on horseback sat motionless.

"We're in for fight," said Alfred, coming back after a moment. "He won't
answer my peace-sign, and he's a Sioux. We can't make a run for it
through this dog-town. We've just got to stand 'em off."

He threw down and back the lever of his old 44 Winchester, and softly
uncocked the arm. Then he sat down by Miss Caldwell.

From various directions, silently, warriors on horseback sprang into
sight and moved dignifiedly toward the first-comer, forming at the last
a band of perhaps thirty men. They talked together for a moment, and
then one by one, at regular intervals, detached themselves and began
circling at full speed to the left, throwing themselves behind their
horses, and yelling shrill-voiced, but firing no shot as yet.

"They'll rush us," speculated Alfred. "We're too few to monkey with this
way. This is a bluff."

The circle about the two was now complete. After watching the whirl of
figures a few minutes, and the motionless landscape beyond, the eye
became dizzied and confused.

"They won't have no picnic," went on Alfred, with a little chuckle.
"Dog-hole's as bad fer them as fer us. They don't know how to fight. If
they was to come in on all sides, I couldn't handle 'em, but they always
rush in a bunch, like _damn_ fools!" and then Alfred became suffused
with blushes, and commenced to apologise abjectly and profusely to a
girl who had heard neither the word nor its atonement. The savages and
the approaching fight were all she could think of.

Suddenly one of the Sioux threw himself forward under his horse's neck
and fired. The bullet went wild, of course, but it shrieked with the
rising inflection of a wind-squall through bared boughs, seeming to come
ever nearer. Miss Caldwell screamed and covered her face. The savages
yelled in chorus.

The one shot seemed to be the signal for a spattering fire all along the
line. Indians never clean their rifles, rarely get good ammunition, and
are deficient in the philosophy of hind-sights. Besides this, it is not
easy to shoot at long range in a constrained position from a running
horse. Alfred watched them contemptuously in silence.

"If they keep that up long enough, the wagon-train may hear 'em," he
said, finally. "Wisht we weren't so far to nor-rard. There, it's
comin'!" he said, more excitedly.

The chief had paused, and, as the warriors came to him, they threw their
ponies back on their haunches, and sat motionless. They turned,