FullReads

At midnight “K” Troop, riding easily along in the moonlight, had travelled a little over half the distance to Phillips’s ranch. The lieutenant, who with two or three troopers was scouting far in advance, halted at the crest of a high ridge over which the road climbs, and dismounted his little party for a brief rest while he went up ahead to reconnoitre.

Cavalrymen in the Indian country never ride into full view on top of a “divide” until after some one of their number has carefully looked over the ground beyond.

There was nothing in sight that gave cause for long inspection, or that warranted the officer’s taking out his field-glasses. He could see the line of hills back of the Chugwater Valley, and all was calm and placid. The valley itself lay some hundreds of feet below his point of observation, and beginning far off to his left ran northeastward until one of its branches crossed the trail along which the troop was riding.

Returning to his party, the lieutenant’s eye was attracted, for the fifth or sixth time since they had left Lodge Pole, by little gleams and flashes of light off in the distance, and he muttered, in a somewhat disparaging manner, to some of the members of his own troop,–

“Now, what the dickens can those men be carrying to make such a streak as that? One would suppose that Arizona would have taken all the nonsense out of ’em, but that glimmer must come from bright bits or buckles, or something of the kind, for we haven’t a sabre with us. What makes those little flashes, sergeant?” he asked, impatiently.

“It’s some of the tin canteens, sir. The cloth is all worn off a dozen of ’em, and when the moonlight strikes ’em it makes a flash almost like a mirror.”

“Indeed it does, and would betray our coming miles away of a moonlit night. We’ll drop all those things at Laramie. Hullo! Mount, men, lively!”

The young officer and his party suddenly sprang to saddle. A clatter of distant hoofs was heard rapidly approaching along the hard-beaten road. Nearer, nearer they came at tearing gallop. The lieutenant rode cautiously forward to where he could peer over the crest.

“Somebody riding like mad!” he muttered. “Hatless and demoralized. Who comes there?” he shouted aloud. “Halt, whoever you are!”

Pulling up a panting horse, pale, wide-eyed, almost exhausted, a young ranchman rode into the midst of the group. It was half a minute before he could speak. When at last he recovered breath, it was a marvellous tale that he told.

“The Chug’s crammed with Indians. They’ve killed all down at Phillips’s, and got all around Farron’s,–hundreds of ’em. Sergeant Wells tried to run away with Jessie, but they cut him off, and he’d have been killed and Jessie captured but for me and Farron. We charged through ’em, and got ’em back to the ranch. Then the Indians attacked us there, and there was only four of us, and some one had to cut his way out. Wells said you fellows were down at Lodge Pole, but he da’sn’t try it. I had to.” Here “Pete” looked important, and gave his pistol-belt a hitch.

“I must ‘a’ killed six of ’em,” he continued. “Both my revolvers empty, and I dropped one of ’em on the trail. My hat was shot clean off my head, but they missed me, and I got through. They chased me every inch of the way up to a mile back over yonder. I shot the last one there. But how many men you got?”

“About fifty,” answered the lieutenant. “We’ll push ahead at once. You guide us.”

“I ain’t going ahead with no fifty. I tell you there’s a thousand Indians there. Where’s the rest of the regiment?”

“Back at Lodge Pole. Go on, if you like, and tell them your story. Here’s the captain now.”

With new and imposing additions, Pete told the story a second time. Barely waiting to hear it through, the captain’s voice rang along the eager column,–