e
galloped along together. 'Not too fast,' I told her, 'it ain't speed as
will win the race. There is a long hundred miles between us and the
fort. We must keep ahead of them varmint for a mile or two, and then
they will settle down.'

"For the first five or six miles we had to ride fast, for the redskins
tried the speed of their horses to the utmost; but none of them gained
anything on us, indeed we widened the gap by a good bit. You see at
first they only thought it was a wild scheme on the part of the gal, and
the first as started jumped on the first horses that came to hand; it
wasn't till they saw me that they found it was a got-up thing. One of
the first lot galloped back with the news. But by the time the alarm was
spread, and the chase really taken up in earnest, we was a good mile
away, and a mile is a long start.

"Black Dog and some of his best-mounted braves rode too hard at first.
Ef we had only had a short start they would have catched us, perhaps;
but a mile's start was too much to be made up by a rush, and so Black
Dog should have known; but I reckon he was too mad at first to
calculate. By hard riding he and his best-mounted braves got within half
a mile of us when we war about ten miles from the village. But by that
time, as you may guess, the steam was out of their horses, while we had
been riding at a steady gallop.

"The first party that had started had now tailed away, and was as far
back as the chief. It was safe to be a long chase now, and I felt pretty
sure as the gal would escape, for her mustang was a beautiful critter,
and the Captain had given a long price for it; besides, it was carrying
no weight to speak of. I didn't feel so sure about myself, for though my
horse was a first-class one, and had over and over again, when out
hunting, showed herself as fast as any out, there might be as good ones
or better among the redskins, for anything I knew. When we were fairly
out on the plains, I could see that pretty nigh the whole tribe of
redskins had joined in the chase.

"At first I couldn't make out why; for although they are all wonderful
for bottom, some of the redskins' horses ain't much for speed, and many
of them could never have hoped to have come up with us. But when I
thought it over, I reckoned that seeing I had joined the gal, they might
have thought that I had brought her news that the Captain, with all the
soldiers from the fort, was coming up behind, and I expect that's why
the