rld.
He was Buffalo Bill's understudy.

Scout Cody did not wear buckskin, to-day. He wore one of his stage
costumes--a Mexican suit of short black velvet jacket trimmed with
silver buttons and silver lace, and black velvet trousers also with
silver buttons down the sides, and slashed from the knee down with
bright red. His brown hair was long and curling.

"What in thunder are those vagabonds down yonder fooling about?" he
growled, on a sudden.

What, indeed? Something new had cropped out. From the ridge in the
southeast a long ravine ran down, crossed in front of the hill and met
the wagon-road trail at the right of the hill. It and the road formed
a V; the two arms of the V were separated by a stretch of high ground,
and the hill was at the point of the V.

Where the ravine headed at the base of the ridge a mile and a half
southeast, thirty or forty Indians had collected, all ready to dash on.
But why? Ah, see! Lieutenant Hall had sent two cavalry couriers
forward, with dispatches for General Merritt. Two miles distant they
were galloping hard, up the road, bent upon reaching the War Bonnet.
The Indians knew. The warriors in the ravine were about to follow it
down to the trail and kill the couriers.

The couriers could not see the Indians, on account of the high ground
between. The Indians could not now see the couriers, for the same
reason. But the Lieutenant King party on the hill could see
everything, on both sides. The couriers, unconscious of their danger,
could not possibly escape. They were far ahead of the wagon train,
they were loping steadily on--were now within a mile of the War Bonnet
camp, and as if at a signal the Indians in the ravine started,
pellmell, to cut them off on their way.

The two parties, couriers and warriors, were converging for the west
side of the hill. It might have been a pretty race to watch, had life
not been the stake. But what to do? The couriers should not be
sacrificed, of course; yet to send the cavalry forward now would spoil
the bigger game.

Buffalo Bill exclaimed, his eyes bright, his face aglow.

"General! Now's our chance! Why not let our party mount here out of
sight, and we'll tend to those fellows, ourselves!"

"Good! Up with you, then. King, you stay here and watch until they're
close under the hill; then give the word. Come down, every other man
of you, where you won't be seen."

Besides the general and Lieutenant King, the party on t