tim, to close when
ready to give the fatal squeeze.

In this case the victim appears to have no hope of escape--no
alternative but to succumb.

That the men sheltered behind the waggons have not "gone under" at the
first onslaught is significative of their character. Of a surety they
are not common emigrants, crossing the prairies on their way to a new
home. Had they been so, they could not have "corralled" their unwieldy
vehicles with such promptitude; for they had started from their night
camp, and the attack was made while the train was in motion--advantage
being taken of their slow drag through the soft, yielding sand. And had
they been but ordinary emigrants they would not have stood so stoutly on
the defence, and shown such an array of dead enemies around them. For
among the savages outside can be seen at least a score of lifeless forms
lying prostrate upon the plain.

For the time, there is a suspension of hostilities. The red men,
disappointed by the failure of their first charge, have retreated back
to a safe distance. The death-dealing bullets of the whites, of which
they have had fatal proof, hold them there.

But the pause is not likely to be for long, as their gestures indicate.
On one side of the circle a body of them clumped together hold counsel.
Others gallop around it, bearing orders and instructions that evidently
relate to a changed plan of attack. With so much blood before their
eyes, and the bodies of their slain comrades, it is not likely they will
retire from the ground. In their shouts there is a ring of resolved
vengeance, which promises a speedy renewal of the attack.

"Who do you think they are?" asks Frank Hamersley, the proprietor of the
assaulted caravan. "Are they Comanches, Walt?"

"Yis, Kimanch," answers the individual thus addressed; "an' the wust
kind o' Kimanch. They're a band o' the cowardly Tenawas. I kin tell by
thar bows. Don't ye see that thar's two bends in 'em?"

"I do."

"Wal, that's the sort o' bow the Tenawas carry--same's the Apash."

"The Indians on this route were reported friendly. Why have they
attacked us, I wonder?"

"Injuns ain't niver friendly--not Tenawas. They've been riled
considerably of late by the Texans on the Trinity. Besides, I reck'n I
kin guess another reezun. It's owin' to some whites as crossed this way
last year. Thar war a scrimmage atween them and the redskins, in the
which some squaws got kilt--I mout say murdered. Tha