she
served. She hardly knew what was in her own mind. Then it became eleven,
and Crook was tired of it, and made the capping move in his bluff. He
gave the orders himself.

"Sergeant."

Keyser saluted.

"You will detail eight men to go with you into the Indian camp. The men
are to carry pistols under their overcoats, and no other arms. You will
tell the Indians to come out. Repeat what I said to them last night.
Make it short. I'll give them ten minutes. If they don't come by then a
shot will be fired out here. At that signal you will remain in there and
blaze away at the Indians."

So Keyser picked his men.

The thirty-one remaining troopers stopped joking, and watched the squad
of nine and the interpreter file down the bank to visit the three
hundred. The dingy overcoats and the bright green shawl passed into the
thicket, and the General looked at his watch. Along the bend of the
stream clear noises tinkled from the water and the ice.

"What are they up to?" whispered a teamster to Jack Long. Long's face
was stern, but the teamster's was chalky and tight drawn. "Say," he
repeated, insistently, "what are we going to do?"

"We're to wait," Long whispered back, "till nothin' happens, and then
th' Ole Man'll fire a gun and signal them boys to shoot in there."

"Oh, it's to be waitin'?" said the teamster. He fastened his eyes on the
thicket, and his lips grew bloodless. The running river sounded more
plainly. "---- ---- it!" cried the man, desperately, "let's start the
fun, then." He whipped out his pistol, and Jack Long had just time to
seize him and stop a false signal.

"Why, you must be skeered," said Long. "I've a mind to beat yer skull
in."

"Waitin's so awful," whimpered the man. "I wisht I was along with them
in there."

Jack gave him back his revolver. "There," said he; "ye're not skeered, I
see. Waitin' ain't nice."

The eight troopers with Keyser were not having anything like so
distasteful a time. "Jock," said Specimen Jones to Cumnor, as they
followed the sergeant into the willows and began to come among the
lodges and striped savages, "you and me has saw Injuns before, Jock."

"And we'll do it again," said Cumnor.

Keyser looked at his watch: Four minutes gone. "Jones," said he, "you
patrol this path to the right so you can cover that gang there. There
must be four or five lodges down that way. Cumnor, see that dugout with
side-thatch and roofing of tule? You attend to that family. It's a b