He had sprung from saddle and leveled his old field glass at the
distant promontory, so absorbed in his search he did not note the
coming of the little column. The litter bearing Blakely foremost of
the four had halted close beside him, and Blakely's voice, weak and
strained, yet commanding, suddenly startled him with demand to be told
what he saw, and Arnold merely handed him the glass and pointed. The
last of the faint smoke puffs was just soaring into space, making
four still in sight. Blakely never even took the binocular. He had
seen enough by the unaided eye.

[Illustration: "INDIAN SIGNALS BEYOND POSSIBILITY OF A DOUBT"]

With uplifted hand the sergeant had checked the coming of the next
litter, Wren's, and those that followed it. One of the wounded men,
the poor lad crazed by the perils of the siege, was alert and begging
for more water, but Wren was happily lost to the world in swoon or
slumber. To the soldier bending over him he seemed scarcely breathing.
Presently they were joined by two of Arnold's party who had been
searching out on the left flank. They, too, had seen, and the three
were now in low-toned conference. Blakely for the moment was unnoted,
forgotten.

"That tank--where we found the ribbon--was just about two miles
yonder," said Arnold, pointing well down the rugged slope toward the
southwest, where other rocky, pine-fringed heights barred the view to
the distant Sandy. "Surely the colonel or some of his fellows must be
along here. Ride ahead a hundred yards or so and fire a couple of
shots," this to one of his men, who silently reined his tired bronco
into the rude trail among the pine cones and disappeared. The others
waited. Presently came the half-smothered sound of a shot and a
half-stifled cry from the rearmost litter. Every such shock meant new
terror to that poor lad, but Wren never stirred. Half a minute passed
without another sound than faint and distant echo; then faint, and not
so distant, came another sound, a prolonged shout, and presently
another, and then a horseman hove in sight among the trees across a
nearly mile-wide dip. Arnold and his friends rode on to meet him,
leaving the litters at the crest. In five minutes one of the riders
reappeared and called: "It's Horn, of the orderlies. He reports
Colonel Byrne just ahead. Come on!" and turning, dove back down the
twisted trail.

The colonel might have been just ahead when last seen, but when they
reached the tank he was fa