The Red Mustang

Chapter IX.
THE HACIENDA OF SANTA LUCIA

Early in the afternoon of the fourth day after the red mustang and the regular-army black brought Cal home to Santa Lucia, the ranch wore a very peaceful appearance. No cavalry were camped near it. There was not now any American flag floating from the staff on the roof of the hacienda, and there was not wind enough to have made one float if it had been there.

No cattle were grazing within sight of anybody standing at the stockade gate. That was closed and barred in an unusually inhospitable manner, and no wayfarer could ride in without first explaining himself. There was reason in it, for Santa Lucia now contained only one man to strengthen the brave female garrison which had held it against the intended surprise-party of Kah-go-mish. More men would be there at sunset, on the return of the herders, and no Indians were believed to be within a very long distance.

A wide awning had been stretched out from the veranda, and there were two or three chairs under the awning, but they were empty.

Norah McLory and a couple of the Mexican women were busy with some tubs in the courtyard. The windows looking into it were not narrow slits like those outside. They were wide enough, had swinging sashes in them, and they gave the old adobe less the appearance of being either a fort or a prison. Most of them were curtained, and the curtains of a pair opposite the open side of the square were very handsome. Just beyond one of these curtains stood Mrs. Evans, with her arms around her daughter. If anything were troubling Vic's mind, the face she was looking into must have had comfort in it. Mrs. Evans was one of those women who are remarkable, and have no need of proving it to make people believe it. She was of medium height and not at all robust in appearance, although in excellent health. There was hardly a tinge of gray in her auburn hair, her cheeks were smooth, her brown eyes were bright and pleasant, and her voice was full and musical. Those who had heard it once wished to hear it again, even if they wondered what there was in it that made them go and do just as she told them. It was a grand thing for a young cowboy, like Cal Evans, to have such a mother away out there upon the plains, and was equally good for Vic, especially at such a time as had now come.

The room itself was as nearly like a large parlor in an Eastern mansion as such a room in such a building could be made. Colonel Evans had refused to count up how many head of cattle the furniture had cost him, including the piano and the wagoning of it from Santa Fé.

Mrs. Evans had not stopped there, for her china and other elegances enabled her to set a well-furnished table, and her kitchen garden in one corner of the stockade, with her hen-coops, provided something better than the beef and bacon and corn-bread supplied to hungry people at most New Mexican ranches.

More than one Indian chief to whom Mrs. Evans had given a dinner had declared it "good medicine," not understanding that his own race was passing away because the chickens and the potato-patches were coming.

Army-men, officers and soldiers, had ridden away from Santa Lucia, remarking of Cal's mother: "Very uncommon woman. But how did she get those things to grow 'way down here?"

Mexican herders in the colonel's employ had also discussed the matter, and had decided that no melon or bean or hill of corn or other vegetable dared refuse to grow after getting orders from the "Señora."

Perhaps the most remarkable thing, after all, was the fact that such a lady, with all her refinement and cultivation, should say that she preferred a ranch life at Santa Lucia to any other kind of life anywhere.

She was saying so now to Victoria. Vic would have been a smaller pattern of her mother, but for a tinge of red in her hair and something saucy about her nose and mouth. That is, on ordinary occasions, but not just now, for she was looking blue enough.

"Mother," she said, "father never gets hurt, but Cal is so young. The Indians, mother, and there may be fighting. I almost hate this country. I'd rather be where no savages can come."

"They will never come, Vic."

"They did come, this time! I saw them from the roof. Some of them come along here every now and then."

"Peaceably, my dear. It's a wonder to me that they touched anything of ours. If everybody had dealt with them as your father has there would not be any fighting."

"He went away angry enough," said Vic.

"Not angry enough to hurt any Indian without necessity. If there should be any fighting – "

"Seems to me I can't think he could kill anybody, or be killed; but Cal is so young!"

"Victoria," said her mother, almost laughing, "Cal is a smaller mark than your father, and not half so likely to get hit. I hope they will bring the horses back with them."

"You are a wonderful woman, mother. Were you ever really afraid of anything?"

Mrs. Evans thought for a moment, and then replied, "Yes, Vic, the other day. I was afraid we'd not get our soldier scarecrows ready before the Apaches came. Then, too, they might have met your father. I thought of that, but I wasn't really afraid that they had. I think I was made to live here."

That was the truth of the matter, and she soon convinced Victoria that the time to be nervous had not yet arrived. It was true that Colonel Evans and Cal and a dozen cowboys had gone with Captain Moore and the cavalry to trail the thieving Mescaleros and bring back the horses, but the Indians had three days the start, and were not likely to be caught up with at once.

"There may not be any fighting, even then," said Mrs. Evans; but Victoria did not find any use for her piano that day.

Chapter X.
THE TARGET ON THE ROCK

It was the very hour when Mrs. Evans and Vic were talking, at Santa Lucia, about the cavalry and cowboy expedition which had gone in search of the Apaches. Many a long mile to the southward of the old hacienda the sun shone hotly down upon the rugged slope of a spur of a range of mountains. At the bottom of the slope ran a wide trail which had been used by wagons, and was almost like a road. Along its narrow pathway of sand and shale rode a straggling cavalcade of extraordinary-looking horsemen. About half of them carried lances and wore a showy green and yellow uniform. All had firearms in abundance, and most of them had long sabres rattling at their sides. There seemed to be a profusion of silver ornaments, even on men as well as upon bridles and saddles, but there were also a number of badly battered sombreros and ragged serapes. What is a sombrero? It is any sort of very wide-brimmed, low-crowned hat, and can be made to carry much tinsel and feathers. As for a serape, one can be made out of any blanket by cutting a hole in the middle of it, so that it will hang gracefully around the man or woman whose head has been pushed through the hole. It was not easy to say whether the gay officer commanding the gaudy lancers, or the remarkably tattered peon who led the last string of pack-mules, at the rear, was really the most picturesque Mexican of that cavalcade.

On the slope above them, less than three hundred yards from the trail, a great bowlder of gray granite stood out prominently from the bushes and the smaller lumps of rock around it.

On the bowlder, at its very edge, stood the figure of a man who was even more noteworthy than were the officer and the peon. His arms were folded, so that two red stocking-legs spanned his broad chest; his silk hat, with a green-veil streamer, was cocked on one side defiantly; his attitude was that of a man who did not fear all Mexico, and the loudly uttered words he sent down at the horsemen were: "Kah-go-mish is a great chief!"

Whether or not they believed him, and although he had given them no apparent cause for considering him an enemy, horseman after horseman lifted carbine or revolver and blazed away at the Mescalero leader. Bullet after bullet buzzed in among the bushes and rocks above and behind him, but not a muscle of his tall form flinched.

All practised riflemen know that a mark posted as he was is difficult to hit, even at short range and in shadow, and that the difficulty magnifies with distance and a sunny glare.

There stood Kah-go-mish, and while report after report rang out in the narrow valley, and called forth echoes from among the crags, he exhausted all he knew of Spanish and was compelled to help it with his native Apache dialect, and even then seemed unable to express his opinion of the marksmen. He had much to say concerning his own great and good qualities and those of his people, but declared that all the unpleasant reptiles and insects and quadrupeds he could name were serving as Mexicans that afternoon. He shouted to them that they did not even know how to shoot. If they had been Gringos (Yankees) of the lowest order, he said he might be in danger from their bullets, but, as it was, the man they aimed at was safer than any other man within range.

The Mexican caballeros may or may not have been able to understand any part of that hailstorm of hard words, but Kah-go-mish had an audience and was not wasting his eloquence. He and his bowlder seemed to be alone, jutting out from the slope, but that was an optical illusion. That knob of granite stood upon the outer rim of a wide, ragged, bushy ledge, and at no great distance there began a shadowy growth of forest. The broken level behind Kah-go-mish was peopled by scores of braves and squaws and younger people, proving that the two sections of his band had reunited. Dogs ran hither and thither, while ponies and horses could be seen among the trees. One dog in particular did his futile best to climb the bowlder, and then sat down under a furze bush and yelped with all his might at the cavalcade, as if in sympathy with the chief of his band of Apaches.

At the right of the granite bowlder, and several paces from the edge or the ledge, were some huge fragments of red basalt rock. In front of these crouched a group which gazed at Kah-go-mish with unmistakable pride. In the middle sat Wah-wah-o-be, bonnet and all. Against her, on the right, was curled the form of the young lady in the wonderful red dress, and she looked almost pretty as her black eyes flashed with admiration of her father's magnificent heroism and oratory. At the left of Wah-wah-o-be, the boy in the Reservation trousers stood sturdily erect, but nothing could make him handsome or take from his broad, dark face the look of half-anxious dulness which belonged there. His beady eyes glittered, and he showed his white teeth, now and then, but his very smile was dull. He leaned back against the rock, and just then a something came whizzing past his head, and there was a slightly stinging sensation in his left ear. He did not wince, but he lifted his hand quickly to his ear, and there sprang to his lips an involuntary imitation of the sound made by the ragged ounce ball of lead when it struck the crumbling basalt.

"Z-st-ping!" he said, and the sound was caught up by other voices.

"Ping – ping – ping," ran from lip to lip, and some laughed merrily, for all had heard the whiz and thud of the deadly missiles which were coming up from the valley, although they and Wah-wah-o-be had deemed themselves entirely sheltered.

Kah-go-mish had at that moment turned for a glance at his family, and he uttered a loud whoop, as if of pleasure. At the same breath he came down from his rock with a great, staglike bound, and stood among them.

"Wah-wah-o-be, look!" he said. "Ugh!"

He had no need to point, for she was already aware that the ragged edge of the bit of lead had made a deep scratch in her son's ear. She was both very proud and very angry.

"Ping!" she exclaimed, as if the sound had acquired a new meaning.

"Ugh!" said Kah-go-mish. "Ping!"

As for the boy himself, the dulness almost vanished from his face in his exultation at having been so nearly hit, actually grazed, by a rifle-ball. His sister came around to stare at the scratch, and then his own quick eyes caught something.

"Tah-nu-nu!" he said, and pointed at the wide fold of her red calico. It was torn. A Mexican bullet had found its way through the furze bushes, and Tah-nu-nu had been almost as much in peril, the moment she stood erect, as her brother had been.

Wah-wah-o-be's wrath boiled over. The Apaches pay more of respect to their squaws than do some other tribes, and the chief's wife was a woman who was likely to demand all that belonged to her.

Kah-go-mish had stood upon the rock to be fired at by the rancheros for the glory of it, and was almost too proud of so great an exploit to lose his temper at once. He was beginning to say something about Mexican marksmanship when he was interrupted by Wah-wah-o-be. She had feelings of her own, if he had not. She pointed at her son's ear, and again she said "Ping!"

The bullet might have wantonly murdered any member of her family, or any of her neighbors. She made rapid remarks about it, of such a nature that Kah-go-mish felt a change going on in his mind. Other ears had heard, and the voices of braves and squaws seemed to agree with that of Wah-wah-o-be. All had fallen back from the dangerous margin, and it would have looked a little like a council if a squaw had not been the speaker. There was very little red upon the ear of Ping, but it served her as a representative of all the wrongs ever done to the Apaches by the white men, including that of cooping them in upon the Reservation, where she had obtained her bonnet, and where they had all but starved for lack of game.

The blood of Kah-go-mish reached the right heat at last, and his hand arose to his mouth to help out the largest, longest, fiercest war-whoop he knew anything about.

"Kah-go-mish is a great chief!"

He said this as he strode away towards the trees, waving back all the rest with his hands. Warriors and squaws, boys and girls, they at once seemed to arrange themselves for a good look at whatever their great man might be about to do.

He was gone but a few minutes, and returned, leading a mean-looking, undersized, disreputable pony, upon whose head he had placed a miserable, worn-out bridle.

He did not utter a word to Wah-wah-o-be, but upon the ground before her he deposited a handsome rifle, a bow and arrows, and a lance. He took from his belt the revolver and laid it beside the other weapons, and upon them all he placed the green-veil-plumed silk hat and the red stocking-legs. He ostentatiously called attention to the fact that he retained nothing but his heavy bowie-knife. Armed with only that weapon, and mounted upon his worst pony, he, the great chief, the hero, was about to depart upon a war-path against the coyotes, the buzzards, the tarantulas, the red ants, the lost dogs – namely, the Mexicans of Chihuahua, or any other Mexicans. He would make them pay bitterly for having wasted so much ammunition that day.

The announcement of the chief's purpose was received with whoops and yells of approbation. Wah-wah-o-be seemed to overlook any possible peril of losing her husband altogether. She may have been hardened by a long habit of seeing him come home safe.

Kah-go-mish gave some rapid orders to one brave after another, mounted his pony while others were gathering their own, and then he rode straight into the side of the mountain, followed by his whole band – horses, dogs, and all. That is, it would have so appeared to any white man standing at the foot of the granite bowlder, but it was only a good illustration of the magical arts by which the Indian medicine-men make it so difficult for green white men in blue uniforms to catch red runaways. Uniformity of color in quartz and granite, or other ledges, provides for a part of the mystery. Shrubs and trees and distances help, and so, often, does their absence. A great break in the side of that spur of the Sierra was as invisible from the pass as if it had been hidden by snow or midnight. It was a chasm which led in two directions from that point. Kah-go-mish waved his hand authoritatively and wheeled his pony to the left, to the southward, towards Mexico. His warriors and his family, and all other members of the band, dogs included, turned northward, to the right, carrying with them positive assurances as to the place, and very nearly as to the time, when they might again hope to see and admire their leader.

During his absence the command fell to a short, broad-shouldered warrior, who walked dreadfully intoed, and who seemed to stand very much in awe of Wah-wah-o-be. She, on the other hand, was evidently well satisfied with the course which affairs were taking. She had picked up the weapons so heroically laid upon the ground by her husband, and she had helped Tah-nu-nu and Ping to gather the ponies of the family. She had said a great many things while doing so, for one point in her superiority to other squaws was the capacity of her tongue for expressing her ideas.

The whole band had an almost prosperous appearance, very different from that which it had worn just before it began to swarm around Sam Herrick and the drove of horses. Lodge-poles had been cut, now that there were ponies to drag them. Hardly anybody was on foot, except a few braves whose half-trained, spirited horses were likely to require leading over narrow and pokerish mountain-passes.

Kah-go-mish rode on alone in one direction and the band went in the other, and both were shortly buried in the deep, cool gloom of the shadowy chasms.

Chapter XI.
THE STORY OF A LOG

The red mustang was in excellent health, and he was also in high spirits. So was his master, and they were nearly agreed upon another point. Dick evidently believed that any trail whatever ought to be followed at full speed, and Cal fretted continually over the steady plodding commanded by Captain Moore. Cal was glad that in his first Indian campaign he was to have so much first-class help, including the four Chiricahua-Apache scouts. He had confidence in his father and in the captain, as men of experience in such matters, but at last he could hardly help mentioning to Sam Herrick the joint criticism made by himself and Dick. "Why, Sam," he remarked, "the red-skins have three days the start of us, and Captain Moore isn't in any kind of hurry. They must be gaining on us."

"That's not of much account, Cal," said Sam, "so long as their trail stays in this country. They're camped at the end of it to-night. So they will be every night till they get to the far end of it, and there we'll find 'em, unless they cross over into Mexico."

"And if they do that?" asked Cal.

"Mexico's a hot place for Indians just now," replied Sam. "Troops moving; militia called out. These fellows couldn't stay there."

The far end of an Indian trail is sometimes a curious thing to hunt for, as Sam went on to explain. It may get lost in the sand, or among the mountains, or in the snow, or somebody may hide it or steal it, or a heavy rain may wash it all out.

"Well," said Cal, "one thing's sure. If we should come near 'em, and have to chase 'em, the horses won't be too travel-tired for good running."

"Exactly so," said Sam. "That's what the captain's up to."

The cavalry and cowboy camp, that night, was as safe as Santa Lucia, but there was something like a disturbance in another place.

The party of rancheros and Chiricahua militia who had blazed away at Kah-go-mish may have been a kind of scouting-party. They had escaped destruction by not following him up the slope, and they afterwards had not many miles to ride before they reached a camp to which they evidently belonged. One small corner of that camp had an appearance of good order, where an experienced officer of the Mexican army was in command of a few disciplined soldiers. All the remainder of it seemed to bear the likeness of a grand military picnic, where all the men who had tickets were free to have a good time in any manner they might please. Very soon after supper most of them pleased to lie down and go to sleep, while others sat up to smoke and play cards.

Of course there could not be any danger threatening a force of over four hundred men, all so warlike, so soldierly, so completely ready to whip any tribe of mere red Indians. Besides, no important band of hostiles was known or believed to be in that vicinity. There might have been a better watch kept that night, nevertheless, especially at the corral where all their horses were picketed.

This had been made along the bank of the deep, still stream which supplied the camp with ice-water from the Sierra Madre. Nobody ever heard of any fellow taking a swim in such cold water as that was. It was cold enough to chill the bones of a mountain trout. Of course no one did undertake to swim in it, but, at about midnight, a log came floating down. There was a large knot on one side of the log. The current or something carried it against the bank, right in the middle of the corral, and either there were two logs, or that log divided, for one log floated off down stream, while the other log crept out on shore, stood erect, and walked stealthily around among the horses. The knot was carried on the upper end of this log, and the other went off without any.

Very quickly were four of the best horses fixed with four of the best saddles and bridles from among the long rows at the edge of the corral. The log did it, and added holsters with revolvers in them and two bundles of fine lances and some good American carbines, and two full straddle packs of cartridges. The sentries of the corral were all stationed away outside of the place where that peculiar log was at work. All but two of them were asleep, as the guardians of so strong and warlike a camp had a right to be.

Now the log crept around until it found a path leading out southerly, past a sentry who was sleeping very soundly indeed. Then it went back into the corral and led out the four saddled and bridled horses, with four others following that wore only halters, but carried securely strapped burdens, selected and fitted by the log.

There was a brilliant moonlight, so that there was no danger whatever to the camp from Indians, and the log led the horses on until it became wise to go ahead and see if there had been any picket posted at the place and distance at which one might have been expected.

"Ugh!" exclaimed the log, as it went back for the horses. "Mexican! No blue-coat!"

That was a compliment to such men as Captain Moore, but then the log was doing what no kind of fellow would have undertaken with "blue-coats." It now mounted one of the horses and led on up the stream, to a place it seemed to know about, where the water was wide and shallow and could be easily forded. On crossing it the log was still at no great distance from the camp, but upon higher ground. Looking down, it could have a good view of the smouldering camp-fires and the sleeping Mexicans, for tents there were not.

"Kah-go-mish is a great chief!" exclaimed the knot at the top of the log, exultingly. "Ugh! Got heap hoss, heap saddle, heap gun, heap all plunder. Ugh! Mexican shoot at him on rock. Wonder how feel now, pretty soon. Ugh!"

An irrepressible whoop of triumph burst from him.

"Ugh! Bad medicine," he said. "Great chief let mouth go off like boy."

He had not lost his wits, however, and he followed that whoop with a dozen more, a whole series of fierce, ear-splitting screeches, while he rapidly emptied the nine chambers of the captured carbine and the six of a revolver. He aimed at the camp-fires and with tip-top success, testified to by sudden showers of sparks and brands which flew around among the startled sleepers.

Great was the uproar in that astonished camp. Seven gallant fellows who had bugles began to blow for dear life the moment they were upon their feet. Every officer began to shout orders as soon as he was awake, and some seemed to begin even earlier. They exhibited tremendous presence of mind, but no soldier received the same order from any two of them. Within a minute, at least a hundred men were at their posts of danger behind something or other, while three hundred more were making a blind rush for the corral. The sentries had all fired their pieces at once, and now there began a general popping of guns and pistols at the awful shadows beyond the little river.

Kah-go-mish could hardly have wished for anything better. He wheeled and rode rapidly away, followed by the string of horses which he had regarded as the fee due to him for being made a target of.

He had not been killed, then, no thanks to the Mexicans, and he had not killed anybody now, deeming it imprudent to take any scalps under the circumstances. He had again, however, proved his claim to be considered an extraordinary collector of enemy's horses, and that is a high fame to win among the wild tribes of the southwest. As for the righteousness of what he had done, in his own eyes, he was a commanding officer of Mescalero Apaches, and his people were at war with Mexico, as the rancheros and militia had declared so recklessly. He made war in a manner every inch as civilized as their own, and thought well of himself for so doing. He said so, quite a number of times, that night, as he rode on deeper and deeper into the rugged passes of the Sierras. About daylight he came to an open, shaded spot, by a spring, where there was grass for his prizes, and where he could build a fire and then find out what there might be for breakfast in a very fat haversack which hung from one of the saddles.

As for the Mexican cavalry, of all sorts, they behaved well, and the officer in supreme command at last succeeded in substituting his own orders for those of his hasty subordinates. He stationed a strong force at the ford, to prevent the supposed tribe of red men which had assailed his camp from crossing the river. He threw out scouting-parties, encouraged his men by voice and example, urging them to do their duty, prove their attachment to their flag, and to die rather than surrender. He was answered by enthusiastic cheers, and, when morning came, he readily obtained from among them a body of brave volunteers who followed him across the ford to search the dangerous underbrush on the hill from which the hostile barbarians had fired upon the camp. The more they searched the better they felt, and at last they found a trace of the enemy. They captured a pony, bridle and all. It was the sad-looking beast selected by Kah-go-mish as the most nearly worthless of all that he had brought with him from the Reservation.

Eight militiamen, one of them a bugler, already knew that the enemy had penetrated the corral, and had gotten away again, but here was a sort of a mount for one of them. Well, it was a capture, anyhow, and a proof of victory, and was spoken of as "ponies" in the official report of the manner in which that night-attack had been baffled by the Chiricahua militia.