Adele Robison listened for a short time longer, but finally determined that it was best to retire.
A heavy burden rested upon her young heart. Someone had probably been shot in the pass. That “someone” was doubtless the friend who had so closely followed on after the flight at the crossing of the Marias River.
Who was it?
Her heart grew faint, and her mind dared not suggest an answer. At last sleep came to soothe her wearied brain. It was a calm and quiet sleep, that lasted a long time. At least, so it appeared to Adele when she awoke. In the darkness she lay and wondered where she was, how long she must remain, how it would end.
Tom Rutter’s appearance, with refreshments, told her that without the cave it was daylight.
He was very silent. From anything he might say, she could glean no information as to the probable length of her stay in the cavern, and her ultimate destination after having emerged therefrom. She would have asked, concerning the movements of the Indians, whom she had overheard mentioned as approaching on the previous night, but she cared not to confess herself an eaves-dropper. Tom saved her from trouble on that score, by saying, just as he was leaving:
“Keep yer heart up for the next few days. Thar’s a consid’rable lot o’ Injuns about here, that I don’t keer about meetin’ jist now. Ef we don’t do that, we’ll hev to lay down here till they clar out, and there’s no sartainty when that’ll be.”
CHAPTER V.
MEETING OF ARCHER AND PARSONS.
We need scarcely tell the reader that the horseman at whom Dawson had fired was none other than Waving Plume. As he recklessly urged his horse along the rugged pass, he heard the hail of the outlaw, but thought not of answering it. Then suddenly and furiously did his horse turn, that before he could well understand what had happened, Archer found himself upon the ground in the midst of his whole equipage, while the animal was almost out of hearing.