"That tank--where we found the ribbon--was just about two miles
yonder," said Arnold, pointing well down the rugged slope toward the
southwest, where other rocky, pine-fringed heights barred the view to
the distant Sandy. "Surely the colonel or some of his fellows must be
along here. Ride ahead a hundred yards or so and fire a couple of
shots," this to one of his men, who silently reined his tired bronco
into the rude trail among the pine cones and disappeared. The others
waited. Presently came the half-smothered sound of a shot and a
half-stifled cry from the rearmost litter. Every such shock meant new
terror to that poor lad, but Wren never stirred. Half a minute passed
without another sound than faint and distant echo; then faint, and not
so distant, came another sound, a prolonged shout, and presently
another, and then a horseman hove in sight among the trees across a
nearly mile-wide dip. Arnold and his friends rode on to meet him,
leaving the litters at the crest. In five minutes one of the riders
reappeared and called: "It's Horn, of the orderlies. He reports
Colonel Byrne just ahead. Come on!" and turning, dove back down the
twisted trail.
The colonel might have been just ahead when last seen, but when they
reached the tank he was far aloft again, scouting from another height
to the northward, and while the orderly went on to find and tell him,
Arnold and his grave-faced comrade dismounted there to await the
coming of the litters. Graver were the faces even than before. The
news that had met them was most ominous. Two of those who searched
with Colonel Byrne had found pony tracks leading northward--leading in
the very direction in which they had seen the smoke. There was no
other pony shoe in the Sandy valley. It could be none other than
Angela's little friend and comrade--Punch.
And this news they told to Blakely as the foremost litter came. He
listened with hardly a word of comment; then asked for his scouting
notebook. He was sitting up now. They helped him from his springy
couch to a seat on the rocks, and gave him a cup of the cold water.
One by one the other litters were led into the little amphitheater and
unlashed. Everyone seemed to know that here must be the bivouac for
the night, their abiding place for another day, perhaps, unless they
should find the captain's daughter. They spoke, when they spoke at
all, in muffled tones, these rough, war-worn men of the desert and
the mountain. They bent over the wounded with sorrowing eyes, and
wondered why no surgeon had come out to meet them. Heartburn, of
course, had done his best, dressing and rebandaging the wounds at
dawn, but then he had to go on with Stout and the company, while one
of the Apache Yumas was ordered to dodge his way in to Sandy, with a
letter urging that Graham be sent out to follow the trail and meet the
returning party.