and those two, refusing to halt at his demand, had been overtaken and one of them seized, to his bitter cost, for the other had driven a keen-bladed knife through his ribs, even as he sought to examine his captive. "They wouldn't spake," said he, "so what could I do but pull the shawl from the face of her to see could she be recognized?" Then came the fierce, cat-like spring of the taller of the two. Then the well-nigh fatal thrust. What afterwards became of the women he could say no more than the dead. Norah might rave about its being the Frenchwoman that did it to protect the major's lady--this he spoke in whispered confidence and only in reply to direct question--but it wouldn't be for the likes of him to preshume. Mullins, it seems, was a soldier of the old school.

Then came fresh and dire anxiety at Sandy. Four days after Blakely's start there appeared two swarthy runners from the way of Beaver Creek.

They bore a missive scrawled on the paper lining of a cracker box, and it read about as follows:

CAMP IN SUNSET Pa.s.s, November 3d.

COMMANDING OFFICER, CAMP SANDY:

Scouting parties returning find no trace of Captain Wren and Sergeant Carmody, but we shall persevere. Indians lurking all about us make it difficult. Shall be needing rations in four days. All wounded except Flynn doing fairly well. Hope couriers sent you on 30th and 31st reached you safely.

The dispatch was in the handwriting of Benson, a trooper of good education, often detailed for clerical work. It was signed "Brewster, Sergeant."

Who then were the couriers, and what had become of them? What fate had attended Blakely in his lonely and perilous ride? What man or pair of men could pierce that cordon of Indians lurking all around them and reach the beleaguered command? What need to speculate on the fate of the earlier couriers anyway? Only Indians could hope to outwit Indians in such a case. It was madness to expect white men to get through. It was madness for Blakely to attempt it. Yet Blakely was gone beyond recall, perhaps beyond redemption. From him, and from the detachment that was sent by Bridger to follow his trail, not a word had come of any kind. Asked if they had seen or heard anything of such parties, the Indian couriers stolidly shook their heads. They had followed the old Wingate road all the way until in sight of the valley. Then, scrambling through a rocky labyrinth, impossible for hoof or wheel, had made a short cut to the head waters of the Beaver. Now Blakely, riding from the agency eastward slowly, should have found that Wingate trail before the setting of the first day's sun, and his followers could not have been far behind. It began to look as though the Bugologist had never reached the road. It began to be whispered about the post that Wren and his luckless companions might never be found at all. Kate Sanders had ceased her song. She was now with Angela day and night.

One hope, a vague one, remained beside that of hearing from the baker's dozen that rode on Blakely's trail. Just as soon as Byrne received the Indian story concerning Wren's disappearance, he sent runners eastward on the track of Sanders's troop, with written advice to that officer to drop anything he might be doing along the Black Mesa and, turning northward, to make his way through a country hitherto untrod by white man, between Baker's b.u.t.te at the south and the Sunset Mountains at the north. He was ordered to scout the canon of Chevlon's Fork, and to look for sign on every side until, somewhere among the "tanks" in the solid rock about the mountain gateway known as Sunset Pa.s.s, he should join hands with the survivors of Webb's troop, nursing their wounded and guarding the new-made graves of their dead. Under such energetic supervision as that of Captain Sanders it was believed that even Apache Yuma scouts could be made to accomplish something, and that new heart would be given Wren's dispirited men.

By this time, too, if Blakely had not fallen into the hands of the Apaches, he should have been joined by the intended escort, and, thus strengthened, could either push on to the pa.s.s, or, if surrounded, take up some strong position among the rocks and stand off his a.s.sailants until found by his fellow-soldiers under Sanders. Moreover, Byrne had caused report of the situation to be sent to the general via Camp McDowell, and felt sure he would lose no time in directing the scouting columns to head for the Sunset country. Scattered as were the hostile Apaches, it was apparent that they were in greater force northward, opposite the old reservation, than along the Mogollon Range southeast of it. There was hope, activity, animation, among the little camps and garrisons toward the broad valley of the Gila as the early days of November wore away. Only here at Sandy was there suspense as well as deep despond.

It was a starlit Sunday morning that Blakely rode away eastward from the agency. It was Wednesday night when Sergeant Brewster's runners came, and never a wink of sleep had they or their inquisitors until Thursday was ushered in. It was Sat.u.r.day night again, a week from the night Neil Blakely strove to see and say good-by to Angela Wren. It was high time other runners came from Brewster, unless they, too, had been cut off, as must have been the fate of their forerunners. All drills had been suspended at Sandy; all duty subordinated to guard.

Cutler had practically abolished the daily details, had doubled his sentries, had established outlying pickets, and was even bent on throwing up intrenchments or at least digging rifle pits, lest the Apaches should feel so "c.o.c.ky" over their temporary successes as to essay an attack on the post. Byrne smiled and said they would hardly try that, but he approved the pickets. It was noted that for nearly a week,--not since Blakely's start from the agency,--no signal fires had been seen in the Red Rock country or about the reservation. Mr.

Truman, acting as post quartermaster, had asked for additional men to protect his little herd, for the sergeant in charge declared that, twice, long-distance shots had come from far away up the bouldered heights to the west. The daily mail service had been abandoned, so nervous had the carrier become, and now, twice each week, a corporal and two men rode the rugged trail, thus far without seeing a sign of Apaches. The wire, too, was undisturbed, but an atmosphere of alarm and dread clung about the scattered ranches even as far as the Agua Fria to the west, and the few officials left at Prescott found it impossible to rea.s.sure the settlers, who, quitting their new homes, had either cl.u.s.tered about some favored ranch for general defense or, "packing" to Fort Whipple, were clamoring there for protection with which to return to and occupy their abandoned roofs.

And all this, said Byrne, between his set teeth, because a b.u.mptious agent sought to lay forceful hands upon the daughter of a chief. Poor Daly! He had paid dearly for that essay. As for Natzie, and her shadow Lola, neither one had been again seen. They might indeed have dropped back from Montezuma Well after the first wild stampede, but only fruitless search had the soldiers made for them. Even their own people, said Bridger, at the agency, were either the biggest liars that ever lived or the poorest trailers. The Apaches swore the girls could not be found. "I'll bet Sergeant Shannon could nail them," said Hart, the trader, when told of the general denial among the Indians.

But Shannon was far away from the field column, leading his moccasined comrades afoot and in single file long, wearisome climbs up jagged cliffs or through deep canons, where unquestionably the foe had been in numbers but the day before, yet now they were gone. Shannon might well be needed at the far front, now that most of the Apache scouts had proved timid or worthless, but Byrne wished he had him closer home.

It was the Sat.u.r.day night following the coming of the runners with confirmation of the grewsome Indian stories. Colonel Byrne, with Graham, Cutler, and Westervelt, had been at the office half an hour in consultation when, to the surprise of every soul at Sandy, a four-mule team and Concord wagon came bowling briskly into the post, and Major Plume, dust-covered and grave, marched into the midst of the conference and briefly said: "Gentlemen, I return to resume command."

n.o.body had a word to say beyond that of welcome. It was manifestly the proper thing for him to do. Unable, in face of the stories afloat, to take his wife away, his proper place in the pressing emergency was at his post in command.

To Colonel Byrne, who guardedly and somewhat dubiously asked, "How about Mrs. Plume and that--French thing?" the major's answer was prompt:

"Both at Fort Whipple and in--good hands," said he. "My wife realizes that my duty is here, and, though her recovery may be r.e.t.a.r.ded, she declares she will remain there or even join me. She, in fact, was so insistent that I should bring her back with me that it embarra.s.sed me somewhat. I vetoed it, however."

Byrne gazed at him from under his s.h.a.ggy eyebrows. "H'm," said he, "I fancied she had shaken the dust of Sandy from her shoes for good and all--that she hoped never to come back."

"I, too," answered Plume ingenuously. "She hated the very mention of it,--this is between ourselves,--until this week. Now she says her place is here with me, no matter how she may suffer," and the major seemed to dwell with pride on this new evidence of his wife's devotion. It was, indeed, an unusual symptom, and Byrne had to try hard to look credulous, which Plume appreciated and hurried on:

"Elise, of course, seemed bent on talking her out of it, but, with Wren and Blakely both missing, I could not hesitate. I had to come.

Oh, captain, is Truman still acting quartermaster?" this to Cutler.

"He has the keys of my house, I suppose."

And so by tattoo the major was once more harbored under his old roof and full of business. From Byrne and his a.s.sociates he quickly gathered all particulars in their possession. He agreed with them that another day must bring tidings from the east or prove that the Apaches had surrounded and perhaps cut down every man of the command.

He listened eagerly to the details Byrne and others were able to give him. He believed, by the time "taps" came, he had already settled on a plan for another relief column, and he sent for Truman, the quartermaster.

"Truman," said he, "how much of a pack train have you got left?"

"Hardly a mule, sir. Two expeditions out from this post swallows up pretty much everything."

"Very true; yet I may have to find a dozen packs before we get half through this business. The ammunition is in your hands, too, isn't it?

Where do you keep it?" and the major turned and gazed out in the starlight.

"Only place I got, sir--quartermaster's storehouse," and Truman eyed his commander doubtfully.

"Well, I'm squeamish about such things as that," said the major, looking even graver, "especially since this fire here. By the way, was much of Blakely's property--er--rescued--or recovered?"

"Very little, sir. Blakely lost pretty much everything, except some papers in an iron box--the box that was warped all out of shape."

"Where is it now?" asked Plume, tugging at the strap of a dressing case and laying it open on the broad window-seat.

"In my quarters, under my bed, sir."

"Isn't that rather--unsafe?" asked Plume. "Think how quick _he_ was burned out."

"Best I can do, sir. But he said it contained little of value, mainly letters and memoranda. No valuables at all, in fact. The lock wouldn't work, so the blacksmith strap-ironed it for him. That prevents it being opened by anyone, you know, who hasn't the proper tools."

"I see," said Plume reflectively. "It seems rather unusual to take such precaution with things of no value. I suppose Blakely knows his own business, however. Thank you very much Truman. Good-night."

"I suppose he did, at least, when he had the blacksmith iron that box," thought Truman, as he trudged away. "He did, at any rate, when he made me promise to keep it with the utmost care. Not even you can have it, Major Plume, although you are the post commander."

CHAPTER XVII

A STRANGE COMING

With one orderly and a pair of Apache Yuma scouts, Neil Blakely had set forth in hopes of making his way to Snow Lake, far up in the range to the east. The orderly was all very well,--like most of his fellows, game, true, and tried,--but few were the leaders who had any faith in Apache Yumas. Of those Indians whom General Crook had successively conquered, then turned to valuable use, the Hualpais had done well and proved reliable; the Apache Mohaves had served since '73, and in scout after scout and many a skirmish had proved loyal and worthy allies against the fierce, intractable Tontos, many of whom had never yet come in to an agency or accepted the bounty of the government. Even a certain few of these Tontos had proffered fealty and been made useful as runners and trailers against the recalcitrants of their own band.

But the Apache Yumas, their mountain blood tainted by the cross with the slothful bands of the arid, desert flats of the lower Colorado, had won a bad name from the start, and deserved it. They feared the Tontos, who had thrashed them again and again, despoiled them of their plunder, walked away with their young women, insulted and jeered at their young men. Except when backed by the braves of other bands, therefore, the Apache Yumas were fearful and timorous on the trail.

Once they had broken and run before a mere handful of Tontos, leaving a wounded officer to his fate. Once, when scaling the Black Mesa toward this very Snow Lake, they had whimpered and begged to be sent home, declaring no enemy was there in hiding, when the peaks were found alive with Tontos. The Red Rock country and the northward spurs of the Mogollon seemed fraught with some strange, superst.i.tious terror in their eyes, and if the "nerve" of a dozen would desert them when ordered east of the Verde, what could be expected of Blakely's two? No wonder, then, the elders at Sandy were sorely troubled!

But the Bugologist had nothing else to choose from. All the reliable, seasoned scouts were already gone with the various field columns. Only Apache Yumas remained, and only the least promising of the Apache Yumas at that. Bridger remembered how reluctantly these two had obeyed the summons to go. "If they don't sneak away and come back swearing they have lost the lieutenant, I'm a gopher," said he, and gave orders accordingly to have them hauled before him should they reappear.

Confidently he looked to see or hear of them as again lurking about the commissary storehouse after the manner of their people, beggars to the backbone. But the week went by without a sign of them. "There's only one thing to explain that," said he. "They've either deserted to the enemy or been cut off and killed." What, then, had become of Blakely? What fate had befallen Wren?

By this time, late Sat.u.r.day night, acting for the department commander now lost somewhere in the mountains, Byrne had re-enforced the guards at the agency and the garrison at Sandy with infantry drawn from Fort Whipple at Prescott, for thither the Apaches would never venture. The untrammeled and sovereign citizen had his own way of treating the obnoxious native to the soil.

By this time, too, further word should have come from some of the field columns, Sanders's especially. But though runners had reached the post bearing brief dispatches from the general, showing that he and the troops from the more southerly posts were closing in on the wild haunts of the Tontos about Chevlon's Fork, not a sign had come from this energetic troop commander, not another line from Sergeant Brewster or his men, and there were women at Camp Sandy now nearly mad with sleepless dread and watching. "It means," said Byrne, "that the hostiles are between us and those commands. It means that couriers can't get through, that's all. I'm betting the commands are safe enough. They are too strong to be attacked." But Byrne was silent as to Blakely; he was dumb as to Wren. He was growing haggard with anxiety and care and inability to a.s.sure or comfort. The belated rations needed by Brewster's party, packed on mules hurried down from Prescott, were to start at dawn for Sunset Pa.s.s under stout infantry guard, and they, too, would probably be swallowed up in the mountains. The ranch people down the valley, fearful of raiding Apaches, had abandoned their homes, and, driving their stock before them, had taken refuge in the emptied corrals of the cavalry. Even Hart, the veteran trader, seemed losing his nerve under the strain, for when such intrepid frontiersmen as Wales Arnold declared it reckless to venture across the Sandy, and little scouting parties were greeted with long-range shots from hidden foe, it boded ill for all dwellers without the walls of the fort. For the first time in the annals of Camp Sandy, Hart had sandbagged his lower story, and he and his retainers practically slept upon their arms.

It was after midnight. Lights still burned dimly at the guard-house, the adjutant's office, and over at the quarters of the commanding officer, where Byrne and Plume were in consultation. There were sleepless eyes in every house along the line. Truman had not turned in at all. Pondering over his brief talk with the returned commander, he had gone to the storehouse to expedite the packing of Brewster's rations, and then it occurred to him to drop in a moment at the hospital. In all the dread and excitement of the past two days, Pat Mullins had been well-nigh forgotten. The attendant greeted him at the entrance. Truman, as he approached, could see him standing at the broad open doorway, apparently staring out through the starlight toward the black and distant outlines of the eastward mountains.

Mullins at least was sleeping and seemed rapidly recovering, said he, in answer to Truman's muttered query. "Major Plume," he added, "was over to see him a while ago, but I told the major Pat was asleep."

Truman listened without comment, but noted none the less and lingered.

"You were looking out to the east," he said. "Seen any lights or fire?"

"Not I, sir. But the sentry there on No. 4 had the corporal out just now. He's seen or heard something, and they've moved over toward No.

5's post."

Truman followed. How happened it that when Byrne and Plume had so much to talk of the latter could find time to come away over to the hospital to inquire for a patient? And there! the call for half-past twelve had started at the guard-house and rung out from the stables and corrals. It was Four's turn to take it up now. Presently he did, but neither promptly nor with confidence. There were new men on the relief just down from Fort Whipple and strange to Sandy and its surroundings; but surely, said Truman, they should not have been a.s.signed to Four and Five, the exposed or dangerous posts, so long as there were other men, old-timers at Sandy, to take these stations. No.

4's "A-all's well" sounded more like a wail of remonstrance at his loneliness and isolation. It was a new voice, too, for in those days officers knew not only the face, but the voice, of every man in the little command, and--could Truman be mistaken--he thought he heard a subdued t.i.tter from the black shadows of his own quarters, and turned his course thither to investigate. Five's shout went up at the instant, loud, confident, almost boastful, as though in rebuke of Four's timidity, and, as Truman half expected, there was the corporal of the guard leaning on his rifle, close to the veranda steps, and so absorbed he never heard the officer approach until the lieutenant sharply hailed: