rtburn to the scene, scrambling up with
the other footmen, and speedily was he kneeling by the fevered
officer's side. The troopers had been sent back to their horses. Only
Stout, the doctor, Wales Arnold, and one or two sergeants remained at
the ledge, with rescued Angela, the barely conscious patient, and
their protectors, the Indian girls. Already the boy had been hurried
off with a dispatch to Sandy, and now dull, apathetic, and sullen,
Lola sat shrouded in her blanket, while Arnold, with the little Apache
dialect he knew, was striving to get from Natzie some explanation of
her daring and devotion.

Between tears and laughter, Angela told her story. It was much as they
had conjectured. Mad with anxiety on her father's account, she said,
she had determined to reach him and nurse him. She felt sure that,
with so many troops out between the post and the scene of action,
there was less danger of her being caught by Indians than of being
turned back by her own people. She had purposely dashed by the ranch,
fearing opposition, had purposely kept behind Colonel Byrne's party
until she found a way of slipping round and past them where she could
feel sure of speedily regaining the trail. She had encountered neither
friend nor foe until, just as she would have ridden away from the
Willow Tanks, she was suddenly confronted by Natzie, Lola, and two
young Apaches. Natzie eagerly gesticulated, exclaiming, "Apaches,
Apaches," and pointing ahead up the trail, and, though she could
speak no English, convincing Angela that she was in desperate danger.
The others were scowling and hateful, but completely under Natzie's
control, and between them they hustled her pony into a ravine leading
to the north and led him along for hours, Angela, powerless to
prevent, riding helplessly on. At last they made her dismount, and
then came a long, fearful climb afoot, up the steepest trail she had
ever known, until it brought her here. And here, she could not tell
how many nights afterwards--it seemed weeks, so had the days and hours
dragged--here, while she slept at last the sleep of exhaustion, they
had brought Mr. Blakely. He lay there in raging fever when she was
awakened that very morning by Natzie's crying in her ear some words
that sounded like: _"Hermano viene_! _Hermano viene_!"

[Illustration: "THEY HUSTLED HER PONY INTO A RAVINE"]

Stout had listened with absorbing interest and to the very last word.
Then, as one who heard at length fu