in hopes of catching the ear of
searching comrades?

Wren, exhausted, had apparently dropped into a fitful doze. His eyes
were shut, his lips were parted, his long, lean fingers twitched at
times as a tremor seemed to shoot through his entire frame. Another
day like the last or at worst like this, without food or nourishment,
and even such rugged strength as had been his would be taxed to the
utmost. There might be no to-morrow for the sturdy soldier who had so
gallantly served his adopted country, his chosen flag. As for
Chalmers, the summons was already come. Far from home and those who
most loved and would sorely grieve for him, the brave lad was dying.
Carmody, kneeling by his side, but the moment before had looked up
mutely in his young commander's face, and his swimming, sorrowing eyes
had told the story.

Nine o'clock had come without a symptom of alarm or enemy from
without, yet death had invaded the lonely refuge in the rocks,
claiming one victim as his tribute for the day and setting his seal
upon still another, the prospective sacrifice for the dismal morrow,
and Blakely could stand the awful strain no longer.

"Sergeant," said he, "I must know what this means. We must have help
for the captain before this sun goes down, or he may be gone before we
know it."

And Carmody looked him in the face and answered: "I am strong yet and
unhurt. Let me make the try, sir. Some of our fellows must be scouting
near us, or these beggars wouldn't have quit. I can find the boys, if
anyone can."

Blakely turned and gazed one moment into the deep and dark recess
where lay his wounded and the dying. The morning wind had freshened a
bit, and a low, murmurous song, nature's AEolian, came softly from the
swaying pine and stunted oak and juniper far on high. The whiff that
swept to their nostrils from the lower depths of the canon told its
own grewsome tale. There, scattered along the stream bed, lay the
festering remains of their four-footed comrades, first victims of the
ambuscade. Death lurked about their refuge then on every side, and was
even invading their little fortress. Was this to be the end, after
all? Was there neither help nor hope from any source?

Turning once again, a murmured prayer upon his lips, Blakely started
at sight of Carmody. With one hand uplifted, as though to caution
silence, the other concaved at his ear, the sergeant was bending
eagerly forward, his eyes dilating, his frame fairly quivering. T