for a pair of sage-hens, and they'd about die before they'd be caught again. The boy's a game little critter, and the gal's got an eye like a hawk."
It was decided that they must be tied up, but it was so done as to inflict very little hardship. A thong of hide, knotted hard, so that nothing but a knife could undo the knot, connected an arm of each captive with a stout arm of a mesquit bush, close to the sharp-eyed sentinel at the head of the widest path.
There was no danger of any escape, and both Ping and his sister were wiser and tamer than Sam gave them credit for. They understood the kindness of Colonel Evans better and better every time they looked at the little mirrors or the stunning handkerchiefs. They were also aware that the Apache band had left the chaparral, for the message brought from Kah-go-mish by the Mexicans had been translated to them carefully. Their night was, therefore, not at all uncomfortable.
When the cavalry and cowboys set out to hunt for Cal in the morning, the old Chiricahua volunteered to act as guard while they were gone. It was almost as if he had taken a fancy to Ping and Tah-nu-nu, or it may have been that Sam was correct in saying, "The old wolf'd rather loaf under a bush and spin yarns than hunt through the chaparral under this kind of sunshine."
Loaf he did, in seemingly contented patience; and he had yarns to spin, as if he had been Wah-wah-o-be. Not a few of them related to old-time fights which had been fought around that very spring, in and out of the chaparral. Some of his stories were of a dreadfully blood-curdling kind, but they hardly seemed sensational to Ping and Tah-nu-nu. Perhaps the story which interested Ping most was a long one of a strong party of an unknown, nameless tribe from beyond the Eastern Sierras. They were tall braves, almost black, and they came all this distance to strike the Apaches.