e like
demons than men? Is it to attack the new colony, plunder, and destroy
it?

Regarding their numbers, this would seem absurd. They are in all only
twenty; while the colonists count at least fifty fighting men. No
common men either; but most of them accustomed to the use of arms; many
backwoodsmen, born borderers, staunch as steel. Against such, twenty
Indians--though the picked warriors of the warlike Comanche tribe--would
stand no chance in fair open fight. But they may not mean this; and
their intent be only stealing?

Or they may be but a pioneer party--the vanguard of a greater force?

In any case, their behaviour is singularly suspicious. Such manoeuvring
can mean no good, but may be fraught with evil to Colonel Armstrong and
his colonists.

For several successive days is this surveillance maintained, and still
nothing seems to come of it. The party of savages remains encamped in
the timber at back; while the two sentinels keep their place upon the
promontory; though now and then going and coming, as before.

But on a certain night they forsake their post altogether, as if their
object has been attained, and there is no need to keep watch any more.

On this same night, a man might be seen issuing out of the
mission-building, and making away from its walls. He is not seen,
nevertheless. For it is the hour of midnight, and all have retired to
rest--the whole household seemingly wrapt in profoundest slumber.
Moreover, the man slips out stealthily, through the backdoor; thence
across the second courtyard, and along a narrow passage leading into the
garden. Having reached this, he keeps on down the centre walk, and over
the wall at bottom, through which there chances to be a breach. All
these mysterious movements are in keeping with the appearance of the
man. For his countenance shows cunning of no ordinary kind. At first
glance, and under the moonlight, he might be mistaken for a mulatto.
But, though coloured, he is not of this kind. His tawny skin shows a
tinge of red, which tells of Indian, rather than African blood. He is,
in truth, a _mestizo_--half Spaniard or Mexican, the other half being
the aboriginal race of America.

It is a breed not always evil-disposed, still less frequently
ill-featured; and, so far as looks go, the individual in question might
claim to be called handsome. He has a plenteous profusion of dark curly
hair, framing a countenance by no means common. A face of ova