CHAPTER V.
AMONG THE BUSHES.
The Texan rangers had arrived just in time to see the finish of a veryfine race. They had not actually seen Red Wolf win it, but they werein no doubt as to why his pursuers made such a frantic dash into thechaparral.
"Not after the Comanches!" shouted Bowie. "Into the cover and find theLipans! Charge!"
They went in at a point that was nearer than were Great Bear and hisbraves, to the spot where the Lipans worked their unintentional ambush.They heard all that whooping, and the stillness which followed it didnot puzzle old Indian fighters.
"There's been a sharp brush."
"Those were scalp-whoops."
"We're in for it, boys. Shoot quick if you've got to, but hold yourfire to the last minute. There are none too many of us."
Those were their orders, but there was no shooting to be done rightaway.
Hardly had Bowie pulled in, calling a halt, in some doubt as to whichpath, if any, it was best for him to follow, before a sorrel mustangcame out in an opening before him, somewhat as if he had been droppedlike an acorn from one of the scrub oaks.
"Red Wolf!" exclaimed Bowie. "Where is Castro?"
"Big Knife, come!" replied Red Wolf, pointing rapidly. "Castro there.Great Bear there. Heap Comanches. Young chief take hair! Ugh!"
He was holding up, with intense pride, his proof that he had been avictor in a single-handed fight. To the mind of any man of Bowie'sexperience it was entirely correct, and he said so.
"All right," he told his young friend. "Go ahead. Be a chief someday. Now I must see your father short order. Go ahead."
It was but a few minutes after that that the Lipan chief and Big Knifewere shaking hands, but their questions and answers were few.
"Glad I got here before things were any worse," said Bowie. "I canmake Great Bear pretend to give it up as soon as he knows I'm here."
"Ugh!" replied Castro. "Great Bear heap lie. Say go home. Then killhorse to catch Lipan."
"Just so," said Bowie. "Of course he will. Chief, hear old friend.Do as I say."
"Ugh!" came back assentingly. "Big Knife talk. Chief hear."
"I'll keep him back while you get a good start," said Bowie. "But doyou and your braves ride for the Rio Grande. Ride fast. Get back toyour lodges by that way. I'll follow to-morrow with a squad."
"Ugh!" said Castro, doubtfully. "No go to lodge now. Rio long water.Where wait for Big Knife? Bravo there, along river."
"I don't exactly know just where to say," began Bowie.
"Hacienda Dolores!" sounded gruffly out of one of the bushes near them."Across the river. Tetzcatl."
Castro almost set free a whoop in his surprise, but he checked it intime, and only exclaimed,--
"Black Panther hide deep. Good. No let Comanche see him. How BigKnife find hacienda?"
"All right," said Bowie. "I know. It's the abandoned ranch on theother side. Pretty good buildings, too. Just as good a place as any,if I can get there with a whole skin. Reckon I can."
"Red Wolf lead horse to hacienda for Big Knife," said his father; butthe voice from the bushes added, "Tetzcatl."
"That's it," said Bowie. "I'll get there. You and the youngster meetme and my men at about this place to-morrow any time I can get here.Say it 'll probably be toward noon. Now I must have a talk with GreatBear."
A chorus of friendly grunts responded to him from the Lipans who hadgathered around, and they seemed to follow his instructions at once.Even Red Wolf and his pony had already disappeared.
There was a bugle among the varied outfit of the rangers, and now itwas unslung by its bearer. He really knew what to do with it. As theband of white men rode cautiously forward in the direction given them,the martial music sounded again and again at short intervals. It wasan announcement to the Comanches that they had more than Lipans to dealwith, and it was also a plain invitation to a parley.
Just how many red foemen he might have in front of him Great Bear didnot know. Neither had he any count of the white riflemen, but theirpresence settled his mind.
"Great Bear no fight Texan now!" was his immediate declaration to hiswarriors. "Heap fool Big Knife. Put him in Alamo. No see throughwall. Then find Castro in bushes. No let Lipan get away."
His next business, therefore, was to ride forward, with a cunningsemblance of friendly frankness, to talk with Bowie and send him backto the fort, leaving the bushes clear of rifles. Not even then did therangers expose themselves unduly, and Great Bear knew that he wascovered by more than one unerring marksman while he was shaking handsso heartily.
"Heap friend," he said. "Great Bear glad Texan come. Glad to see BigKnife. Lipan kill Comanche. Gone now."
"Great Bear lie a heap," returned Bowie, coldly. "Said he would gohome to his lodge. Break word. Stay and fight Lipan."
"Ugh!" returned Great Bear, insolently. "Great Bear chief! What forBig Knife ride in bushes? Hunt Lipan dog? Take Castro hair? Shutmouth. No talk hard. Go to fort. Go sleep!"
"Heap bad talk," said Bowie, with steady firmness. "Great Bear is in atrap. Better get out. Lose all his braves. This isn't your land. Goto lodge."
The chief again spoke boastfully, and Bowie became argumentative. Oneof his present objects was to use up time in talk, and he was quitewilling to stir Great Bear's vanity to all sorts of assertions of theright and power of himself and his tribe to fight their enemieswherever they could be found.
He was succeeding very well, and every minute was of importance to theLipans, who were now threading their southward way through thechaparral with all the speed they could reasonably make. With the sunoverhead to guide by, they could dispense with a compass. Here andthere, moreover, some of them, who seemed to have been there before,found marks upon tree-trunks and branches which may have meant more totheir eyes than to those of other people.
"Great Bear is a great chief," said Bowie, at last, looking at thesubtle Comanche steadily. "He has talked enough. What does he say?Will he fight now, or will he go to his lodge?--Bugle, ready!"
The bugler raised to his lips his hollow twist of brass, but a storm of"Ughs" broke out among the Comanche warriors.
Most of them had been near enough to hear the conversation. They wereon dangerous ground and were becoming altogether willing to get out ofit. At this moment they saw rifles cocked and half lifted. They knewthat every white man before them was a dead shot, and none of them feltany desire to hear a bugle blow or a rifle crack.
The chief himself considered that he had talked long enough, and thathe had been sufficiently insolent to preserve his dignity. He couldtherefore pretend to yield the required point.
"Good!" he replied. "Great chief go. Big Knife ride to fort. Lipandogs run away. Save hair. Comanches take all some day. Not now.Texan heap friend. Shut mouth. Ugh!"
He offered his hand, and Bowie took it, but after that he and hisrangers sat upon their horses in grim, menacing silence, while theComanche warriors rode out of the chaparral. They did so glumlyenough, for they had been outwitted and they had lost some of theirbest braves.
"Now, men," said Bowie, "it was touch and go. They were too many forus if it was a fight. We're out of it this time, but they won't forgetor forgive it."
"You bet they won't," replied a ranger; "but I had a sure bead on GreatBear's throat medal, and he knew it. He'd ha' jumped jest once."
"Back to the Alamo," said Bowie. "We must make good time."
Away they went, and in an instant the appearance of military disciplinehad vanished. The leader and his hard-fighting comrades were once morefellow-frontiersmen rather than "soldiers." Differences of rank,indeed, were but faintly marked upon the dress or trappings of any ofthem.
There were no epaulets or sashes, but at no moment of time could anobserver have been in doubt as to who was in command. The roughest andfreest spoken of them all showed marked deference whenever he addressedor even came near to the man whom Great
Bear himself, with all hispride, had acknowledged to be his superior.
"Jim," said Bowie to a tall horseman who was at his side when they cameout into the open prairie, "have you made up your mind to go with meinto Chihuahua?"
"Go!" exclaimed Jim. "Why, colonel, I ain't enlisted. Travis can'tstop me. Of course I'll go. Wouldn't miss it for a pile. It 'll beas good as a spree."
So said more than one of the other rangers when opportunity came to askthem the same question. To each the romantic legend of the hiddentreasures of the Aztec kings had been mentioned confidentially. Nodoubt it acted as a bait, but every way as attractive, apparently, wasthe prospect of a raid into Mexico, a prolonged hunting and scoutingexpedition, and a fair chance for brushes with Bravo's lancers.
"A Comanche or Lipan is worth two of 'em," they said, "and oneAmerican's worth four. We shall outnumber any lot of Greasers we're atall likely to run against."
There was a great deal too much of arrogance and overbearingself-confidence among the men of the Texas border, and at no distantday they were to pay for it bitterly.
They had gone and the chaparral seemed to be deserted, but it was notentirely without inhabitants.
"Tetzcatl!"
"Ugh! Red Wolf!"
There they sat, once more confronting each other, the young Lipan onhis pony and the old tiger on his mule.
"Boy heap fool," said Tetzcatl. "Comanches in chaparral. Castro gone."
"Ugh!" said Red Wolf. "See one Comanche ride away. Keep arrow."
Tetzcatl's eyes were angry. Part of his disappointment had been therenewal of the feud between the tribes. He had hoped for their jointhelp in working out his own revenges. Nevertheless he now listened toa further explanation, and learned that a noted Comanche warrior had nouse for bow or lance just then, because of an arrow that was yetsticking through his right arm above the elbow. Red Wolf could notfollow him, but he had captured a dropped lance, which he was nowsomewhat boastfully exhibiting.
"Boy go now," said Tetzcatl. "Tell Castro, Texans gone to the fort."
"No! no!" replied Red Wolf. "Big Knife say wait. Tetzcatl wait.Hide in bushes."
No further persuasion was attempted by the old Tlascalan, although hedid not conceal his preference for being without young company.
"Come," said Red Wolf. "No stay. Heap eat. Where water?"
That seemed a useless question to be asked in such a place, but therewere secrets of the chaparral which were unknown to the red men of theplains. This was not their hunting-ground and never had been so.Moreover, there had been local changes and wide bush-growths during theyears which had elapsed since the tribes of the Guadalupe and NuecesRiver country had been exterminated.
Less than half an hour of brisk riding brought Tetzcatl and hiscompanion to the hiding-place of one of those secrets of the chaparral.
"Whoop!" burst from Red Wolf. "Old lodge. Heap water. Greatmedicine. Tetzcatl white head. Know heap!"
Except for its being there, unknown to almost everybody, there wasnothing to be seen that could be called remarkable. There were sometumbling walls of _adobe_, or sunburned brick, of no great extent ornumber, near the margin of a bright-looking pond. There might be twoacres of water, but no rill could be seen running into it. One thatran out, feebly, on the farther side, shortly disappeared in the sandysoil. Red Wolf knew, for he at once rode to investigate.
"Ugh!" he exclaimed, when he reached the bit of marsh where the tinyrivulet ended. "Dead water."
A deer sprang out of a covert at the border of the marsh, but RedWolf's bow had been all the while in his hand, ready for instant use.The bowstring twanged, the arrow sped, and in a moment more a thrust ofa lance followed.
"Heap meat," said the young hunter, as he sprang to the ground andtethered his mustang.
He did not have to cut up his game unaided. Tetzcatl came to join himwith his heavy _machete_ already out, and he proved himself an expertbutcher.
"Good!" said Red Wolf. "Where go now? Heap fire tell Comanche."
"Come," said Tetzcatl, slinging the venison across his mule, but hesaid no more about what he intended doing.
They rode back to the pond and around it to the southerly side. Here,scattered over several acres of open, grassy ground, were the ruins,none of them more than one-story buildings. At one place, near themiddle of them, there remained almost a complete house, roofed over.Into this, leaving his mule at the door, Tetzcatl led the way. On thefloor in a corner smouldered the embers of a fire, suggesting that hehad been there before, on that very day. Fragments of dry wood laynear, and were at once thrown on to make a blaze, in spite of theremonstrances of Red Wolf.
"Smoke tell Comanche," he said, as the blue vapor began to curl out atan opening in the shattered roof.
"No!" replied Tetzcatl. "Small smoke. Much wind. Comanches are agreat way off."
Red Wolf had to give it up, and he was very ready to enjoy broiledvenison.
The best part of his unexpected good luck, however, was the water. Thedeer had been a sudden arrival truly, but deer were plentiful in Texasin those days. They were to be met with at any time, but a pond in adesert was quite another affair.
The riding and the fighting and the after-lurking among the bushes hadconsumed the day. The sun was going down when the two cooks in the_adobe_ turned away from their dinner and carefully covered theirfire-embers. The mule and the mustang had also been doing very wellupon the grass of the clearing. Everything was peaceful, evencomfortable, therefore, when Red Wolf remarked to Tetzcatl, "Dark come.Heap sleep. Ugh!"
"_Bueno!_" he replied. "Boy sleep. Old man too old."
With thorough-going Indian caution, however, the son of Castro did notthink of sleeping in any house, to be found there, perhaps, by hisenemies. He took his pony with him and went in among the bushes. Thenhe tied the sorrel securely, but left him to whatever might be coming.As for himself, no other young wolf hunted for a more perfect coverbefore consenting to shut his eyes. Then, indeed, it was quicklyproved that the toughest kind of red Indian boy could be completelytired out.