receiving another fall, he
refused to try to regain his feet.

Avon now managed to loosen the loop sufficiently to slip it off the
imprisoned leg. Then, holding several coils in his grasp, he reached
over and gave the panting animal several resounding whacks on his ribs.

He smiled as the brute hastily clambered up, and, turning his nose
toward the other cattle a considerable distance off, broke into a trot
after them, still bellowing as if asking them to wait until he could
join them. No refractory urchin was ever brought to terms with more
completeness than was the defiant steer.

Now that the disciplined animal was travelling in the right direction,
his conqueror also faced Captain Shirril, who had been watching him with
much interest, while the cattle were stringing along at a rapid gallop
in the direction of the ridge beyond which lay the invisible camp of the
cowmen.

The lull in the stirring proceeding led Avon to recall the mishap of
Shackaye, who had escaped the horns of the other steer by such a narrow
chance. He cast his eye toward the body of the dead animal plainly seen
across the prairie, but the young Comanche himself was not in sight. He
concluded that he must have remounted his mustang and galloped back to
camp. Possibly he had received some injury from his fall which placed it
beyond his power to help in the work of gathering the stray members of
the herd.

Avon turned his attention to his relative, when he was astonished to
perceive fully a dozen horsemen a short distance off between him and the
ridge.

The first natural thought of the youth was that the party at the camp
had ridden out to their help, but he instantly saw that such could not
be the case, since there were so many of them, and it did not require a
second glance to ascertain that each one was a mounted Indian.

The first emotion following this discovery was that of a wonderment as
to what it could all mean. It was not remarkable that they should
encounter Indians, while crossing the section set apart especially for
their occupancy, nor was anything to be feared from them unless the
temptation to violence became unusually strong on the part of the red
men.

But there was something ominous in the sudden and singular appearance of
these dusky plainsmen. They had shown up unexpectedly, the indication
being that they had emerged from a group of hills a short distance to
the eastward. Colonel Sclevinger and his herd were beyond sigh