I N G 
 
 4 
 
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AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 


 

 THE FIGHT IX THE CAJfOX 
 
AN APACHE 
 PRINCESS 
 
 A Tale of the Indian Frontier 
 
 BY 
 GENERAL CHARLES KING 
 
 AUTHOR OF "A DAUGHTER OF THE SIOUX," "THE COLONEL S 
 
 DAUGHTER," " FORT FRAYNE," "AN ARMY WIFE," 
 
 ETC., ETC. 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS BY 
 
 FREDERIC REMINGTON 
 
 and 
 
 EDWIN WILLARD DEMING 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 THE HOBART COMPANY 
 
 1903 
 
COPYRIGHT, 1903, 
 
 BY 
 THE HOBART COMPANY. 
 
 i ?, * ?*} "* " I 
 v;s i* 6^5 V ":: ^ ; -. 
 
 published 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 THE MEETING BY THE WATERS, . f . . . . 9 
 
 CHAPTER II 
 SCOT VERSUS SAXON, . . . . . . .21 
 
 CHAPTER III 
 MOCCASIN TRACKS 33 
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 A STRICKEN SENTRY, . . . 42 
 
 CHAPTER V 
 THE CAPTAIN S DEFIANCE, 51 
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 A FIND IN THE SANDS, . . . . . . .61 
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 " WOMAN- WALK-IN-THE-NIGHT," ...... 70 
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 "APACHE KNIVES DIG DEEP," , . . . . .88 
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 A CARPET KNIGHT, INDEED, " 97 
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 " WOMAN-WALK-IN-THE NlGHT " AGAIN, ..... IO5 
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 A STOP BY WIRE, . . . . . . , . .119 
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 FIRE! . t .130 
 
6 CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 WHOSE LETTERS ? . 141 
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 AUNT JANET BRAVED 152 
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 A CALL FOR HELP . .166 
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 A RETURN TO COMMAND, ..*..,. 177 
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 A STRANGE COMING, ** . . . 188 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII 
 A STRANGER GOING, * . . . . . . 199 
 
 CHAPTER XIX 
 BESIEGED. . . . .. . . . . . 213 
 
 CHAPTER XX 
 WHERE is ANGELA? . . . . . . , . . 226 
 
 CHAPTER XXI 
 OUR VANISHED PRINCESS, . . . . ... . 238 
 
 CHAPTER XXII 
 SUSPENSE, 249 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII 
 AN APACHE QUEEN 259 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV 
 THE MEETING AT SANDY, . . . . . . 271 
 
 CHAPTER XXV 
 RESCUE REQUITED, . 282 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI 
 
 " WOMAN- WALK-NO-MORE," . 293 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII 
 THE PARTING BY THE WATERS, 306 
 
 LENVOI 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 FRONTISPIECE 
 
 "Now HALTING, DROPPING ON ONE KNEE TO FIRE," . . 90 
 
 " BLAKELY LED EM ACROSS No. 4/3 POST," . . . . 134 
 
 THE FIGHT IN THE CANON, ....... 220 
 
 " INDIAN SIGNALS BEYOND POSSIBILITY OF A DOUBT," . . 242 
 " THEN SLOWLY, THEY SAW HER RAISE HER RIGHT HAND, 
 
 STILL CAUTIOUSLY HOLDING THE LITTLE MIRROR," . 263 
 
 " THEY HUSTLED HER PONY INTO A RAVINE," .. . . 270 
 " NATZIE WRENCHED HER HAND FROM THAT OF BLAKELY, 
 
 AND WITH THE SPRING OF A TlGRESS BOUNDED AWAY," . 324 
 
AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 THE MEETING BY THE WATERS 
 
 UNDER the willows at the edge of the pool a 
 young girl sat daydreaming, though the day 
 was nearly done. All in the valley was wrapped 
 in shadow, though the cliffs and turrets across the stream 
 were resplendent in a radiance of slanting sunshine. Not 
 a cloud tempered the fierce glare of the arching heavens 
 or softened the sharp outline of neighboring peak or dis 
 tant mountain chain. Not a whisper of breeze stirred the 
 drooping foliage along the sandy shores or ruffled the 
 liquid mirror surface. Not a sound, save drowsy hum of 
 beetle or soft murmur of rippling waters, among the 
 pebbly shallows below, broke the vast silence of the scene. 
 The snow cap, gleaming at the northern horizon, lay one 
 hundred miles away and looked but an easy one-day 
 march. The black upheavals of the Matitzal, barring the 
 southward valley, stood sullen and frowning along the 
 Verde, jealous of the westward range that threw their 
 rugged gorges into early shade. Above and below the 
 still and placid pool and but a few miles distant, the pine- 
 fringed, rocky hillsides came shouldering close to the 
 
10 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 - Stream, tost, fell away, forming a deep, semicircular 
 .. basin, toward the west, at the hub of which stood bolt- 
 ftpVight a tall^ snowy flagstaff, its shred of bunting hang 
 ing limp and lifeless from the peak, and m the dull, dirt- 
 colored buildings of adobe, ranged in rigid lines about 
 the dull brown, flat-topped mesa, a thousand yards up 
 stream above the pool, drowsed a little band of martial 
 exiles, stationed here to keep the peace twixt scattered 
 settlers and swarthy, swarming Apaches. The fort was 
 their soldier home ; the solitary girl a soldier s daughter. 
 
 She could hardly have been eighteen. Her long, slim 
 figure, in its clinging riding habit, betrayed, despite round 
 ness and supple grace, a certain immaturity. Her hands 
 and feet were long and slender. Her sun-tanned cheek 
 and neck were soft and rounded. Her mouth was deli 
 cately chiseled and the lips were pink as the heart of a 
 Bridesmaid rose, but, being firmly closed, told no tale of 
 the teeth within, without a peep at which one knew not 
 whether the beauty of the sweet young face was really 
 made or marred. Eyes, eyebrows, lashes, and a wealth 
 of tumbling tresses of rich golden brown were all superb, 
 but who could tell what might be the picture when she 
 opened those pretty, curving lips to speak or smile? 
 Speak she did not, even to the greyhounds stretched 
 sprawling in the warm sands at her feet. Smile she 
 could not, for the young heart was sore troubled. 
 
 Back in the thick of the willows she had left her pony, 
 blinking lazily and switching his long tail to rid his flanks 
 of humming insects, but never mustering energy enough 
 
THE MEETING BY THE WATERS 11 
 
 to stamp a hoof or strain a thread of his horsehair riata. 
 Both the long, lean, sprawling hounds lolled their red, 
 dripping tongues and panted in the sullen heat. Even 
 the girl herself, nervous at first and switching with her 
 dainty whip at the crumbling sands and pacing restlessly 
 to and fro, had yielded gradually to the drooping influ 
 ences of the hour and, seated on a rock, had buried her 
 chin in the palm of her hand, and, with eyes no longer 
 vagrant and searching, had drifted away into maiden 
 dreamland. Full thirty minutes had she been there wait 
 ing for something, or somebody, and it, or he, had not 
 appeared. 
 
 Yet somebody else was there and close at hand. The 
 shadow of the westward heights had gradually risen to 
 the crest of the rocky cliffs across the stream. A soft, 
 prolonged call of distant trumpet summoned homeward, 
 for the coming night, the scattered herds and herd guards 
 of the post, and, rising with a sigh of disappointment, the 
 girl turned toward her now impatient pony when her ear 
 caught the sound of a smothered hand-clap, and, whirling 
 about in swift hope and surprise, her face once more 
 darkened at sight of an Indian girl, Apache unquestion 
 ably, crouching in the leafy covert of the opposite willows 
 and pointing silently down stream. For a moment, with 
 out love or fear in the eyes of either, the white girl and 
 the brown gazed at each other across the intervening 
 water mirror and spoke no word. Then, slowly, the for 
 mer approached the brink, looked in the direction indi 
 cated by the little dingy index and saw nothing to warrant 
 
12 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 the recall. Moreover, she was annoyed to think that all 
 this time, perhaps, the Indian girl had been lurking in 
 that sheltering grove and stealthily watching her. Once 
 more she turned away, this time with a toss of her head 
 that sent the russet-brown tresses tumbling about her 
 slim back and shoulders, and at once the hand-clap was 
 repeated, low, but imperative, and Tonto, the biggest of 
 the two big hounds, uplifted one ear and growled a chal 
 lenge. 
 
 " What do you want ? " questioned the white girl, 
 across the estranging waters. 
 
 For answer the brown girl placed her left forefinger 
 on her lips, and again distinctly pointed to a little clump 
 of willows a dozen rods below, but on the westward 
 side. 
 
 " Do you mean someone s coming? " queried the first. 
 
 " Sh-sh-sh ! " answered the second softly, then pointed 
 again, and pointed eagerly. 
 
 The soldier s daughter glanced about her, uncertainly, 
 a moment, then slowly, cautiously made her way along 
 the sandy brink in the direction indicated, gathering the 
 folds of her long skirt in her gauntleted hand and step 
 ping lightly in her slender moccasins. A moment or 
 two, and she had reached the edge of a dense little copse 
 and peered cautiously within. The Indian girl was right. 
 Somebody lay there, apparently asleep, and the fair young 
 intruder recoiled in obvious confusion, if not dismay. 
 For a moment she stood with fluttering heart and parting 
 lips that now permitted reassuring glimpse of pearly 
 
THE MEETING BY THE WATERS 13 
 
 white teeth. For a moment she seemed on the verge of 
 panicky retreat, but little by little regained courage and 
 self-poise. What was there to fear in a sleeping soldier 
 anyhow ? She knew who it was at a glance. She could, 
 if she would, whisper his name. Indeed, she had been 
 whispering it many a time, day and night, these last two 
 weeks until until certain things about him had come to 
 her ears that made her shrink in spite of herself from 
 this handsome, petted young soldier, this Adonis of her 
 father s troop, Neil Blakely, lieutenant of cavalry. 
 
 " The Bugologist," they called him in cardroom circles 
 at the " store," where men were fiercely intolerant of 
 other pursuits than poker, for which pastime Mr. Blakely 
 had no use whatever no more use than had its votaries 
 for him. He was a dreamy sort of fellow, with big blue 
 eyes and a fair skin that were in themselves sufficient to 
 stir the rancor of born frontiersmen, and they of Arizona 
 in the days of old were an exaggeration of the type in 
 general circulation on the Plains. He was something of 
 a dandy in dress, another thing they loathed; something 
 of a purist in speech, which was affectation unpardon 
 able; something of a dissenter as to drink, appreciative 
 of " Cucumungo " and claret, but distrustful of whisky 
 another thing to call down scorn illimitable from the elect 
 of the mining camps and packing " outfits." But all 
 these disqualifications might have been overlooked had 
 the lieutenant displayed even a faint preference for poker. 
 " The Lord loveth a cheerful giver or loser " was the 
 creed of the cardroom circle at the store, but beyond a 
 
14 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 casual or smiling peep at the game from the safe dis 
 tance of the doorway, Mr. Blakely had vouchsafed no in 
 terest in affairs of that character. To the profane disgust 
 of Bill Hyde, chief packer, and the malevolent, if veiled, 
 criticism of certain " sporty " fellow soldiers, Blakely pre 
 ferred to spend his leisure hours riding up and down the 
 valley, with a butterfly net over his shoulders and a ja 
 panned tin box slung at his back, searching for specimens 
 that were scarce as the Scriptures among his commenta 
 tors. 
 
 Even on this hot October afternoon he had started on 
 his entomological work, but, finding little encouragement 
 and resting a while in the shade, he had dozed away on a 
 sandy couch, his head on his arms, his broad-brimmed 
 hat over his face, his shapely legs outstretched in lazy, 
 luxurious enjoyment, his tall and slender form, arrayed 
 in cool white blouse and trousers, really a goodly thing 
 to behold. This day, too, he must have come afoot, but 
 his net and box lay there beside him, and his hunt had 
 been without profit, for both were apparently empty. 
 Possibly he had devoted but little time to netting insects. 
 Possibly he had thought to encounter bigger game. If 
 so his zest in the sport must have been but languid, since 
 he had so soon yielded to the drowsy influences of the 
 day. There was resentment in the heart of the girl as 
 this occurred to her, even though it would have angered 
 her the more had anyone suggested she had come in hope 
 of seeing or speaking with him. 
 
 And yet, down in the bottom of her heart, she knew 
 
THE MEETING BY THE WATERS 15 
 
 that just such a hope had held her there even to the hour 
 of recall. She knew that, since opportunities for meet 
 ing him within the garrison were limited, she had delib 
 erately chosen to ride alone, and farther than she had 
 ever ridden alone before, in hope of meeting him without. 
 She knew that in the pursuit of his winged prey he never 
 sought the open mesa or the ravines and gorges of the 
 foothills. Only along the stream were they and he to 
 be found. Only along the stream, therefore, had she 
 this day ridden and, failing to see aught of him, had dis 
 mounted to think in quiet by the pool, so she told herself, 
 but incidentally to wait and watch for him; and now she 
 had found him, neither watching nor waiting, but in 
 placid unconcern and slumber. 
 
 One reason why they met so seldom in garrison was 
 that her father did not like him in the least. The captain 
 was a veteran soldier, self-taught and widely honored, 
 risen from the ranks. The lieutenant was a man of gen 
 tle breeding and of college education, a soldier by choice, 
 or caprice, yet quite able at any time to quit the service 
 and live a life of ease, for he had, they said, abundant 
 means of his own. He had been first lieutenant of that 
 troop at least five years, not five months of which had he 
 served on duty with it. First one general, then another, 
 had needed him as aide-de-camp, and when, on his own 
 application, he had been relieved from staff duty to en 
 able him to accompany his regiment to this then distant 
 and inhospitable land, he had little more than reached 
 Camp Sandy when he was sent by the department com- 
 
16 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 mander to investigate some irregularity at the Apache 
 reservation up the valley, and then, all unsoliciting, he 
 had been placed in charge pending the coming of a new 
 agent to replace the impeached one going home under 
 guard, and the captain said things about his subaltern s 
 always seeking " fancy duty " that were natural, yet un 
 just things that reached Mr. Blakely in exaggerated 
 form, and that angered him against his senior to the ex 
 tent of open rupture. Then Blakely took the mountain 
 fever at the agency, thereby still further delaying his re 
 turn to troop duty, and then began another complication, 
 for the contract doctor, though skillful in his treatment, 
 was less assiduous in nursing than were the wife of the 
 newly arrived agent and her young companion Lola, 
 daughter of the agency interpreter and his Apache-Yuma 
 wife. 
 
 When well enough to attempt light duty again, the 
 lieutenant had rejoined at Sandy, and, almost the first 
 face to greet him on his arrival was one he had never seen 
 before and never forgot thereafter the sweet, laughing, 
 winsome face of Angela Wren, his captain s only child. 
 
 The regiment had marched into Arizona overland, few 
 of the wives and daughters with it. Angela, motherless 
 since her seventh year, was at school in the distant East, 
 together with the daughters of the colonel then command 
 ing the regiment. They were older; were "finishing" 
 that summer, and had amazed that distinguished officer 
 by demanding to be allowed to join him with their 
 mother. When they left the school Angela could stand 
 
THE MEETING BY THE WATERS 17 
 
 it no longer. She both telegraphed and wrote, begging 
 piteously to be permitted to accompany them on the long 
 journey by way of San Francisco, and so it had finally 
 been settled. The colonel s household were now at regi 
 mental headquarters up at Prescott, and Angela was quite 
 happy at Camp Sandy. She had been there barely four 
 weeks when Neil Blakely, pale, fragile-looking, and still 
 far from strong, went to report for duty at his captain s 
 quarters and was met at the threshold by his captain s 
 daughter. 
 
 Expecting a girl friend, Kate Sanders, from " down the 
 row," she had rushed to welcome her, and well-nigh pre 
 cipitated herself upon a stranger in the natty undress 
 uniform of the cavalry. Her instant blush was something 
 beautiful to see. Blakely said the proper things to re 
 store tranquillity ; smilingly asked for her father, his cap 
 tain ; and, while waiting for that warrior to finish shaving 
 and come down to receive him, was entertained by Miss 
 Wren in the little army parlor. Looking into her won 
 drous eyes and happy, blushing face, he forgot that there 
 was rancor between his troop commander and himself, 
 until the captain s stiff, unbending greeting reminded 
 him. Thoughtless people at the post, however, were 
 laughing over the situation a week thereafter. Neil 
 Blakely, a squire of dames in San Francisco and other 
 cities when serving on staff duty, a society " swell " and 
 clubman, had obviously become deeply interested in this 
 blithe young army girl, without a cent to her name with 
 nothing but her beauty, native grace, and sweet, sunshiny 
 
18 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 nature to commend her. And everyone hitherto had said 
 Neil Blakely would never marry in the army. 
 
 And there was one woman at Sandy who saw the symp 
 toms with jealous and jaundiced eyes Clarice, wife of 
 the major then commanding the little " four-company " 
 garrison. Other women took much to heart the fact that 
 Major Plume had cordially invited Blakely, on his return 
 from the agency, to be their guest until he could get set 
 tled in his own quarters. The Plumes had rooms to 
 spare and no children. The major was twelve years 
 older than his wife, but women said it often looked the 
 other way. Mrs. Plume had aged very rapidly after his 
 sojourn on recruiting duty in St. Louis. Frontier com 
 missariat and cooking played hob with her digestion, said 
 the major. Frontier winds and water dealt havoc to her 
 complexion, said the women. But both complexion and 
 digestion seemed to " take a brace," as irreverent youth 
 expressed it, when Neil Blakely came to Sandy and the 
 major s roof. True, he stayed but six and thirty hours 
 and then moved into his own domicile quarters No. 7 
 after moving out a most reluctant junior. Major Plume 
 and Mrs. Plume had expected him, they were so kind as 
 to say, to choose a vacant half set, excellent for bachelor 
 purposes, under the roof that sheltered Captain Wren, 
 Captain Wren s maiden sister and housekeeper, and An 
 gela, the captain s daughter. This set adjoined the 
 major s big central house, its south windows looking into 
 the major s north gallery. " It would be so neighborly 
 and nice," said Mrs. Plume. Instead, however, Mr. 
 
THE MEETING BY THE WATERS 19 
 
 Blakely stood upon his prerogative as a senior subaltern 
 and " ranked out " Mr. and Mrs. Bridger and baby, and 
 these otherwise gentle folk, evicted and aggrieved, know 
 ing naught of Blakely from previous association, and 
 seeing no reason why he should wish to be at the far end 
 of the row instead of the middle, with his captain, where 
 he properly belonged, deemed themselves the objects of 
 wanton and capricious treatment at his hands, and re 
 sented it according to their opportunities. Bridger, being 
 a soldier and subordinate, had to take it out in soliloquy 
 and swear-words, but his impetuous little helpmate be 
 ing a woman, a wife and mother, set both wits and tongue 
 to work, and heaven help the man when woman has both 
 to turn upon him ! In refusing the room and windows 
 that looked full-face into those of Mrs. Plume, Blakely 
 had nettled her. In selecting the quarters occupied by Mr. 
 and Mrs. Bridger he had slightly inconvenienced and 
 sorely vexed the latter. With no incumbrances whatever, 
 with fine professional record, with personal traits and 
 reputation to make him enviable, with comparative wealth 
 and, as a rule, superlative health, Blakely started on his 
 career as a subaltern at Sandy with three serious handi 
 caps, the disfavor of his captain, who knew and loved 
 him little, the prejudice of Mrs. Bridger, who knew and 
 loved him not at all, and the jealous pique of Mrs. 
 Plume, who had known and loved him, possibly, too well. 
 There was little duty doing at Sandy at the time where 
 of we write. Men rose at dawn and sent the horses forth 
 to graze all day in the foothills under heavy guard. It 
 
20 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 was too hot for drills, with the mercury sizzling at the 
 hundred mark. Indian prisoners did the " police " work 
 about the post; and men and women dozed and wilted in 
 the shade until the late afternoon recall. Then Sandy 
 woke up and energetically stabled, drilled, paraded under 
 arms at sunset, mounted guard immediately thereafter, 
 dined in spotless white; then rode, drove, flirted, danced, 
 gossiped, made mirth, melody, or monotonous plaint till 
 nearly midnight; then slept until the dawn of another 
 day. 
 
 Indians there were in the wilds of the Mogollon to the 
 southeast, and, sometimes at rare intervals straying from 
 the big reservation up the valley, they scared the scat 
 tered settlers of the Agua Fria and the Hassayampa ; but 
 Sandy rarely knew of them except as prisoners. Not a 
 hostile shot had been fired in the surrounding mountains 
 for at least six months, so nobody felt the least alarm, 
 and many only languid interest, when the white-coated 
 officers reported the result of sunset roll-call and inspec 
 tion, and, saluting Major Plume, the captain of " C " 
 Troop announced in tones he meant should be heard along 
 the row : " Mr. Blakely, sir, is absent ! " 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 SCOT VERSUS SAXON 
 
 THREE women were seated at the moment on 
 the front veranda of the major s quarters 
 Mrs. Plume, Miss Janet Wren, the captain s 
 sister, and little Mrs. Bridger. The first named had been 
 intently watching the officers as, after the dismissal of their 
 companies at the barracks, they severally joined the post 
 commander, who had been standing on the barren level 
 of the parade, well out toward the flagstaff, his adjutant 
 beside him. To her the abrupt announcement caused no 
 surprise. She had seen that Mr. Blakely was not with 
 his troop. The jeweled hands slightly twitched, but her 
 voice had the requisite and conventional drawl as she 
 turned to Miss Wren : " Chasing some new butterfly, I 
 suppose, and got lost. A what time did Angela re 
 turn?" 
 
 " Hours ago, I fancy. She was dressed when I re 
 turned from hospital. Sergeant Leary seems worse to 
 day." 
 
 " That was nearly six," dreamily persisted Mrs. Plume. 
 " I happened to be at the side window." In the pursuit 
 of knowledge Mrs. Plume adhered to the main issue and 
 ignored the invalid sergeant, whose slow convalescence 
 had stirred the sympathies of the captain s sister. 
 
 21 
 
22 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 " Yes, it was nearly that when Angela dismounted," 
 softly said Mrs. Bridger. " I heard Punch galloping 
 away to his stable." 
 
 "Why, Mrs. Bridger, are you sure?" And the spin 
 ster of forty-five turned sharply on the matron of less than 
 half her years. " She had on her white muslin when she 
 came to the head of the stairs to answer me." 
 
 Mrs. Bridger could not be mistaken. It was Angela s 
 habit when she returned from her rides to dismount at the 
 rear gateway ; give Punch his conge with a pat or two of 
 the hand ; watch him a moment as he tore gleefully away, 
 round to the stables to the westward of the big quad 
 rangle ; then to go to her room and dress for the evening, 
 coming down an hour later, looking fresh and sweet and 
 dainty as a de\vy Mermct. As a rule she rode without 
 other escort than the hounds, for her father would not go 
 until the sun was very low and would not let her go with 
 Blakcly or Duane, the only bachelor troop officers then 
 at Sandy. He had nothing against Duane, but, having 
 set his seal against the other, felt it necessary to include 
 them both. As a rule, therefore, she started about four, 
 alone, and was home an hour later. Five young maidens 
 dwelt that year in officers row, daughters of the regi 
 ments, for it was a mixed command and not a big one, 
 two companies each of infantry and cavalry, after the 
 manner of the early 7o s. Angela knew all four girls, of 
 course, and had formed an intimacy with one one who 
 only cared to ride in the cool of the bright evenings when 
 the officers took the hounds jack-rabbit hunting up the 
 
SCOT VERSUS SAXON 23 
 
 valley. Twice a week, when Luna served, they held these 
 moonlit meets, and galloping at that hour, though more 
 dangerous to necks, was less so to complexions. As a 
 rule, too, Angela and Punch contented themselves with 
 a swift scurry round the reservation, with frequent ford- 
 ings of the stream for the joy it gave them both. They 
 were rarely out of sight of the sentries and never in any 
 appreciable danger. No Apache with hostile intent ven 
 tured near enough to Sandy to risk reprisals. Miners, 
 prospectors, and ranchmen were few in numbers, but, far 
 and wide they knew the captain s bonny daughter, and, 
 like the men of her father s troop, would have risked 
 their lives to do her a service. Their aversions as to 
 Sandy were centered in the other sex. 
 
 Aunt Janet, therefore, had some reason for doubting 
 the report of Mrs. Bridger. It was so unlike Angela to 
 be so very late returning, although, now that Mrs. 
 Bridger had mentioned it, she, too, remembered hearing 
 the rapid thud of Punch s galloping hoofs homeward 
 bound, as was she, at 5.45. Yet, barely five minutes 
 thereafter, Angela, who usually spent half an hour splash 
 ing in her tub, appeared full panoplied, apparently, at 
 the head of the stairs upon her aunt s arrival, and was 
 even now somewhere down the row, hobnobbing with 
 Kate Sanders. That Lieutenant Blakely should have 
 missed retreat roll-call was in itself no very serious mat 
 ter. " Slept through at his quarters, perhaps," said 
 Plume. " He ll turn up in time for dinner/ In fine the 
 major s indifference struck the captain as an evidence of 
 
24 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 official weakness, reprehensible in a commander charged 
 with the discipline of a force on hostile soil. What 
 Wren intended was that Plume should be impressed by 
 his formal word and manner, and direct the adjutant to 
 look up the derelict instanter. As no such action was 
 taken, however, he felt it due to himself to speak again. 
 A just man was Wren, and faithful to the core in his own 
 discharge of duty. What he could not abide was negli 
 gence on part of officer or man, on part of superior or in 
 ferior, and he sought to " stiffen " Plume forthwith. 
 
 " If he isn t in his quarters, shall I send a party out in 
 search, sir? " 
 
 "Who? Blakely? Dear, no, Wren! What for?" 
 returned the post commander, obviously nettled. " I 
 fancy he ll not thank you for even searching his quarters. 
 You may stumble over his big museum in the dark and 
 smash things. No, let him alone. If he isn t here for 
 dinner, I ll tend to it myself." 
 
 And so, rebuffed, as it happened, by an officer much his 
 inferior in point of experience and somewhat in years, 
 Wren silently and stiffly saluted and turned away. Vir 
 tually he had been given to understand that his sugges 
 tion was impertinent. He reached his quarters, therefore, 
 in no pleasant mood, and found his sister waiting for him 
 with Duty in her clear and shining eyes. 
 
 A woman of many a noble trait was Janet Wren, a 
 woman who had done a world of good to those in sick 
 ness, sorrow, or other adversity, a woman of boundless 
 faith in herself and her opinions, but not too much hope 
 
SCOT VERSUS SAXON 26 
 
 or charity for others. The blood of the Scotch Coven 
 anters was in her veins, for her mother had been born and 
 bred in the shadow of the kirk and lived and died in the 
 shadow of the cross. A woman with a mission was 
 Janet, and one who went at it unflinchingly. She had 
 loved her brother always, yet disapproved his marriage 
 to so young and unformed a woman as was his wife. 
 Later, she had deprecated from the start the soldier spirit, 
 fierce in his Highland blood, that tore him from the 
 teachings of their gentle mother and her beloved meenis- 
 ter, took him from his fair young wife when most she 
 needed him and sent him straightway into the ranks of 
 the one Highland regiment in the Union Army at the out 
 break of the Civil War. His gallant colonel fell at First 
 Bull Run, and Sergeant Wren fought over his body to 
 the fervent admiration of the Southerners who captured 
 both. The first War Secretary, mourning a beloved 
 brother and grateful to his defender, commissioned the 
 latter in the regulars at once and, on his return from 
 Libby, Wren joined the army as a first lieutenant. With 
 genuine Scottish thrift, his slender pay had been hoarded 
 for him, and his now motherless little one, by that devoted 
 sister, and when, a captain at the close of the war, he 
 came to clasp his daughter to his heart, he found himself 
 possessed of a few hundreds more than fell to the lot of 
 most of his associates. It was then that Janet, mother 
 less herself, had stepped into the management of her 
 brother s army home, and sought to dominate in that as 
 she had in everything else from early girlhood. Wren 
 
26 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 loved her fondly, but he, too, had a will. They had many 
 a clash. It was this, indeed, that led to Angela s going 
 so early to an Eastern school. We are all paragons of 
 wisdom in the management of other people s children. 
 It is in dealing with our own our limitations are so ob 
 vious. Fond as she had become of Angela s sweet young 
 mother, it must be owned that whom Janet loved in this 
 way she often chastened. Neighbors swore it was not 
 grief, nor illness, half so much as sister-in-law, that wore 
 the gentle spirit to the snapping-point. The great strong 
 heart of the soldier was well-nigh broken at his loss, and 
 Janet, who had never seen him shed a tear since early 
 boyhood, stood for once, at least, in awe and trembling 
 at sight of his awful grief. Time and nature played their 
 part and brought him, gradually, resignation, but never 
 genuine solace. He turned to little Angela with almost 
 passionate love and tenderness. He would, mayhap, have 
 spoiled her had not frontier service kept him so much 
 afield that it was Janet who really reared her, but not 
 according to the strict letter of her law. Wren knew well 
 what that was and forbade. 
 
 Misfortunes came to Janet Wren while yet a comely 
 woman of thirty-five. She could have married, and mar 
 ried well, a comrade captain in her brother s regiment; 
 but him, at least, she held to be her own, and, loving him 
 with genuine fervor and devotion, she sought to turn him 
 in all things to her serious views of life, its manifold 
 duties and responsibilities. She had her ideal of what a 
 man should be a monarch among other men, but one 
 
SCOT VERSUS SAXON 27 
 
 knowing no God but her God, no creed but her creed, no 
 master but Duty, no mistress but herself, and no weak 
 ness whatsoever. A braver, simpler, kinder soul than her 
 captain there dwelt not in the service of his country, but 
 he loved his pipe, his song, his dogs, his horses, his troop, 
 and certain soldier ways that, during his convalescence 
 from wounds, she had not had opportunity to observe. 
 She had nursed him back to life and love and, unwit 
 tingly, to his former harmless habits. These all she 
 would have had him forswear, not for her sake so much, 
 she said, but because they were in themselves sinful and 
 beneath him. She sought to train him down too fine for 
 the rugged metal of the veteran soldier, and the fabric 
 snapped in her hands. She had sent him forth sore- 
 hearted over her ceaseless importunity. She had told 
 him he must not only give up all his ways, but, if he would 
 make her happy, he must put the words of Ruth into his 
 mouth, and that ended it. He transferred into another 
 corps when she broke with him ; carried his sore heart to 
 the Southern plains, and fell in savage battle within an 
 other month. 
 
 Not long thereafter her little fortune, invested accord 
 ing to the views of a spiritual rather than a temporal ad 
 viser, and much against her brother s wishes, went the 
 way of riches that have wings, and now, dependent solely 
 upon him, welcomed to his home and fireside, she never 
 theless strove to dominate as of yore. He had had to tell 
 her Angela could not and should not be subjected to such 
 restraints as the sister would have prescribed, but so long 
 
AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 as he was the sole victim he whimsically bore it without 
 vehement protest. " Convert me all you can, Janet, dear," 
 he said, "but don t try to reform the whole regiment. 
 It s past praying- for." 
 
 Now, when other women whispered to her that while 
 Mrs. Plume had been a belle in St. Louis and Mr. Blakcly 
 a young society beau, the magnitude of their flirtation 
 had well-nigh stopped her marriage, Miss Wren saw op 
 portunity for her good offices and, so far from avoiding, 
 she sought the society of the major s brooding wife. She 
 even felt a twinge of disappointment when the young 
 officer appeared, and after the initial thirty-six hours 
 under the commander s roof, rarely went thither at all. 
 She knew her brother disapproved of him, and thought it 
 to be because of moral, not military, obliquity. She saw 
 with instant apprehension his quick interest in Angela and 
 the child s almost unconscious response. With the solemn 
 conviction of the maiden who, until past the meridian, had 
 never loved, she looked on Angela as far too young and 
 immature to think of marrying, yet too shallow, vain and 
 frivolous, too corrupted, in fact, by that pernicious soci 
 ety school not to shrink from flirtations that might mean 
 nothing to the man but would be damnation to the girl. 
 Even the name of this big, blue-eyed, fair-skinned young 
 votary of science had much about it that made her fairly 
 bristle, for she had once been described as an " austere 
 vestal " by Lieutenant Blake, of the regiment preceding 
 them at Sandy, the th Cavalry and a mutual friend 
 had told her all about it another handicap for Blakely. 
 
SCOT VERSUS SAXON 29 
 
 She had grown, it must be admitted, somewhat gaunt 
 and forbidding in these later years, a thing that had 
 stirred certain callow wits to differentiate between the 
 Misses Wren as Angela and Angular, which, hearing, 
 some few women reproved but all repeated. Miss 
 Wren, the sister, was in fine a woman widely honored but 
 little sought. It was Angela that all Camp Sandy would 
 have met with open arms. 
 
 " R-r-robert," began Miss Wren, as the captain un 
 clasped his saber belt and turned it over to Mickel, his 
 German " striker." She would have proceeded further, but 
 he held up a warning hand. He had come homeward 
 angering and ill at ease. Disliking Blakely from the 
 first, a " ballroom soldier," as he called him, and alienated 
 from him later, he had heard still further whisperings of 
 the devotions of a chieftain s daughter at the agency, 
 above all, of the strange infatuation of the major s wife, 
 and these had warranted, in his opinion, warning words 
 to his senior subaltern in refusing that gentleman s re 
 quest to ride with Angela. " I object to any such atten 
 tions to any meetings whatsoever," said he, but sooner 
 than give the real reason, added lamely, " My daughter 
 is too young." Now he thought he saw impending duty 
 in his sister s somber eyes and poise. He knew it when 
 she began by rolling her r s it was so like their child 
 hood s spiritual guide and mentor, MacTaggart, erst 
 while of the "Auld Licht " persuasion, and a power. 
 
 " Wait a bit, Janet," said he. " Mickel, get my horse 
 and tell Sergeant Strang to send me a mounted orderly." 
 
30 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 Then, as Mickel dropped the saber in the open doorway 
 and departed, he turned upon her. 
 
 "Where s Angela?" said he, "and what was she do 
 ing out after recall? The stable sergeant says twas six 
 when Punch came home." 
 
 " R-r-robert, it is of that I wish to speak to you, and 
 before she comes to dinner. Hush ! She s coming 
 now." 
 
 Down the row of shaded wooden porticos, at the ma 
 jor s next door, at Dr. Graham s, the Scotch surgeon and 
 Wren s especial friend and crony, at the Lynns and 
 Sanders s beyond, little groups of women and children in 
 cool evening garb, and officers in white, were gathered 
 in merry, laughing chat. Nowhere, save in the eyes of 
 one woman at the commanding officer s, and here at 
 Wren s, seemed there anything ominous in the absence of 
 this officer so lately come to join them. The voice of 
 Angela, glad and ringing, fell upon the father s ears in 
 sudden joy. Who could associate shame or subterfuge 
 with tones so charged with merriment? The face of 
 Angela, coming suddenly round the corner from the side 
 veranda, beamed instantly upon him, sweet, trusting and 
 welcoming, then slowly shadowed at sight of the set ex 
 pression about his mouth, and the rigid, uncompromising, 
 determined sorrow in the features of her aunt. 
 
 Before she could utter a word, the father questioned : 
 
 "Angela, my child, have you seen Mr. Blakely this 
 afternoon ? " 
 
 One moment her big eyes clouded, but unflinchingly 
 
SCOT VERSUS SAXON 31 
 
 they met his gaze. Then, something in the stern scrutiny 
 of her aunt s regard stirred all that was mutinous within 
 her; yet there was an irrepressible twitching about the 
 corners of the rosy mouth, a twinkle about the big brown 
 eyes that should have given them pause, even as she de 
 murely answered: 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " When ? " demanded the soldier, his muscular hand 
 clutching ominously at the wooden rail; his jaw setting 
 squarely. "When and where?" 
 
 But now the merriment with which she had begun 
 changed slowly at sight of the repressed fury in his rug* 
 ged Gaelic face. She, too, was trembling as she an 
 swered : 
 
 " Just after recall down at the pool." 
 
 For an instant he stood glaring, incredulous. "At the 
 pool ! You ! My bairnie ! " Then, with sudden out 
 burst of passionate wrath, " Go to your room ! " said he. 
 
 " But listen father, dear," she began, imploringly. 
 For answer he seized her slender arm in almost brutal 
 grasp and fairly hurled her within the doorway. " Not 
 a word ! " he ground between his clinched teeth. " Go 
 instantly ! " Then, slamming the door upon her, he 
 whirled about as though to seek his sister s face, and saw 
 beyond her, rounding the corner of the northwest set of 
 quarters, coming in from the mesa roadway at the back, 
 the tall, white figure of the missing man. 
 
 Another moment and Lieutenant Blakely, in the front 
 room of his quarters, looking pale and strange, was being 
 
32 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 pounced upon with eager questioning by Duane, his 
 junior, when the wooden steps and veranda creaked un 
 der a quick, heavy, ominous tread, and, with livid face 
 and clinching hands, the troop commander came striding 
 
 in. 
 
 " Mr. Blakely," said he, his voice deep with wrath and 
 tremulous with passion, " I told you three days ago my 
 daughter and you must not meet, and you know why ! 
 To-day you lured her to a rendezvous outside the 
 post- 
 
 " Captain Wren ! " 
 
 " Don t lie ! I say you lured her, for my lass would 
 never have met you 
 
 "You shall unsay it, sir," was Blakely s instant re 
 joinder. "Are you mad or what? I never set eyes on 
 your daughter to-day until a moment ago." 
 
 And then the voice of young Duane was uplifted, shout 
 ing for help. With a crash, distinctly heard out on the 
 parade, Wren had struck his junior down. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 MOCCASIN TRACKS 
 
 WHEN Mr. Blakely left the post that afternoon 
 he went afoot. When he returned, just after 
 the sounding- of retreat, he came in saddle. 
 Purposely he avoided the road that led in front of the 
 long line of officers quarters and chose instead the water- 
 wagon track along the rear. People among- the laun 
 dresses quarters, south of the mesa on which stood the 
 quadrangular inclosure of Camp Sandy, eyed him curi 
 ously as he ambled through on his borrowed pony; but 
 he looked neither to right nor left and hurried on in ob 
 vious discomposure. He was looking pale and very tired, 
 said the saddler sergeant s wife, an hour later, when all 
 the garrison was agog with the story of Wren s mad as 
 sault. He never seemed to see the two or three soldiers, 
 men of family, who rose and saluted as he passed, and 
 not an officer in the regiment was more exact or scrupu 
 lous in his recognition of such soldier courtesy as Blakely 
 had ever been. They wondered, therefore, at his strange 
 abstraction. They wondered more, looking after him, 
 when, just as his stumbling pony reached the crest, the 
 rider reined him in and halted short in evident embar 
 rassment. They could not see what he saw two young 
 girls in gossamer gowns of white, with arms entwining 
 
34 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 each other s waists, their backs toward him, slowly pacing 
 northward up the mesa and to the right of the road. 
 Some old croquet arches, balls, and mallets lay scattered 
 about, long since abandoned to dry rot and disuse, and, 
 so absorbed were the damsels in their confidential chat, 
 bubbling over, too, with merry laughter, they gave no 
 heed to these until one, the taller of the pair, catching her 
 slippered foot in the stiff, unyielding wire, plunged for 
 ward and fell, nearly dragging her companion with her. 
 Blakely, who had hung back, drove his barbless heels 
 into the pony s flanks, sent him lurching forward, and in 
 less than no time was out of saddle and aiding her to rise, 
 laughing so hard she, for a moment, could not speak or 
 thank him. Save to flowing skirt, there was not the 
 faintest damage, yet his eyes, his voice, his almost tremu 
 lous touch were all suggestive of deep concern, before, 
 once more mounting, he raised his broad-brimmed hat 
 and bade them reluctant good-night. Kate Sanders ran 
 scurrying home an instant later, but Angela s big and 
 shining eyes followed him every inch of the way until he 
 once more dismounted at the upper end of the row and, 
 looking back, saw her and waved his hat, whereat she ran, 
 blushing, smiling, and not a little wondering, flustered 
 and happy, into the gallery of their own quarters and the 
 immediate presence of her father. Blakely, meanwhile, 
 had summoned his servant: 
 
 " Take this pony at once to Mr. Hart," said he, " and 
 say I ll be back again as soon as I ve seen the command 
 ing officer." 
 
MOCCASIN TRACKS 35 
 
 When Downs, the messenger, returned to the house 
 about half an hour later, it was to find his master pros 
 trate and bleeding on the bed in his room, Dr. Graham 
 and the hospital attendant working over him, the major 
 and certain of his officers, with gloomy faces and mutter 
 ing tongues, conferring on the piazza in front, and one of 
 the lieutenant s precious cases of bugs and butterflies a 
 wreck of shattered glass. More than half the officers of 
 the post were present. A bevy of women and girls had 
 gathered in the dusk some distance down the row. The 
 wondering Milesian whispered inquiry of silent soldiers 
 lingering about the house, but the gruff voice of Ser 
 geant Clancy bade them go about their business. Not 
 until nearly an hour later was it generally known that 
 Captain Wren had been escorted to his quarters by the 
 post adjutant and ordered to remain therein in close ar 
 rest. 
 
 If some older and more experienced officer than Duane 
 had been there perhaps the matter would not have proved 
 so tragic, but the latter was utterly unstrung by Wren s 
 furious attack and the unlooked-for result. Without 
 warning of any kind, the burly Scot had launched his big 
 fist straight at Blakely s jaw, and sent the slender, still 
 fever-weakened form crashing through a case of speci 
 mens, reducing it to splinters that cruelly cut and tore the 
 bruised and senseless face. A corporal of the guard, 
 marching his relief in rear of the quarters at the moment, 
 every door and window being open, heard the crash, the 
 wild cry for help, rushed in, with his men at his heels, 
 
36 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 and found the captain standing stunned and ghastly, with 
 the sweat starting from his brow, staring down at the 
 result of his fearful work. From the front Captain San- 
 "ders and his amazed lieutenant came hurrying. Together 
 they lifted the stricken and bleeding man to his bed in 
 the back room and started a soldier for the doctor on the 
 run. The sight of this man, speeding down the row, 
 bombarded all the way with questions he could not stop 
 to answer, startled every soul along that westward-facing 
 front, and sent men and women streaming up the line 
 toward Blakely s quarters at the north end. The doctor 
 fairly brushed them from his path and Major Plume had 
 no easy task persuading the tearful, pallid groups of army 
 wives and daughters to retire to the neighboring quarters. 
 Janet Wren alone refused point-blank. She would not 
 go without first seeing her brother. It was she who took 
 the arm of the awed, bewildered, shame- and conscience- 
 stricken man and led him, with bowed and humbled head, 
 the adjutant aiding on the other side, back to the door he 
 had so sternly closed upon his only child, and that now 
 as summarily shut on him. Dr. Graham had pronounced 
 the young officer s injuries serious, and the post com 
 mander was angry to the very core. 
 
 One woman there was who, with others, had aimlessly 
 hastened up the line, and who seemed now verging on 
 hysterics the major s wife. It was Mrs. Graham who 
 rebukefully sent her own braw young brood scurrying 
 homeward through the gathering dusk, and then pos 
 sessed herself of Mrs. Plume. " The shock has unnerved 
 
MOCCASIN TRACKS 37 
 
 you," she charitably, soothingly whispered : " Come 
 away with me," but the major s wife refused to go. 
 Hart, the big post trader, had just reached the spot, driv 
 ing up in his light buckboard. His usually jovial face 
 was full of sympathy and trouble. He could not believe 
 the news, he said. Mr. Blakely had been with him so 
 short a time beforehand and was coming down again at 
 once, so Downs, the striker, told him, when some soldier 
 ran in to say the lieutenant had been half killed by Captain 
 Wren. Plume heard him talking and came down the 
 low steps to meet and confer with him, while the others, 
 men and women, listened eagerly, expectant of develop 
 ments. Then Hart became visibly embarrassed. Yes, 
 Mr. Blakely had come up from below and begged the 
 loan of a pony, saying he must get to the post at once to 
 see Major Plume. Hadn t he seen the major? No! 
 Then Hart s embarrassment increased. Yes, something 
 had happened. Blakely had told him, and in fact they 
 he all of them had something very important on hand. 
 He didn t know what to do now, with Mr. Blakely unable 
 to speak, and, to the manifest disappointment of the swift- 
 gathering group, Hart finally begged the major to step 
 aside with him a moment and he would tell him what he 
 knew. All eyes followed them, then followed the major 
 as he came hurrying back with heightened color and went 
 straight to Dr. Graham at the sufferer s side. " Can I 
 speak with him ? Is he well enough to answer a question 
 or two?" he asked, and the doctor shook his head. 
 " Then, by the Lord, I ll have to wire to Prescott ! " said 
 
38 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 Plume, and left the room at once. " What is it? " feebly 
 queried the patient, now half-conscious. But the doctor 
 answered only " Hush ! No talking now, Mr. Blakely," 
 and bade the others leave the room and let him get to sleep. 
 But tattoo had not sounded that still and starlit evening 
 when a strange story was in circulation about the post, 
 brought up from the trader s store by pack-train hands 
 who said they were there when Mr. Blakely came in and 
 asked for Hart " wanted him right away, bad," was the 
 way they put it. Then it transpired that Mr. Blakely had 
 found no sport at bug-hunting and had fallen into a doze 
 while waiting for winged insects, and when he woke it 
 was to make a startling discovery his beautiful Geneva 
 watch had disappeared from one pocket and a flat note 
 case, carried in an inner breast pocket of his white duck 
 blouse, and containing about one hundred dollars, was 
 also gone. Some vagrant soldier, possibly, or some 
 " hard-luck outfit " of prospectors, probably, had come 
 upon him sleeping, and had made way with his few 
 valuables. Two soldiers had been down stream, fishing 
 for what they called Tonto trout, but they were looked up 
 instantly and proved to be men above suspicion. Two 
 prospectors had been at Hart s, nooning, and had ridden 
 off down stream toward three o clock There was a clew 
 worth following, and certain hangers-on about the trad 
 er s, " layin fer a job," had casually hinted at the prospect 
 of a game down at Snicker s a ranch, five miles below. 
 Here, too, was something worth investigating. If Blakely 
 had been robbed, as now seemed more than likely, Camp 
 
MOCCASIN TRACKS 39 
 
 Sandy felt that the perpetrator must still be close at hand 
 and of the packer or prospector class. 
 
 But before the ranks were broken, after the roll-call, 
 then invariably held at half-past nine, Hart came driving 
 back in a buckboard, with a lantern and a passenger, the 
 latter one of the keenest trailers among the sergeants of 
 Captain Sanders troop, and Sanders was with the major 
 as the man sprang from the wagon and stood at salute. 
 
 " Found anything, sergeant? " asked Plume. 
 
 " Not a boot track, sir, but the lieutenant s own." 
 
 " No tracks at all in that soft sand ! " exclaimed the 
 major, disappointed and unbelieving. His wife had 
 come slowly forward from within doors, and, bending 
 slightly toward them, stood listening. 
 
 " No boot tracks, sir. There s others though Tonto 
 moccasins ! " 
 
 Plume stood bewildered. " By Jove ! I never thought 
 of that ! " said he, turning presently on his second troop 
 commander. " But who ever heard of Apaches taking 
 a man s watch and leaving him ? " 
 
 " If the major will look," said the sergeant, quietly pro 
 ducing a scouting notebook such as was then issued by 
 the engineer department, " I measured em and made 
 rough copies here. There was two, sir. Both came, 
 both went, by the path through the willows up stream. 
 We didn t have time to follow. One is longer and slimmer 
 than the other. If I may make so bold, sir, I d have a 
 guard down there to-night to keep people away ; otherwise 
 the tracks may be spoiled before morning." 
 
40 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 " Take three men and go yourself," said the major 
 promptly. " See anything of any of the lieutenant s prop 
 erty? Mr. Hart told you, didn t he?" Plume was 
 studying the sergeant s pencil sketches, by the light of 
 the trader s lantern, as he spoke, a curious, puzzled look 
 on his soldierly face. 
 
 " Saw where the box had lain in the sand, sir, but no 
 trace of the net," and Sergeant Shannon was thinking less 
 of these matters than of his sketches. There was some 
 thing he thought the major ought to see, and presently 
 he saw. 
 
 " Why, sergeant, these may be Tonto moccasin tracks, 
 but not grown men s. They are mere boys, aren t they? " 
 
 " Mere girls, sir." 
 
 There was a sound of rustling skirts upon the bare 
 piazza. Plume glanced impatiently over his shoulder. 
 Mrs. Plume had vanished into the unlighted hallway. 
 
 " That would account for their taking the net," said he 
 thoughtfully, " but what on earth would the guileless 
 Tonto maiden do with a watch or with greenbacks? 
 They wouldn t dare show with them at the agency ! How 
 far did you follow the tracks ? " 
 
 " Only a rod or two. Once in the willows they can t 
 well quit them till they reach the shallows above the pool, 
 sir. We can guard there to-night and begin trailing at 
 dawn." 
 
 " So be it then ! " and presently the conference closed. 
 
 Seated on the adjoining gallery, alone and in darkness, 
 stricken and sorrowing, a woman had been silently ob- 
 
MOCCASIN TRACKS 41 
 
 servant of the meeting, and had heard occasional snatches 
 of the talk. Presently she rose ; softly entered the house 
 and listened at a closed door on the northward side 
 Captain Wren s own room. An hour previous, tortured 
 between his own thoughts and her well-meant, but unwel 
 come efforts to cheer him, he had begged to be left alone, 
 and had closed his door against all comers. 
 
 Now, she as softly ascended the narrow stairway and 
 paused for a moment at another door, also closed. Lis- 
 tening a while, she knocked, timidly, hesitatingly, but no 
 answer came. After a while, noiselessly, she turned the 
 knob and entered. 
 
 A dim light was burning on a little table by the white 
 bedside. A long, slim figure, white-robed and in all the 
 abandon of girlish grief, was lying, face downward, on 
 the bed. Tangled masses of hair concealed much of the 
 neck and shoulders, but, bending over, Miss Wren could 
 partially see the flushed and tear-wet cheek pillowed on 
 one slender white arm. Exhausted by long weeping, 
 Angela at last had dropped to sleep, but the little hand 
 that peeped from under the thick, tumbling tresses still 
 clung to an odd and unfamiliar object something the 
 older woman had seen only at a distance before some 
 thing she gazed at in startled fascination this strange and 
 solemn night a slender, long-handled butterfly net of 
 filmy gauze. 
 
CHAPTER iv 
 
 A STRICKEN SENTRY 
 
 SENTRY duty at Camp Sandy along in 75 had not 
 been allowed to bear too heavily on its little gar 
 rison. There was nothing worth stealing about 
 the place, said Plume, and no pawn-shop handy. Of 
 course there were government horses and mules, food and 
 forage, arms and ammunition, but these were the days of 
 soldier supremacy in that arid and distant land, and sol 
 diers had a summary way of settling with marauders that 
 was discouraging to enterprise. Larceny was therefore 
 little known until the law, with its delays and circum 
 ventions, took root in the virgin soil, and people at such 
 posts as Sandy seldom shut and rarely locked their doors, 
 even by night. Windows were closed and blanketed by 
 day against the blazing sun and torrid heat, but, soon after 
 nightfall, every door and window was usually opened 
 wide and often kept so all the night long, in order that 
 the cooler air, settling down from mesa and mountain, 
 might drift through every room and hallway, licking up 
 the starting dew upon the smooth, rounded surface of the 
 huge alias, the porous water jars that hung suspended on 
 every porch, and wafting comfort to the heated brows of 
 the lightly covered sleepers within. Pyjamas were then 
 unknown in army circles, else even the single sheet that 
 
A STRICKEN SENTRY 43 
 
 covered the drowsing soldier might have been dispensed 
 with. 
 
 Among the quarters occupied by married men, both in 
 officers row and Sudsville under the plateau, doors were 
 of little account in a community where the only intruder 
 to be feared was heat, and so it had resulted that while 
 the corrals, stables, and storehouses had their guards, only 
 a single sentry paced the long length of the eastward 
 side of the post, a single pair of eyes and a single rifle 
 barrel being deemed amply sufficient to protect against 
 possible prowlers the rear yards and entrances of the 
 row. The westward front of the officers homes stood 
 in plain view, on bright nights at least, of the sentry at 
 the guard-house, and needed no other protector. On 
 dark nights it was supposed to look out for itself. 
 
 A lonely time of it, as a rule, had No. 5, the "back 
 yard sentry," but this October night he lacked not for 
 sensation. Lights burned until very late in many of the 
 quarters, while at Captain Wren s and Lieutenant 
 Blakely s people were up and moving about until long 
 after midnight. Of course No. 5 had heard all about 
 the dreadful affair of the early evening. What he and 
 his fellows puzzled over was the probable cause of Cap 
 tain Wren s furious assault upon his subaltern. Many a 
 theory was afloat, Duane, with unlooked-for discretion, 
 having held his tongue as to the brief conversation that 
 preceded the blow. It was after eleven when the doctor 
 paid his last visit for the night, and the attendant came 
 out on the rear porch for a pitcher of cool water from the 
 
44 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 olla. It was long after twelve when the light in the up 
 stairs room at Captain Wren s was turned low, and for 
 two hours thereafter, with bowed head, the captain him 
 self paced nervously up and down, wearing in the soft 
 and sandy soil a mournful pathway parallel with his back 
 porch. It was after three, noted Private Mullins, of that 
 first relief, when from the rear door of the major s quar 
 ters there emerged two forms in feminine garb, and, there 
 being no hindering fences, away they hastened in the 
 dim starlight, past Wren s, Cutler s, Westervelt s, and 
 Truman s quarters until they were swallowed up in the 
 general gloom about Lieutenant Blakely s. Private 
 Mullins could not say for certain whether they had entered 
 the rear door or gone around under the deep shadows of 
 the veranda. When next he saw them, fifteen minutes 
 later, coming as swiftly and silently back, Mullins was 
 wondering whether he ought not to challenge and have 
 them account for themselves. His orders were to allow 
 inmates of the officers quarters to pass in or out at night 
 without challenge, provided he " recognized them to be 
 such." Now, Mullins felt morally certain that these two 
 were Mrs. Plume and Mrs. Plume s vivacious maid, a 
 French-Canadian damsel, much admired and sought in 
 soldier circles at the post, but Mullins had not seen their 
 faces and could rightfully insist it was his duty and pre 
 rogative to do so. The question was, how would the 
 " commanding officer s lady " like and take it ? Mullins 
 therefore shook his head. " I hadn t the nerve," as he 
 expressed it, long afterwards. But no such frailty 
 
A STRICKEN SENTRY 45 
 
 oppressed the occupant of the adjoining house. Just as 
 the two had reached the rear of Wren s quarters, and were 
 barely fifty steps from safety, the captain himself, issuing 
 again from the doorway, suddenly appeared upon the 
 scene, and in low, but imperative tone accosted them. 
 " Who are you ? " said he, bending eagerly, sternly over 
 them. One quick look he gave, and, almost instantly re 
 coiling, exclaimed " Mrs. Plume ! I beg " Then, as 
 
 though with sudden recollection, " No, madam, I do not 
 beg your pardon," and, turning on his heel, abruptly left 
 them. Without a word, but with the arm of the maid 
 supporting, the taller woman sped swiftly across the nar 
 row intervening space and was lost again within the 
 shadows of her husband s home. 
 
 Private Mullins, silent and probably unseen witness of 
 this episode, slowly tossed his rifle from the port to the 
 shoulder ; shook his puzzled head ; stared a moment at the 
 dim figure of Captain Wren again in the starlit morning, 
 nervously tramping up and down his narrow limit; then 
 mechanically sauntered down the roadway, pondering 
 much over what he had seen and heard during the brief 
 period of his early morning watch. Reaching the south, 
 the lower, end of his post, he turned again. He had but 
 ten minutes left of his two-hour tramp. The second, re 
 lief was due to start at 3.30, and should reach him at 3.35. 
 He was wondering would the officer of the day " come 
 nosin round " within that time, asking him his orders, 
 and was everything all right on his post? And had he 
 observed anything unusual? There was Captain Wren, 
 
46 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 like a caged tiger, tramping up and down behind his quar 
 ters. At least he had been, for now he had disappeared. 
 There were, or rather had been, the two ladies in long 
 cloaks flitting in the shadows from the major s quarters to 
 those of the invalid lieutenant. Mullins certainly did not 
 wish to speak about them to any official visitor, whatever 
 he might whisper later to Norah Shaughnessy, the saddler 
 sergeant s daughter Norah, who was nurse girl at the 
 Trumans , and knew all the ins and outs of social life at 
 Sandy Norah, at whose window, under the north gable, 
 he gazed with love in his eyes as he made his every round. 
 He was a good soldier, was Mullins, but glad this night 
 to get off post. Through the gap between the second 
 and third quarters he saw the lights at the guard-house 
 and could faintly see the black silhouette of armed men in 
 front of them. The relief was forming sharp on time, 
 and presently Corporal Donovan would be bringing 
 Trooper Schultz, of " C " Troop, straight across the 
 parade in search of him. The major so allowed his 
 sentry on No. 5 to be relieved at night. Mullins thanked 
 the saints with pious fervor that no more ladies would be 
 like to flit across his vision, that night at least, when, dimly 
 through the dusk, against the spangled northern sky, he 
 sighted another figure crouching across the upper end of 
 his post and making straight for the lighted entrance at 
 the rear of the lieutenant s quarters. Someone else, then, 
 had interest at Blakely s someone coming stealthily 
 from without. A minute later certain wakeful ears were 
 startled by a moaning cry for aid. 
 
A STRICKEN SENTRY 47 
 
 Just what happened, and how it happened, within the 
 minute, led to conflicting stories on the morrow. First 
 man examined by Major Plume was Lieutenant Truman 
 of the Infantry, who happened to be officer of the day. 
 He had been over at Blakely s about midnight, he said; 
 had found the patient sleeping under the influence of 
 soothing medicine, and, after a whispered word with Todd, 
 the hospital attendant, had tiptoed out again, encounter 
 ing Downs, the lieutenant s striker, in the darkness on the 
 rear porch. Downs said he was that excited he couldn t 
 sleep at all, and Mr. Truman had come to the conclusion 
 that Downs s excitement was due, in large part, to local 
 influences totally disconnected with the affairs of the early 
 evening. Downs was an Irishman who loved the 
 " craytur," and had been known to resort to uncon 
 ventional methods of getting it. At twelve o clock, said 
 Mr. Truman, the striker had obviously been priming. 
 Now Plume s standing orders were that no liquor should 
 be sold to Downs at the store and none to other soldiers 
 except in " pony " glasses and for use on the spot. None 
 could be carried away unconsumed. The only legitimate 
 spirits, therefore, to which Downs could have access were 
 those in Blakely s locked closet spirits hitherto used only 
 in the preservation of specimens, and though probably not 
 much worse than the whisky sold at the store, dis 
 dainfully referred to by votaries as " Blakely s bug juice." 
 Mr. Truman, therefore, demanded of Downs the posses 
 sion of the lieutenant s keys, and, with aggrieved dignity 
 of mien, Downs had referred him to the doctor, whose 
 
48 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 suspicions had been earlier aroused. Intending to visit 
 his sentries after the change of guard at 1.30, Truman 
 had thrown himself into a reclining chair in his little par 
 lor, while Mrs. Truman and the little Trumans slumbered 
 peacefully aloft. After reading an hour or so the lieu 
 tenant fell into a doze from which he awoke with a start. 
 Mrs. Truman was bending over him. Mrs. Truman had 
 been aroused by hearing voices in cautious, yet excited, 
 colloquy in the shadows of Blakely s back porch. She 
 felt sure that Downs was one and thought from the sound 
 that he must be intoxicated, so Truman shuffled out to 
 see, and somebody, bending double in the dusk, scurried 
 away at his approach. He heard rather than saw. But 
 there was Downs, at least, slinking back into the house, 
 and him Truman halted and accosted. " Who was that 
 with you ? " he asked, and Downs thickly swore he hadn t 
 seen a soul. But all the while Downs was clumsily stuf 
 fing something into a side pocket, and Truman, seizing 
 his hand, dragged it forth into the light. It was one of 
 the hospital six-ounce bottles, bearing a label indicative 
 of glycerine lotion, but the color of the contained fluid 
 belied the label. A sniff was sufficient. " Who gave you 
 this whisky ? " was the next demand, and Downs de 
 clared twas a hospital " messager " that brought it over, 
 thinking the lieutenant might need it. Truman, filled 
 with wrath, had dragged Downs into the dimly lighted 
 room to the rear of that in which lay Lieutenant Blakely, 
 and was there upbraiding and investigating when startled 
 by the stifled cry that, rising suddenly on the night from 
 
A STRICKEN SENTRY 49 
 
 the open mesa just without, had so alarmed so many in 
 the garrison. Of what had led to it he had then no more 
 idea than the dead. 
 
 Corporal Donovan, next examined, said he was march 
 ing Schultz over to relieve Mullins on No. 5, just after 
 half-past three, and heading for the short cut between the 
 quarters of Captains Wren and Cutler, which was about 
 where No. 5 generally met the relief, when, just as they 
 were halfway between the flagstaff and the row, Schultz 
 began to limp and said there must be a pebble in his boot. 
 So they halted. Schultz kicked off his boot and shook 
 it upside down, and, while he was tugging at it again, 
 they both heard a sort of gurgling, gasping cry out on the 
 mesa. Of course Donovan started and ran that way, 
 leaving Schultz to follow, and, just back of Captain 
 Westervelt s, the third house from the northward end, 
 he almost collided with Lieutenant Truman, officer of the 
 day, who ordered him to run for Dr. Graham and fetch 
 him up to Lieutenant Blakely s quick. So of what had 
 taken place he, too, was ignorant until later. 
 
 It was the hospital attendant, Todd, whose story came 
 next and brought Plume to his feet with consternation in 
 his eyes. Todd said he had been sitting at the lieu 
 tenant s bedside when, somewhere about three o clock, he 
 had to go out and tell Downs to make less noise. Downs 
 was completely upset by the catastrophe to his officer and, 
 somehow, had got a few comforting drinks stowed away, 
 and these had started him to singing some confounded 
 Irish keen that grated on Todd s nerves. He was afraid 
 
50 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 it would disturb the patient and he was about to go out 
 and remonstrate when the singing stopped and presently 
 he heard Downs s voice in excited conversation. Then a 
 woman s voice in low, urgent, persuasive whisper be 
 came faintly audible, and this surprised Todd beyond ex 
 pression. He had thought to go and take a look and see 
 who it could be, when there was a sudden swish of skirts 
 and scurry of feet, and then Mr. Truman s voice was 
 heard. Then there was some kind of sharp talk from the 
 lieutenant to Downs, and then, in a sort of a lull, there 
 came that uncanny cry out on the mesa, and, stopping 
 only long enough to see that the lieutenant was not roused 
 or disturbed, Todd hastened forth. One or two dim 
 figures, dark and shadowy, were just visible on the east 
 ward mesa, barely ten paces away, and thither the at 
 tendant ran. Downs, lurching heavily, was just ahead 
 of him. Together they came upon a little group. Some 
 body went running southward Lieutenant Truman, as 
 Todd learned later hurrying for the doctor. A soldier 
 equipped as a sentry lay moaning on the sand, clasping a 
 bloody hand to his side, and over him, stern, silent, but 
 agitated, bent Captain Wren. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 THE CAPTAIN S DEFIANCE 
 
 WITHIN ten minutes of Todd s arrival at the 
 spot the soft sands of the mesa were tramped 
 into bewildering confusion by dozens of 
 trooper boots. The muffled sound of excited voices, so 
 soon after the startling affair of the earlier evening, and 
 hurrying footfalls following, had roused almost every 
 household along the row and brought to the spot half the 
 officers on duty at the post. A patrol of the guard had 
 come in double time, and soldiers had been sent at speed 
 to the hospital for a stretcher. Dr. Graham had lost no 
 moment of time in reaching the stricken sentry. Todd 
 had been sent back to Blakely s bedside and Downs to 
 fetch a lantern. They found the latter, five minutes later, 
 stumbling about the Trumans kitchen, weeping for that 
 which was lost, and the sergeant of the guard collared 
 and cuffed him over to the guard-house one witness, at 
 least, out of the way. At four o clock the doctor was 
 working over his exhausted and unconscious patient at 
 the hospital. Mullins had been stabbed twice, and dan 
 gerously, and half a dozen men with lanterns were hunt 
 ing about the bloody sands where the faithful fellow had 
 dropped, looking for a weapon or a clew, and probably 
 trampling out all possibility of finding either. Major 
 
 51 
 
52 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 Plume, through Mr. Doty, his adjutant, had felt it neces 
 sary to remind Captain Wren that an officer in close arrest 
 had no right to be away from his quarters. Late in the 
 evening, it seems, Dr. Graham had represented to the 
 post commander that the captain was in so nervous and 
 overwrought a condition, and so distressed, that as a phy 
 sician he recommended his patient be allowed the limits 
 of the space adjoining his quarters in which to walk off 
 his superabundant excitement. Graham had long been 
 the friend of Captain Wren and was his friend as well as 
 physician now, even though deploring his astounding out 
 break, but Graham had other things to demand his atten 
 tion as night wore on, and there was no one to speak for 
 Wren when the young adjutant, a subaltern of infantry, 
 with unnecessary significance of tone and manner, sug 
 gested the captain s immediate return to his proper quar 
 ters. Wren bowed his head and went in stunned and 
 stubborn silence. It had never occurred to him for a mo 
 ment, when he heard that half-stifled, agonized cry for 
 help, that there could be the faintest criticism of his rush 
 ing to the sentry s aid. Still less had it occurred to him 
 that other significance, and damning significance, might 
 attach to his presence on the spot, but, being first to reach 
 the fallen man, he was found kneeling over him within 
 thirty seconds of the alarm. Not another living creature 
 was in sight when the first witnesses came running 
 to the spot. Both Truman and Todd could swear to 
 that. 
 
 In the morning, therefore, the orderly came with the 
 
THE CAPTAIN S DEFIANCE 63 
 
 customary compliments to say to Captain Wren that the 
 post commander desired to see him at the office. 
 
 It was then nearly nine o clock. Wren had had a sleep 
 less night and was in consultation with Dr. Graham when 
 the summons came. " Ask that Captain Sanders be sent 
 for at once," said the surgeon, as he pressed his com 
 rade patient s hand. " The major has his adjutant and 
 clerk and possibly some other officers. You should have 
 at least one friend." 
 
 " I understand," briefly answered Wren, as he stepped 
 to the hallway to get his sun hat. " I wish it might be 
 you." The orderly was already speeding back to the office 
 at the south end of the brown rectangle of adobe and 
 painted pine, but Janet Wren, ministering, according to 
 her lights, to Angela in the little room aloft, had heard 
 the message and was coming down. Taller and more 
 angular than ever she looked as, with flowing gown, she 
 slowly descended the narrow stairway. 
 
 " I have just succeeded in getting her to sleep," she 
 murmured. " She has been dreadfully agitated ever 
 since awakened by the voices and the running this morn 
 ing, and she must have cried herself to sleep last night. 
 R-r-r-obert, would it not be well for you to see her when 
 she wakes? She does not know I could not tell her 
 that you are under arrest." 
 
 Graham looked more " dour " than did his friend of 
 the line. Privately he was wondering how poor Angela 
 could get to sleep at all with Aunt Janet there to soothe 
 her. The worst time to teach a moral lesson, with any 
 
54 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 hope of good effect, is when the recipient is suffering 
 from sense of utter injustice and wrong, yet must per 
 force listen. But it is a favorite occasion with the " ower 
 guid." Janet thought it would be a long step in the right 
 direction to bring her headstrong niece to the belief that 
 all the trouble was the direct result of her having sought, 
 against her father s wishes, a meeting with Mr. Blakely. 
 True, Janet had now some doubt that such had been the 
 case, but, in what she felt was only stubborn pride, her 
 niece refused all explanation. " Father would not hear 
 me at the time," she sobbed. " I am condemned without 
 a chance to defend myself or him." Yet Janet loved the 
 bonny child devotedly and would go through fire and 
 water to serve her best interests, only those best interests 
 must be as Janet saw them. That anything very serious 
 might result as a consequence of her brother s violent 
 assault on Blakely, she had never yet imagined. That 
 further complications- had arisen which might blacken his 
 record she never could credit for a moment. Mullins lay 
 still unconscious, and not until he recovered strength was 
 he to talk with or see anyone. Graham had given faint 
 hope of recovery, and declared that everything depended 
 on his patient s having no serious fever or setback. In a 
 few days he might be able to tell his story. Then the 
 mystery as to his assailant would be cleared in a breath. 
 Janet had taken deep offense that the commanding officer 
 should have sent her brother into close arrest without first 
 hearing of the extreme provocation. " It is an utterly 
 unheard-of proceeding," said she, " this confining of an 
 
THE CAPTAIN S DEFIANCE 55 
 
 officer and gentleman without investigation of the affair," 
 and she glared at Graham, uncomprehending, when, with 
 impatient shrug of his big shoulders, he asked her what 
 had they done, between them, to Angela. It was his wife 
 put him up to saying that, she reasoned, for Janet s Cal- 
 vinistic dogmas as to daughters in their teens were ever 
 at variance with the views of her gentle neighbor. If 
 Angela had been harshly dealt with, undeserving, it was 
 Angela s duty to say so and to say why, said Janet. 
 Meantime, her first care was her wronged and misjudged 
 brother. Gladly would she have gone to the office with 
 him and stood proudly by his side in presence of his 
 oppressor, could such a thing be permitted. She marveled 
 that Robert should now show so little of tenderness for 
 her who had served him loyally, if masterfully, so very 
 long. He merely laid his hand on hers and said he had 
 been summoned to the commanding officer s, then went 
 forth into the light and left her. 
 
 Major Plume was seated at his desk, thoughtful and 
 perplexed. Up at regimental headquarters at Prescott 
 Wren was held in high esteem, and the major s brief tele 
 graphic message had called forth anxious inquiry and 
 something akin to veiled disapprobation. Headquarters 
 could not see how it was possible for Wren to assault 
 Lieutenant Blakely without some grave reason. Had 
 Plume investigated? No, but that was coming now, he 
 said to himself, as Wren entered and stood in silence be 
 fore him. 
 
 .The little office had barely room for the desks of the 
 
66 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 commander and his adjutant and the table on which were 
 spread the files of general orders from various superior 
 headquarters regimental, department, division, the army, 
 and the War Secretary. No curtains adorned the little 
 windows, front and rear. No rug or carpet vexed the 
 warping floor. Three chairs, kitchen pattern, stood 
 against the pine partition that shut off the sight, but by no 
 means the hearing, of the three clerks scratching at their 
 flat-topped desks in the adjoining den. Maps of tho 
 United States, of the Military Division of the Pacific, and 
 of the Territory, as far as known and surveyed, hung 
 about the wooden walls. Blue-prints and photographs of 
 scout maps, made by their predecessors of the th Cav 
 alry in the days of the Crook campaigns, were scattered 
 with the order files about the table. But of pictures, orna 
 mentation, or relief of any kind the gloomy box was desti 
 tute as the dun-colored flat of the parade. Official severity 
 spoke in every feature of the forbidding office as well as 
 in those of the major commanding. 
 
 There was striking contrast, too, between the man at 
 the desk and the man on the rack before him. Plume had 
 led a life devoid of anxiety or care. Soldiering he took 
 serenely. He liked it, so long as no grave hardship 
 threatened. He had done reasonably good service at 
 corps headquarters during the Civil War ; had been com 
 missioned captain in the regulars in 61, and held no vex 
 atious command at any time perhaps, until this that took 
 him to far-away Arizona. Plume was a gentlemanly 
 fellow and no bad garrison soldier. He really shone on 
 
THE CAPTAIN S DEFIANCE 57 
 
 parade and review at such fine stations as Leavenworth 
 and Riley, but had never had to bother with mountain 
 scouting or long-distance Indian chasing on the plains. 
 He had a comfortable income outside his pay, and when 
 he was wedded, at the end of her fourth season in society, 
 to a prominent, if just a trifle passce belle, people thought 
 him a more than lucky man, until the regiment was sent 
 to Arizona and he to Sandy. Gossip said he went to 
 General Sherman with appeal for some detaining duty, 
 whereupon that bluff and most outspoken warrior ex 
 claimed : " What, what, what ! Not want to go with the 
 regiment? Why, here s Blakely begging to be relieved 
 from Terry s staff because he s mad to go." And this, 
 said certain St. Louis commentators, settled it, for Mrs. 
 Plume declared for Arizona. 
 
 Well garbed, groomed, and fed was Plume, a hand 
 some, soldierly figure. Very cool and placid was his look 
 in the spotless white that even then by local custom had 
 bcome official dress for Sandy ; but beneath the snowy 
 surface his heart beat with grave disquiet as he studied 
 the strong, rugged, somber face of the soldier on the 
 floor. 
 
 Wren was tall and gaunt and growing gray. His face 
 was deeply lined; his close-cropped beard was silver- 
 stranded; his arms and legs were long and sinewy and 
 powerful ; his chest and shoulders burly ; his regimental 
 dress had not the cut and finish of the commander s. Too 
 much of bony wrist and hand was in evidence, too little 
 of grace and curve. But, though he stood rigidly at at- 
 
58 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 tention, with all semblance of respect and subordination, 
 the gleam in his deep-set eyes, the twitch of the long fin 
 gers, told of keen and pent-up feeling, and he looked the 
 senior soldier squarely in the face. A sergeant, standing 
 by the adjutant s desk, tiptoed out into the clerk s room 
 and closed the door behind him, then set himself to listen. 
 Young Doty, the adjutant, fiddled nervously with his pen 
 and tried to go on signing papers, but failed. It was for 
 Plume to break the awkward silence, and he did not quite 
 know how. Captain Westervelt, quietly entering at the 
 moment, bowed to the major and took a chair. He had 
 evidently been sent for. 
 
 " Captain Wren," presently said Plume, his fingers 
 trembling a bit as they played with the paper folder, " I 
 have felt constrained to send for you to inquire still fur 
 ther into last night s affair or affairs. I need not tell 
 you that you may decline to answer if you consider your 
 interests are involved. I had hoped this painful matter 
 might be so explained as to as to obviate the necessity 
 of extreme measures, but your second appearance close to 
 Mr. Blakely s quarters, under all the circumstances, was 
 so so extraordinary that I am compelled to call for ex 
 planation, if you have one you care to offer." 
 
 For a moment Wren stood staring at his commander 
 in amaze. Pie had expected to be offered opportunity to 
 state the circumstances leading to his now deeply de 
 plored attack on Mr. Blakely, and to decline the offer on 
 the ground that he should have been given that oppor 
 tunity before being submitted to the humiliation of arrest. 
 
THE CAPTAIN S DEFIANCE 69 
 
 He had intended to refuse all overtures, to invite trial by 
 court-martial or investigation by the inspector general, 
 but by no manner of means to plead for reconsideration 
 now; and here was the post commander, with whom he 
 had never served until they came to Sandy, a man who 
 hadn t begun to see the service, the battles, and campaigns 
 that had fallen to his lot, virtually accusing him of fur 
 ther misdemeanor, when he had only rushed to save or 
 succor. He forgot all about Sanders or other witnesses. 
 He burst forth impetuously : 
 
 " Extraordinary, sir ! It would have been most ex 
 traordinary if I hadn t gone with all speed when I heard 
 that cry for help." 
 
 Plume looked up in sudden joy. " You mean to tell 
 me you didn t you weren t there till after the cry? " 
 
 Wren s stern Scottish face was a sight to see. " Of 
 what can you possibly be thinking, Major Plume?" he 
 demanded, slowly now, for wrath was burning within 
 him, and yet he strove for self-control. He had had a 
 lesson and a sore one. 
 
 " I will answer that a little later, Captain Wren," said 
 Plume, rising from his seat, rejoicing in the new light 
 now breaking upon him. Westervelt, too, had gasped a 
 sigh of relief. No man had ever known Wren to swerve 
 a hair s breadth from the truth. " At this moment time is 
 precious if the real criminal is to be caught at all. You 
 were first to reach the sentry. Had you seen no one 
 else?" 
 
 In the dead silence that ensued within the room the 
 
60 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 sputter of hoofs without broke harshly on the ear. Then 
 came spurred boot heels on the hollow, heat-dried board 
 ing, but not a sound from the lips of Captain Wren. The 
 rugged face, twitching with pent-up indignation the mo 
 ment before, was now slowly turning gray. Plume stood 
 facing him in growing wonder and new suspicion. 
 
 " You heard me, did you not ? I asked you did you see 
 anyone else during along the sentry post when you went 
 out?" 
 
 A fringed gauntlet reached in at the doorway and 
 tapped. Sergeant Shannon, straight as a pine, stood ex 
 pectant of summons to enter and his face spoke eloquently 
 of important tidings, but the major waved him away, and, 
 marveling, he slowly backed to the edge of the porch. 
 
 " Surely you can answer that, Captain Wren," said 
 Plume, his clear-cut, handsome face filled with mingled 
 anxiety and annoy. " Surely you should answer, or " 
 
 The ellipsis was suggestive, but impotent. After a 
 painful moment came the response : 
 
 "Or take the consequences, major?" Then slowly 
 " Very well, sir I must take them." 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 A FIND IN THE SANDS 
 
 THE late afternoon of an eventful day had come 
 to camp Sandy just such another day, from a 
 meteorological viewpoint, as that on which 
 this story opened nearly twenty-four hours earlier by the 
 shadows on the eastward cliffs. At Tuesday s sunset the 
 garrison was yawning with the ennui born of monotonous 
 and uneventful existence. As Wednesday s sunset drew 
 nigh and the mountain shadows overspread the valley, 
 even to the opposite crests of the distant Mogollon, the 
 garrison was athrill with suppressed excitement, for half 
 a dozen things had happened since the flag went up at 
 reveille. 
 
 In the first place Captain Wren s arrest had been con 
 firmed and Plume had wired department headquarters, in 
 reply to somewhat urgent query, that there were several 
 counts in his indictment of the captain, any one of which 
 was sufficient to demand a trial by court-martial, but he 
 wished, did Plume, for personal and official reasons that 
 the general commanding should send his own inspector 
 down to judge for himself. 
 
 The post sergeant major and the three clerks had heard 
 with sufficient distinctness every word that passed be 
 tween the major and the accused captain, and, there being 
 
 61 
 
62 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 at Sandy some three hundred inquisitive souls, thirsting 
 for truth and light, it could hardly be expected of this 
 quartette that it should preserve utter silence even though 
 silence had been enjoined by the adjutant. It was told all 
 over the post long before noon that Wren had been vir 
 tually accused of being the sentry s assailant as well as 
 Lieutenant Blakely s. It was whispered that, in some 
 insane fury against the junior officer, Wren had again, 
 toward 3.30, breaking his arrest, gone up the row with 
 the idea of once more entering Blakely s house and pos 
 sibly again attacking him. It was believed that the sentry 
 had seen and interposed, and that, enraged at being 
 balked by an enlisted man, Wren had drawn a knife and 
 stabbed him. True, no knife had been found anywhere 
 about the spot, and Wren had never been known to carry 
 one. But now a dozen men, armed with rakes, were 
 systematically going over the ground under the vigilant 
 eye of Sergeant Shannon Shannon, who had heard the 
 brief, emphatic interview between the major and the troop 
 commander and who had been almost immediately sent 
 forth to supervise this search, despite the fact that he had 
 but just returned from the conduct of another, the result 
 of which he imparted to the ears of only two men, Plume, 
 the post commander, and Doty, his amazed and be 
 wildered adjutant. But Shannon had with him a trio of 
 troopers, one of whom, at least, had not been proof against 
 inquisitive probing, for the second sensation of the day 
 was the story that one of the two pairs of moccasin traoks, 
 among the yielding sands of the willow copse, led from 
 
A FIND IN THE SANDS 63 
 
 where Mr. Blakely had been dozing to where the pony 
 Punch had been drowsing in the shade, for there they 
 were lost, as the maker had evidently mounted and ridden 
 away. All Sandy knew that Punch had no other rider 
 than pretty Angela Wren. 
 
 A third story, too, was whispered in half a dozen 
 homes, and was going wild about the garrison, to the 
 effect that Captain Wren, when accused of being Mullins s 
 assailant, had virtually declared that he had seen 
 other persons prowling on the sentry s post and that they, 
 not he, were the guilty ones ; but when bidden to name or 
 describe them, Wren had either failed or refused; some 
 said one, some said the other, and the prevalent belief in 
 Sudsville circles, as well as in the barracks, was that Cap 
 tain Wren was going crazy over his troubles. And now 
 there were women, ay, and men, too, though they spake 
 with bated breath, who had uncanny things to say of 
 Angela the captain s only child. 
 
 And this it was that led to sensation No. 4 a wordy 
 battle of the first magnitude between the next-door 
 neighbor of the saddler sergeant and no less a champion 
 of maiden probity than Norah Shaughnessy the saddler 
 sergeant s buxom daughter. All the hours since early 
 morning Norah had been in a state of nerves so uncon 
 trollable that Mrs. Truman who knew of Norah s 
 fondness for Mullins and marveled not that Mullins 
 always preferred the loneliness and isolation of the post 
 on No. 5 decided toward noon to send the girl home to 
 her mother for a day or so, and Norah thankfully went, and 
 
64 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 threw herself upon her mother s ample breast and sobbed 
 aloud. It was an hour before she could control herself, 
 and her agitation was such that others came to minister 
 to her. Of course there was just one explanation 
 Norah was in love with Mullins and well-nigh crazed 
 with grief over his untimely taking off, for later reports 
 from the hospital were most depressing. This, at least, 
 was sufficient explanation until late in the afternoon. 
 Then, restored to partial composure, the girl was sitting 
 up and being fanned in the shade of her father s roof- 
 tree, when roused by the voice of the next-door neighbor 
 before mentioned Mrs. Quinn, long time laundress of 
 Captain Sanders s troop and jealous as to Wren s, was tell 
 ing what she had heard of Shannon s discoveries, opining 
 that both Captain Wren and the captain s daughter de 
 served investigation. " No wan need tell me there was 
 others prowling about Mullins s post at three in the 
 
 marnin. As for Angela " But here Miss Shaugh- 
 
 nessy bounded from the wooden settee, and, with amazing 
 vim and vigor, sailed spontaneously into Mrs. Quinn. 
 
 " No wan need tell you ye say ! No wan need tell 
 you, ye black-tongued scandium! Well, then, / tell ye 
 Captain Wren did see others prowlin on poor Pat Mul 
 lins s post an others than him saw them too. Go you to 
 the meejer, soon as ye like and say 7 saw them, and if 
 Captain Wren won t tell their names there s them that 
 will." 
 
 The shrill tones of the infuriated girl were plainly audi 
 ble all over the flats whereon were huddled the little 
 
A FIND IN THE SANDS 65 
 
 cabins of log and adobe assigned as quarters to the few 
 married men among the soldiery. These were the 
 halcyon days of the old army when each battery, troop, or 
 company was entitled to four laundresses and each laun 
 dress to one ration. Old and young, there were at least 
 fifty pairs of ears within easy range of the battle that 
 raged forthwith, the noise of which reached even to the 
 shaded precincts of the trader s store three hundred yards 
 away. It was impossible that such a flat-footed state 
 ment as Norah s should not be borne to the back doors of 
 " The Row " and, repeated then from lip to lip, should 
 soon be told to certain of the officers. Sanders heard it 
 as he came in from stable duty, and Dr. Graham felt con 
 fident that it had been repeated under the major s roof 
 when at 6 p. M. the post commander desired his profes 
 sional services in behalf of Mrs. Plume, who had become 
 unaccountably, if not seriously, ill. 
 
 Graham had but just returned from a grave conference 
 with Wren, and his face had little look of the family phy 
 sician as he reluctantly obeyed the summons. As another 
 of the auld licht school of Scotch Presbyterians, he also 
 had conceived deep-rooted prejudice to that frivolous 
 French aide-de-camp of the major s wife. The girl did 
 dance and flirt and ogle to perfection, and half a dozen 
 strapping sergeants were now at sword s points all on ac 
 count of this objectionable Eliza. Graham, of course, had 
 heard with his ears and fathomed with his understanding 
 the first reports of Wren s now famous reply to his com 
 manding officer ; and though Wren would admit no more 
 
66 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 to him than he had to the major, Graham felt confident 
 that the major s wife was one of the mysterious persons 
 seen by Wren, and declared by Norah, in the dim starlight 
 of the early morning, lurking along the post of No. 
 5. Graham had no doubt that Elise was the other. The 
 man most concerned in the case, the major himself, was 
 perhaps the only one at sunset who never seemed to sus 
 pect that Mrs. Plume could have been in any way con 
 nected with the affair. He met the doctor with a world 
 of genuine anxiety in his eyes. 
 
 " My wife," said he, " is of a highly sensitive organi 
 zation, and she has been completely upset by this suc 
 cession of scandalous affairs. She and Blakely were 
 great friends at St. Louis three years ago; indeed, 
 many people were kind enough to couple their names 
 before our marriage. I wish you could quiet her," 
 and the sounds from aloft, where madame was ner 
 vously pacing her room, gave point to the suggestion. 
 Graham climbed the narrow stairs and tapped at the 
 north door on the landing. It was opened by Elise, 
 whose big, black eyes were dilated with excitement, while 
 Mrs. Plume, her blonde hair tumbling down her back, 
 her peignoir decidedly rumpled and her general appear 
 ance disheveled, was standing in mid-floor, wringing her 
 jeweled hands. " She looks like sixty," was the doc 
 tor s inward remark, " and is probably not twenty-six." 
 
 Her first question jarred upon his rugged senses. 
 
 " Dr. Graham, when will Mr. Blakely be able to see 
 or read?" 
 
A FIND IN THE SANDS 67 
 
 " Not for a day or two. The stitches must heal before 
 the bandages can come off his eyes. Even then, Mrs. 
 Plume, he should not be disturbed," was the uncompro 
 mising answer. 
 
 "Is that wretch, Downs, sober yet?" she demanded, 
 standing and confronting him, her whole form quivering 
 with strong, half-suppressed emotion. 
 
 " The wretch is sobering," answered Graham gravely. 
 "And now, madame, I ll trouble you to take a chair. Do 
 you," with a glance of grim disfavor, " need this girl for 
 the moment? If not, she might as well retire." 
 
 " I need my maid, Dr. Graham, and I told Major 
 Plume distinctly I did not need you," was the impulsive 
 reply, as the lady strove against the calm, masterful grasp 
 he laid on her wrist. 
 
 " That s as may be, Mrs. Plume. We re often blind to 
 our best interests. Be seated a moment, then I ll let you 
 tramp the soles of your feet off, if you so desire." And 
 so he practically pulled her into a chair ; Elise, glaring the 
 while, stood spitefully looking on. The antipathy was 
 mutual. 
 
 " You ve slept too little of late, Mrs. Plume," contin 
 ued the doctor, lucklessly hitting the mark with a home 
 shot instantly resented, for the lady was on her feet again. 
 
 " Sleep ! People do nothing but sleep in this woebe 
 gone hole ! " she cried. " I ve had sleep enough to last 
 a lifetime. What I want is to wake wake out of this 
 horrible nightmare! Dr. Graham, you are a friend of 
 Captain Wren s. What under heaven possessed him, 
 
68 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 with his brutal strength, to assault so sick a man as Mr. 
 Blakely ? What possible pretext could he assert ? " And 
 again she was straining at her imprisoned hand and seek 
 ing to free herself, Graham calmly studying her the while, 
 as he noted the feverish pulse. Not half an hour earlier 
 he had been standing beside the sick bed of a fair young 
 girl, one sorely weighted now with grave anxieties, yet 
 who lay patient and uncomplaining, rarely speaking a 
 word. They had not told the half of the web of accusa 
 tion that now enmeshed her father s feet, but what had 
 been revealed to her was more than enough to banish 
 every thought of self or suffering and to fill her fond 
 heart with instant and loving care for him. No one, not 
 even Janet, was present during the interview between 
 father and child that followed. Graham found him later 
 locked in his own room, reluctant to admit even him, and 
 lingering long before he opened the door ; but even then 
 the tear-stains stood on his furrowed face, and the doctor 
 knew he had been sobbing his great heart out over the 
 picture of his child the child he had so harshly judged 
 and sentenced, all unheard. Graham had gone to him, 
 after seeing Angela, with censure on his tongue, but he 
 never spoke the words. He saw there was no longer need. 
 
 " Let the lassie lie still the day," said he, " with Kate, 
 perhaps, to read to her. Your sister might not choose a 
 cheering book. Then perhaps we ll have her riding 
 Punch again to-morrow." But Graham did not smile 
 when meeting Janet by the parlor door. 
 
 He was thinking of the contrast in these two, his pa- 
 
A FIND IN THE SANDS 69 
 
 tients, as with professional calm he studied the troubled 
 features of the major s wife when the voice of Sergeant 
 Shannon was heard in the lower hall, inquiring for the 
 major, and in an instant Plume had joined him. In that 
 instant, too, Elise had sped, cat-like, to the door, and Mrs. 
 Plume had followed. Possibly for this reason the major 
 led the sergeant forth upon the piazza and the conversa 
 tion took place in tones inaudible to those within the 
 house ; but, in less than a minute, the doctor s name was 
 called and Graham went down. 
 
 " Look at this," said Plume. " They raked it out of 
 the sand close to where Mullins was lying." And the 
 major held forth an object that gleamed in the last rays 
 of the slanting sunshine. It was Blakely s beautiful 
 watch. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 THE dawn of another cloudless day was breaking 
 and the dim lights at the guard-house and the 
 hospital burned red and bleary across the sandy 
 level of the parade. The company cooks were already at 
 their ranges, and a musician of the guard had been sent 
 to rouse his fellows in the barracks, for the old-style 
 reveille still held good at many a post in Arizona, before 
 the drum and fife were almost entirely abandoned in favor 
 of the harsher bugle, by the infantry of our scattered little 
 army. Plume loved tradition. At West Point, where 
 he had often visited in younger days, and at all the " old- 
 time " garrisons, the bang of the morning gun and the 
 simultaneous crash of the drums were the military means 
 devised to stir the soldier from his sleep. Then, his 
 brief ablutions were conducted to the accompaniment of 
 the martial strains of the field musicians, alternating the 
 sweet airs of Moore and Burns, the lyrics of Ireland and 
 Auld Reekie, with quicksteps from popular Yankee melo 
 dies of the day, winding up with a grand flourish at the 
 foot of the flagstaff, to whose summit the flag had started 
 at the first alarum ; then a rush into rattling " double 
 quick " that summoned the laggards to scurry into the 
 silently forming ranks, and finally, with one emphatic 
 
 70 
 
" WOMAN-WALK-IN-THE-NIGHT 71 
 
 rataplan, the morning concert abruptly closed and the 
 gruff voices of the first sergeants, in swift-running mono 
 tone, were heard calling the roll of their shadowy compa 
 nies, and, thoroughly roused, the garrison " broke ranks " 
 for the long routine of the day 
 
 We have changed all that, and not for the better. A 
 solitary trumpeter steps forth from the guard-house or 
 adjutant s office and, at the appointed time, drones a long, 
 dispiriting strain known to the drill books as "Assembly 
 of the Trumpeters," and to the army at large as " First 
 Call." Unassisted by other effort, it would rouse nobody, 
 but from far and near the myriad dogs of the post 
 " mongrel, hound, and cur of low degree " lift up their 
 canine voices in some indefinable sympathy and stir the 
 winds of the morning with their mournful yowls. Then, 
 when all the garrison gets up cursing and all necessity 
 for rousing is ended, the official reveille begins, sounded 
 by the combined trumpeters, and so, uncheered by concord 
 of sweet sounds, the soldier begins his day. 
 
 The two infantry companies at Sandy, at the time 
 whereof we tell, were of an honored old regiment that 
 had fought with Worth at Monterey one whose scamps 
 of drum boys and fifers had got their teachings from pre 
 decessors whose nimble fingers had trilled the tunes of 
 old under the walls of the Bishop s Palace and in the re 
 sounding Halls of the Montezumas. Plume and Cutler 
 loved their joyous, rhythmical strains, and would gladly 
 have kept the cavalry clarions for purely cavalry calls; 
 but reveille and guard-mounting were the only ones 
 
72 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 where this was practicable, and an odd thing had become 
 noticeable. Apache Indians sometimes stopped their 
 ears, and always looked impolite, when the brazen trum 
 pets sounded close at hand ; whereas they would squat on 
 the sun-kissed sands and listen in stolid, unmurmuring 
 bliss to every note of the fife and drum. Members of the 
 guard were always sure of sympathetic spectators during 
 the one regular ceremony guard-mounting held just 
 after sunset, for the Apache prisoners at the guard-house 
 begged to be allowed to remain without the prison room 
 until a little after the " retreat " visit of the officer of the 
 day, and, roosting along the guard-house porch, to gaze 
 silently forth at the little band of soldiery in the center of 
 the parade, and there to listen as silently to the music of 
 the fife and drum. The moment it was all over they 
 would rise without waiting for directions, and shuffle 
 stolidly back to their hot wooden walls. They had had 
 the one intellectual treat of the day. The savage breast 
 was soothed for the time being, and Plume had come to 
 the conclusion that, aside from the fact that his Indian 
 prisoners were better fed than when on their native heath, 
 the Indian prison pen at Sandy was not the place of pen 
 ance the department commander had intended. Acces 
 sions became so frequent ; discharges so very few. 
 
 Then there was another symptom: Sentries on the 
 north and east front, Nos. 4 and 5, had been a bit 
 startled at first at seeing, soon after dawn, shadowy forms 
 rising slowly from the black depths of the valley, hover- 
 mg uncertainly along the edge of the mesa until they 
 
" WOMAN-WALK-IN-THE-NIGHT 73 
 
 could make out the lone figure of the morning watcher, 
 then slowly, cautiously, and with gestures of amity and 
 suppliance, drawing gradually nearer. Sturdy Germans 
 and mercurial Celts were, at the start, disposed to " shoo " 
 away these specters as being hostile, or at least incon 
 gruous. But officers and men were soon made to see it 
 was to hear the morning music these children of the des 
 ert flocked so early. The agency lay but twenty miles 
 distant. The reservation lines came no nearer; but the 
 fame of the invader s big maple tom-tom (we wore still 
 the deep, resonant drum of Bunker Hill and Waterloo, 
 of Jemappes, Saratoga, and Chapultepec, not the modern 
 rattle pan borrowed from Prussia), and the trill of his 
 magical pipe had spread abroad throughout Apache land 
 to the end that no higher reward for good behavior could 
 be given by the agent to his swarthy charges than the 
 begged-for pa-pel permitting them, in lumps of twenty, to 
 trudge through the evening shades to the outskirts of the 
 soldier castle on the mesa, there to wait the long night 
 through until the soft tinting of the eastward heavens 
 and the twitter of the birdlings in the willows along the 
 stream, gave them courage to begin their timid approach. 
 And this breathless October morning was no exception. 
 The sentry on the northward line, No. 4, had recognized 
 and passed the post surgeon soon after four o clock, 
 hastening to hospital in response to a summons from an 
 anxious nurse. Mullins seemed far too feverish. No. 4 
 as well as No. 5 had noted how long the previous evening 
 Shannon and his men kept raking and searching about 
 
74 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 the mesa where Mullins was stabbed in the early morn 
 ing, and they were in no mood to allow strangers to near 
 them unchallenged. The first shadowy forms to show at 
 the edge had dropped back abashed at the harsh recep 
 tion accorded them. Four s infantry rifle and Five s 
 cavalry carbine had been leveled at the very first to ap 
 pear, and stern voices had said things the Apache could 
 neither translate nor misunderstand. The would-be au 
 dience of the morning concert ducked and waited. With 
 more light the sentry might be more kind. The evening 
 previous six new prisoners had been sent down under 
 strong guard by the agent, swelling the list at Sandy to 
 thirty-seven and causing Plume to set his teeth and an 
 extra sentry. Now, as the dawn grew broader and the 
 light clear and strong, Four and Five were surprised, if 
 not startled, to see that not twenty, but probably forty 
 Apaches, with a sprinkling of squaws, were hovering all 
 along the mesa, mutely watching for the signaled per 
 mission to come in. Five, at least, considered the symp 
 tom one of sufficient gravity to warrant report to higher 
 authority, and full ten minutes before the time for reveille 
 to begin, his voice went echoing over the arid parade in 
 a long-draw, yet imperative " Corporal of the Gua-a-rd, 
 No. 5 ! " 
 
 Whereat there were symptoms of panic among the 
 dingy white-shirted, dingy white-turbaned watchers along 
 the edge, and a man in snowy white fatigue coat, pacing 
 restlessly up and down in rear, this time, of the major s 
 quarters, whirled suddenly about and strode put on the 
 
" WOMAN-WALK-IN-THE-NIGHT 75 
 
 mesa, gazing northward in the direction of the sound. It 
 was Plume himself, and Plume had had a sleepless night. 
 
 At tattoo, by his own act and direction, the malor had 
 still further strained the situation. The discovery of 
 Blakely s watch, buried loosely in the sands barely ten 
 feet from where the sentry fell, had seemed to him a mat 
 ter of such significance that, as Graham maintained an 
 expression of professional gravity and hazarded no ex 
 planation, the major sent for the three captains still on 
 duty, Cutler, Sanders, and Westervelt, and sought their 
 views. One after another each picked up and closely ex 
 amined the watch, within and without, as though expec 
 tant of finding somewhere concealed about its mechanism 
 full explanation of its mysterious goings and comings. 
 Then in turn, with like gravity, each declared he had no 
 theory to offer, unless, said Sanders, Mr. Blakely was 
 utterly mistaken in supposing he had been robbed at the 
 pool. Mr. Blakely had the watch somewhere about him 
 when he dismounted, and then joggled it into the sands, 
 where it soon was trampled under foot. Sanders admit 
 ted that Blakely was a man not often mistaken, and that 
 the loss reported to the post trader of the flat notebook 
 was probably correct. But no one could be got to see, 
 much less to say, that Wren was in the slightest degree 
 connected with the temporary disappearance of the watch. 
 Yet by this time Plume had some such theory of his own. 
 
 Sometime during the previous night, along toward 
 morning, he had sleepily asked his wife, who was softly 
 moving about the room, to give him a little water. The 
 
76 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 " monkey " stood usually on the window sill, its cool and 
 dewy surface close to his hand ; but he remembered later 
 that she did not then approach the window did not im 
 mediately bring him the glass. He had retired very late, 
 yet was hardly surprised to find her wide awake and more 
 than usually nervous. She explained by saying Elise 
 had been quite ill, was still suffering, and might need her 
 services again. She could not think, she said, of sending 
 for Dr. Graham after all he had had to vex him. It must 
 have been quite a long while after, so soundly had Plume 
 slept, when she bent over him and said something was 
 amiss and Mr. Doty was at the front door waiting for 
 him to come down. He felt oddly numb and heavy and 
 stupid as he hastily dressed, but Doty s tidings, that Mul- 
 lins had been stabbed on post, pulled him together, as it 
 were, and, merely running back to his room for his can 
 vas shoes, he was speedily at the scene. Mrs. Plume, 
 when briefly told what had happened, had covered her 
 face with her hands and buried face and all in the pillow, 
 shuddering. At breakfast-time Plume himself had taken 
 her tea and toast, both mistress and maid being still on 
 the invalid list, and, bending affectionately over her, he 
 had suggested her taking this very light refreshment and 
 then a nap. Graham, he said, should come and prescribe 
 for Elise. But madame was feverishly anxious. " What 
 will be the outcome? What will happen to Captain 
 Wren?" she asked. 
 
 Plume would not say just what, but he would certainly 
 have to stand court-martial, said he. Mrs. Plume shud- 
 
" WOMAN-WALK-IN-THE-NIGHT 77 
 
 dered more. What good would that do? How much 
 better it would be to suppress everything than set such 
 awful scandal afloat. The matter was now in the hands 
 of the department commander, said Plume, and would 
 have to take its course. Then, in some way, from her 
 saying how ill the captain was looking, Plume gathered 
 the impression that she had seen him since his arrest, and 
 asked the question point-blank. Yes, she admitted, 
 from the window, while she was helping Elise. Where 
 was he? What was he doing? Plume had asked, all in 
 terest now, for that must have been very late, in fact, well 
 toward morning. " Oh, nothing especial, just looking 
 at his watch," she thought, " he probably couldn t sleep." 
 Yes, she was sure he was looking at his watch. 
 
 Then, as luck would have it, late in the day, when the 
 mail came down from Prescott, there was a little package 
 for Captain Wren, expressed, and Doty signed the re 
 ceipt and sent it by the orderly. "What was it ? " asked 
 Plume. " His watch, sir," was the brief answer. " He 
 sent it up last month for repairs," And Mrs. Plume at 
 nine that night, knowing nothing of this, yet surprised at 
 her husband s pertinacity, stuck to her story. She was 
 sure Wren was consulting or winding or doing some 
 thing with a watch, and, sorely perplexed and marveling 
 much at the reticence of his company commanders, who 
 seemed to know something they would not speak of, 
 Wren sent for Doty. He had decided on another inter 
 view with Wren. 
 
 Meanwhile " the Bugologist " had been lying patiently 
 
78 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 in his cot, saying little or nothing, in obedience to the doc 
 tor s orders, but thinking who knows what. Duane and 
 Doty occasionally tiptoed in to glance inquiry at the fan 
 ning attendant, and then tiptoed out. Mullins had been 
 growing worse and was a very sick man. Downs, the 
 wretch, was painfully, ruefully, remorsefully sobered 
 over at the post of the guard, and of Graham s feminine 
 patients the one most in need, perhaps, of his ministration 
 was giving the least trouble. While Aunt Janet paced 
 restlessly about the lower floor, stopping occasionally to 
 listen at the portal of her brother, Angela Wren lay silent 
 and only sometimes sighing, with faithful Kate Sanders 
 reading in low tone by the bedside. 
 
 The captains had gone back to their quarters, confer 
 ring in subdued voices. Plume, with his unhappy young 
 adjutant, was seated on the veranda, striving to frame 
 his message to Wren, when the crack of a whip, the 
 crunching of hoofs and wheels, sounded at the north end 
 of the row, and down at swift trot came a spanking, four- 
 mule team and Concord wagon. It meant but one thing, 
 the arrival of the general s staff inspector straight from 
 Prescott. 
 
 It was the very thing Plume had urged by telegraph, 
 yet the very fact that Colonel Byrne was here went to 
 prove that the chief was far from satisfied that the ma 
 jor s diagnosis was the right one. With soldierly alac 
 rity, however, Plume sprang forward to welcome the 
 coming dignitary, giving his hand to assist him from the 
 dark interior into the light. Then he drew back in some 
 
" WOMAN-WALK-IN-THE-NIGHT 79 
 
 chagrin. The voice of Colonel Byrne was heard, jovial 
 and reassuring, but the face and form first to appear 
 were those of Mr. Wayne Daly, the new Indian agent at 
 the Apache reservation. Coming by the winding way of 
 Cherry Creek, the colonel must have found means to wire 
 ahead, then to pick up this civil functionary some dis 
 tance up the valley, and to have some conference with him 
 before ever reaching the major s bailiwick. This was not 
 good, said Plume. All the same, he led them into his 
 cozy army parlor, bade his Chinese servant get abundant 
 supper forthwith, and, while the two were shown to the 
 spare room to remove the dust of miles of travel, once 
 more returned to the front piazza and his adjutant. 
 
 " Captain Wren, sir," said the young officer at once, 
 "begs to be allowed to see Colonel Byrne this evening. 
 He states that his reasons are urgent." 
 
 " Captain Wren shall have every opportunity to see 
 Colonel Byrne in due season," was the answer. " It is 
 not to be expected that Colonel Byrne will see him until 
 after he has seen the post commander. Then it will prob 
 ably be too late," and that austere reply, intended to reach 
 the ears of the applicant, steeled the Scotchman s heart 
 against his commander and made him merciless. 
 
 The " conference of the powers " was indeed protracted 
 until long after 10.30, yet, to Plume s surprise, the 
 colonel at its close said he believed he would go, if Plume 
 had no objection, and see Wren in person and at once. 
 " You see, Plume, the general thinks highly of the old 
 Scot. He has known him ever since First Bull Run and, 
 
80 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 in fact, I am instructed to hear what Wren may have to 
 say. I hope you will not misinterpret the motive." 
 
 " Oh, not at all not at all ! " answered the major, obvi 
 ously ill pleased, however, and already nettled that, 
 against all precedent, certain of the Apache prisoners had 
 been ordered turned out as late as 10 P.M. for interview 
 with the agent. It would leave him alone, too, for as 
 much as half an hour, and the very air seemed surcharged 
 with intrigue against the might, majesty, power, and do 
 minion of the post commander. Byrne, a soldier of the 
 old school, might do his best to convince the major that 
 in no wise was the confidence of the general commanding 
 abated, but every symptom spoke of something to the 
 contrary. " I should like, too, to see Dr. Graham to 
 night," said the official inquisitor ere he quitted the piazza 
 to go to Wren s next door. " He will be here to meet 
 you on your return," said Plume, with just a bit of state- 
 liness, of ruffled dignity in manner, and turned once more 
 within the hallway to summon his smiling Chinaman. 
 
 Something rustling at the head of the stairs caused him 
 to look up quickly. Something dim and white was hov 
 ering, drooping, over the balustrade, and, springing aloft, 
 he found his wife in a half-fainting condition, Elise, the 
 invalid, sputtering vehemently in French and making 
 vigorous effort to pull her away. Plume had left her at 
 8.30, apparently sleeping at last under the influence of 
 Graham s medicine. Yet here she was again. He lifted 
 her in his arms and laid her upon the broad, white bed. 
 " Clarice, my child," he said, " you must be quiet. You 
 
" WOMAN-WALK-IN-THE-NIGHT 81 
 
 must not leave your bed. I am sending for Graham and 
 he will come to us at once." 
 
 " I will not see him ! He shall not see me ! " she burst 
 in wildly. " The man maddens me with his his inso 
 lence." 
 
 "Clarice!" 
 
 " Oh, I mean it ! He and his brother Scot, between 
 them they would infuriate a saint," and she was writh 
 ing in nervous contortions. 
 
 "But, Clarice, how?" 
 
 " But, monsieur, no ! " interppsed Elise, bending over, 
 glass in hand. " Madame will but sip of this Madame 
 will be tranquil." And the major felt himself thrust 
 aside. " Madame must not talk to-night. It is too 
 much." 
 
 But madame would talk. Madame would know where 
 Colonel Byrne was gone, whether he was to be permitted 
 to see Captain Wren and Dr. Graham, and that wretch 
 Downs. Surely the commanding officer must have some 
 rights. Surely it was no time for investigation this 
 hour of the night. Five minutes earlier Plume was of 
 the same way of thinking. Now he believed his wife 
 delirious. 
 
 " See to her a moment, Elise," said he, breaking loose 
 from the clasp of the long, be jeweled fingers, and, scurry 
 ing down the stairs, he came face to face with Dr. Gra 
 ham. 
 
 " I was coming for you," said he, at sight of the rugged, 
 somber face. " Mrs. Plume " 
 
82 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 " I heard at least I comprehend/ answered Graham, 
 with uplifted hand. " The lady is in a highly nervous 
 state, and my presence does not tend to soothe her. The 
 remedies I left will take effect in time. Leave her to 
 that waiting woman ; she best understands her." 
 
 " But she s almost raving, man. I never knew a 
 woman to behave like that." 
 
 " Ye re not long married, major," answered Graham. 
 " Come into the air a bit," and, taking his commander s 
 arm, the surgeon swept him up the starlit row, then over 
 toward the guard-house, and kept him half an hour 
 watching the strange interview between Mr. Daly, the 
 agent, and half a dozen gaunt, glittering-eyed Apaches, 
 from whom he was striving to get some admission or in 
 formation, with Arahawa, " Washington Charley," as 
 interpreter. One after another the six had shaken their 
 frowsy heads. They admitted nothing knew nothing. 
 
 " What do you make of it all ? " queried Plume. 
 
 " Something s wrang at the reservation," answered 
 Graham. " There mostly is. Daly thinks there s run 
 ning to and fro between the Tontos in the Sierra Ancha 
 country and his wards above here. He thinks there s 
 more out than there should be and more a-going. 
 What d you find, Daly ? " he added, as the agent joined 
 them, mechanically wiping his brow. Moisture there 
 was none. It evaporated fast as the pores exuded. 
 
 " They know well enough, damn them ! " said the new 
 official. " But they think I can be stood off. I ll nail 
 em yet to-morrow," he added. " But could you send 
 
" WOMAN-WALK-IN-THE-NIGHT 83 
 
 a scout at once to the Tonto basin ? " and Daly turned 
 eagerly to the post commander. 
 
 Plume reflected. Whom could he send? Men there 
 were in plenty, dry-rotting at the post for lack of some 
 thing to limber their joints ; but officers to lead ? There 
 was the rub! Thirty troopers, twenty Apache Mohave 
 guides, a pack train and one or, at most, two officers 
 made up the usual complement of such expeditions. Men, 
 mounts, scouts, mules and packers, all, were there at his 
 behest ; but, with Wren in arrest, Sanders and Lynn back 
 but a week from a long prod through the Black Mesa 
 country far as Fort Apache, Blakely invalided and Duane 
 a boy second lieutenant, his choice of cavalry officers 
 was limited. It never occurred to him to look 
 beyond. 
 
 " What s the immediate need of a scout ? " said he. 
 
 " To break up the traffic that s going on and the ran- 
 cherias they must have somewhere down there. If we 
 don t, I ll not answer for another month." Daly might be 
 new to the neighborhood, but not to the business. 
 
 " I ll confer with Colonel Byrne," answered Plume 
 guardedly. And Byrne was waiting for them, a tall, dark 
 shadow in the black depths of the piazza. Graham would 
 have edged away and gone to his own den, but Plume 
 held to him. There was something he needed to say, yet 
 could not until the agent had retired. Daly saw, per 
 haps he had already imbibed something of the situation, 
 and was not slow to seek his room. Plume took the lit 
 tle kerosene lamp ; hospitably led the way ; made the cus- 
 
84 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 tomary tender of a " night-cap," and polite regrets he 
 had no ice to offer therewith; left his unwonted guest 
 with courteous good-night and cast an eye aloft as he 
 came through the hall. All there was dark and still, 
 though he doubted much that Graham s sedatives had yet 
 prevailed. He had left the two men opposite the door 
 way. He found them at the south end of the piazza, 
 their heads together. They straightened up to perfunc 
 tory talk about the Medical Director, his drastic methods 
 and inflammable ways; but the mirth was forced, the 
 humor far too dry. Then silence fell. Then Plume in 
 vaded it: 
 
 "How d you find Wren mentally?" he presently 
 asked. He felt that an opening of some kind was neces 
 sary. 
 
 " Sound," was the colonel s answer, slow and "senten 
 tious. " Of course he is much concerned." 
 
 " About his case ? Ah, will you smoke, colonel ? " 
 " About Blakely. I believe not, Plume ; it s late." 
 Plume struck a light on the sole of his natty boot. 
 " One would suppose he would feel very natural anxiety 
 as to the predicament in which he has placed himself," he 
 ventured. 
 
 " Wren worries much over Blakely s injuries, which 
 accident made far more serious than he would have in 
 flicted, major, even had he had the grounds for violence 
 that he thought he had. Blakely was not the only suf 
 ferer, and is not the only cause, of his deep contrition. 
 Wren tells me that he was even harsher to Angela. But 
 
" WOMAN-WALK-IN-THE-NIGHT " 85 
 
 that is all a family matter." The colonel was speaking 
 slowly, thoughtfully. 
 
 " But these later affairs that Wren couldn t explain 
 or wouldn t." Plume s voice and color both were 
 rising. 
 
 " Couldn t is the just word, major, and couldn t espe 
 cially to you," was the significant reply. 
 
 Plume rose from his chair and stood a moment, trem 
 bling not a little and his fingers twitching. " You 
 mean " he huskily began. 
 
 " I mean this, my friend," said Byrne gently, as he, 
 too, arose, " and I have asked Graham, another friend, to 
 be here that Wren would not defend himself to you by 
 even mentioning others, and might not have revealed 
 the truth even to me had he been the only one cognizant 
 of it. But, Plume, others saw what he saw, and what is 
 now known to many people on the post. Others than 
 Wren were abroad that night. One other was being 
 carefully, tenderly brought home led home to your 
 roof. You did not know Mrs. Plume was a somnam 
 bulist?" 
 
 In the dead silence that ensued the colonel put forth a 
 pitying hand as though to stay and support the younger 
 soldier, the post commander. Plume stood, swaying a 
 bit, and staring. Presently he strove to speak, but choked 
 in the effort. 
 
 " It s the only proper explanation," said Graham, and 
 between them they led the major within doors. 
 
 And this is how it happened that he, instead of Wren, 
 
86 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 was pacing miserably up and down in the gathering dawn, 
 when the sentry startled all waking Sandy with his cry 
 for the corporal. This is how, far ahead of the corporal, 
 the post commander reached the alarmed soldier, with 
 demand to know the cause ; and, even by the time he came, 
 the cause had vanished from sight. 
 
 "Apaches, sir, by the dozen, all along the edge of the 
 mesa" stammered No. 5. He could have convinced the 
 corporal without fear or thought of ridicule, but his voice 
 lacked confidence when he stood challenged by his com 
 manding officer. Plume heard with instant suspicion. 
 He was in no shape for judicial action. 
 
 "Apaches ! " This in high disdain. " Trash, man ! 
 Because one sentry has a scuffle with some night prowler 
 is the next to lose his nerve ? You re scared by shadows, 
 Hunt. That s what s the matter with you ! " 
 
 It " brought to " a veteran trooper with a round turn. 
 Hunt had served his fourth enlistment, had " worn out 
 four blankets " in the regiment, and was not to be accused 
 of scare. 
 
 " Let the major see for himself, then," he answered 
 sturdily. " Come in here, you ! " he called aloud. 
 " Come, the whole gang of ye. The concert s begin 
 ning ! " Then, slowly along the eastward edge there be 
 gan to creep into view black polls bound with dirty white, 
 black crops untrammeled by any binding. Then, swift 
 from the west, came running footfalls, the corporal with 
 a willing comrade or two, wondering was Five in further 
 danger. There, silent and regretful, stood the post com- 
 
" WOMAN-WALK-IN-THE-NIGHT " 87 
 
 mander, counting in surprise the score of scarecrow forms 
 now plainly visible, sitting, standing, or squatting along 
 the mesa edge. Northernmost in view, nearly opposite 
 Blakely s quarters, were two, detached from the general 
 assembly, yet clinging close together two slender fig 
 ures, gowned, and it was at these the agent Daly was 
 staring, as he, too, came running to the spot. 
 
 " Major Plume," cried he, panting, " I want those girls 
 arrested, at once ! " 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 A five o clock of this cloudless October morning 
 Colonel Montgomery Byrne, " of the old Army, 
 sir," was reviling the fates that had set him the 
 task of unraveling such a skein as he found at Sandy. 
 At six he was blessing the stars that sent him. Awak 
 ened, much before his usual hour, by half-heard murmur 
 of scurry and excitement, so quickly suppressed he be 
 lieved it all a dream, he was thinking, half drowsily, all 
 painfully, of the duty devolving on him for the day, and 
 wishing himself well out of it, when the dream became 
 real, the impression vidid. His watch told him reveille 
 should now be sounding. His ears told him the sounds 
 he heard were not those of reveille, yet something had 
 roused the occupants of Officers Row, and then, all on 
 a sudden, instead of the sweet strains of " The Dawn of 
 the Day " or " Bonnie Lass o Gawrie " there burst upon 
 the morning air, harsh and blustering, the alarum of the 
 Civil War days, the hoarse uproar of the drum thundering 
 the long roll, while above all rang the loud clamor of the 
 cavalry trumpet sounding " To Horse." 
 
 " Fitz James was brave, but to his heart 
 The life blood leaped with sudden start." 
 
" APACHE KNIVES DIG DEEP " 89 
 
 Byrne sprang from his bed. He was a soldier, battle- 
 tried, but this meant something utterly new to him in 
 war, for, mingling with the gathering din, he heard the 
 shriek of terror-stricken women. Daly s bed was empty. 
 The agent was gone. Elise aloft was jabbering patois at 
 her dazed and startled mistress. Suey, the Chinaman, 
 came clattering in, all flapping legs and arms and pigtail, 
 his face livid, his eyes staring. " Patcheese ! Pat- 
 cheese ! " he squealed, and dove under the nearest bed. 
 Then Byrne, shinning into boots and breeches and shun 
 ning his coat, grabbed his revolver and rushed for the 
 door. 
 
 Across the parade, out of their barracks the " dough 
 boys " came streaming, no man of them dressed for in 
 spection, but rather, like sailors, stripped for a fight; 
 and, never waiting to form ranks, but following the lead 
 of veteran sergeants and the signals or orders of officers 
 somewhere along the line, went sprinting straight for the 
 eastward mesa. From the cavalry barracks, the north 
 ward sets, the troopers, too, were flowing, but these were 
 turned stableward, back of the post, and Byrne, with his 
 nightshirt flying wide open, wider than his eyes, bolted 
 round through the space between the quarters of Plume 
 and Wren, catching sight of the arrested captain standing 
 grim and gaunt on his back piazza, and ran with the fore 
 most sergeants to the edge of the plateau, where, in his 
 cool white garb, stood Plume, shouting orders to those 
 beneath. 
 
 There, down in the Sandy bottom, was explanation of 
 
90 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 it all. Two soldiers were bending over a prostrate form 
 in civilian dress. Two swarthy Apaches, one on his face, 
 the other, ten rods away, writhing on his side, lay welter 
 ing in blood. Out along the sandy barren and among the 
 clumps of mezquite and greasewood, perhaps as many as 
 ten soldiers, members of the guard, were scattering in 
 rude skirmish order; now halting and dropping on one 
 knee to fire, now rushing forward ; while into the willows, 
 that swept in wide concave around the flat, a number of 
 forms in dirty white, or nothing at all but streaming 
 breechclout, were just disappearing. 
 
 Northward, too, beyond the post of No. 4, other little 
 squads and parties could be faintly seen scurrying away 
 for the shelter of the willows, and as Byrne reached the 
 major s side, with the to-be-expected query " Whatin- 
 heirsthematter ? " the last of the fleeing Apaches popped 
 out of sight, and Plume turned toward him in mingled 
 wrath and disgust : 
 
 " That ass of an agent ! " was all he could say, as he 
 pointed to the prostrate figure in pepper and salt. 
 
 Byrne half slid, half stumbled down the bank and bent 
 over the wounded man. Dead he was not, for, with both 
 hands clasped to his breast, Daly was cradling from side 
 to side and saying things of Apaches totally unbecoming 
 an Indian agent and a man of God. " But who did it ? 
 and how ? and why ? " demanded Byrne of the minis 
 tering soldiers. 
 
 " Tried to rest two Patchie girls, sir," answered the 
 first, straightening up and saluting, " and her feller 
 
" APACHE KNIVES DIG DEEP " 91 
 
 wouldn t stand it, I reckon. Knifed the agent and Cra- 
 ney, too. Yonder s the feller." 
 
 Yonder lay, face downward, as described, a sinewy 
 young brave of the Apache Mohave band, his newer, 
 cleaner shirt and his gayly ornamented sash and headgear 
 telling of superior rank and station among his kind. With 
 barely a glance at Craney, squatted beside a bush, and 
 with teeth and hands knotting a kerchief about a bleeding 
 arm, Byrne bent over the Apache and turned the face to 
 the light. 
 
 " Good God ! " he cried, at the instant, " it s Quona- 
 thay Raven Shield ! Why, you know him, corporal ! " 
 this to Casey, of Wren s troop, running to his side. 
 " Son of old Chief Quonahelka ! I wouldn t have had 
 this happen for all the girls on the reservation. Who 
 were they? Why did he try to arrest them ? Here! I ll 
 have to ask him stabbed or not ! " And, anxious and an 
 gering, the colonel hastened over toward the agent, now 
 being slowly aided to his feet. Plume, too, had come 
 sidelong down the sandy bank with Cutler, of the infan 
 try, asking where he should put in his men. " Oh, just 
 deploy across the flats to stand off any possible attack," 
 said Plume. " Don t cross the Sandy, and, damn it all ! 
 get a bugler out and sound recall ! " For now the sound 
 of distant shots came echoing back from the eastward 
 cliffs. The pursuit had spread beyond the stream. " I 
 don t want any more of those poor devils hurt. There s 
 mischief enough already," he concluded. 
 
 " I should say so," echoed the colonel. " What was 
 
92 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 the matter, Mr. Daly? Whom did you seek to arrest? 
 and why ? " 
 
 "Almost any of em," groaned Daly. " There were a 
 dozen there I d refused passes to come again this week. 
 They were here in defiance of my orders, and I thought 
 to take that girl Natzie, she that led Lola off, back to 
 her father at the agency. It would have been a good les 
 son. Of course she fought and scratched. Next thing 
 I knew a dozen of em were atop of us some water, for 
 God s sake ! and lift me out of this ! " 
 
 Then with grave and watch-worn face, Graham came 
 hurrying to the spot, all the way over from Mullins s bed 
 side at the hospital and breathing hard. Dour indeed 
 was the look he gave the groaning agent, now gulping at 
 a gourd held to his pale lips by one of the men. The 
 policy of Daly s predecessor had been to feather his own 
 nest and let the Indian shift for himself, and this had led 
 to his final overthrow. Daly, however, had come direct 
 from the care of a tribe of the Pueblo persuasion, peac- 
 loving and tillers of the soil, meek as the Pimas and Mari- 
 copas, natives who fawned when he frowned and cringed 
 at the crack of his whip. These he had successfully, and 
 not dishonestly, ruled, but that very experience had un 
 fitted him for duty over the mountain Apache, who 
 cringed no more than did the lordly Sioux or Cheyenne, 
 and truckled to no man less than a tribal chief. Blakely, 
 the soldier, cool, fearless, and resolute, but scrupulously 
 just, they believed in and feared; but this new blusterer 
 only made them laugh, until he scandalized them by 
 
APACHE KNIVES DIG DEEP 
 
 93 
 
 wholesale arrest and punishment. Then their childlike 
 merriment changed swiftly to furious and scowling hate, 
 -to open defiance, and finally, when he dared lay hands 
 on a chosen daughter of the race, to mutiny and the knife. 
 Graham, serving his third year in the valley, had seen the 
 crisis coming and sought to warn the man. But what 
 should an army doctor know of an Apache Indian? said 
 Daly, and, fatuous in his own conceit, the crisis found 
 him unprepared. 
 
 " Go you for a stretcher," said the surgeon, after a 
 quick look into the livid face. "Lay him down gently 
 there," and kneeling, busied himself with opening a way 
 to the wound. Out over the flats swung the long skir 
 mish line, picturesque in the variety of its undress, Cutler 
 striding vociferous in its wake, while a bugler ran himself 
 out of breath, far to the eastward front, to puff feeble and 
 abortive breath into unresponsive copper. And still the 
 same flutter of distant, scattering shots came drifting back 
 from the brakes and canons in the rocky wilds beyond 
 the stream. The guard still pursued and the Indians 
 still led, but they who knew anything well knew it could 
 not be long before the latter turned on the scattering 
 chase, and Byrne strode about, fuming with anxiety. 
 " Thank God! " he cried, as a prodigious clatter of hoofs, 
 on hollow and resounding wood, told of cavalry coming 
 across the acequia, and Sanders galloped round the sandy 
 point in search of the foe-or orders. "Thank God! 
 Here, Sanders pardon me, major, there isn t an in 
 stant to lose Rush your men right on to the front there! 
 
94 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 Spread well out, but don t fire a shot unless attacked in 
 force! Get those chasing idiots and bring them in! 
 By God, sir, we ll have an Indian war on our hands as it 
 is ! " And Sanders nodded and dug spurs to his troop 
 horse, and sang out: " Left front into line gallop! " and 
 the rest was lost in a cloud of dust and the blare of cav 
 alry trumpet. 
 
 Then the colonel turned to Plume, standing now silent 
 and sore troubled. " It was the quickest way," he said 
 apologetically. " Ordinarily I should have given the or 
 der through you, of course. But those beggars are 
 armed to a man. They left their guns in the crevices of 
 yonder rocks, probably, when they came for the morning 
 music. We must have no fight over this unless they 
 force it. I wish to heaven we hadn t killed these two," 
 and ruefully he looked at the stark forms the dead lover 
 of Natzie, the gasping tribesman just beyond, dying, 
 knife in hand. " The general has been trying to curb 
 Daly for the last ten days," continued he, " and warned 
 him he d bring on trouble. The interpreter split with 
 him on Monday last, and there s been mischief brewing 
 ever since. If only we could have kept Blakely there 
 all this row would have been averted !" 
 
 If only, indeed! was Plume thinking, as eagerly, anx 
 iously he scanned the eastward shore, rising jagged, rocky, 
 and forbidding from the willows of the stream bed. If 
 only, indeed ! Not only all this row of which Byrne had 
 seen so much, but all this other row, this row within a 
 row, this intricacy of mishaps and misery that involved 
 
" APACHE KNIVES DIG DEEP " 95 
 
 the social universe of Camp Sandy, of which as yet the 
 colonel, presumably, knew so very little ; of which, as post 
 commander, Plume had yet to tell him! An orderly 
 came running with a field glass and a scrap of paper. 
 Plume glanced at the latter, a pencil scrawl of his wife s 
 inseparable companion, and, for aught he knew, con 
 fidante. " Madame," he could make out, and " affreuse- 
 ment" something, but it was enough. The orderly sup 
 plemented : " Leece, sir, says the lady is very bad " 
 
 " Go to her, Plume," with startling promptitude cried 
 the colonel. " I ll look to everything here. It s all 
 coming out right," for with a tantara tantara-ra-ra 
 Sanders s troop, spreading far and wide, were scrambling 
 up the shaly slopes a thousand yards away. " Go to 
 your wife and tell her the danger s over," and, with hardly 
 another glance at the moaning agent, now being limply 
 hoisted on a hospital stretcher, thankfully the major went. 
 " The lady s very bad, is she ? " growled Byrne, in fierce 
 aside to Graham. " That French hag sometimes speaks 
 truth, in spite of herself. How d you find him ?" This 
 with a toss of the head toward the vanishing stretcher. 
 
 " Bad likewise. These Apache knives dig deep. 
 There s Mullins now " 
 
 " Think that was Apache ? " glared Byrne, with sud 
 den light in his eyes, for Wren had told his troubles all. 
 
 " Apache knife yes." 
 
 "What the devil do you mean, Graham?" and the 
 veteran soldier, who knew and liked the surgeon, whirled 
 again on him with eyes that looked not like at all. 
 
96 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 The doctor turned, his somber gaze following the now 
 distant figure of the post commander, struggling pain 
 fully up the yielding sand of the steep slope to the plateau. 
 The stretcher bearers and attendants were striding away 
 to hospital with the now unconscious burden. The few 
 men, lingering close at hand, were grouped about the 
 dead Apaches. The gathering watchers along the bank 
 were beyond earshot. Staff officer and surgeon were 
 practically alone and the latter answered : 
 
 " I mean, sir, that if that Apache knife had been driven 
 in by an Apache warrior, Mullins would have been dead 
 long hours ago which he isn t." 
 
 Byrne turned a shade grayer. 
 
 " Could she have done that? " he asked, with one side 
 ward jerk of his head toward the major s quarters. 
 
 " I m not saying," quoth the Scot. " I m asking was 
 there anyone else?" 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 A CARPET KNIGHT, INDEED 
 
 THE flag at Camp Sandy drooped from the peak. 
 Except by order it never hung halfway. The 
 flag at the agency fluttered no higher than the 
 cross-trees, telling that Death had loved some shining 
 mark and had not sued in vain. Under this symbol of 
 mourning, far up the valley, the interpreter was telling to 
 a circle of dark, sullen, and unresponsive faces a fact that 
 every Apache knew before. Under the full-masted flag 
 at the post, a civilian servant of the nation lay garbed for 
 burial. Poor Daly had passed away with hardly a chance 
 to tell his tale, with only a loving, weeping woman or two 
 to mourn him. Over the camp the shadow of death tem 
 pered the dazzling sunshine, for all Sandy felt the strain 
 and spoke only with sorrow. He meant well, did Daly, 
 that was accorded him now. He only lacked 
 " savvy " said they who had dwelt long in the land of 
 Apache. 
 
 Over at the hospital two poor women wept, and twice 
 their number strove to soothe. Janet Wren and Mrs. 
 Graham were there, as ever, when sorrow and trouble 
 came. Mrs. Sanders and Mrs. Cutler, too, were hover 
 ing about the mourners, doing what they could, and the 
 hospital matron, busy day and night of late, had never 
 
 97 
 
^B AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 left her patient until he needed her no more, and then had 
 turned to minister to those he left behind the widow and 
 the fatherless. Over on the shaded verandas other 
 women met and murmured in the soft, sympathetic drawl 
 appropriate to funereal occasion, and men nodded silently 
 to each other. Death was something these latter saw so 
 frequently it brought but little of terror. Other things 
 were happening of far greater moment that they could not 
 fathom at all. 
 
 Captain Wren, after four days of close arrest, had 
 been released by the order of Major Plume himself, who, 
 pending action on his application for leave of absence, 
 had gone on sick report and secluded himself within his 
 quarters. It was rumored that Mrs. Plume was seriously 
 ill, so ill, indeed, she had to be denied to every one of the 
 sympathizing women who called, even to Janet, sister of 
 their soldier next-door neighbor, but recently a military 
 prisoner, yet now, by law and custom, commander of the 
 post. 
 
 Several things had conspired to bring about this con 
 dition of affairs. Byrne, to begin with, had been closely 
 questioning Shannon, and had reached certain conclusions 
 with regard to the stabbing of Mullins that were laid be 
 fore Plume, already stunned by the knowledge that, sleep 
 ing as his friendly advisers declared, or waking, as his 
 inner consciousness would have it, Clarice, his young and 
 still beautiful wife, had left her pillow and gone by night 
 toward the northern limit of the line of quarters. If 
 Wren were tried, or even accused, that fact would be the 
 
A CARPET KNIGHT, INDEED 09 
 
 first urged in his defense. Plume s stern accusation of 
 Elise had evoked from her nothing but a voluble storm 
 of protest. Madame was ill, sleepless, nervous had gone 
 forth to walk away her nervousness. She, Elise, had 
 gone in search and brought her home. Downs, the 
 wretch, when as stoutly questioned, declared he had been 
 blind drunk ; saw nobody, knew nothing, and must have 
 taken the lieutenant s whisky. Plume shrank from ask 
 ing Norah questions. He could not bring himself to talk 
 ing of his wife to the girl of the laundresses quarters, 
 but he knew now that he must drop that much of the case 
 against Wren. 
 
 Then came the final blow. Byrne had gone to the 
 agency, making every effort through runners, with 
 promises of immunity, to coax back the renegades to the 
 reservation, and so avert another Apache war. Plume, in 
 sore perplexity, was praying for the complete restoration 
 of Mullins the only thing that could avert investigation 
 when, as he entered his office the morning of this 
 eventful day, Doty s young face was eloquent with 
 news. 
 
 One of the first things done by Lieutenant Blakely 
 when permitted by Dr. Graham to sit and speak, was to 
 dictate a letter to the post adjutant, the original of which, 
 together with the archives of Camp Sandy, was long since 
 buried among the hidden treasures of the War Depart 
 ment. The following is a copy of the paper placed by 
 Mr. Doty in the major s hands even before he could 
 reach his desk : 
 
100 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 CAMP SANDY, A. T., 
 October, 187 
 LIEUTENANT J. J. DOTY, 
 8th U. S. Infantry, 
 
 Post Adjutant. 
 
 Sir : I have the honor to submit for the consideration of the 
 post commander, the following: 
 
 Shortly after retreat on the th inst. I was suddenly accosted 
 in my quarters by Captain Robert Wren, th Cavalry, and ac 
 cused of an act of treachery to him; an accusation which called 
 forth instant and indignant denial. He had, as I now have 
 cause to know, most excellent reason for believing his charge to 
 be true, and the single blow he dealt me was the result of intense 
 and natural wrath. That the consequences were so serious he 
 could not have foreseen. 
 
 As the man most injured in the affair, I earnestly ask that no 
 charges be preferred. Were we in civil life I should refuse to 
 prosecute, and, if the case be brought before a court-martial it 
 will probably fail for lack of evidence. 
 
 Very Respectfully, 
 
 Your Obedient Servant, 
 
 NEIL D. BLAKELY, 
 ist Lieut., th Cavalry. 
 
 Now, Doty had been known to hold his tongue when a 
 harmful story might be spread, but he could no more sup 
 press his rejoicing over this than he could the impulse to 
 put it in slang. " Say, aint this just a corker? " said this 
 ingenuous youth, as he spread it on his desk for Graham s 
 grimly gleaming eyes. Plume had read it in dull, apa 
 thetic, unseeing fashion. It was the morning after the 
 Apache emeute. Plume had stared hard at his adjutant 
 a moment, then, whipping up the sun hat that he had 
 dropped on his desk, and merely saying, " I ll return- 
 shortly," had sped to his darkened quarters and not for 
 an hour had he reappeared. Then the first thing he asked 
 
A CARPET KNIGHT, INDEED 101 
 
 for was that letter of Mr. Blakely s, winch, this - f-iriie/lic 
 read with lips compressed and twitching a bit at the cor 
 ners. Then he called for a telegraph blank and sent a 
 wire to intercept Byrne at the agency. " I shall turn over 
 command to Wren at noon. I m too ill for further duty," 
 was all he said. Byrne read the rest between the lines. 
 
 But Graham went straightway to the quarters of Cap 
 tain Wren, a rough pencil copy of that most unusual 
 paper in his hand. " R-robert Wren," said he, as he 
 entered, unknocking and unannounced, " will ye listen to 
 this? Nay, Angela, lass, don t go." When strongly 
 moved, as we have seen, our doctor dropped to the border 
 land of dialect. 
 
 In the dim light from the shaded windows he had not 
 at first seen the girl. She was seated on a footstool, her 
 hands on her father s knee, her fond face gazing up into 
 his, and that strong, bony hand of his resting on her head 
 and toying with the ribbon, the " snood," as he loved to 
 call it, with which she bound her abundant tresses. At 
 sound of the doctor s voice, Janet, ever apprehensive of 
 ill, had come forth from the dining room, silver brush 
 and towel in hand, and stood at the doorway, gazing 
 austerely. She could not yet forgive her brother s friend 
 his condemnation of her methods as concerned her 
 brother s child. Angela, rising to her full height, stood 
 with one hand on the back of her father s chair, the other 
 began softly stroking the grizzled crop from his furrowed 
 forehead. 
 
 No one spoke a word as Graham began and slowly, to 
 
102 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 the uttermost line, read his draft of Blakely s missive. 
 No one spoke for a moment after he had finished. 
 Angela, with parted lips and dilated eyes, had stood at 
 first drinking in each syllable, then, with heaving bosom, 
 she slowly turned, her left hand falling by her side. 
 Wren sat in silence, his deep-set eyes glowering on the 
 grim reader, a dazed look on his rugged face. Then he 
 reached up and drew the slim, tremulous hand from his 
 forehead and snuggled it against his stubbly cheek, and 
 still he could not speak. Janet slowly backed away into 
 the darkness of the dining room. The situation had soft 
 ening tendencies and Janet s nature revolted at sen 
 timent. It was Graham s voice that again broke the 
 silence. 
 
 " For a vain carpet knight, whose best boast was to 
 wear a braid of his fair lady s hair/ it strikes me our 
 butterfly chaser has some points of a gentleman," said he, 
 slowly folding his paper. " I might say more," he con 
 tinued presently, retiring toward the hall. Then, paus 
 ing at the doorway, " but I won t," he concluded, and 
 abruptly vanished. 
 
 An hour later, when Janet in person went to answer a 
 knock at the door, she glanced in at the parlor as she 
 passed, and that peep revealed Angela again seated on her 
 footstool, with her bonny head pillowed on her father s 
 knee, his hand again toying with the glossy tresses, and 
 both father and child looked up, expectant. Yes, there 
 stood the young adjutant, officially equipped with belt and 
 sword and spotless gloves. " Can I see the captain ? " he 
 
A CARPET KNIGHT, INDEED 103 
 
 asked, lifting his natty kepi, and the captain arose and 
 strode to the door. 
 
 " Major Plume presents his compliments and this 
 letter, sir," stammered the youth, blushing, too, at sight 
 of Angela, beaming on him from the parlor door. " And 
 you re in command, sir. The major has gone on sick 
 report." 
 
 That evening a solemn cortege filed away down the 
 winding road to the northward flats and took the route to 
 the little cemetery, almost all the garrison following to the 
 grave all that was mortal of the hapless agent. Byrne, 
 returned from the agency, was there to represent the gen 
 eral commanding the department. Wren stalked sol 
 emnly beside him as commander of the post. Even the 
 women followed, tripping daintily through the sand. 
 Graham watched them from the porch of the post hospital. 
 He could not long leave Mullins, tossing in fever and 
 delirium. He had but recently left Lieutenant Blakely, 
 sitting up and placidly busying himself in patching butter 
 fly wings, and Blakely had even come to the front door to 
 look at the distant gathering of decorous mourners. But 
 the bandaged head was withdrawn as two tall, feminine 
 forms came gravely up the row, one so prim and almost 
 antique, the other so lithe and lissome. He retreated to 
 the front room, and with the one available eye at the 
 veiled window, followed her, the latter, until the white 
 flowing skirt was swept from the field of his vision. He 
 had stood but a few hours previous on the spot where he 
 had received that furious blow five nights before, and this 
 
104 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 time, with cordial grasp, had taken the huge hand that 
 dealt it between his white and slender palms. " Forgive 
 us our trespasses as we forgive those," Wren had mur 
 mured, as he read the deeply regretful words of his late 
 accuser and commander, for had not he in his turn, and 
 without delay, also to eat humble pie ? There was some 
 thing almost pathetic in the attitude of the big soldier as 
 he came to the darkened room and stood before his junior 
 and subordinate, but the latter had stilled the broken, 
 clumsy, faltering words with which this strong, masterful 
 man was striving to make amend for bitter wrong. " I 
 won t listen to more, Captain Wren," he said. " You 
 had reasons I never dreamed of then. Our eyes have 
 been opened " (one of his was still closed). " You have 
 said more than enough. Let us start afresh now with 
 better understanding." 
 
 " It it is generous in you, Blakely. I misjudged 
 everything everybody, and now, well, you know there 
 are still Hotspurs in the service. I m thinking some man 
 may be ass enough to say you got a blow without re 
 senting " 
 
 Blakely smiled, a contorted and disunited smile, per 
 haps, and one much trammeled by adhesive plaster. Yet 
 there was placid unconcern in the visible lines of his pale 
 face. " I think I shall know how to answer," said he. 
 And so for the day, and without mention of the name 
 uppermost in the thoughts of each, the two had parted 
 for the first time as friends. 
 
 But the night was yet to come. 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 fALK-IN-THE-NIGHT " AGAIN 
 
 SO swift had been the succession of events since the 
 first day of the week, few of the social set at Sandy 
 could quite realize, much less fathom, all that had 
 happened, and as they gathered on the verandas, in the 
 cool of the evening after Daly s funeral, the trend of talk 
 was all one way. A man who might have thrown light 
 on certain matters at issue had been spirited away, and 
 there were women quite ready to vow it was done simply 
 to get him beyond range of their questioning. Sergeant 
 Shannon had been sent to the agency on some mission 
 prescribed by Colonel Byrne. It was almost the last order 
 issued by Major Plume before turning over the command. 
 Byrne himself still lingered at the post, " watching the 
 situation," as it was understood, and in constant tele 
 graphic correspondence with the general at Prescott and 
 the commander of the little guard over the agency build 
 ings at the reservation Lieutenant Bridger, of the In 
 fantry. With a sergeant and twenty men that young 
 officer had been dispatched to that point immediately 
 after the alarming and unlooked-for catastrophe of the 
 reveille outbreak. Catastrophe was what Byrne called it, 
 and he meant what he said, not so much because it had 
 cost the life of Daly, the agent, whose mistaken zeal had 
 
 105 
 
106 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 precipitated the whole misunderstanding, but rather be 
 cause of the death of two such prominent young warriors 
 as " Shield " and his friend, who had fallen after dealing 
 the fatal blow to him who had laid violent hands, so they 
 regarded it, on two young girls, one a chieftain s daughter 
 and both objects of reverent and savagely sentimental 
 interest. " If war doesn t come at once," said Byrne, " it 
 will be because the Apache has a new sense or a deep-laid 
 scheme. Look out for him." 
 
 No news as yet had come from the runners sent forth in 
 search of the scattered fugitives, who would soon be 
 flocking together again in the fastnesses of the Mogollon 
 to the east or the Red Rock country northward the latter 
 probably, as being nearer their friends at the reservation 
 and farther from the few renegade Tontos lurking in the 
 mountains toward Fort Apache. Byrne s promise to the 
 wanderers, sent by these runners, was to the effect that 
 they would be safe from any prosecution if they would 
 return at once to the agency and report themselves to the 
 interpreter and the lieutenant commanding the guard. 
 He would not, he said, be answerable for what might 
 happen if they persisted in remaining at large. But when 
 it was found that, so far from any coming in, there were 
 many going out, and that Natzie s father and brother had 
 already gone, Byrne s stout heart sank. The message 
 came by wire from the agency not long after the return 
 of the funeral party, and while the evening was yet young. 
 He sent at once for Wren, and, seated on the major s front 
 piazza, with an orderly hovering just out of earshot, ancl 
 
" WOMAN-WALK-IN-THE-NIGHT " AGAIN 107 
 
 with many an eye anxiously watching them along the 
 row, the two veterans were holding earnest conference. 
 Major Plume was at the bedside of his wife, so said Gra 
 ham when he came down about eight. Mrs. Plume, he 
 continued, was at least no worse, but very nervous. Then 
 he took himself back to the hospital. 
 
 Another topic of talk along the line was Blakely s watch 
 and its strange recovery, and many were the efforts to 
 learn what Blakely himself had to say about it. The 
 officers, nearly all of them, of course, had been at inter 
 vals to see Blakely and inquire if there were not some 
 thing that they could do, this being the conventional and 
 proper thing, and they who talked with him, with hardly 
 an exception, led up to the matter of the watch and wished 
 to know how he accounted for its being there on the post 
 of No. 5. It was observed that, upon this topic and the 
 stabbing of Private Mullins, Mr. Blakely was oddly reti 
 cent. He had nothing whatever to suggest as explana 
 tion of either matter. The watch was taken from the 
 inner pocket of his thin white coat as he lay asleep at the 
 pool, of this he felt confident, but by whom he would not 
 pretend to say. Everybody knew by this time that An 
 gela Wren had seen him sleeping, and had, in a spirit of 
 playful mischief, fetched away his butterfly net, but who 
 would accuse Angela of taking his watch and money? 
 Of course such things had been, said one or two wise 
 heads, but not with girls like Angela. 
 
 But who could say what, all this while, Angela herself 
 was thinking? Once upon a time it had been the way of 
 
108 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 our young folk well over the North and West to claim 
 forfeit in the game of " Catching the weasel asleep." 
 There had been communities, indeed, and before co 
 education became a fad at certain of our great universities, 
 wherein the maid caught napping could hold it no sin 
 against watchful swain, or even against her, that he then 
 and there imprinted on her lips a kiss. On the other 
 hand, the swain found sleeping might not always expect a 
 kiss, but must pay the penalty, a pair of dainty gloves. 
 Many a forfeit, both lip and glove, had there been claimed 
 and allowed in army days whereof we write, and Angela, 
 stealing upon Blakely as he dozed beneath the willows, 
 and liking him well and deploring her father s pronounced 
 aversion to him perhaps even resenting it an unduti- 
 ful bit had found it impossible to resist the temptation to 
 softly disengage that butterfly net from the loosely clasp 
 ing fingers, and swiftly, stealthily, delightedly to scamper 
 away with it against his waking. It was of this very ex 
 ploit, never dreaming of the fateful consequences, she and 
 Kate Sanders were so blissfully bubbling over, fairly 
 shaking with maiden merriment when the despoiled victim, 
 homeward bound, caught sight of them upon the mesa. 
 Ten minutes more, and in full force she had been made to 
 feel the blow of her father s fierce displeasure. Twenty 
 minutes more, and, under the blow of her father s furious 
 wrath, Blakely had been felled like a log. 
 
 When with elongated face and exaggerated gloom of 
 manner Aunt Janet came to make her realize the awful 
 consequences of her crime, Angela s first impulse had been 
 
" WOMAN-WALK-IN-THE-NIGHT " AGAIN 109 
 
 to cry out against her father s unreasoning rage. When 
 she learned that he was in close arrest, to be tried, doubt 
 less, for his mad assault, in utter revulsion of feeling, 
 in love and tenderness, in grief and contrition inexpressi 
 ble, she had thrown herself at his feet and, clasping his 
 knees, had sobbed her heart out in imploring his forgive 
 ness for what she called her wicked, heedless, heartless 
 conduct. No one saw that blessed meeting, that scene of 
 mutual forgiveness, of sweet reconciliation; too sweet 
 and serene, indeed, for Janet s stern and Calvinistic 
 mold. 
 
 Are we ever quite content, I wonder, that others 
 bairnies should be so speedily, so entirely, forgiven ? All 
 because of this had all Janet s manifestations of sympathy 
 for Robert to be tempered with a fine reserve. As for 
 Angela, it would never do to let the child so soon forget 
 that this should be an awful lesson. Aunt Janet s man 
 ner, therefore, when, butterfly net in hand, she required 
 of her niece full explanation of the presence in the room 
 of this ravished trophy, was something fraught with far 
 too much of future punishment, of wrath eternal. Even 
 in her chastened mood Angela s spirit stood en garde. 
 " I have told father everything, auntie," she declared. 
 " I leave it all to him," and bore in silence the comments, 
 without the utterance of which the elder vestal felt she 
 could not conscientiously quit the field. " Bold," " im 
 modest," " unmaidenly," " wanton," were a choice few of 
 Aunt Janet s expletives, and these were unresented. But 
 when she concluded with " I shall send this thing to 
 
110 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 him at once, with my personal apologies for the act of an 
 irresponsible child," up sprang Angela with rebellion 
 flashing from her eyes. She had suffered punishment as 
 a woman. She would not now be treated as a child. To 
 Janet s undisguised amaze and disapprobation, Wren de 
 cided that Angela herself should send both apology and 
 net. It was the first missive of the kind she had ever 
 written, but, even so, she would not submit it for either 
 advice or criticism even though its composition cost her 
 many hours and tears and sheets of paper. No one but 
 the recipient had so much as a peep at it, but when Blakely 
 read it a grave smile lighted his pallid and still bandaged 
 face. He stowed the little note in his desk, and presently 
 took it out and read it again, and still again, and then it 
 went slowly into the inner pocket of his white sack coat 
 and was held there, while he, the wearer, slowly paced up 
 and down the veranda late in the starlit night. This was 
 the evening of Daly s funeral, the evening of the day on 
 which he and his captain had shaken hands and were to 
 start afresh with better understanding. 
 
 Young Duane was officer of the day and, after the 
 tattoo inspection of his little guard, had gone for a few 
 minutes to the hospital where Mullins lay muttering and 
 tossing in his feverish sleep; then, meeting Wren and 
 Graham on the way, had tramped over to call on Blakely, 
 thinking, perhaps, to chat a while and learn something. 
 Soon after " taps " was sounded, however, the youngster 
 joined the little group gossiping in guarded tones on the 
 porch at Captain Sanders , far down the row, and, in re- 
 
" WOMAN- WALK-IN-THE-NIGHT AGAIN 111 
 
 sponse to question, said that " Bugs " that being Blake- 
 ly s briefest nom de guerre must be convalescing rapidly, 
 he " had no use for his friends," and, as the lad seemed 
 somewhat ruffled and resentful, what more natural than 
 that he should be called upon for explanation? Sanders 
 and his wife were present, and Mrs. Bridger, very much 
 alive with inquiry and not a little malicious interest. Kate, 
 too, was of the party, and Doty, the adjutant, and Mes- 
 dames Cutler and Westervelt it was so gloomy and 
 silent, said these latter, at their end of the row. Much 
 of the talk had been about Mrs. Plume s illness and her 
 " sleep-walking act," as it had been referred to, and many 
 had thought, but few had spoken, of her possible presence 
 on the post of No. 5 about the time that No. 5 was stabbed. 
 They knew she couldn t have done it, of course, but then 
 how strange that she should have been there at all ! The 
 story had gained balloon-like expanse by this time, and 
 speculation was more than rife. But here was Duane 
 with a new grievance which, when put into Duane s Eng 
 lish, reduced itself to this : " Why, it was like as if Bugs 
 wanted to get rid of me and expected somebody else," and 
 this they well remembered later. Nobody else was ob 
 served going to Blakely s front door, at least, but at 
 eleven o clock he himself could still be dimly heard and 
 seen pacing steadily up and down his piazza, apparently 
 alone and deep in thought. His lights, too, were turned 
 down, a new man from the troop having asked for and 
 assumed the duties formerly devolving on the wretch 
 Downs, now doing time within the garrison prison. Be- 
 
112 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 fore eleven, however, this new martial domestic had gone 
 upstairs to bed and Blakely was all alone, which was as 
 he wished it, for he had things to plan and other things 
 to think of that lifted him above the possibility of loneli 
 ness. 
 
 Down the line of officers quarters only in two or three 
 houses could lights be seen. Darkness reigned at 
 Plume s, where Byrne was still rooming. Darkness 
 reigned at Wren s and Graham s, despite the fact that the 
 lords of these manors were still abroad, both at the bed 
 side of Trooper Mullins. A dozen people were gathered 
 by this time at Sanders . All the other verandas, except 
 Blakely s with its solitary watcher, seemed deserted. To 
 these idlers of the soft and starlit night, sitting bare 
 headed about the gallery and chatting in the friendly way 
 of the frontier, there came presently a young soldier from 
 the direction of the adjutant s office at the south end. 
 " The night operator," he explained. " Two dispatches 
 have just come for Colonel Byrne, and I thought 
 maybe " 
 
 "No, Cassidy," said Doty. "The colonel is at his 
 quarters. Dispatch, is it? Perhaps I d better go with 
 you," and, rising, the young officer led the way, entering 
 on tiptoe the hall of the middle house where, far back on 
 a table, a lamp was burning low. Tapping at an inner 
 door, he was bidden to enter. Byrne was in bed, a single 
 sheet over his burly form, but he lay wide awake. He 
 took the first dispatch and tore it open eagerly. It was 
 from Bridger at the agency : 
 
" WOMAN-WALK-IN-THE-NIGHT " AGAIN 113 
 
 Runners just in say Natzie and Lola had turned back from 
 trail to Montezuma Well, refusing to go further from their dead. 
 Can probably be found if party go at dawn or sooner. Alchisay 
 with them. More Indians surely going out from here. 
 
 Byrne s brow contracted and his lips compressed, but 
 he gave no other sign. " Is Captain Wren still up ? " he 
 briefly asked, as he reached for the other dispatch. 
 
 " Over at the hospital, sir," said Doty, and watched this 
 famous campaigner s face as he ripped open the second 
 brown envelope. This time he was half out of bed before 
 he could have half finished even that brief message. It 
 was from the general : 
 
 News of trouble must have reached Indians at San Carlos. 
 Much excitement there and at Apache. Shall start for Camp 
 McDowell to-morrow as soon as I have seen Plume. He should 
 come early. 
 
 The colonel was in his slippers and inexpressibles in 
 less than no time, but Plume aloft had heard the muffled 
 sounds from the lower floor, and was down in a moment. 
 Without a word Byrne handed him the second message 
 and waited until he had read, then asked : " Can you start 
 at dawn?" 
 
 " I can start now," was the instant reply. " Our best 
 team can make it in ten hours. Order out the Concord, 
 Mr. Doty." And Doty vanished. 
 
 " But Mrs. Plume " began the colonel tenta 
 tively. 
 
 " Mrs. Plume simply needs quiet and to be let alone," 
 was the joyless answer. " I think perhaps I am 
 rather in the way." 
 
114 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 " Well, I know the general will appreciate your prompt 
 ness. I did not know you had asked to see him," and 
 Byrne looked up from under his shaggy brows. 
 
 " I hadn t exactly, but my letter intimated as much. 
 There is so very much I I cannot write about that of 
 course he s bound to hear, I don t mean you, Colonel 
 Byrne, and he ought to know the facts. Now I ll get 
 ready at once and see you before starting." 
 
 " Better take an escort, Plume." 
 
 " One man on driver s seat. That s all, sir. I ll come 
 in presently, in case you have anything to send," said 
 Plume, and hurried again upstairs. 
 
 It was barely midnight when Plume s big black wagon, 
 the Concord, all spring and hickory, as said the post quar 
 termaster, went whirling away behind its strapping team 
 of four huge Missouri mules. It was 12.30 by the guard 
 house clock and the call of the sentries when Wren came 
 home to find Angela, her long, luxuriant hair tumbling 
 down over her soft, white wrapper, waiting for him at the 
 front door. From her window she had seen him coming ; 
 had noted the earlier departure of the wagon ; had heard 
 the voice of Major Plume bidding good-by, and won 
 dered what it meant this midnight start of the senior 
 officer of the post. She had been sitting there silent, 
 studying the glittering stars, and wondering would there 
 be an answer to her note? Would he be able to write 
 just yet? Was there reason, really, why he should write, 
 after all that had passed? Somehow she felt that write 
 he certainly would, and soon, and the thought kept her 
 
" WOMAN-WALK-IN-THE-NIGHT " AGAIN 115 
 
 from sleeping. It was because she was anxious about 
 Mullins, so she told herself and told her father, that she 
 had gone fluttering down to meet him at the door. But 
 no sooner had he answered, " Still delirious and yet hold 
 ing his own," than she asked where and why Major Plume 
 had gone. 
 
 " The general wired for him," answered Wren. " And 
 what is my tall girlie doing, spiering from windows this 
 time of night? Go to bed, child." She may be losing 
 beauty sleep, but not her beauty, thought he fondly, as 
 she as fondly kissed him and turned to obey. Then came 
 a heavy footfall on the gallery without, and a dark form, 
 erect and soldierly, stood between them and the dim 
 lights of the guard-house. It was a corporal of the 
 guard. 
 
 " No. 4, sir, reports he heard shots two way up the 
 valley." 
 
 "Good God!" Wren began, then throttled the ex 
 pletive half spoken. Could they have dared waylay the 
 major and so close to the post? A moment more and 
 he was hurrying over to his troop quarters ; five minutes, 
 and a sergeant and ten men were running with him to the 
 stables; ten, and a dozen horses, swiftly saddled, were 
 being led into the open starlight; fifteen, and they were 
 away at a lunging bronco lope, a twisting column of twos 
 along the sandy road, leaving the garrison to wake and 
 wonder. Three, four, five miles they sped, past Boulder 
 Point, past Rattlesnake Hill, and still no sign of any 
 thing amiss, no symptom of night-raiding Apache, for in- 
 
116 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 deed the Apache dreads the dark. Thrice the sergeant 
 had sprung from his horse, lighted a match, and studied 
 the trail. On and on had gone the mules and wagon 
 without apparent break or interruption, until, far beyond 
 the bluff that hid the road from sight of all at Sandy, they 
 had begun the long, tortuous climb of the divide to Cherry 
 Creek. No. 4 might have heard shots, but, if intended 
 for the wagon, they had been harmless. It was long after 
 one when Wren gave the word to put back to the post, and 
 as they remounted and took the homeward trail, they rode 
 for the first five minutes almost directly east, and, as they 
 ascended a little slant of hillside, the sergeant in advance 
 reined suddenly in. " Look there ! " said he. 
 
 Far over among the rocky heights beyond the valley, 
 hidden from the south from Sandy by precipitous cliffs 
 that served almost as a reflector toward the reservation, 
 a bright blaze had shot suddenly heavenward a signal 
 fire of the Apache. Some of them, then, were in the heart 
 of that most intractable region, not ten miles northeast of 
 the post, and signaling to their fellows; but the major 
 must have slipped safely through. 
 
 Sending his horse to stable with the detachment, Wren 
 had found No. 4 well over toward the east end of his 
 post, almost to the angle with that of No. 5. " Watch 
 well for signal fires or prowlers to-night," he ordered. 
 " Have you seen any ? " 
 
 " No signal fires, sir," answered the sentry. " Welch, 
 who was on before me, thought he heard shots 
 
 " I know," answered Wren impatiently. " There was 
 
" WOMAN-WALK-IN-THE-NIGHT " AGAIN 117 
 
 nothing in it. But we did see a signal fire over ro thq 
 northeast, so they are around us, and some may be creep 
 ing close in to see what we re doing, though I doubt it. 
 You ve seen nothing ? " 
 
 " Well, no, sir ; we can t see much of anything, it s so 
 dark. But there s a good many of the post people up and 
 moving about, excited, I suppose. There were lights 
 there at the lieutenant s, Mr. Blakely s, a while ago, and 
 voices." No. 4 pointed to the dark gable end barely forty 
 yards away. 
 
 " That s simple enough," said Wren. " People would 
 naturally come up to this end to see what had become of 
 us, why we had gone, etc. They heard of it, I dare say, 
 and some were probably startled." 
 
 " Yes, sir, it sounded like somebody cryin ." 
 
 Wren was turning away. "What?" he suddenly 
 asked. 
 
 No. 4 repeated his statement. Wren pondered a mo 
 ment, started to speak, to question further, but checked 
 himself and trudged thoughtfully away through the yield 
 ing sand. The nearest path led past the first quarters, 
 Blakely s, on the eastward side, and as the captain neared 
 the house he stopped short. Somewhere in the shadows 
 of the back porch low, murmuring voices were faintly 
 audible. One, in excited tone, was not that of a man, and 
 as Wren stood, uncertain and surprised, the rear door 
 was quickly opened and against the faint light from within 
 two dark forms were projected. One, the taller, he 
 recognized beyond doubt as that of Neil Blakely; the 
 
118 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 other he did not recognize at all. But he had heard the 
 tone of the voice. He knew the form to be, beyond doubt, 
 that of a young and slender woman. Then together the 
 shadows disappeared within and the door was closed be 
 hind them. 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 A STOP BY WIRE 
 
 THREE days later the infantry guard of the gar 
 rison were in sole charge. Wren and Sanders, 
 with nearly fifty troopers apiece, had taken the 
 field in compliance with telegraphic orders from Pres- 
 cott. The general had established field headquarters 
 temporarily at Camp McDowell, down the Verde Valley, 
 and under his somewhat distant supervision four or five 
 little columns of horse, in single file, were boring into the 
 fastnesses of the Mogollon and the Tonto Basin. The 
 runners had been unsuccessful. The renegades would 
 not return. Half a dozen little nomad bands, forever out 
 from the reservation, had eagerly welcomed these mal 
 contents and the news they bore that two ef their young 
 braves had been murdered while striving to defend Natzie 
 and Lola. It furnished all that was needed as excuse for 
 instant descent upon the settlers in the deep valleys north 
 of the Rio Salado, and, all unsuspecting, all unprepared, 
 several of these had met their doom. Relentless war was 
 already begun, and the general lost no time in starting his 
 horsemen after the hostiles. Meantime the infantry com 
 panies, at the scattered posts and camps, were left to 
 " hold the fort," to protect the women, children, and prop 
 erty, and Neil Blakely, a sore-hearted man because for- 
 
 119 
 
120 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 bidden by the surgeon to attempt to go, was chafing, fum 
 ing, and retarding his recovery at his lonely quarters. 
 The men whom he most liked were gone, and the few, 
 among the women who might have been his friends 
 seemed now to stand afar off. Something, he knew not 
 what, had turned garrison sentiment against him. 
 
 For a day or two, so absorbed was he in his chagrin 
 over Graham s verdict and the general s telegraphic 
 orders in the case, Mr. Blakely never knew or noticed that 
 anything else was amiss. Then, too, there had been no 
 opportunity of meeting garrison folk except the few 
 officers who dropped in to inquire civilly how he was pro 
 gressing. The bandages were off, but the plaster still 
 disfigured one side of his face and neck. He could not 
 go forth and seek society. There was really only one girl 
 at the post whose society he cared to seek. He had his 
 books and his bugs, and that, said Mrs. Bridger, was " all 
 he demanded and more than he deserved." To think that 
 the very room so recently sacred to the son and heir 
 should be transformed into what that irate little woman 
 called a " beetle shop " ! It was one of Mr. Blakely s un 
 pardonable sins in the eyes of the sex that he found so 
 much to interest him in a pursuit that neither interested 
 nor included them. A man with brains and a bank ac 
 count had no right to live alone, said Mrs. Sanders, she 
 having a daughter of marriageable age, if only moder 
 ately prepossessing. All this had the women to complain 
 of in him before the cataclysm that, for the time at least, 
 had played havoc with his good looks. All this he knev/ 
 
A STOP BY WIRE 121 
 
 and bore with philosophic and whimsical stoicism. But 
 all this and more could not account for the phenomenon 
 of averted eyes and constrained, if not freezing, manner 
 when, in the dusk of the late autumn evening, issuing 
 suddenly from his quarters, he came face to face with a 
 party of four young women under escort of the post 
 adjutant Mrs. Bridger and Mrs. Truman foremost of 
 the four and first to receive his courteous, yet half em 
 barrassed, greeting. They had to stop for half a second, 
 as they later said, because really he confronted them, all 
 unsuspected. But the other two, Kate Sanders and Mina 
 Westervelt, with bowed heads and without a word, 
 scurried by him and passed on down the line. Doty ex 
 plained hurriedly that they had been over to the post hos 
 pital to inquire for Mullins and were due at the Sanders 
 now for music, whereupon Blakely begged pardon for 
 even the brief detention, and, raising his cap, went on out 
 to the sentry post of No. 4 to study the dark and distant 
 upheavals in the Red Rock country, where, almost every 
 night of late, the signal fires of the Apaches were re 
 ported. Not until he was again alone did he realize that 
 he had been almost frigidly greeted by those who spoke 
 at all. It set him to thinking. 
 
 Mrs. Plume was still confined to her room. The major 
 had returned from Prescott and, despite the fact that the 
 regiment was afield and a clash with the hostiles immi 
 nent, was packing up preparatory to a move. Books, 
 papers, and pictures were being stored in chests, big and 
 little, that he had had made for such emergencies. It was 
 
122 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 evident that he was expecting orders for change of sta 
 tion or extended leave, and they who went so far as to 
 question the grave-faced soldier, who seemed to have 
 grown ten years older in the last ten days, had to be con 
 tent with the brief, guarded reply that Mrs. Plume had 
 never been well since she set foot in Arizona, and even 
 though he returned, she would not. He was taking her, 
 he said, to San Francisco. Of this unhappy woman s 
 nocturnal expedition the others seldom spoke now and 
 only with bated breath. " Sleep-walking, of course ! " 
 said everybody, no matter what everybody might think. 
 But, now that Major Plume knew that in her sleep his 
 wife had wandered up the row to the very door the 
 back door of Mr. Blakely s quarters, was it not strange 
 that he had taken no pains to prevent a recurrence of so 
 compromising an excursion, for strange stories were 
 afloat. Sentry No. 4 had heard and told of a feminine 
 voice, " somebody cryin like " in the darkness of mid 
 night about Blakely s, and Norah Shaughnessy re 
 turned to her duties at the Trumans , yet worrying over 
 the critical condition of her trooper lover, and losing 
 thereby much needed sleep had gained some new and 
 startling information. One night she had heard, an 
 other night she had dimly seen, a visitor received at 
 Blakely s back door, and that visitor a woman, with a 
 shawl about her head. Norah told her mistress, who 
 very properly bade her never refer to it again to a soul, 
 and very promptly referred to it herself to several souls, 
 one of them Janet Wren. Janet, still virtuously averse to 
 
A STOP BY WIRE 123 
 
 Blakely, laid the story before her brother the very day he 
 started on the war-path, and Janet was startled to see that 
 she was telling him no news whatever. " Then, indeed," 
 said she, " it is high time the major took his wife away," 
 and Wren sternly bade her hold her peace, she knew not 
 what she was saying ! But, said Camp Sandy, who could 
 it have been but Mrs. Plume or, possibly, Elise ? Once or 
 twice in its checkered past Camp Sandy had had its 
 romance, its mystery, indeed its scandals, but this was 
 something that put in the shade all previous episodes ; this 
 shook Sandy to its very foundation, and this, despite her 
 brother s prohibition, Janet Wren felt it her duty to de 
 tail in full to Angela. 
 
 To do her justice, it should be said that Miss Wren had 
 striven valiantly against the impulse, had indeed mas 
 tered it for several hours, but the sight of the vivid blush, 
 the eager joy in the sweet young face when Blakely s new 
 " striker " handed in a note addressed to Miss Angela 
 Wren, proved far too potent a factor in the undoing of 
 that magnanimous resolve. The girl fled with her prize, 
 instanter, to her room, and thither, as she did not re 
 appear, the aunt betook herself within the hour. The 
 note itself was neither long nor effusive merely a bright, 
 cordial, friendly missive, protesting against the idea that 
 any apology had been due. There was but one line which 
 could be considered even mildly significant. " The little 
 net," wrote Blakely, " has now a value that it never had 
 before." Yet Angela was snuggling that otherwise un 
 important billet to her cheek when the creaking stairway 
 
124 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 told her portentously of a solemn coming. Ten minutes 
 more and the note was lying neglected on the bureau, and 
 Angela stood at her window, gazing out over dreary miles 
 of almost desert landscape, of rock and shale and sand 
 and cactus, with eyes from which the light had fled, and 
 a new, strange trouble biting at her girlish heart. Con 
 found No. 4 and Norah Shaughnessy! 
 
 It had been arranged that when the Plumes were ready 
 to start, Mrs. Daly and her daughter, the newly widowed 
 and the fatherless, should be sent up to Prescott and 
 thence across the desert to Ehrenberg, on the Colorado. 
 While no hostile Apaches had been seen west of the 
 Verde Valley, there were traces that told that they were 
 watching the road as far at least as the Agua Fria, and a 
 sergeant and six men had been chosen to go as escort to 
 the little convoy.. It had been supposed that Plume 
 would prefer to start in the morning and go as far as 
 Stemmer s ranch, in the Agua Fria Valley, and there rest 
 his invalid wife until another day, thus breaking the fifty- 
 mile stage through the mountains. To the surprise of 
 everybody, the Dalys were warned to be in readiness to 
 start at five in the morning, and to go through to Prescott 
 that day. At five in the morning, therefore, the quarter 
 master s ambulance was at the post trader s house, where 
 the recently bereaved ones had been harbored since poor 
 Daly s death, and there, with their generous host, was 
 the widow s former patient, Blakely, full of sympathy and 
 solicitude, come to say good-bye. Plume s own Concord 
 appeared almost at the instant in front of his quarters, 
 
A STOP BY WIRE 195 
 
 and presently Mrs. Plume, veiled and obviously far from 
 strong, came forth leaning on her husband s arm, and 
 closely followed by Elise. Then, despite the early hour, 
 and to the dismay of Plume, who had planned to start 
 without farewell demonstration of any kind, lights were 
 blinking in almost every house along the row, and a 
 flock of women, some tender and sympathetic, some mor 
 bidly curious, had gathered to wish the major s wife a 
 pleasant journey and a speedy recovery. They loved her 
 not at all, and liked her none too well, but she was ill and 
 sorrowing, so that was enough. Elise they could not 
 bear, yet even Elise came in for a kindly word or two. 
 Mrs. Graham was there, big-hearted and brimming over 
 with helpful suggestion, burdened also with a basket of 
 dainties. Captain and Mrs. Cutler, Captain and Mrs. 
 Westervelt, the Trumans both, Doty, -the young adjutant, 
 Janet Wren, of course, and the ladies of the cavalry, the 
 major s regiment, without exception, were on hand to bid 
 the major and his wife good-bye. Angela Wren was not 
 feeling well, explained her aunt, and Mr. Neil Blakely 
 was conspicuous by his absence. 
 
 It had been observed that, during those few days of 
 hurried packing and preparation, Major Plume had not 
 once gone to Blakely s quarters. True, he had visited 
 only Dr. Graham, and had begged him to explain that 
 anxiety on account of Mrs. Plume prevented his making 
 the round of farewell calls ; but that he was thoughtful of 
 others to the last was shown in this: Plume had asked 
 Captain Cutler, commander of the post, to order the re- 
 
126 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 lease of that wretch Downs. " He has been punished 
 quite sufficiently, I think," said Plume, " and as I was in 
 strumental in his arrest I ask his liberation." At tattoo, 
 therefore, the previous evening " the wretch " had been 
 returned to duty, and at five in the morning was found 
 hovering about the major s quarters. When invited by 
 the sergeant of the guard to explain, he replied, quite 
 civilly for him, that it was to say good-by to Elise. " Me 
 and her," said he, " has been good friends." 
 
 Presumably he had had his opportunity at the kitchen 
 door before the start, but still he lingered, feigning pro 
 fessional interest in the condition of the sleek mules that 
 were to haul the Concord over fifty miles of rugged road, 
 up hill and down dale before the setting of the sun. Then, 
 while the officers and ladies clustered thick on one side 
 of the black vehicle, Downs sidled to the other, and the 
 big black eyes of the Frenchwoman peered down at him 
 a moment as she leaned toward him, and, with a whis 
 pered word, slyly dropped a little folded packet into his 
 waiting palm. Then, as though impatient, Plume shouted 
 "All right. Go on ! " The Concord whirled away, and 
 something like a sigh of relief went up from assembled 
 Sandy, as the first kiss of the rising sun lighted on the 
 bald pate of Squaw Peak, huge sentinel of the valley, 
 looming from the darkness and shadows and the mists 
 of the shallow stream that slept in many a silent pool 
 along its massive, rocky base. With but a few hurried, 
 embarrassed words, Clarice Plume had said adieu to 
 Sandy, thinking never to see it again. They stood and 
 
A STOP BY WIRE 
 
 watched her past the one unlighted house, the northern 
 most along the row. They knew not that Mr. Blakely 
 was at the moment bidding adieu to others in far humbler 
 station. They only noted that, even at the last, he was 
 not there to wave a good-by to the woman who had once 
 so influenced his life. Slowly then the little group dis 
 solved and drifted away. She had gone unchallenged of 
 any authority, though the fate of Mullins still hung in 
 the balance. Obviously, then, it was not she whom 
 Byrne s report had implicated, if indeed that report had 
 named anybody. There had been no occasion for a cor 
 oner and jury. There would have been neither coroner 
 nor jury to serve, had they been called for. Camp Sandy 
 stood in a little world of its own, the only civil function 
 ary within forty miles being a ranchman, dwelling seven 
 miles down stream, who held some Territorial warrant as 
 a justice of the peace. 
 
 But Norah Shaughnessy, from the gable window of the 
 Trumans quarters, shook a hard-clinching Irish fist and 
 showered malediction after the swiftly speeding ambu 
 lance. " Wan o ye," she sobbed, " dealt Pat Mullins a 
 coward and cruel blow, and I ll know which, as soon as 
 ever that poor bye can spake the truth." She would have 
 said it to that hated Frenchwoman herself, had not mother 
 and mistress both forbade her leaving the room until the 
 Plumes were gone. 
 
 Three trunks had been stacked up and secured on the 
 hanging rack at the rear of the Concord. Others, with 
 certain chests and boxes, had been loaded into one big 
 
128 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 wagon and sent ahead. The ambulance, with the Dalys 
 and the little escort of seven horsemen, awaited the rest 
 of the convoy on the northward flats, and the cloud of 
 their combined dust hung long on the scarred flanks as 
 the first rays of the rising sun came gilding the rocks at 
 Boulder Point, and what was left of the garrison at 
 Sandy turned out for reveille. 
 
 That evening, for the first time since his injury, Mr. 
 Blakely took his horse and rode away southward in the 
 soft moonlight, and had not returned when tattoo 
 sounded. The post trader, coming- up with the latest 
 San Francisco papers, said he had stopped a moment to 
 ask at the store whether Schandein, the ranchman justice 
 of the peace before referred to, had recently visited the 
 post. 
 
 That evening, too, for the first time since his danger 
 ous wound, Trooper Mullins awoke from his long deli 
 rium, weak as a little child; asked for Norah, and what 
 in the world was the matter with him in bed and ban 
 dages, and Dr. Graham, looking into the poor lad s dim, 
 half-opening eyes, sent a messenger to Captain Cutler s 
 quarters to ask would the captain come at once to hos 
 pital. This was at nine o clock. 
 
 Less than two hours later a mounted orderly set forth 
 with dispatches from the temporary post commander to 
 Colonel Byrne at Prescott. A wire from that point about 
 sundown had announced the safe arrival of the party 
 from Camp Sandy. The answer, sent at ten o clock, 
 broke up the game of whist at the quarters of the in spec- 
 
A STOP BY WIRE 
 
 tor general. Byrne, the recipient, gravely read it, backed 
 from the table, and vainly strove not to see the anxious 
 inquiry in the eyes of Major Plume, his guest. But 
 Plume cornered him. 
 
 " From Sandy? " he asked. " May I read it? " 
 Byrne hesitated just one moment, then placed the paper 
 in his junior s hand. Plume read, turned very white, 
 and the paper fell from his trembling fingers. The mes 
 sage merely said : 
 
 Mullins recovering and quite rational, though very weak. He 
 says two women were his assailants. Courier with dispatches at 
 once. 
 
 (Signed) CUTLER, Commanding. 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 FIRE! 
 
 ~W~ T was not so much his wounds as his weakness," 
 Dr. Graham was saying, later still that autumn 
 
 -*- night, " that led to my declaring Blakely unfit to 
 take the field. He would have gone in spite of me, but 
 for the general s order. He has gone now in spite of me, 
 and no one knows where." 
 
 It was then nearly twelve o clock, and " the Bugolo- 
 gist " was still abroad. Dinner, as usual since his mis 
 hap, had been sent over to him from the officers mess 
 soon after sunset. His horse, or rather the troop horse 
 designated for his use, had been fed and groomed in the 
 late afternoon, and then saddled at seven o clock and 
 brought over to the rear of the quarters by a stable or 
 derly. 
 
 There had been some demur at longer sending 
 Blakely s meals from mess, now reduced to an actual 
 membership of two. Sandy was a " much married " 
 post in the latter half of the 70*5, the bachelors of the 
 commissioned list being only three, all told, Blakely, 
 and Duane of the Horse, and Doty of the Foot. 
 With these was Heartburn, the contract doctor, and now 
 Duane and the doctor were out in the mountains 
 and Blakely on sick report, yet able to be about. Doty 
 
 130 
 
FIRE ! 131 
 
 thought him able to come to mess. Blakely, thinking he 
 looked much worse than he felt, thanks to his plastered 
 jowl, stood on his rights in the matter and would not go. 
 There had been some demur on part of the stable ser 
 geant of Wren s troop as to sending over the horse. Few 
 officers brought eastern-bred horses to Arizona in those 
 days. The bronco was best suited to the work. An of 
 ficer on duty could take out the troop horse assigned to 
 his use any hour before taps and no questions asked ; but 
 the sergeant told Mr. Blakely s messenger that the lieu 
 tenant wasn t for duty, and it might make trouble. It 
 did. Captain Cutler sent for old Murray, the veteran 
 sergeant, and asked him did he not know his orders. He 
 had allowed a horse to be sent to a sick man an officer 
 not on duty and one the doctor had warned against ex 
 ercise for quite a time, at least. And now the officer 
 was gone, so was the horse, and Cutler, being sorely torn 
 up by the revelations of the evening and dread of ill be 
 falling Blakely, was so injudicious as to hint to a soldier 
 who had worn chevrons much longer than he, Cutler, had 
 worn shoulder-straps, that the next thing to go would 
 probably be his sergeant s bars, whereat Murray went red 
 to the roots of his hair which " continued the march " 
 of the color, and said, with a snap of his jaws, that he 
 got those chevrons, as he did his orders, from his troop 
 commander. A court might order them stricken off, but 
 a captain couldn t, other than his own. For which piece 
 of impudence the veteran went straightway to Sudsville 
 in close arrest. Corporal Bolt was ordered to take over 
 
132 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 his keys and the charge of the stables until the return of 
 Captain Wren, also this order that no government 
 horse should be sent to Lieutenant Blakely hereafter un 
 til the lieutenant was declared by the post surgeon fit for 
 duty. 
 
 There were left at the post, of each of the two cavalry 
 troops, about a dozen men to care for the stables, the bar 
 racks, and property. Seven of these had gone with the 
 convoy to Prescott, and, when Cutler ordered half a dozen 
 horsemen out at midnight to follow Blakely s trail and 
 try to find him, they had to draw on both troop stables, 
 and one of the designated men was the wretch Downs, 
 and Downs was not in his bunk, not anywhere about 
 the quarters or corrals. It was nearly one by the time 
 the party started down the sandy road to the south, Hart 
 and his buckboard and a sturdy brace of mules joining 
 them as they passed the store. " We may need to bring 
 him back in this," said he, to Corporal Quirk. 
 
 "An* what did ye fetch to bring him to wid ? " asked 
 the corporal. Hart touched lightly the breast of his coat, 
 then clucked to his team. " Faith, there s more than 
 wan way of tappin it then/ said Quirk, but the cavalcade 
 moved on. 
 
 The crescent moon had long since sunk behind the 
 westward range, and trailing was something far too slow 
 and tedious. They spurred, therefore, for the nearest 
 ranch, five miles down stream, making their first inquiry 
 there. The inmates were slow to arise, but quick to an 
 swer. Blakely had neither been seen nor heard of. 
 
FIRE ! 133 
 
 Downs they didn t wish to know at all. Indians hadn t 
 been near the lower valley since the " break " at the post 
 the previous week. One of the inmates declared he had 
 ridden alone from Camp McDowell within three days, 
 and there wasn t a Tatchie west of the Matitzal. Hart 
 did all the questioning*. He was a business man and a 
 brother. Soldiers, the ranchmen didn t like soldiers set 
 too much value on government property. 
 
 The trail ran but a few hundred yards east of the 
 stream, and close to the adobe walls of the ranch. Strom, 
 the proprietor, got out his lantern and searched below 
 the point where the little troop had turned off. No re 
 cent hoof-track, southbound, was visible. " He couldn t 
 have come this far," said he. " Better put back ! " Put 
 back they did, and by the aid of Hart s lantern found the 
 fresh trail of a government-shod horse, turning to the 
 east nearly two miles toward home. Quirk said a bad 
 word or two; borrowed the lantern and thoughtfully in 
 cluded the flask ; bade his men follow in file and plunged 
 through the underbrush in dogged pursuit. Hart and 
 his team now could not follow. They waited over half 
 an hour without sign or sound from the trailers, then 
 drove swiftly back to the post. There was a light in the 
 telegraph office, and thither Hart went in a hurry. Lieu 
 tenant Doty, combining the duties of adjutant and officer 
 of the day, was up and making the rounds. The sen 
 tries had just called off three o clock. 
 
 " Had your trouble for nothing, Hart/ hailed the 
 youngster cheerily. " Where re the men ? " 
 
134 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 " Followed his trail turned to the east three miles 
 below here," answered the trader. 
 
 " Three miles below! Why, man, he wasn t below. 
 He met them up Beaver Creek, an brought em in." 
 
 " Brought who in ? " asked Hart, dropping his whip. 
 " I don t understand." 
 
 " Why, the scouts, or runners ! Wren sent em in. 
 He s had a sharp fight up the mountains beyond Snow 
 Lake. Three men wounded. You couldn t have gone a 
 mile before Blakely led em across No. 4 s post. Ahorah 
 and another chap Patchie-Mohaves. We clicked the 
 news up to Prescott over an hour ago." 
 
 The tin reflector at the office window threw the light 
 of the glass-framed candle straight upon Hart s rubicund 
 face, and that face was a study. He faltered a bit be 
 fore he asked : 
 
 " Did Blakely seem all right ? not used up, I mean ? " 
 
 " Seemed weak and tired, but the man is mad to go 
 and join his troop now wants to go right out with Aho 
 rah in the morning, and Captain Cutler says no. Oh, 
 they had quite a row ! " 
 
 They had had rather more than quite a row, if truth 
 were told. Doty had heard only a bit of it. Cutler had 
 been taken by surprise when the Bugologist appeared, 
 two strange, wiry Apaches at his heels, and at first had 
 contented himself with reading Wren s dispatch, repeat 
 ing it over the wires to Prescott. Then he turned on 
 Blakely, silently, wearily waiting, seated at Doty s desk, 
 and on the two Apaches, silently, stolidly waiting, squat- 
 
r V 
 
FIRE ! 135 
 
 ted on the floor. Cutler wished to know how Blakely 
 knew these couriers were coming, and how he came to 
 leave the post without permission. For a moment the 
 lieutenant simply gazed at him, unanswering, but when 
 the senior somewhat sharply repeated the question, in 
 part, Blakely almost as sharply answered : " I did not 
 know they were coming nor that there was wrong in my 
 going. Major Plume required nothing of the kind when 
 we were merely going out for a ride." 
 
 This nettled Cutler. He had always said that Plume 
 was lax, and here was proof of it. " I might have 
 wanted you I did want you, hours ago, Mr. Blakely, 
 and even Major Plume would not countenance his of 
 ficers spending the greater part of the night away from 
 the post, especially on a government horse/ and there 
 had Cutler the whip hand of the scientist, and Blakely had 
 sense enough to see it, yet not sense enough to accept. 
 He was nervous and irritable, as well as tired. Graham 
 had told him he was too weak to ride, yet he had gone, 
 not thinking, of course, to be gone so long, but gone de 
 liberately, and without asking the consent of the post 
 commander. " My finding the runners was an accident," 
 he said, with some little asperity of tone and manner. 
 " In fact, I didn t find them. They found me. I had 
 known them both at the reservation. Have I your per 
 mission, sir" this with marked emphasis "to take 
 them for something to eat. They are very hungry, 
 have come far, and wish to start early and rejoin Captain 
 Wren, -as I do, too." 
 
136 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 " They will start when / am ready, Mr. Blakely," said 
 Cutler, " and you certainly will not start before. In 
 point of fact, sir, you may not be allowed to start at all." 
 
 It was now Blakely s turn to redden to the brows. 
 " You surely will not prevent my going to join my troop, 
 now that it is in contact with the enemy," said he. "All 
 I need is a few hours sleep. I can start at seven." 
 
 " You cannot, with my consent, Mr. Blakely," said the 
 captain dryly. " There are reasons, in fact, why you 
 can t leave here for any purpose unless the general him 
 self give contrary orders. Matters have come up that 
 you ll probably have to explain." 
 
 And here Doty entered, hearing only the captain s last. 
 At sight of his adjutant the captain stopped short in his 
 reprimand. " See to it that these runners have a good 
 supper, Mr. Doty," said Cutler. " Stir up my company 
 cook, if need be, but take them with you now." Then, 
 turning again on Blakely, " The doctor wishes you to go 
 to bed at once, Mr. Blakely, and I will see you in the 
 morning, but no more riding away without permission," 
 he concluded, and thereby closed the interview. He had, 
 indeed, other things to say to, and inquire of, Blakely, 
 but not until he had further consulted Graham. He con 
 fidently expected the coming day would bring instruc 
 tions from headquarters to hold both Blakely and Trooper 
 Downs at the post, as a result of his dispatches, based on 
 the revelation of poor Pat Mullins. But Downs, fore 
 warned, perhaps, had slipped into hiding somewhere an 
 old trick of his, when punishment was imminent. It 
 
FIRE ! 137 
 
 might be two or three days before Downs turned up 
 again, if indeed he turned up at all, but Blakely was here 
 and could be held. Hence the " horse order " of the 
 earlier evening. 
 
 It was nearly two when Blakely reached his quarters, 
 rebuffed and stung. He was so nervous, however, that, 
 in spite of serious fatigue, he found it for over an hour 
 impossible to sleep. He turned out his light and lay in 
 the dark, and the atmosphere of the room seemed heavily 
 charged with rank tobacco. His new " striker " had sat 
 up, it seems, keeping faithful vigil against his master s 
 return, but, as the hours wore on, had solaced himself 
 with pipe after pipe, and wandering about to keep awake. 
 Most of the time, he declared, he had spent in a big rock 
 ing chair on the porch at the side door, but the scent of 
 the weed and of that veteran pipe permeated the entire 
 premises, and the Bugologist hated dead tobacco. He 
 got up and tore down the blanket screen at the side win 
 dows and opened all the doors wide and tried his couch 
 again, and still he wooed the drowsy god in vain. " Nor 
 poppy nor mandragora " had he to soothe him. Instead 
 there were new and anxious thoughts to vex, and so an 
 other half hour he tossed and tumbled, and when at last 
 he seemed dropping to the borderland, perhaps, of 
 dreams, he thought he must be ailing again and in need 
 of new bandages or cooling drink or something, for the 
 muffled footfalls, betrayed by creaking pine rather than 
 by other sound, told him drowsily that the attendant or 
 somebody, cautioned not to disturb him, was moving 
 
138 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 slowly across the room. He might have been out on the 
 side porch to get cool water from the olla, but he needn t 
 be so confoundedly slow and cautious, though he couldn t 
 help the creaking. Then, what could the attendant want 
 in the front room, where were still so many of the 
 precious glass cases unharmed, and the Bugologist s favo 
 rite books and his big desk, littered with papers, etc. ? 
 Blakely thought to hail and warn him against moving 
 about among those brittle glass things, but reflected that 
 he, the new man, had done the reshifting under his, 
 Blakely s, supervision, and knew just where each item was 
 placed and how to find the passage way between them. 
 It really was a trifle intricate. How could he have gone 
 into the spare room at Captain Wren s, and there made 
 his home as she Mrs. Plume had first suggested? 
 There would not have been room for half his plunder, to 
 say nothing of himself. " What on earth can Nixon 
 want ? " he sleepily asked himself, " fumbling about there 
 among those cases ? Was that a crack or a snap ? " It 
 sounded like both, a splitting of glass, a wrenching of 
 lock spring or something. " Be careful there! " he man 
 aged to call. No answer. Perhaps it was some one of 
 the big hounds, then, wandering restlessly about at night. 
 They often did, and why, yes, that would account for it. 
 Doors and windows were all wide open here, what was 
 to prevent ? Still, Blakely washed he hadn t extinguished 
 his lamp. He might then have explored. The sound 
 ceased entirely for a moment, and, now that he was quite 
 awake, he remembered that the hospital attendant was no 
 
FIRE ! 139 
 
 longer with him. Then the sounds must have been made 
 by the striker or the hounds. Blakely had no dogs of his 
 own. Indeed they were common property at the post, 
 most of them handed down with the rest of the public 
 goods and chattels by their predecessors of the th. At 
 all events, he felt far too languid, inert, weak, indifferent 
 or something. If the striker, he had doubtless come 
 down for cool water. If the hounds, they were in search 
 of something to eat, and in either case why bother about 
 it ? The incident had so far distracted his thoughts from 
 the worries of the night that now, at last and in good ear 
 nest, he was dropping to sleep. 
 
 But in less than twenty minutes he was broad awake 
 again, with sudden start gasping, suffocating, listening 
 in amaze to a volley of snapping and cracking, half- 
 smothered, from the adjoining room. He sprang from 
 his bed with a cry of alarm and flung himself through a 
 thick, hot veil of eddying, yet invisible, smoke, straight 
 for the communicating doorway, and was brought up 
 standing by banging his head against the resounding pine, 
 tight shut instead of open as he had left it, and refusing 
 to yield to furious battering. It was locked, bolted, or 
 barred from the other side. Blindly he turned and 
 rushed for the side porch and the open air, stumbling 
 against the striker as the latter came clattering headlong 
 down from aloft. Then together they rushed to the par 
 lor window, now cracking and splitting from the furious 
 heat within. A volume of black fume came belching 
 forth, driven and lashed by ruddy tongues of flame 
 
140 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 within, and their shouts for aid went up on the wings of 
 the dawn, and the infantry sentry on the eastward 
 post came running to see ; caught one glimpse of the glare 
 at that southward window ; bang went his rifle with a ring 
 that came echoing back from the opposite cliffs, as all 
 Camp Sandy sprang from its bed in answer to the sten 
 torian shout " Fire ! No. 5 ! " 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 WHOSE LETTERS? 
 
 THERE is something about a night alarm of fire 
 at a military post that borders on the thrilling. 
 In the days whereof we write the buildings 
 were not the substantial creations of brick and stone to 
 be seen to-day, and those of the scattered " camps " and 
 stations in that arid, sun-scorched land of Arizona were 
 tinder boxes of the flimsiest and most inflammable 
 kind. 
 
 It could hardly have been a minute from the warning 
 shot and yell of No. 5 repeated right and left by other 
 sentries and echoed by No. I at the guard-house be 
 fore bugle and trumpet were blaring their fierce alarm, 
 and the hoarse roar of the drum was rousing the inmates 
 of the infantry barracks. Out they came, tumbling pell- 
 mell into the accustomed ranks, confronted by the sight 
 of Blakely s quarters one broad sheet of flame. With 
 incredible speed the blaze had burst forth from the front 
 room on the lower floor ; leaped from window to window, 
 from ledge to ledge; fastened instantly on overhanging 
 roof, and the shingled screen of the veranda; had darted 
 up the dry wooden stairway, devouring banister, railing, 
 and snapping pine floor, and then, billowing forth from 
 every crack, crevice, and casement of the upper floor 
 
 141 
 
142 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 streamed hissing and crackling on the blackness that pre 
 cedes the dawn, a magnificent glare that put to shame the 
 feeble signal fires lately gleaming in the mountains. 
 Luckily there was no wind there never was a wind at 
 Sandy and the flames leaped straight for the zenith, 
 lashing their way into the huge black pillar of smoke 
 cloud sailing aloft to the stars. 
 
 Under their sergeants, running in disciplined order, 
 one company had sped for the water wagon and were now 
 slowly trundling that unwieldy vehicle, pushing, pulling, 
 straining at the wheels, from its night berth close to the 
 corrals. Rushing like mad, in no order at all, the men of 
 the other company came tearing across the open parade, 
 and were faced and halted far out in front of officers row 
 by Blakely himself, barefooted and clad only in his 
 pyjamas, but all alive with vim and energy. 
 
 " Back, men ! back for your blankets ! " he cried. 
 " Bring ladders and buckets ! Back with you, lively ! " 
 They seemed to catch his meaning at the instant. His 
 soldier home with everything it contained was doomed. 
 Nothing could save it. But there stood the next quar 
 ters, Truman s and Westervelt s double set, and in the 
 intense heat that must speedily develop, it might well be 
 that the dry, resinous woodwork that framed the adobe 
 would blaze forth on its own account and spread a con 
 flagration down the line. Already Mrs. Truman, with 
 Norah and the children, was being hurried down to the 
 doctor s, while Truman himself, with the aid of two or 
 three neighboring " strikers," had stripped the beds of 
 
WHOSE LETTERS? 143 
 
 their single blanket and, bucketing these with water, was 
 slashing at the veranda roof and cornice along the north 
 ward side. 
 
 Somebody came with a short ladder, and in an 
 other moment three or four adventurous spirits, led by 
 Blakely and Truman, were scrambling about the veranda 
 roof, their hands and faces glowing in the gathering heat, 
 spreading blankets over the shingling and cornice. In 
 five minutes all that was left of Blakely s little homestead 
 was gone up in smoke and fierce, furious heat and flame, 
 but the daring and well-directed effort of the garrison 
 had saved the rest of the line. In ten minutes nothing 
 but a heap of glowing beams and embers, within four 
 crumbling walls of adobe, remained of the " beetle shop." 
 Bugs, butterflies, books, chests, desk, trunks, furniture, 
 papers, and such martial paraphernalia as a subaltern 
 might require in that desert land, had been reduced to 
 ashes before their owner s eyes. He had not saved so 
 much as a shoe. His watch, lying on the table by his 
 bedside, a silk handkerchief, and a little scrap of a note, 
 written in girlish hand and carried temporarily in the 
 breast pocket, were the only items he had managed to 
 bring with him into the open air. He was still gasping, 
 gagging, half-strangling, when Captain Cutler accosted 
 him to know if he could give the faintest explanation of 
 the starting of so strange and perilous a fire, and Blakely, 
 remembering the stealthy footsteps and that locked or 
 bolted door, could not but say he believed it incendiary, 
 yet could think of no possible motive. 
 
144 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 It was daybreak as the little group of spectators, women 
 and children of the garrison, began to break up and return 
 to their homes, all talking excitedly, all intolerant of the 
 experiences of others, and centered solely in the narrative 
 of their own. Leaving a dozen men with buckets, 
 readily rilled from the acequia which turned the old 
 water wheel just across the post of No. 4, and sending the 
 big water wagon down to the stream for another liquid 
 load, the infantry went back to their barracks and early 
 coffee. The drenched blankets, one by one, were 
 stripped from the gable end of Truman s quarters, every 
 square inch of the paint thereon being now a patch of 
 tiny blisters, and there, as the dawn broadened and the 
 pallid light took on again a tinge of rose, the officers 
 gathered about Blakely in his scorched and soaked 
 pyjamas, extending both condolence and congratulation. 
 
 " The question is, Blakely," remarked Captain Wester- 
 velt dryly, " will you go to Frisco to refit now, or wait 
 till Congress reimburses ? " whereat the scientist was ob 
 served to smile somewhat ruefully. " The question is, 
 Bugs," burst in young Doty irrepressibly, " will you 
 wear this rig, or Apache full dress, when you ride after 
 Wren? The runners start at six," whereat even the rue 
 ful smile was observed to vanish, and without answer 
 Blakely turned away, stepping gingerly into the heated 
 sand with his bare white feet. 
 
 " Don t bother about dousing anything else, sergeant," 
 said he presently, to the soldier supervising the work of 
 the bucket squad. " The iron box should be under what s 
 
WHOSE LETTERS? 145 
 
 left of my desk about there," and he indicated a charred 
 and steaming heap, visible through a gap in the doubly 
 baked adobe that had once been the side window. " Lug 
 that out as soon as you can cool things off. I ll probably 
 be back by that time." Then, turning again to the group 
 of officers, and ignoring Doty Blakely addressed him 
 self to the senior. 
 
 " Captain Cutler," said he, " I can fit myself out at the 
 troop quarters with everything I need for the field, at 
 least, and wire to San Francisco for what I shall need 
 when we return. I shall be ready to go with Ahorah at 
 six." 
 
 There was a moment of silence. Embarrassment 
 showed plainly in almost every face. When Cutler spoke 
 it was with obvious effort. Everybody realized that 
 Blakely, despite severe personal losses, had been the 
 directing head in checking the progress of the flames. 
 Truman had borne admirable part, but Blakely was at 
 once leader and actor. He deserved well of his com 
 mander. He was still far from strong. He was weak 
 and weary. His hands and face were scorched and in 
 places blistered, yet, turning his back on the ruins of his 
 treasures, he desired to go at once to join his comrades in 
 the presence of the enemy. He had missed every previous 
 opportunity of sharing perils and battle with them. He 
 could afford such loss as that no longer, in view of what 
 he knew had been said. He had every right, so thought 
 they all, to go, yet Cutler hesitated. When at last he 
 spoke it was to temporize. 
 
146 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 " You re in no condition for field work, Mr. Blakely," 
 said he. " The doctor has so assured me, and just now 
 things are tajdng such shape I need you here." 
 
 " You will permit me to appeal by wire, sir ? " queried 
 Blakely, standing attention in his bedraggled night garb, 
 and forcing himself to a semblance of respect that he was 
 far from feeling. 
 
 " I I will consult Dr. Graham and let you know," was 
 the captain s awkward reply. 
 
 Two hours later Neil Blakely, in a motley dress made up 
 of collections from the troop and trader s stores a com 
 bination costume of blue flannel shirt, bandanna kerchief, 
 cavalry trousers with machine-made saddle piece, Tonto 
 moccasins and leggings, fringed gauntlets and a broad- 
 brimmed white felt hat, strode into the messroom in 
 quest of eggs and coffee. Doty had been there and van 
 ished. Sick call was soimding and Graham was stalking 
 across the parade in the direction of the hospital, too far 
 away to be reached by human voice, unless uplifted to the 
 pitch of attracting the whole garrison. The telegraph 
 operator had just clicked off the last of half a dozen mes 
 sages scrawled by the lieutenant orders on San Fran 
 cisco furnishers for the new outfit demanded by the occa 
 sion, etc., but Captain Cutler was still mured within his 
 own quarters, declining to see Mr. Blakely until ready to 
 come to the office. Ahorah and his swarthy partner were 
 already gone, " started even before six," said the acting 
 sergeant major, and Blakely was fuming with impatience 
 and sense of something much amiss. Doty was obviously 
 
WHOSE LETTERS? 147 
 
 dodging him, there could be no doubt of that, for the 
 youngster was between two fires, the post commander s 
 positive orders on one hand and Blakely s urgent plead 
 ings on the other. 
 
 Over at " C " Troop s quarters was the lieutenant s 
 saddle, ready packed with blanket, greatcoat, and bulg 
 ing saddle-bags. Over in " C " Troop s stables was Delt- 
 chay the lieutenant s bronco charger, ready fed and 
 groomed, wondering why he was kept in when the other 
 horses were out at graze. With the saddle kit were the 
 troop carbine and revolver, Blakely s personal arms being 
 now but stockless tubes of seared and blistered steel. 
 Back of " C " Troop s quarters lolled a half-breed Mexi 
 can packer, with a brace of mules, one girt with saddle, 
 the other in shrouding aparejo diamond-hitched, both 
 borrowed from the post trader with whom Blakely s note 
 of hand was good as a government four per cent. all 
 ready to follow the lieutenant to the field whither right 
 and duty called him. There, too, was Nixon, the new 
 " striker," new clad as was his master, and full panoplied 
 for the field, yet bemoaning the loss of soldier treasures 
 whose value was never fully realized until they were irre 
 vocably gone. Six o clock, six-thirty, six-forty-five and 
 even seven sped by and still there came no summons to join 
 the soldier master. There had come instead, when Nixon 
 urged that he be permitted to lead forth both his own 
 troop horse and Deltchay, the brief, but significant reply : 
 " Shut yer gab, Nixon. There s no horse goes till the 
 captain says so ! " 
 
148 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 At seven o clock, at last, the post commander came 
 forth from his doorway; saw across the glaring level of 
 the parade the form of Mr. Blakely impatiently pacing the 
 veranda at the adjutant s office, and, instead of going 
 thither, as was his wont, Captain Cutler turned the other 
 way and strode swiftly to the hospital, where Graham 
 met him at the bedside of Trooper patient Patrick Mul- 
 lins. " How is he ? " queried Cutler. 
 
 " Sleeping thank God and not to be wakened," was 
 the Scotchman s answer. " He had a bad time of it dur 
 ing the fire." 
 
 " What am I to tell Blakely? " demanded Cutler, seek 
 ing strength for his faltering hand. " You re bound to 
 help me now, Graham." 
 
 " Let him go and you may make it worse," said the 
 doctor, with a clamp of his grizzled jaws. " Hold him 
 here and you re sure to." 
 
 " Can t you, as post surgeon, tell him he isn t fit to 
 ride?" 
 
 " Not when he rides the first half of the night and puts 
 out a nasty fire the last. Can t you, as post commander, 
 tell him you forbid his going till you hear from Byrne 
 and investigate the fire ? " If Graham had no patience 
 with a frail woman, he had nothing but contempt for a 
 weak man. " If he s bound to be up and doing some 
 thing, though," he added, " send him out with a squad of 
 men and orders to hunt for Downs." 
 
 Cutler had never even thought of it. Downs was still 
 missing. No one had seen him. His haunts had been 
 
WHOSE LETTERS? 149 
 
 searched to no purpose. His horse was still with the 
 herd. One man, the sergeant of the guard, the previous 
 day, had marked the brief farewell between the missing 
 man and the parting maid had seen the woman s gloved 
 hand stealthily put forth and the little folded packet 
 passed to the soldier s ready palm. What that paper con 
 tained no man ventured to conjecture. Cutler and Gra 
 ham, notified by Sergeant Kenna of what he had seen, 
 puzzled over it in vain. Norah Shaughnessy could per 
 haps unravel it, thought the doctor, but he did not 
 say. 
 
 Cutler came forth from the shaded depths of the broad 
 hallway to face the dazzling glare of the morning sun 
 shine, and the pale, stern, reproachful features of the 
 homeless lieutenant, who simply raised his hand in salute 
 and said : " I ve been ready two hours, sir, and the run 
 ners are long gone." 
 
 " Too long and too far for you to catch them now," 
 said Cutler, catching at another straw. " And there is 
 far more important matter here. Mr. Blakely, I want 
 that man Downs followed, found, and brought back to 
 this post, and you re the only man to do it. Take a 
 dozen troopers, if necessary, and set about it, sir, at 
 once." 
 
 A soldier was at the moment hurrying past the front of 
 the hospital, a grimy-looking packet in his hand. Hear 
 ing the voice of Captain Cutler, he turned, saw Lieu 
 tenant Blakely standing there at attention, saw that, as the 
 captain finished, Blakely still remained a moment as 
 
150 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 though about to speak saw that he seemed a trifle dazed 
 or stunned. Cutler marked it, too. " This is imperative 
 and immediate, Mr. Blakely/ said he, not unkindly. 
 " Pull yourself together if you are fit to go at all, and lose 
 no more time." With that he started away. Graham 
 had come to the doorway, but Blakely never seemed to 
 see him. Instead he suddenly roused and, turning sharp, 
 sprang down the wooden steps as though to overtake the 
 captain, when the soldier, saluting, held forth the dingy 
 packet. 
 
 " It was warped out of all shape, sir," said he. " The 
 blacksmith pried out the lid wid a crowbar. The books 
 are singed and soaked and the packages charred all but 
 this." 
 
 It fell apart as it passed from hand to hand, and a lot 
 of letters, smoke-stained, scorched at the edges, and some 
 of them soaking wet, also two or three carte de visile pho 
 tographs, were scattered on the sand. Both men bobbed 
 in haste to gather them up, and Graham came hurriedly 
 down to help. As Blakely straightened again he swayed 
 and staggered slightly, and the doctor grasped him by the 
 arm, a sudden clutch that perhaps shook loose some of 
 the recovered papers from the long, slim fingers. At all 
 events, a few went suddenly back to earth, and, as Cutler 
 turned, wondering what was amiss, he saw Blakely, with 
 almost ashen face, supported by the doctor s sturdy arm 
 to a seat on the edge of the piazza ; saw, as he quickly re 
 traced his steps, a sweet and smiling woman s face look 
 ing up at him out of the trampled sands, and, even as he 
 
WHOSE LETTERS? 161 
 
 stooped to recover the pretty photograph, though it 
 looked far younger, fairer, and more winsome than ever 
 he had seen it, Cutler knew the face at once. It was that 
 of Clarice, wife of Major Plume. Whose, then, were 
 those scattered letters? 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 AUNT JANET BRAVED 
 
 NIGHTFALL of a weary day had come. Camp 
 Sandy, startled from sleep in the dark hour be 
 fore the dawn, had found topic for much excit 
 ing talk, and was getting tired as the twilight waned. 
 No word had come from the party sent in search of 
 Downs, now deemed a deserter. No sign of him had 
 been found about the post. No explanation had occurred 
 to either Cutler or Graham of the parting between Elise 
 and the late " striker." She had never been known to 
 notice or favor him in any way before. Her smiles and 
 coquetries had been lavished on the sergeants. In Downs 
 there was nothing whatsoever to attract her. It was not 
 likely she had given him money, said Cutler, because he 
 was about the post all that day after the Plumes departure 
 and with never a sign of inebriety. He could not himself 
 buy whisky, but among the ranchmen, packers, and pros 
 pectors forever hanging about the post there were plenty 
 ready to play middleman for anyone who could supply 
 the cash, and in this way were the orders of the post com 
 mander made sometimes abortive. Downs was gone, 
 that was certain, and the question was, which way? 
 
 A sergeant and two men had taken the Prescott road ; 
 followed it to Dick s Ranch, in the Cherry Creek Valley, 
 and were assured the missing man had never gone that 
 
 152 
 
AUNT JANET BRAVED 153 
 
 way. Dick was himself a veteran trooper of the th. 
 He had invested his savings in this little estate and settled 
 thereon to grow up with the country the Stannards win 
 some Millie having accepted a life interest in him and his 
 modest property. They knew every man riding that trail, 
 from the daily mail messenger to the semi-occasional 
 courier. Their own regiment had gone, but they had 
 warm interest in its successors. They knew Downs, had 
 known him ever since his younger days when, a trig 
 young Irish-Englishman, some Londoner s discharged 
 valet, he had listed in the cavalry, as he expressed it, to 
 reform. A model of temperance, soberness, and chastity 
 was Downs between times, and his gifts as groom of the 
 chambers, as well as groom of the stables, made him, when 
 a model, invaluable to bachelor officers in need of a com 
 petent soldier servant. In days just after the great war 
 he had won fame and money as a light rider. It was then 
 that Lieutenant Blake had dubbed him " Epsom " Downs, 
 and well-nigh quarreled with his chum, Lieutenant Ray, 
 over the question of proprietorship when the two were 
 sent to separate stations and Downs was " striking " for 
 both. Downs settled the matter by getting on a seven- 
 days drunk, squandering both fame and money, and, 
 though forgiven the scriptural seventy times seven (dur 
 ing which term of years his name was changed to Ups and 
 Downs), finally forfeited the favor of both these indul 
 gent masters and became thereafter simply Downs, with 
 no ups of sufficient length to restore the average much 
 less to redeem him. And yet, when eventually " bob- 
 
154 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 tailed " out of the th, he had turned up at the old arsenal 
 recruiting depot at St. Louis, clean-shaven, neat, deft- 
 handed, helpful, to the end that an optimistic troop com 
 mander " took him on again," in the belief that a reform 
 had indeed been inaugurated. But, like most good sol 
 diers, the commander referred to knew little of politics or 
 potables, otherwise he would have set less store by the 
 strength of the reform movement and more by that of the 
 potations. Downs went so far on the highroad to heaven 
 this time as to drink nothing until his first payday. 
 Meantime, as his captain s mercury, messenger, and gen 
 eral utility man, moving much in polite society at the arse 
 nal and in town, he was frequently to be seen about 
 Headquarters of the Army, then established by General 
 Sherman as far as possible from Washington and as close 
 to the heart of St. Louis. He learned something of the 
 ins and outs of social life in the gay city, heard much 
 theory and little truth about the time that Lieutenant 
 Blakely, returning suddenly thereto after an absence of 
 two months, during which time frequent letters had 
 passed between him and Clarice Latrobe, found that 
 Major Plume had been her shadow for weeks, her escort 
 to dance after dance, her companion riding, driving, din 
 ing day after day. Something of this Blakely had heard 
 in letters from friends. Little or nothing thereof had he 
 heard from her. The public never knew what passed be 
 tween them (Elise, her maid, was better informed). But 
 Blakely within the day left town again, and within the 
 jveek there appeared the announcement of her forthcom- 
 
AUNT JANET BRAVED 155 
 
 ing marriage, Plume the presumably happy man. Downs 
 got full the first payday after his re-enlistment, as has 
 been said, and drunk, as in duty bound, at the major s 
 " swagger " wedding. It was after this episode he fell 
 utterly from grace and went forth to the frontier irre- 
 claimably " Downs." It was a seven-days topic of talk 
 at Sandy that Lieutenant Blakely, when acting Indian 
 agent at the reservation, should have accepted the services 
 of this unpromising specimen as " striker." It was a seven- 
 weeks wonder that Downs kept the pact, and sober as a 
 judge, from the hour he joined the Bugologist to the night 
 that self-contained young officer was sent crashing into 
 his beetle show under the impact of Wren s furious fist. 
 Then came the last pound that broke the back of Downs 
 wavering resolution, and now had come what? The 
 sergeant and party rode back from Dick s to tell Captain 
 Cutler the deserter had not taken the Cherry Creek road. 
 Another party just in reported similarly that he had not 
 taken the old, abandoned Grief Hill trail. Still another 
 returned from down-stream ranches to say he could not 
 have taken that route without being seen and he had not 
 been seen. Ranchman Strom would swear to that be 
 cause Downs was in his debt for value received in shape 
 of whisky, and Strom was rabid at the idea of his getting 
 away. In fine, as nothing but Downs was missing, it be 
 came a matter of speculation along toward tattoo as to 
 whether Downs could have taken anything at all except 
 possibly his own life. 
 
 Cutler was now desirous of questioning Blakely at 
 
156 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 length, and obtaining- his views and theories as to Downs, 
 for Cutler believed that Blakely had certain well-defined 
 views which he was keeping to himself. Between these 
 two, however, had grown an unbridgeable gulf. Dr. 
 Graham had declared at eight o clock that morning that 
 Mr. Blakely was still so weak that he ought not to go 
 with the searching parties, and on receipt of this dictum 
 Captain Cutler had issued his, to wit, that Blakely 
 should not go either in search of Downs or in pursuit 
 of Captain Wren. It stung Blakely and angered him 
 even against Graham, steeling him against the post 
 commander. Each of these gentlemen begged him to 
 make his temporary home under his roof, and Blakely 
 would not. " Major Plume s quarters are now vacant, 
 then," said Cutler to Graham. " If he won t come to you 
 or to me, let him take a room there." This, too, Blakely 
 refused. He reddened, what is more, at the suggestion. 
 He sent Ni*on down to Mr. Hart s, the trader s, to ask if 
 he could occupy a spare room there, and when Hart said, 
 yes, most certainly, Cutler reddened in turn when told of 
 it, and sent Lieutenant Doty, the adjutant, to say that the 
 post commander could not " consent to an officer s occupy 
 ing quarters outside the garrison when there was abun 
 dant room within." Then came Truman and Westervelt 
 to beg Blakely to come to them. Then came a note from 
 Mrs. Sanders, reminding him that, as an officer of the 
 cavalry, it would be casting reflections on his own corps 
 to go and dwell with aliens. " Captain Sanders would 
 never forgive me," said she, " if you did not take our 
 
AUNT JANET BRAVED 157 
 
 spare room. Indeed, I shall feel far safer with a man in 
 the house now that we are having fires and Indian out 
 breaks and prisoners escaping and all that sort of thing. 
 Do come, Mr. Blakely." And in that blue flannel shirt 
 and the trooper trousers and bandanna neckerchief, Blakely 
 went and thanked her; sent for Nixon and his saddle 
 bags, and with such patience as was possible settled down 
 forthwith. Truth to tell it was high time he settled 
 somewhere, for excitement, exposure, physical ill, and 
 mental torment had told upon him severely. At sunset, 
 as he seemed too miserable to leave his room and come to 
 the dining table, Mrs. Sanders sent for the doctor, and 
 reluctantly Blakely let him in. 
 
 That evening, just after tattoo had sounded, Kate 
 Sanders and Angela were having murmured conference 
 on the Wrens veranda. Aunt Janet had gone to hos 
 pital to carry unimpeachable jelly to the several patients 
 and dubious words of cheer. Jelly they absorbed with 
 much avidity and her words with meek resignation. Mul- 
 lins, she thought, after his dreadful experience and close 
 touch with death, must be in receptive mood and re 
 pentant of his sins. Of just what sins to repent poor 
 Pat might still be unsettled in his mind. It was sufficient 
 that he had them, as all soldiers must have, said Miss 
 Wren, and now that his brain seemed clearing and the 
 fever gone and he was too weak and helpless to resist, 
 the time seemed ripe for the sowing of good seed, and 
 Janet went to sow. 
 
 But there by Mullins s bed, all unabashed at Janet s 
 
158 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 marked disapprobation, sat Norah Shaughnessy. There, 
 in flannel shirt and trooper trousers and bandanna necker 
 chief, pale, but collected, stood the objectionable Mr. 
 Blakely. He was bending over, saying something to 
 Mullins, as she halted in the open doorway, and Blakely, 
 looking quickly up, went with much civility to greet and 
 escort her within. To his courteous, " Good-evening, 
 Miss Wren, may I relieve you of your basket ? " she re 
 turned prompt negative and, honoring him with no fur 
 ther notice, stood and gazed with Miss Shaughnessy at the 
 focus Miss Shaughnessy who, after one brief glance, 
 turned a broad Irish back on the intruder at the doorway 
 and resumed her murmuring to Mullins. 
 
 " Is the doctor here or Steward Griffin ? " spoke the 
 lady, to the room at large, looking beyond the lieutenant 
 and toward the single soldier attendant present. 
 
 " The doctor and the steward are both at home just 
 now, Miss Wren/ said Blakely. " May I offer you a 
 chair?" 
 
 Miss Wren preferred to stand. 
 
 " I wish to speak with Steward Griffin," said she again. 
 " Can you go for him? " this time obviously limiting her 
 language to the attendant himself, and carefully exclud 
 ing Mr. Blakely from the field of her recognition. The 
 attendant dumbly shook his head. So Aunt Janet tried 
 again. 
 
 " Norah, you know where the steward lives, will 
 
 you " But Blakely saw rebellion awake again in 
 
 Ireland and interposed. 
 
AUNT JANET BRAVED 159 
 
 " The steward shall be here at once, Miss Wren," said 
 he, and tiptoed away. The lady s doubtful eye turned 
 and followed him a moment, then slowly she permitted 
 herself to enter. Griffin, heading for the dispensary at 
 the moment and apprised of her visit, came hurrying in. 
 Blakely, pondering over the few words Mullins had faintly 
 spoken, walked slowly over toward the line. His talk 
 with Graham had in a measure stilled the spirit of rancor 
 that had possessed him earlier in the day. Graham, at 
 least, was stanch and steadfast, not a weathercock like 
 Cutler. Graham had given him soothing medicine and 
 advised his strolling a while in the open air he had slept 
 so much of the stifling afternoon and now, hearing the 
 sound of women s voices on the dark veranda nearest him, 
 he veered to the left, passed around the blackened ruin 
 of his own quarters and down along the rear of the line 
 just as the musician of the guard was sounding " Lights 
 Out " " Taps." 
 
 And then a sudden thought occurred to him. Sen 
 tries began challenging at taps. He was close to the post 
 of No. 5. He could even see the shadowy form of the 
 sentry slowly pacing toward him, and here he stood in the 
 garb of a private soldier instead of his official dress. It 
 caused him quickly to veer again, to turn to his right, the 
 west, and to enter the open space between the now de 
 serted quarters of the permanent commander and those of 
 Captain Wren adjoining them to the north. Another 
 moment and he stopped short. Girlish voices, low and 
 murmurous, fell upon his ear. In a moment he had 
 
160 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 recognized them. " It won t take me two minutes, Angela. 
 I ll go and get it now," were the first words distinctly 
 heard, and, with a rustle of skirts, Kate Sanders bounded 
 lightly from the piazza to the sands and disappeared 
 around the corner of the major s quarters, going in the 
 direction of her home. For the first time in many event 
 ful days Blakely stood almost within touch of the girl 
 whose little note was even then nestling in an inner pocket, 
 and they were alone. 
 
 "Miss Angela!" 
 
 Gently he spoke her name, but the effect was startling. 
 She had been reclining in a hammock, and at sound of 
 his voice struggled suddenly to a sitting posture, a low cry 
 on her lips. In some strange way, in the darkness, the 
 fright, confusion, whatever it may have been, she lost 
 her balance and her seat. The hammock whirled from 
 under her, and with exasperating thump, unharmed but 
 wrathful, the girl was tumbled to the resounding floor. 
 Blakely sprang to her aid, but she was up in the split of a 
 second, scorning, or not seeing, his eager, outstretched 
 hand. 
 
 " My Miss Angela ! " he began, all anxiety and dis 
 tress, " I hope you re not hurt," and the outstretched 
 hands were trembling. 
 
 " I know I m not," was the uncompromising reply, 
 " not in the least ; startled that s all ! Gentlemen don t 
 usually come upon one that way in the dark." She was 
 panting a bit, but striving bravely, angrily, to be calm and 
 cool icy cool. 
 
AUNT JANET BRAVED 161 
 
 " Nor would I have come that way/ then, stupidly, 
 " had I known you were here. Forgive me." 
 
 How could she, after that? She had no wish to see 
 him, so she had schooled herself. She would decline to 
 see him, were he to ask for her at the door ; but, not for an 
 instant did she wish to hear that he did not wish to see 
 her, yet he had haplessly, brusquely said he wouldn t have 
 come had he known she was there. It was her duty to 
 leave him, instantly. It was her desire first to punish 
 him. 
 
 " My aunt is not at home," she began, the frost of the 
 Sierras in her tone. 
 
 " I just left her, a moment ago, at the hospital," said he, 
 steadfastly ignoring her repellent tone. Indeed, if any 
 thing, the tone rejoiced him, for it told a tale she would 
 not have told for realms and empires. He was ten years 
 older and had lived. " But forgive me," he went on, 
 " you are trembling, Miss Angela." She was, and 
 loathed herself, and promptly denied it. He gravely 
 placed a chair. " You fell heavily, and it must have 
 jarred you. Please sit down," and stepping to the olla, 
 " let me bring you some water." 
 
 She was weak. Her knees, her hands, were shaking as 
 they never shook before. He had seen her aunt at the 
 hospital. He had left her aunt there without a moment s 
 delay that he might hasten to see her, Angela. He was 
 here and bending over her, with brimming gourd of cool 
 spring water. Nay, more, with one hand he pressed it to 
 her lips, with the other he held his handkerchief so that the 
 
162 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 drops might not fall upon her gown. He was bending 
 over her, so close she could hear, she thought, the swift 
 beating of his heart. She knew that if what Aunt Janet 
 had told, and her father had seen, of him were true, she 
 would rather die than suffer a touch of his hand. Yet 
 one hand had touched her, gently, yet firmly, as he helped 
 her to the chair, and the touch she loathed was sweet to 
 her in spite of herself. From the moment of their first 
 meeting this man had done what no other man had done 
 before spoken to her and treated her as a grown woman, 
 with a man s admiration in his fine blue eyes, with defer 
 ence in word and chivalric grace in manner. And in spite 
 of the mean things whispered about him about him and 
 anybody, she had felt her young heart going out to him, 
 her buoyant, joyous, healthful nature opening and ex 
 panding in the sunshine of his presence. And now he 
 had come to seek her, after all the peril and excitement 
 and trouble he had undergone, and now, all loverlike 
 tenderness and concern, was bending over her and mur 
 muring to her, his deep voice almost as tremulous as her 
 hand. Oh, it couldn t be true that he cared for was 
 interested in that woman, the major s wife! Not that 
 she ought to care one way or another, except that it was 
 so despicable so unlike him. Yet she had promised her 
 self had virtually promised her father that she would 
 hold far aloof from this man, and here he stood, so close 
 that their heart-beats almost intermingled, and he was tell 
 ing her that he wished she had kept and never returned 
 the little butterfly net, for now, when it had won a value it 
 
AUNT JANET BRAVED 163 
 
 never before had known, it was his fate to lose it. " And 
 now," he said, " I hope to be sent to-morrow to join your 
 father in the field, and I wish to tell you that, whenever I 
 go, I shall first come to see what you may have to send to 
 him. Will you be here, Miss Angela? " 
 
 For a moment silence. She was thinking of her 
 duty to her father, of her implied promise, of all that 
 Janet had told her, and so thinking could not for the mo 
 ment answer could not meet his earnest gaze. Dark as 
 it was she felt, rather than saw, the glow of his deep blue 
 eyes. She could not mistake the tenderness of his tone. 
 She had so believed in him. He seemed so far above the 
 callow, vapid, empty-headed youngsters the other girls 
 were twittering about from morn till night. She felt that 
 she believed in him now, no matter what had been said or 
 who had said it. She felt that if he would but say it was 
 all a mistake that no woman had crossed his threshold, 
 all Camp Sandy might swear to the truth of the story, and 
 she would laugh at it. But how could she ask such a thing 
 of him ? Her cheeks took fire at the thought. It was he 
 who broke the silence. 
 
 " Something has happened to break your faith in me, 
 Miss Angela," said he, with instant gravity. " I certainly 
 had it I know I had it not a week ago " ; and now he 
 had dropped to a seat in the swaying hammock, and with 
 calm strength and will bent toward her and compelled 
 her attention. " I have a right to know, as matters 
 stand. Will you tell me, or must I wait until I see your 
 father? " With that Neil Blakely actually sought to take 
 
164 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 her hand. She whipped it behind her at the instant. 
 " Will you tell me ? " he repeated, bending closer. 
 
 From down the line, dancing along the wooden veranda, 
 came the sound of swift footfalls Kate Sanders hurry 
 ing back. Another moment and it would be too late. 
 The denial she longed to hear from his lips might never 
 be spoken. If spoken at all it must be here and now, yet 
 how could she how could she ask him? 
 
 " I will tell you, Mr. Blakely." The words came from 
 the window of the darkened parlor, close at hand. The 
 voice was that of Janet Wren, austere and uncompromis 
 ing. " I got here in time to hear your question I will 
 answer for my niece " 
 
 "Aunt Janet No!" 
 
 " Be quiet, Angela. Mr. Blakely, it is because this 
 child s father saw, and I heard of, that which makes 
 you unworthy the faith of a young, pure-hearted girl. 
 Who was the the creature to whom you opened your 
 door last Wednesday midnight? " 
 
 Kate Sanders, singing softly, blithely, came tripping 
 along the major s deserted veranda, her fresh young voice, 
 glad, yet subdued, caroling the words of a dear old song 
 that Parepa had made loved and famous full ten years 
 
 before : 
 
 " And as he lingered by her side, 
 In spite of his comrade s warning 
 The old, old story was told again 
 At five o clock in the morning." 
 
 Then came sudden silence, as springing to the sandy 
 ground, the singer reached the Wrens veranda and saw 
 
AUNT JANET BRAVED 165 
 
 the dim form of Mr. Blakely, standing silently confront 
 ing a still dimmer form, faintly visible at the side window 
 against the soft, tempered light of the hanging lamp in 
 the hall. 
 
 " Who was the creature ? " I repeat, were the strange 
 words, in Miss Wren s most telling tone, that brought 
 Kate Sanders to a halt, startled, silent. 
 
 Then Blakely answered : " Some day I shall tell Miss 
 Angela, madam, but never you. Good-night." 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 
 A CALL FOR HELP 
 
 THAT night the wire across the mountains to 
 Prescott was long alive with news, and there 
 was little rest for operator, adjutant, or com 
 manding officer at Sandy. Colonel Byrne, it seems, had 
 lost telegraphic touch with his chief, who, quitting Camp 
 McDowell, had personally taken the field somewhere over 
 in the Tonto Basin beyond the Matitzal Range, and Byrne 
 had the cares of a continent on his hands. Three of the 
 five commands out in the field had had sharp encounters 
 with the foe. Official business itself was sufficiently en 
 grossing, but there were other matters assuming grave 
 proportions. Mrs. Plume had developed a feverish anx 
 iety to hie on to the Pacific and out of Arizona just at a 
 time when, as her husband had to tell her, it was impos 
 sible for him, and impolitic for her, to go. Matters at 
 Sandy, he explained, were in tangled shape. Mullins 
 partially restored, but still, as Plume assured her, utterly 
 out of his head, had declared that his assailants were 
 women; and other witnesses, Plume would not give 
 names, had positively asserted that Elise had been seen 
 along the sentry post just about the time the stabbing 
 occurred. Everything now, said he, must depend on Cap 
 tain Wren, who was known to have seen and spoken to 
 
A CALL FOR HELP 167 
 
 Elise, and who could probably testify that she returned to 
 their roof before the tragic affair of the night. But Wren 
 was now away up in the mountains beyond Snow Lake 
 and might be going far over through Sunset Pass to the 
 Colorado Chiquito. Meantime he, Plume, was respon 
 sible for Elise, in duty bound to keep her there to face 
 any accuser. In her nervous, semi-hysterical state the 
 wife could not well be told how much she, too, was in 
 volved. It was not necessary. She knew all Fort 
 Whipple, as Prescott s military post was called, knew all 
 about the fire that had destroyed the " beetle shop " and 
 Blakely s belongings. Elise, in wild excitement, had 
 rushed to her mistress with that news and the further in 
 formation that Downs was gone and could not be found. 
 This latter fact, indeed, they learned before Plume 
 ever heard of it and made no mention of it in his 
 presence. 
 
 " I shall have to run down to Sandy again," said Byrne, 
 to Plume. " Keep up your heart and watch that French 
 woman. The jade ! " And with the following day he was 
 bounding and bumping down the stony road that led 
 from the breezy, pine-crested heights about headquarters 
 to the sandy flats and desert rocks and ravines fifty miles 
 to the east and twenty-five hundred feet below. " Shall be 
 with you after dark," he wired Cutler, who was having a 
 bad quarter of an hour on his own account, and wishing 
 all Sandy to the devil. It had transpired that Strom s 
 rival ranchman, a little farther down the valley, was short 
 just one horse and set of horse equipments. He had made 
 
168 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 no complaint. He had accused nobody. He had never 
 failed in the past to appear at Sandy with charge of theft 
 and demand for damages at the expense of the soldiery 
 whenever he missed an item, big or little and sometimes 
 when he didn t miss a thing. But now he came not at all, 
 and Cutler jumped at the explanation: he had sold that 
 steed, and Downs, the deserter, was the purchaser. 
 Downs must have had money to aid in his escape. 
 Downs must have received it from someone eager to get 
 him out of the way. It might well be Elise, for who else 
 would trust him? and Downs must be striking for the 
 south, after wide detour. No use now to chase him. The 
 wire was the only thing with which to round him up, so 
 the stage stations on the Gila route, and the scattered 
 army posts, were all notified of the desertion, and Downs s 
 description, with all his imperfections, was flashed far 
 and wide over the Territory. He could no more hope to 
 escape than fly on the wings of night. He would be cut 
 off or run down long before he could reach Mexico ; that 
 is, he would be if only troopers got after him. The civil 
 list of Arizona in 1875 was of peculiar constitution. It 
 stood ready at any time to resolve itself into a modifica 
 tion of the old-day underground railways, and help spirit 
 off soldier criminals, first thoughtfully relieving them of 
 care and responsibility for any surplus funds in their 
 possession. 
 
 And with Downs gone one way, Wren s troop gone 
 another, and Blakely here clamoring to follow, Cutler was 
 mentally torn out of shape. He believed it his duty to 
 
A CALL FOR HELP 169 
 
 hold Blakely at least until the colonel came, and he lacked 
 the " sand " to tell him so. 
 
 From Wren not another word had been received direct, 
 but Bridger at the agency had sent word that the Indians 
 there were constantly in receipt of news from the hos- 
 tiles that filled them with excitement. Wren, at last ac 
 counts, had gone into the mountains south of Sunset Pass 
 toward Chevlon s Fork, and his trail was doubtless 
 watched to head off couriers or cut down stragglers. 
 Blakely s appeal to be allowed to follow and join his 
 troop had been declared foolish, and the attempt fool 
 hardy, by Captain Cutler. This and not the real reason 
 was given, coupled of course, with the doctor s dictum. 
 But even Graham had begun to think Blakely would be 
 the better for anything that would take him away from a 
 station where life had been one swift succession of ills and 
 mishaps. 
 
 And even Graham did not dream how sorely Blakely 
 had been hit. Nor could he account for the access of ner 
 vous irritability that possessed his patient all the livelong 
 day, while waiting, as they all were, for the coming of 
 Colonel Byrne. Mrs. Sanders declared to Mrs. Graham 
 her private impression that he was on the verge of pros 
 tration, although, making an effort, Blakely had appeared 
 at breakfast after an early morning walk, had been most 
 courteous, gentle, and attentive to her and to her whole 
 some, if not actually homely, Kate. How the mother s 
 heart yearned over that sweet-natured, sallow-faced child ! 
 But after breakfast Blakely had wandered off again and 
 
170 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 was out on the mesa, peering through a pair of borrowed 
 glasses over the dreary eastward landscape and up and 
 down the deep valley. " How oddly are we constituted ! " 
 said Mrs. Sanders. " If I only had his money, I d never 
 be wearing my heart out in this desert land." She was 
 not the only army wife and mother that should have mar 
 ried a stockbroker anything rather than a soldier. 
 
 The whole post knew by noon that Byrne was coming, 
 and waited with feverish impatience. Byrne was the 
 power that would put an end to the doubts and distrac 
 tions, decide who stabbed Pat Mullins, who set fire to the 
 " beetle shop," where Epsom Downs had gone, and could 
 even settle, possibly, the long-doubtful question, " Who 
 struck Billy Patterson ? " Sandy believed in Byrne as it 
 did in no one since the days of General Crook. With 
 two exceptions, all Sandy society was out on the parade, 
 the porticoes, or the northward bluff, as the sun went 
 down. These two were the Misses Wren. "Angela," 
 said Miss Janet, " is keeping her room to-day, and pre 
 tending to keep her temper " this to Kate Sanders, who 
 had twice sought admission, despite a girlish awe of, if 
 not aversion to, this same Aunt Janet. 
 
 " But don t you think she d like to see me just a little 
 while, Miss Wren? " the girl inquired, her hand caressing 
 the sleek head of one of the big hounds as she spoke. 
 Hounds were other objects of Miss Wren s disfavor. 
 " Lazy, pilfering brutes," she called them, when after 
 hours of almost incredible labor and ingenious effort they 
 had managed to tear down, and to pieces, a haunch of 
 
A CALL FOR HELP 171 
 
 venison she had slung to the rafters of the back porch. 
 " You can come in, Kate, provided you keep out the 
 dogs," was her ungracious answer, " and I ll go see. I 
 think she s sleeping now, and ought not to be disturbed." 
 
 " Then I won t disturb her," was Miss Sanders s 
 prompt reply, as she turned away and would have gone, 
 but the elder restrained her. Janet did not wish the girl 
 to go at all. She knew Angela had asked for her, and 
 doubtless longed to see her; and now, having adminis 
 tered her feline scratch and made Kate feel the weight of 
 her disapproval, she was quite ready to promote the very 
 interview she had verbally condemned. Perhaps Miss 
 Sanders saw and knew this and preferred to worry Miss 
 Wren as much as possible. At all events, only with re 
 luctance did she obey the summons to wait a minute, and 
 stood with a pout on her lips as the spinster vanished in 
 the gloom of the hallway. Angela could not have been 
 asleep, for her voice was audible in an instant. " Come 
 up, Kate," she feebly cried, just as Aunt Janet had begun 
 her little sermon, and the sermon had to stop, for Kate 
 Sanders came, and neither lass was in mood to listen to 
 pious exhortation. Moreover, they made it manifest to 
 Aunt Janet that there would be no interchange of confi 
 dences until she withdrew. " You are not to talk your 
 selves into a pitch of excitement," said she. "Angela 
 must sleep to-night to make up for the hours she lost 
 thanks to the abominable remarks of that hardened young 
 man." With that, after a pull at the curtain, a soothing 
 thump or two at Angela s pillow, and the muttered wish 
 
172 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 that the coming colonel were empowered to arrest recal 
 citrant nieces as well as insubordinate subs, she left them 
 to their own devices. They were still in eager, almost 
 breathless chat when the crack of whip and sputter of 
 hoofs and wheels through gravelly sands told that the in 
 spector s ambulance had come. Was it likely that Angela 
 could sleep until she heard the probable result of the in 
 spector s coming? 
 
 He was closeted first with Cutler. Then Dr. Graham 
 was sent for, and the three walked over to the hospital, 
 just as the musicians were forming for tattoo. They 
 were at Mullins s bedside, with the steward and attend 
 ants outside, when taps went wailing out upon the night. 
 There were five minutes of talk with that still bewildered 
 patient. Then Byrne desired to see Mr. Blakely at once 
 and alone. Cutler surrendered his office to the depart 
 ment inspector, and thither the lieutenant was summoned. 
 Mrs. Sanders, with Mrs. Truman, was keeping little Mrs. 
 Bridger company at the moment, and Blakely bowed 
 courteously to the three in passing by. 
 
 " Even in that rough dress," said Mrs. Sanders reflec 
 tively, as her eyes followed the tall, straight figure over 
 the moonlit parade, " he is a most distinguished looking 
 man." 
 
 " Yes," said Mrs. Bridger, still unappeased. " If he 
 were a Sioux, I suppose they d call him Man-In- 
 Love-With-His-Legs. " Blakely heard the bubble of 
 laughter that followed him on his way, and wished that 
 he, too, felt in mood as merry. The acting sergeant 
 
A CALL FOR HELP 173 
 
 major, a clerk, and young Cassidy, the soldier telegraph 
 operator, seated at the westward end of the rough board 
 porch of the adjutant s office, arose and saluted as he en 
 tered. Byrne had sent every possible hearer out of the 
 building. 
 
 Five minutes the conference lasted, no sound coming 
 from within. Cutler and Graham, with Captain Wester- 
 velt, sat waiting on the porch of the doctor s quarters, 
 Mrs. Graham being busy with her progeny aloft. Others 
 of the officers and families were also on the piazzas, or 
 strolling slowly up and down the pathway, but all eyes 
 wandered from time to time toward the dim light at the 
 office. All was dark at the barracks. All was hushed 
 and still about the post. The sentry call for half-past 
 ten was still some minutes distant, when one of the 
 three seated figures at the end of the office porch was 
 seen to rise. Then the other two started to their feet. 
 The first hastened to the door and began to knock. So 
 breathless was the night that over on the verandas the im 
 perative thumping could be distinctly heard, and every 
 one ceased talk and listened. Then, in answer to some 
 query from within, the voice of young Cassidy was up 
 lifted. 
 
 " I beg pardon, sir, but that s the agency calling me, 
 and it s hurry." 
 
 They saw the door open from, within ; saw the soldier 
 admitted and the door closed after him ; saw the two men 
 waiting standing and expectant, no longer content to re 
 sume their chat. For three minutes of suspense there 
 
174 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 came no further sound. Then the door was again thrown 
 open, and both Byrne and Blakely came hurrying out. 
 In the memory of the earliest inhabitant never had Sandy 
 seen the colonel walk so fast. Together they came strid 
 ing straight toward Cutler s, and the captain arose and 
 went to meet them, foreboding in his soul. Graham and 
 Westervelt, restrained by discipline, held back. The 
 women and younger officers, hushed by anxiety, gazed at 
 the swift-coming pair in dread and fascination. There 
 was a moment of muttered conference with the command 
 ing officer, some hurried words, then Blakely was seen 
 to spring away, to be recalled by Cutler, to start a second 
 time, only to be again recalled. Then Cutler, shouting, 
 " Mr. Doty, I need you ! " hurried away toward the office, 
 and Blakely, fairly running, sped straight for the barracks 
 of Wren s troop. Only Byrne was left to answer the 
 storm of question that burst upon him all at once, women 
 thronging about him from all along the line. 
 
 " We have news from the agency," said he. " It is 
 from Indian runners, and may not be reliable some ru 
 mor of a sharp fight near Sunset Pass." 
 
 "Are there particulars, colonel anybody killed or 
 wounded ? " It was Mrs. Sanders who spoke, her face 
 very pale. 
 
 " We cannot know as yet. It is all an Indian story. 
 Mr. Blakely is going at once to investigate," was the 
 guarded answer. But Mrs. Sanders knew, as well as a 
 dozen others, that there were particulars that somebody 
 had been killed or wounded, for Indian stories to that 
 
A CALL FOR HELP 175 
 
 effect had been found singularly reliable. It was Wren s 
 troop that had gone to Sunset Pass, and here was Wren s 
 sister with question in her eye, and at sight of her the 
 colonel turned and hurried back to headquarters, follow 
 ing the post commander. 
 
 Another moment and Blakely, in the broad light stream 
 ing suddenly from the office room of Wren s troop, came 
 speeding straight across the parade again in the direction 
 of Sanders s quarters, next to the last at the southward 
 end of the row. They sought, of course, to intercept 
 him, and saw that his face was pale, though his manner 
 was as composed as ever. To every question he had but 
 one thing to say : " Colonel Byrne and the captain know 
 all that I do and more. Ask them." But this he said 
 with obvious wish to be questioned no further, said it 
 gently, but most firmly, and then, with scant apology, 
 passed on. Five minutes more and Nixon was lugging 
 out the lieutenant s field kit on the Sanders s porch, and 
 Blakely, reappearing, went straight up the row to Wren s. 
 It was now after 10.30, but he never hesitated. Miss 
 Janet, watching him from the midst of her friends, saw 
 him stride, unhesitatingly, straight to the door and 
 knock. She followed instantly, but, before she could 
 reach the steps, Kate Sanders, with wonder in her eyes, 
 stood faltering before him. 
 
 " Will you say to Miss Angela that I have come as I 
 promised? I am going at once to join the troop. Can 
 I see her? "he asked. 
 
 " She isn t well, Mr. Blakely. She hasn t left her room 
 
176 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 to-day." And Miss Sanders began herself to tremble, 
 for up the steps came the resolute lady of the house, whom 
 seeing, Mr. Blakely honored with a civil bow, but with 
 not a word. 
 
 " I will hear your message, Mr. Blakely," said Miss 
 Wren, pallid, too, and filled with wordless anxiety, but 
 determined none the less. 
 
 " Miss Sanders has heard it, madam," was the uncom 
 promising answer. " Will you see Miss Angela, 
 please ? " This again to Kate and, without another 
 word, she went. 
 
 " Mr. Blakely," began the lady impressively, " almost 
 the last thing my brother said to me before leaving the 
 post was that he wished no meetings between you and 
 Angela. Why do you pursue her ? Do you wish to com 
 pel me to take her away ? " 
 
 For a moment he was silent. Then, " It is I who must 
 go, Miss Wren," was the answer, and she, who expected 
 resentment, looked at him in surprise, so gentle, so sor 
 rowing was his tone. " I had hoped to bear her mes 
 sage, but shall intrude no more. If the news that came 
 to-night should be confirmed and only in that event 
 say to her, if you please, that I shall do my best to find 
 her father." 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 
 A RETURN TO COMMAND 
 
 WITH but a single orderly at his back, Mr. 
 Blakely had left Camp Sandy late at night; 
 had reached the agency, twenty miles up 
 stream, two hours before the dawn and found young 
 Bridger waiting for him. They had not even a reliable 
 interpreter now. Arahawa, " Washington Charley," had 
 been sent to the general at Camp McDowell. Lola s 
 father, with others of her kin, had taken Apache leave 
 and gone in search of the missing girl. But between the 
 sign language and the patois of the mountains, a strange 
 mixture of Spanish, English, and Tonto Apache, the of 
 ficers had managed, with the aid of their men, to gather 
 explanation of the fierce excitement prevailing all that 
 previous day among the Indians at the agency. There 
 had been another fight, a chase, a scattering of both pur 
 suers and pursued. Most of the troops were at last ac 
 counts camping in the rocks near Sunset Pass. Two had 
 been killed, several were wounded, three were missing, 
 lost to everybody. Even the Apaches swore they knew 
 not where they were a sergeant, a trumpeter, and " Gran 
 Capitan " himself Captain Wren. 
 
 In the paling starlight of the coming day Blakely and 
 Bridger plied the reluctant Indians with questions in 
 
 177 
 
178 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 every form possible with their limited knowledge of the 
 sign language. Blakely, having spent so many years on 
 staff duty, had too little knowledge of practical service in 
 the field. Bridger was but a beginner at best. Together 
 they had decided on their course. A wire was sent to 
 Sandy saying that from all they could gather the rumors 
 were probably true, but urging that couriers be sent for 
 Dick, the Cherry Creek settler, and Wales Arnold, an 
 other pioneer who had lived long in Apache land and 
 owned a ranch on the little Beaver. They could get more 
 out of the Indians than could these soldiers. It would be 
 hours after dawn before either Dick or his fellow fron 
 tiersman could arrive. Meanwhile Sandy must bear the 
 suspense as well as it might. The next wire came from 
 Bridger at nine o clock : 
 
 Arnold arrived hour ago. Examined six. Says stories prob 
 ably true. Confident Wren not killed. 
 
 For answer Byrne wired that a detachment of a dozen 
 men with three packers had marched at five o clock to re 
 port to Blakely for such duty as he might require, and 
 the answer came within the minute : 
 
 Blakely gone. Started for Snow Lake 4.30. Left orders de 
 tachment follow. Took orderly and two Apache Yuma scouts. 
 
 Byrne, Cutler, and Graham read with grave and anx 
 ious faces, but said very little. It was Blakely s way. 
 
 And that was the last heard of the Bugologist for as 
 much as a week. 
 
 Meantime there was a painful situation at Fort Whip- 
 
A RETURN TO COMMAND 179 
 
 pie, away up in " the hills." Major Plume, eager on his 
 wife s account to get her to the seashore " Monterey or 
 Santa Barbara," said the sapient medical director and 
 ceaselessly importuned by her and viciously nagged by 
 Elise, found himself bound to the spot. So long as Mul- 
 lins stuck to his story Plume knew it would never do for 
 him to leave. "A day or two more and he may abate or 
 amend his statement," wrote Graham. Indeed, if Norah 
 Shaughnessy were not there to prompt to prop his 
 memory, Graham thought it like enough that even now 
 the soldier would have wavered. But never a jot or tittle 
 had Mullins been shaken from the original statement. 
 
 " There was two women," he said, " wid their shawls 
 over their heads," and those two, refusing to halt at his 
 demand, had been overtaken and one of them seized, to 
 his bitter cost, for the other had driven a keen-bladed 
 knife through his ribs, even as he sought to examine his; 
 captive. " They wouldn t spake," said he, " so what 
 could I do but pull the shawl from the face of her to see 
 could she be recognized ? " Then came the fierce, cat 
 like spring of the taller of the two. Then the well-nigh 
 fatal thrust. What afterwards became of the women he 
 could say no more than the dead. Norah might rave 
 about its being the Frenchwoman that did it to protect 
 the major s lady this he spoke in whispered confidence 
 and only in reply to direct question but it wouldn t be 
 for the likes of him to preshume. Mullins, it seems, was 
 a soldier of the old school. 
 
 Then came fresh and dire anxiety at Sandy. Four 
 
180 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 days after Blakely s start there appeared two swarthy run 
 ners from the way of Beaver Creek. They bore a mis 
 sive scrawled on the paper lining of a cracker box, and 
 it read about as follows : 
 
 CAMP IN SUNSET PASS, November 3d. 
 COMMANDING OFFICER, CAMP SANDY : 
 
 Scouting parties returning find no trace of Captain Wren and 
 Sergeant Carmody, but we shall persevere. Indians lurking all 
 about us make it difficult. Shall be needing rations in four 
 days. All wounded except Flynn doing fairly well. Hope 
 couriers sent you on soth and 3ist reached you safely. 
 
 The dispatch was in the handwriting of Benson, a 
 trooper of good education, often detailed for clerical 
 work. It was signed " Brewster, Sergeant." 
 
 Who then were the couriers, and what had become of 
 them ? What fate had attended Blakely in his lonely and 
 perilous ride? What man or pair of men could pierce 
 that cordon of Indians lurking all around them and reach 
 the beleaguered command? What need to speculate on 
 the fate of the earlier couriers anyway? Only Indians 
 could hope to outwit Indians in such a case. It was 
 madness to expect white men to get through. It was 
 madness for Blakely to attempt it. Yet Blakely was 
 gone beyond recall, perhaps beyond redemption. From 
 him, and from the detachment that was sent by Bridger 
 to follow his trail, not a word had come of any kind. 
 Asked if they had seen or heard anything of such parties, 
 the Indian couriers stolidly shook their heads. They had 
 followed the old Wingate road all the way until in sight 
 of the valley. Then, scrambling through a rocky laby- 
 
A RETURN TO COMMAND 181 
 
 rinth, impossible for hoof or wheel, had made a short cut 
 to the head waters of the Beaver. Now Blakely, riding 
 from the agency eastward slowly, should have found that 
 Wingate trail before the setting of the first day s sun, and 
 his followers could not have been far behind. It began 
 to look as though the Bugologist had never reached the 
 road. It began to be whispered about the post that Wren 
 and his luckless companions might never be found at all. 
 Kate Sanders had ceased her song. She was now with 
 Angela day and night. 
 
 One hope, a vague one, remained beside that of hearing 
 from the baker s dozen that rode on Blakely s trail. Just 
 as soon as Byrne received the Indian story concerning 
 Wren s disappearance, he sent runners eastward on the 
 track of Sanders s troop, with written advice to that of 
 ficer to drop anything he might be doing along the Black 
 Mesa and, turning northward, to make his way through 
 a country hitherto untrod by white man, between Baker s 
 Butte at the south and the Sunset Mountains at the north. 
 He was ordered to scout the canon of Chevlon s Fork, 
 and to look for sign on every side until, somewhere among 
 the " tanks " in the solid rock about the mountain gate 
 way known as Sunset Pass, he should join hands with the 
 survivors of Webb s troop, nursing their wounded and 
 guarding the new-made graves of their dead. Under 
 such energetic supervision as that of Captain Sanders it 
 was believed that even Apache Yuma scouts could be 
 made to accomplish something, and that new heart would 
 be given Wren s dispirited men. By this time, too, if 
 
182 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 Blakely had not fallen into the hands of the Apaches, he 
 should have been joined by the intended escort, and, thus 
 strengthened, could either push on to the pass, or, if sur 
 rounded, take up some strong position among the rocks 
 and stand off his assailants until found by his fellow-sol 
 diers under Sanders. Moreover, Byrne had caused re 
 port of the situation to be sent to the general via Camp 
 McDowell, and felt sure he would lose no time in direct 
 ing the scouting columns to head for the Sunset country. 
 Scattered as were the hostile Apaches, it was apparent 
 that they were in greater force northward, opposite the 
 old reservation, than along the Mogollon Range southeast 
 of it. There was hope, activity, animation, among the 
 little camps and garrisons toward the broad valley of the 
 Gila as the early days of November wore away. Only 
 here at Sandy was there suspense as well as deep despond. 
 It was a starlit Sunday morning that Blakely rode 
 away eastward from the agency. It was Wednesday 
 night when Sergeant Brewster s runners came, and never 
 a wink of sleep had they or their inquisitors until Thurs 
 day was ushered in. It was Saturday night again, a 
 week from the night Neil Blakely strove to see and say 
 good-by to Angela Wren. It was high time other run 
 ners came from Brewster, unless they, too, had been cut 
 off, as must have been the fate of their forerunners. All 
 drills had been suspended at Sandy; all duty subordi 
 nated to guard. Cutler had practically abolished the 
 daily details, had doubled his sentries, had established out 
 lying pickets, and was even bent on throwing up intrench- 
 
A RETURN TO COMMAND 183 
 
 ments or at least digging rifle pits, lest the Apaches should 
 feel so " cocky " over their temporary successes as to 
 essay an attack on the post. Byrne smiled and said they 
 would hardly try that, but he approved the pickets. It 
 was noted that for nearly a week, not since Blakely s 
 start from the agency, no signal fires had been seen in 
 the Red Rock country or about the reservation. Mr. 
 Truman, acting as post quartermaster, had asked for ad 
 ditional men to protect his little herd, for the sergeant in 
 charge declared that, twice, long-distance shots had come 
 from far away up the bouldered heights to the west. The 
 daily mail service had been abandoned, so nervous had 
 the carrier become, and now, twice each week, a corporal 
 and two men rode the rugged trail, thus far without see 
 ing a sign of Apaches. The wire, too, was undisturbed, 
 but an atmosphere of alarm and dread clung about the 
 scattered ranches even as far as the Agua Fria to the 
 west, and the few officials left at Prescott found it impos 
 sible to reassure the settlers, who, quitting their new 
 homes, had either clustered about some favored ranch for 
 general defense or, " packing " to Fort Whipple, were 
 clamoring there for protection with which to return to and 
 occupy their abandoned roofs. 
 
 And all this, said Byrne, between his set teeth, because 
 a bumptious agent sought to lay forceful hands upon the 
 daughter of a chief. Poor Daly! He had paid dearly 
 for that essay. As for Natzie, and her shadow Lola, 
 neither one had been again seen. They might indeed 
 have dropped tack from Montezuma Well after the first 
 
184 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 wild stampede, but only fruitless search had the soldiers 
 made for them. Even their own people, said Bridger, at 
 the agency, were either the biggest liars that ever lived 
 or the poorest trailers. The Apaches swore the girls 
 could not be found. " I ll bet Sergeant Shannon could 
 nail them," said Hart, the trader, when told of the general 
 denial among the Indians. But Shannon was far away 
 from the field column, leading his moccasined comrades 
 afoot and in single file long, wearisome climbs up jagged 
 cliffs or through deep canons, where unquestionably the 
 foe had been in numbers but the day before, yet now they 
 were gone. Shannon might well be needed at the far 
 front, now that most of the Apache scouts had proved 
 timid or worthless, but Byrne wished he had him closer 
 home. 
 
 It was the Saturday night following the coming of the 
 runners with confirmation of the grewsome Indian stories. 
 Colonel Byrne, with Graham, Cutler, and Westervelt, had 
 been at the office half an hour in consultation when, to 
 the surprise of every soul at Sandy, a four-mule team and 
 Concord wagon came bowling briskly into the post, and 
 Major Plume, dust-covered and grave, marched into the 
 midst of the conference and briefly said : " Gentlemen, I 
 return to resume command." 
 
 Nobody had a word to say beyond that of welcome. It 
 was manifestly the proper thing for him to do. Unable, 
 in face of the stories afloat, to take his wife away, his 
 proper place in the pressing emergency was at his post in 
 command, 
 
A RETURN TO COMMAND 185 
 
 To Colonel Byrne, who guardedly and somewhat 
 dubiously asked, " How about Mrs. Plume and that 
 French thing? " the major s answer was prompt: 
 
 " Both at Fort Whipple and in good hands," said he. 
 " My wife realizes that my duty is here, and, though her 
 recovery may be retarded, she declares she will remain 
 there or even join me. She, in fact, was so insistent that 
 I should bring her back with me that it embarrassed me 
 somewhat. I vetoed it, however." 
 
 Byrne gazed at him from under his shaggy eyebrows. 
 " H m," said he, " I fancied she had shaken the dust of 
 Sandy from her shoes for good and all that she hoped 
 never to come back." 
 
 " I, too," answered Plume ingenuously. " She hated 
 the very mention of it, this is between ourselves, until 
 this week. Now she says her place is here with me, no 
 matter how she may suffer," and the major seemed to 
 dwell with pride on this new evidence of his wife s devo 
 tion. It was, indeed, an unusual symptom, and Byrne 
 had to try hard to look credulous, which Plume appre 
 ciated and hurried on: 
 
 " Elise, of course, seemed bent on talking her out of it, 
 but, with Wren and Blakely both missing, I could not 
 hesitate. I had to come. Oh, captain, is Truman still 
 acting quartermaster?" this to Cutler. "He has the 
 keys of my house, I suppose." 
 
 And so by tattoo the major was once more harbored 
 under his old roof and full of business. From Byrne and 
 his associates he quickly gathered all particulars in their 
 
186 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 possession. He agreed with them that another day must 
 bring tidings from the east or prove that the Apaches had 
 surrounded and perhaps cut down every man of the com 
 mand. He listened eagerly to the details Byrne and 
 others were able to give him. He believed, by the time 
 " taps " came, he had already settled on a plan for another 
 relief column, and he sent for Truman, the quarter 
 master. 
 
 " Truman," said he, " how much of a pack train have 
 you got left?" 
 
 " Hardly a mule, sir. Two expeditions out from this 
 post swallows up pretty much everything." 
 
 " Very true ; yet I may have to find a dozen packs be 
 fore we get half through this business. The ammunition 
 is in your hands, too, isn t it ? Where do you keep it ? " 
 and the major turned and gazed out in the starlight. 
 
 " Only place I got, sir quartermaster s storehouse," 
 and Truman eyed his commander doubtfully. 
 
 " Well, I m squeamish about such things as that," said 
 the major, looking even graver, " especially since this fire 
 here. By the way, was much of Blakely s property er 
 rescued or recovered ? " 
 
 " Very little, sir. Blakely lost pretty much everything, 
 except some papers in an iron box the box that was 
 warped all out of shape." 
 
 " Where is it now ? " asked Plume, tugging at the strap 
 of a dressing case and laying it open on the broad win 
 dow-seat. 
 
 " In my quarters, under my bed, sir," 
 
A RETURN TO COMMAND 187 
 
 "Isn t that rather unsafe?" asked Plume. "Think 
 how quick he was burned out." 
 
 " Best I can do, sir. But he said it contained little of 
 value, mainly letters and memoranda. No valuables at 
 all, in fact. The lock wouldn t work, so the blacksmith 
 strap-ironed it for him. That prevents it being opened 
 by anyone, you know, who hasn t the proper tools." 
 
 " I see," said Plume reflectively. " It seems rather 
 unusual to take such precaution with things of no value. 
 I suppose Blakely knows his own business, however. 
 Thank you very much Truman. Good-night." 
 
 " I suppose he did, at least, when he had the black 
 smith iron that box," thought Truman, as he trudged 
 away. " He did, at any rate, when he made me promise 
 to keep it with the utmost care. Not even you can have 
 it, Major Plume, although you are the post commander." 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 
 A STRANGE COMING 
 
 WITH one orderly and a pair of Apache Yuma 
 scouts, Neil Blakely had set forth in hopes of 
 making his way to Snow Lake, far up in the 
 range to the east. The orderly was all very well, like 
 most of his fellows, game, true, and tried, but few were 
 the leaders who had any faith in Apache Yumas. Of 
 those Indians whom General Crook had successively con 
 quered, then turned to valuable use, the Hualpais had 
 done well and proved reliable; the Apache Mohaves had 
 served since 73, and in scout after scout and many a 
 skirmish had proved loyal and worthy allies against the 
 fierce, intractable Tontos, many of whom had never yet 
 come in to an agency or accepted the bounty of the gov 
 ernment. Even a certain few of these Tontos had prof 
 fered fealty and been made useful as runners and trailers 
 against the recalcitrants of their own band. But the 
 Apache Yumas, their mountain blood tainted by the cross 
 with the slothful bands of the arid, desert flats of the 
 lower Colorado, had won a bad name from the start, and 
 deserved it. They feared the Tontos, who had thrashed 
 them again and again, despoiled them of their plunder, 
 walked away with their young women, insulted and 
 jeered at their young men. Except when backed by the 
 
 188 
 
A STRANGE COMING 189 
 
 braves of other bands, therefore, the Apache Yumas were 
 fearful and timorous on the trail. Once they had broken 
 and run before a mere handful of Tontos, leaving a 
 wounded officer to his fate. Once, when scaling the 
 Black Mesa toward this very Snow Lake, they had 
 whimpered and begged to be sent home, declaring no 
 enemy was there in hiding, when the peaks were found 
 alive with Tontos. The Red Rock country and the north 
 ward spurs of the Mogollon seemed fraught with some 
 strange, superstitious terror in their eyes, and if the 
 " nerve " of a dozen would desert them when ordered 
 east of the Verde, what could be expected of Blakely s 
 two? No wonder, then, the elders at Sandy were sorely 
 troubled ! 
 
 But the Bugologist had nothing else to choose from. 
 All the reliable, seasoned scouts were already gone with 
 the various field columns. Only Apache Yumas re 
 mained, and only the least promising of the Apache Yu 
 mas at that. Bridger remembered how reluctantly these 
 two had obeyed the summons to go. " If they don t 
 sneak away and come back swearing they have lost the 
 lieutenant, I m a gopher," said he, and gave orders ac 
 cordingly to have them hauled before him should they 
 reappear. Confidently he looked to see or hear of them 
 as again lurking about the commissary storehouse after 
 the manner of their people, beggars to the backbone. 
 But the week went by without a sign of them. " There s 
 only one thing to explain that," said he. " They ve either 
 deserted to the enemy or been cut off and killed." What, 
 
190 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 then, had become of Blakely? What fate had befallen 
 Wren? 
 
 By this time, late Saturday night, acting for the de 
 partment commander now lost somewhere in the moun 
 tains, Byrne had re-enforced the guards at the agency and 
 the garrison at Sandy with infantry drawn from Fort 
 Whipple at Prescott, for thither the Apaches would never 
 venture. The untrammeled and sovereign citizen had his 
 own way of treating the obnoxious native to the soil. 
 
 By this time, too, further word should have come from 
 some of the field columns, Sanders s especially. But 
 though runners had reached the post bearing brief dis 
 patches from the general, showing that he and the troops 
 from the more southerly posts were closing in on the wild 
 haunts of the Tontos about Chevlon s Fork, not a sign 
 had come from this energetic troop commander, not an 
 other line from Sergeant Brewster or his men, and there 
 were women at Camp Sandy now nearly mad with sleep 
 less dread and watching. " It means," said Byrne, " that the 
 hostiles are between us and those commands. It means 
 that couriers can t get through, that s all. I m betting 
 the commands are safe enough. They are too strong to 
 be attacked." But Byrne was silent as to Blakely; he 
 was dumb as to Wren. He was growing haggard with 
 anxiety and care and inability to assure or comfort. 
 The belated rations needed by Brewster s party, packed 
 on mules hurried down from Prescott, were to start at 
 dawn for Sunset Pass under stout infantry guard, and 
 they, too, would probably be swallowed up in the moun- 
 
A STRANGE COMING 191 
 
 tains. The ranch people down the valley, fearful of raid 
 ing Apaches, had abandoned their homes, and, driving 
 their stock before them, had taken refuge in the emptied 
 corrals of the cavalry. Even Hart, the veteran trader, 
 seemed losing his nerve under the strain, for when such 
 intrepid frontiersmen as Wales Arnold declared it reck 
 less to venture across the Sandy, and little scouting par 
 ties were greeted with long-range shots from hidden foe, 
 it boded ill for all dwellers without the walls of the fort. 
 For the first time in the annals of Camp Sandy, Hart had 
 sandbagged his lower story, and he and his retainers 
 practically slept upon their arms. 
 
 It was after midnight. Lights still burned dimly at the 
 guard-house, the adjutant s office, and over at the quar 
 ters of the commanding officer, where Byrne and Plume 
 were in consultation. There were sleepless eyes in every 
 house along the line. Truman had not turned in at all. 
 Pondering over his brief talk with the returned com 
 mander, he had gone to the storehouse to expedite the 
 packing of Brewster s rations, and then it occurred to 
 him to drop in a moment at the hospital. In all the dread 
 and excitement of the past two days, Pat Mullins had 
 been well-nigh forgotten. The attendant greeted him 
 at the entrance. Truman, as he approached, could see 
 him standing at the broad open doorway, apparently star 
 ing out through the starlight toward the black and dis 
 tant outlines of the eastward mountains. Mullins at 
 least was sleeping and seemed rapidly recovering, said he, 
 in answer to Truman s muttered query. " Major Plume," 
 
192 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 he added, " was over to see him a while ago, but I told 
 the major Pat was asleep." Truman listened without 
 comment, but noted none the less and lingered. " You 
 were looking out to the east," he said. " Seen any lights 
 or fire?" 
 
 tl Not I, sir. But the sentry there on No. 4 had the 
 corporal out just now. He s seen or heard something, 
 and they ve moved over toward No. 5 s post." 
 
 Truman followed. How happened it that when Byrne 
 and Plume had so much to talk of the latter could find 
 time to come away over to the hospital to inquire for a 
 patient? And there! the call for half-past twelve had 
 started at the guard-house and rung out from the stables 
 and corrals. It was Four s turn to take it up now. 
 Presently he did, but neither promptly nor with confi 
 dence. There were new men on the relief just down 
 from Fort Whipple and strange to Sandy and its sur 
 roundings ; but surely, said Truman, they should not have 
 been assigned to Four and Five, the exposed or danger 
 ous posts, so long as there were other men, old-timers at 
 Sandy, to take these stations. No. 4 s " A-all s well" 
 sounded more like a wail of remonstrance at his loneliness 
 and isolation. It was a new voice, too, for in those days 
 officers knew not only the face, but the voice, of every man 
 in the little command, and could Truman be mistaken 
 he thought he heard a subdued titter from the black 
 shadows of his own quarters, and turned his course 
 thither to investigate. Five s shout went up at the in 
 stant, loud, confident, almost boastful, as though in re- 
 
A STRANGE COMING 193 
 
 buke of Four s timidity, and, as Truman half expected, 
 there was the corporal of the guard leaning on his rifle, 
 close to the veranda steps, and so absorbed he never heard 
 the officer approach until the lieutenant sharply hailed : 
 
 " Who s that on No. 4?" 
 
 " One of C Company s fellers, sir," answered the 
 watcher, coming to his senses and attention at the instant. 
 " Just down from Prescott, and thinks he sees ghosts or 
 Indians every minute. Nearly shot one of the hounds a 
 moment ago." 
 
 " You shouldn t put him on that post " 
 
 " I didn t sir," was the prompt rejoinder. " Twas the 
 sergeant. He said twould do him good, but the man s 
 really scared, lieutenant. Thought I d better stay near 
 him a bit." 
 
 Across the black and desolate ruin of Blakely s quar 
 ters, and well out on the northward mesa, they could 
 dimly discern the form of the unhappy sentry pacing un 
 easily along his lonely beat, pausing and turning every 
 moment as though fearful of crouching assailant. Even 
 among these veteran infantrymen left at Sandy, that north 
 east corner had had an uncanny name ever since the night 
 of Pat Mullins s mysterious stabbing. Many a man 
 would gladly have shunned sentry duty at that point, 
 but none dare confess to it. Partly as a precaution, partly 
 as protection to his sentries, the temporary commander 
 had early in the week sent out a big " fatigue " detail, 
 with knives and hatchets to slice away every clump of 
 sage or greasewood that could shelter a prowling Apache 
 
194 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 for a hundred yards out from the line. But the man now 
 on No. 4 was palpably nervous and distressed, in spite of 
 this fact. Truman watched him a moment in mingled 
 compassion and amusement, and was just turning aside 
 to enter his open doorway when the corporal held up a 
 warning hand. 
 
 Through the muffling sand of the roadway in rear of 
 the quarters, a tall, dark figure was moving straight and 
 swift toward the post of No. 4, and so far within that of 
 No. 5 as to escape the latter s challenge. The corporal 
 sprung his rifle to the hollow of his arm and started the 
 next instant, sped noiselessly a few yards in pursuit, then 
 abruptly halted. " It s the major, sir," said he, embar 
 rassed, as Truman joined him again. " Gad, I hope No. 
 4 won t fire ! " 
 
 Fire he did not, but his challenge came with a yell. 
 " W-whocomesthere ? " three words as one and that 
 through chattering teeth. 
 
 " Commanding officer," they heard Plume clearly an 
 swer, then in lower tone, but distinctly rebukeful. 
 " What on earth s the matter, No. 4? You called off very 
 badly. Anything disturbing you out here ? " 
 
 The sentry s answer was a mumble of mingled confu 
 sion and distress. How could he own to his post com 
 mander that he was scared? No. 5 now was to be seen 
 swiftly coming up the eastward front so as to be within 
 supporting or hearing distance curiosity, not sympathy, 
 impelling ; and so there were no less than five men, four of 
 them old and tried soldiers, all within fifty yards of the 
 
A STRANGE COMING 195 
 
 angle made by the two sentry beats, all wide awake, yet 
 not one of their number could later tell just what started 
 it. All on a sudden, down in Sudsville, down among the 
 southward quarters of the line, the hounds went rushing 
 forth, barking and baying excitedly, one and all heading 
 for the brink of the eastward mesa, yet halting short as 
 though afraid to approach it nearer, and then, darting up 
 and down, barking, sniffing, challenging angrily, they 
 kept up their fierce alarm. Somebody or something was 
 out there in the darkness, perhaps at the very edge of the 
 bluff, and the dogs dare go no further. Even when the 
 corporal, followed by No. 5, came running down the post, 
 the hounds hung back, bristling and savage, yet fearful. 
 Corporal Foote cocked his rifle and went crouching for 
 ward through the gloom, but the voice of the major was 
 heard : 
 
 " Don t go out there, corporal. Call for the guard," 
 as he hurried in to his quarters in search of his revolver. 
 Truman by this time had run for his own arms and to 
 gether they reappeared on the post of No. 5, as a ser 
 geant, with half a doze,n men, came panting from across 
 the parade, swift running to the scene. 
 
 " No. 4 would have it that there were Indians, or some 
 body skulking about him when I was examining him a 
 moment ago," said Plume hurriedly. " Shut up, you 
 brutes ! " he yelled angrily at the nearest hounds. 
 " Scatter your men forward there, sergeant, and see if 
 we can find anything." Other men were coming, too, by 
 this time, and a lantern was dancing out from Doty s quar- 
 
196 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 ters. Byrne, pyjama-clad and in slippered feet, shuffled 
 out to join the party as the guard, with rifles at ready, 
 bored their way out to the front, the dogs still suspiciously 
 sniffing and growling. For a moment or two no expla 
 nation offered. The noise was gradually quieting down. 
 Then from far out to the right front rose the shout: 
 " Come here with that lantern ! " and all hands started at 
 the sound. 
 
 Old Shaughnessy, saddler sergeant, was the first on the 
 spot with a light. All Sudsville seemed up and astir. 
 Some of the women, even, had begun to show at the nar 
 row doorways. Corporal Foote and two of the guard 
 were bending over some object huddled in the sand. To 
 gether they turned it over and tugged it into semblance 
 of human shape, for the thing had been shrouded in what 
 proved to be a ragged cavalry blanket. Senseless, yet 
 feebly breathing and moaning, half-clad in tattered skirt 
 and a coarsely made tamisa such as was worn by peon 
 women of the humblest class, with blood-stained ban 
 dages concealing much of the face and head, a young In 
 dian woman was lifted toward the light. A soldier 
 started on the run for Dr. Graham ; another to the laun 
 dresses homes for water. Others, still, with the lanterns 
 now coming flitting down the low bluff, began searching 
 through the sands for further sign, and found it within 
 the minute sign of a shod horse and of moccasined 
 feet, moccasins not of Tonto, but of Yuma make, said 
 Byrne, after a moment s survey. 
 
 Rough, yet tender, hands bore the poor creature to the 
 
A STRANGE COMING 197 
 
 nearest shelter Shaughnessy s quarters. Keen, eager 
 eyes and bending forms followed hoof and foot prints to 
 the ford. Two Indians, evidently, had lately issued, 
 dripping, from the stream; one leading an eager horse, 
 for it had been dancing sidewise as they neared the post, 
 the other, probably sustaining the helpless burden on its 
 back. Two Indians had then re-entered the swift waters, 
 almost at the point of emergence, one leading a reluctant, 
 resisting animal, for it had struggled and plunged and set 
 its fore feet against the effort. The other Indian had 
 probably mounted as they neared the brink. Already 
 they must be a good distance away on the other side, ren 
 dering pursuit probably useless. Already the explana 
 tion of their coming was apparent. The woman had been 
 hurt or wounded when far from her tribe, and the In 
 dians with her were those who had learned the white 
 man s ways, knew that he warred not on women and 
 would give this stricken creature care and comfort, food 
 and raiment and relieve them of all such trouble. It was 
 easy to account for their bringing her to Sandy and drop 
 ping her at the white man s door, but how came they by 
 a shod horse that knew the spot and strove to break from 
 them at the stables strove hard against again being 
 driven away? Mrs. Shaughnessy, volubly haranguing 
 all within hearing as the searchers returned from the ford, 
 was telling how she was lying awake, worrin about 
 Norah and Pat Mullins and the boys that had gone afield 
 (owing her six weeks wash) when she heard a dull 
 trampin like and what sounded like horses stifled squeal 
 
198 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 (doubtless the leading Indian had gripped the nostrils 
 to prevent the eager neigh), and then, said she, all the 
 dogs roused up and rushed out, howling. 
 
 And then came a cry from within the humble doorway, 
 where merciful hands were ministering to the suffering 
 savage, and Plume started at the sound and glared at 
 Byrne, and men stood hushed and startled and amazed, 
 for the voice was that of Norah and the words were 
 strange indeed: 
 
 " Fur the love of hivin, look what she had in her 
 girdle! Shure it s Leese s own scarf, I tell ye the 
 Frenchwoman at the major s ! " 
 
 And Byrne thought it high time to enter and take pos 
 session. 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 A STRANGER GOING 
 
 A the first faint flush of dawn the little train of 
 pack mules, with the rations for the beleaguered 
 command at Sunset Pass, was started on its stony 
 path. Once out of the valley of the Beaver it must 
 clamber over range after range and stumble through deep 
 and tortuous canons. A road there was the old trail by 
 Snow Lake, thence through the famous Pass and the 
 Sunset crossing of the Colorado Chiquito to old Fort 
 Wingate. It wormed its way out of the valley of the 
 broader stream some miles further to the north and in 
 face of the Red Rock country to the northeast, but it had 
 not been traveled in safety for a year. Both Byrne and 
 Plume believed it beset with peril, watched from ambush 
 by invisible foes who could be relied upon to lurk in hid 
 ing until the train was within easy range, then, with sud 
 den volley, to pick off the officers and prominent ser 
 geants and, in the inevitable confusion, aided by their 
 goatlike agility, to make good their escape. Thirty 
 sturdy soldiers of the infantry under a veteran captain 
 marched as escort, with Plume s orders to push through 
 to the relief of Sergeant Brewster s command, and to 
 send back Indian runners with full account of the situa 
 tion. The relief of Wren s company accomplished, the 
 
 199 
 
200 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 next thing was to be a search for Wren himself, then a 
 determined effort to find Blakely, and all the time to keep 
 a lookout for Sanders s troop that must be somewhere 
 north of Chevlon s Fork, as well as for the two or three 
 little columns that should be breaking their way through 
 the unblazed wilderness, under the personal direction of 
 the general himself. Captain Stout and his party were 
 out of sight up the Beaver before the red eye of the morn 
 ing came peering over the jagged heights to the east, and 
 looking in upon a garrison whose eyes were equally red 
 and bleary through lack of sleep a garrison worn and 
 haggard through anxiety and distress gravely augmented 
 by the events of the night. All Sandy had been up and 
 astir within five minutes after Norah Shaughnessy s 
 startling cry, and all Sandy asked with bated breath the 
 same question: How on earth happened it that this 
 wounded waif of the Apaches, this unknown Indian girl, 
 dropped senseless at their doorway in the dead hours of 
 the night, should have in her possession the very scarf 
 worn by Mrs. Plume s nurse-companion, the French 
 woman Elise, as she came forth with her mistress to drive 
 away from Sandy, as was her hope, forever. 
 
 Prominent among those who had hastened down to 
 Sudsville, after the news of this discovery had gone buz 
 zing through the line of officers quarters, was Janet 
 Wren. Kate Sanders was staying with Angela, for the 
 girls seemed to find comfort in each other s presence and 
 society. Both had roused at sound of the clamor and 
 were up and half dressed when a passing hospital at- 
 
A STRANGER GOING 
 
 201 
 
 tendant hurriedly shouted to Miss Wren the tidings. 
 The girls, too, would have gone, but Aunt Janet sternly 
 bade them remain indoors. She would investigate, she 
 said, and bring them all information. 
 
 Dozens of the men were still hovering about old 
 Shaughnessy s quarters as the tall, gaunt form of the 
 captain s sister came stalking through the crowd, making 
 straight for the doorway. The two senior officers, 
 Byrne and Plume, were, in low tones, interrogating 
 Norah. Plume had been shown the scarf and promptly 
 seconded Norah. He knew it at once knew that, as 
 Elise came forth that dismal morning and passed under 
 the light in the hall, she had this very scarf round her 
 throat this that had been found upon the person of a 
 wounded and senseless girl. He remembered now that 
 as the sun climbed higher and the air grew warmer the 
 day of their swift flight to Prescott, Elise had thrown 
 open her traveling sack, and he noticed that the scarf 
 had been discarded. He did not see it anywhere about 
 the Concord, but that proved nothing. She might easily 
 have slipped it into her bag or under the cushions of the 
 seat. Both he and Byrne, therefore, watched with no 
 little interest when, after a brief glance at the feverish 
 and wounded Indian girl, moaning in the cot in Mrs. 
 Shaughnessy s room, Miss Wren returned to the open 
 air, bearing the scarf with her. One moment she 
 studied it, under the dull gleam of the lantern of the ser 
 geant of the guard, and then slowly spoke : 
 
 " Gentlemen, I have seen this worn by Elise and I be- 
 
202 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 licve I know how it came to find its way back here and 
 it does not brighten the situation. From our piazza, the 
 morning of Major Plume s start for Prescott, I could 
 plainly see Downs hanging about the wagon. It started 
 suddenly, as perhaps you remember, and as it rolled away 
 something went fluttering to the ground behind. Every 
 body was looking after the Concord at the moment 
 everybody but Downs, who quickly stooped, picked up the 
 thing, and turned hurriedly away. I believe he had this 
 scarf when he deserted and that he has fallen into the 
 hands of the Apaches." 
 
 Byrne looked at the post commander without speaking. 
 The color had mounted one moment to the major s face, 
 then left him pallid as before. The hunted, haggard, 
 weary look about his eyes had deepened. That was all. 
 The longer he lived, the longer he served about this woe 
 begone spot in mid Arizona, the more he realized the in 
 fluence for evil that handmaid of Shaitan seemed to exert 
 over his vain, shallow, yet beautiful and beloved wife. 
 Against it he had wrought and pleaded in vain. EHse 
 had been with them since her babyhood, was his wife s 
 almost indignant reply. Elise had been faithful to her 
 devoted to her all her life. Elise was indispensable ; the 
 only being that kept her from going mad with home 
 sickness and misery in that God-forsaken clime. Sobs 
 and tears wound up each interview and, like many a 
 stronger man, Plume had succumbed. It might, indeed, 
 be cruel to rob her of Elise, the last living link that bound 
 her to the blessed memories of her childhood, and he only 
 
A STRANGER GOING 203 
 
 mildly strove to point out to her how oddly, yet persist 
 ently, her good name had suffered through the words and 
 deeds of this flighty, melodramatic Frenchwoman. 
 Something of her baleful influence he had seen and sus 
 pected before ever they came to their exile, but here at 
 Sandy, with full force he realized the extent of her 
 machinations. Clarice was not the woman to go prowl 
 ing about the quarters in the dead hours of the night, no 
 matter how nervous and sleepless at home. Clarice was 
 not the woman to be having back-door conferences with 
 the servants of other households, much less the " striker " 
 of an officer with whose name hers, as a maiden, had once 
 been linked. He recalled with a shudder the events of 
 the night that sent the soldier Mullins to hospital, robbed 
 of his wits, if not of his life. He recalled with dread the 
 reluctant admissions of the doctor and of Captain Wren. 
 Sleep-walking, indeed ! Clarice never elsewhere at any 
 time had shown somnambulistic symptoms. It was Elise 
 beyond doubt who had lured her forth for some purpose 
 he could neither foil nor fathom. It was Elise who kept 
 up this discreditable and mysterious commerce with 
 Downs, something that had culminated in the burning 
 of Blakely s home, with who knows what evidence, 
 something that had terminated only with Downs s mad 
 desertion and probable death. All this and more went 
 flashing through his mind as Miss Wren finished her 
 brief and significant story, and it dawned upon him that, 
 whatever it might be to others, the death of Downs to 
 him, and to her whom he loved and whose honor he cher- 
 
204 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 ished was anything but a calamity, a thing to mourn. 
 Too generous to say the words, he yet turned with 
 lightened heart and met Byrne s searching eyes, then 
 those of Miss Wren now fixed upon him with austere 
 challenge, as though she would say the flight and fate of 
 this friendless soldier were crimes to be laid only at his 
 door. 
 
 Byrne saw the instant distress in his comrade s face, 
 and, glancing from him to her, almost in the same 
 instant saw the inciting cause. Byrne had one article of 
 faith if he lacked the needful thirty-nine. Women had 
 no place in official affairs, no right to meddle in official 
 matters, and what he said on the spur of his rising resent 
 ment was intended for her, though spoken to him. " So 
 Downs skipped eastward, did he, and the Apaches got 
 him! Well, Plume, that saves us a hanging." And 
 Miss Wren turned away in wrath unspeakable. 
 
 That Downs had " skipped eastward " received further 
 confirmation with the coming day, when Wales Arnold 
 rode into the fort from a personally conducted scout up 
 the Beaver. Riding out with Captain Stout s party, he 
 had paid a brief visit to his, for the time, abandoned ranch, 
 and was surprised to find there, unmolested, the two per 
 sons and all the property he had left the day he hurried 
 wife and household to the shelter of the garrison. The 
 two persons were half-breed Jose and his Hualpai squaw. 
 They had been with the Arnolds five long years, were 
 known to all the Apaches, and had ever been in highest 
 favor with them because of the liberality with which they 
 
A STRANGER GOING 205 
 
 dispensed the largesse of their employer. Never went an 
 Indian empty-stomached from their door. All the stock 
 Wales had time to gather he had driven in to Sandy. All 
 that was left Jose had found and corraled. Just one 
 quadruped was missing Arnold s old mustang saddler, 
 Dobbin. Jose said he had been gone from the first and 
 with him an old bridle and saddle. No Indian took him, 
 said he. It was a soldier. He had found " government 
 boot tracks " in the sand. Then Downs and Dobbin had 
 gone together, but only Dobbin might they ever look to 
 see again. 
 
 It had been arranged between Byrne and Captain Stout 
 that the little relief column should rest in a deep canon 
 beyond the springs from which the Beaver took its source, 
 and, later in the afternoon, push on again on the long, 
 stony climb toward the plateau of the upper Mogollon. 
 There stood, about twenty-five miles out from the post 
 en a bee line to the northeast, a sharp, rocky peak just 
 high enough above the fringing pines and cedars to be 
 distinctly visible by day from the crest of the nearest foot 
 hills west of the flagstaff. Along the sunset face of this 
 gleaming picacho there was a shelf or ledge that had 
 often been used by the Apaches for signaling purposes; 
 the renegades communicating with their kindred about 
 the agency up the valley. Invisible from the level of 
 Camp Sandy, these fires by night, or smoke and flashes 
 by day, reached only those for whom they were intended 
 the Apaches at the reservation; but Stout, who had 
 known the neighborhood since 65, had suggested that 
 
206 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 lookouts equipped with binoculars be placed on the high 
 ground back of the post. Inferior to the savage in the 
 craft, we had no code of smoke, fire, or, at that time, even 
 sun-flash signal, but it was arranged that one blaze was 
 to mean " Unmolested thus far." Two blazes, a few 
 yards apart, would mean " Important news by runner." 
 In the latter event Plume was to push out forty or fifty 
 men in dispersed order to meet and protect the runner in 
 case he should be followed, or possibly headed off, by 
 hostile tribesmen. Only six Indian allies had gone with 
 Stout and he had eyed them with marked suspicion and 
 disfavor. They, too, were Apache Yumas. The day 
 wore on slowly, somberly. All sound of life, melody, or 
 merriment had died out at Camp Sandy. Even the 
 hounds seemed to feel that a cloud of disaster hung over 
 the garrison. Only at rare intervals some feminine shape 
 flitted along the line of deserted verandas some woman 
 on a mission of mercy to some mourning, sore-troubled 
 sister among the scattered households. For several 
 hours before high noon the wires from Prescott had been 
 hot with demand for news, and with messages from 
 Byrne or Plume to department headquarters. At 
 meridian, however, there came a lull, and at 2 P. M. a 
 break. Somewhere to the west the line was snapped and 
 down. At 2.15 two linesmen galloped forth to find and 
 repair damages, half a dozen " doughboys " on a buck- 
 board going as guard. Otherw.se, all day long, no sol 
 dier left the post, and when darkness settled down, the 
 anxious operator, seated at his keyboard, was still un- 
 
A STRANGER GOING 207 
 
 able to wake the spirit of the gleaming copper thread that 
 spanned the westward wilderness. 
 
 All Sandy was wakeful, out on the broad parade, or 
 the officers verandas, and gazing as one man or woman 
 at the bold, black upheaval a mile behind the post, at 
 whose summit twinkled a tiny star, a single lantern, tell 
 ing of the vigil of Plume s watchers. If Stout made even 
 fair time he should have reached the picacho at dusk, and 
 now it was nearly nine and not a glimmer of fire had been 
 seen at the appointed rendezvous. Nine passed and 9.15, 
 and at 9.30 the fifes and drums of the Eighth turned out 
 and began the long, weird complaint of the tattoo. No 
 body wished to go to bed. Why not sound reveille and 
 let them sit up all night, if they chose ? It was far better 
 than tossing sleepless through the long hours to the dawn. 
 It was nearly time for " taps " lights out when a yell 
 went up from the parade and all Sandy started to its feet. 
 All on a sudden the spark at the lookout bluff began vio 
 lently to dance, and a dozen men tore out of garrison, 
 eager to hear the news. They were met halfway by a 
 sprinting corporal, whom they halted with eager demand 
 for his news. " Two blazes ! " he panted, " two ! I 
 must get in to the major at once ! " Five minutes more 
 the Assembly, not Taps, was sounding. Plume was 
 sending forth his fifty rescuers, and with them, impatient 
 for tidings from the far front, went Byrne, the major 
 himself following as soon as he could change to riding 
 dress. The last seen of the little command was the 
 glinting of the starlight on the gun barrels as they forded 
 
208 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 the rippling stream and took the trail up the narrow, 
 winding valley of the Beaver. 
 
 It was then a little after ten o clock. The wire to 
 Prescott was still unresponsive. Nothing had been 
 heard from the linesmen and their escort, indicating that 
 the break was probably far over as the Agua Fria. Not 
 a sign, except Stout s signal blazes at the picacho, had 
 been gathered from the front. Camp Sandy was cut 
 off from the world, and the actual garrison left to guard 
 the post and protect the women, children and the sick as 
 eleven o clock drew nigh, was exactly forty men of the 
 fighting force. It was believed that Stout s couriers 
 would make the homeward run, very nearly, by the route 
 the pack-train took throughout the day, and if they 
 succeeded in evading hostile scouts or parties, would soon 
 appear about some of the breaks of the upper Beaver, 
 Thither, therefore, with all possible speed Plume had 
 directed his men, promising Mrs. Sanders, as he rode 
 away, that the moment a runner was encountered he would 
 send a light rider at the gallop, on his own good horse 
 that not a moment should be lost in bearing them the 
 news. 
 
 But midnight came without a sign. Long before thai 
 hour, as though by common impulse, almost all the 
 women of the garrison had gathered about Truman s 
 quarters, now the northernmost of the row and in plain 
 view of the confluence of the Sandy and the Beaver. Dr. 
 Graham, who had been swinging to and fro between the 
 limits of the Shaughnessys and the hospital, stopped to 
 
A STRANGER GOING 209 
 
 speak with them a moment and gently drew Angela to 
 one side. His grave and rugged face was sweet in its 
 tenderness as he looked down into her brimming eyes. 
 " Can you not be content at home, my child ? " he mur 
 mured. " You seem like one of my own bairns, An 
 gela, now that your brave father is afield, and I want to 
 have his bonnie daughter looking her best against the 
 home-coming. Surely Aunt Janet will bring you the 
 news the moment any comes, and I ll bid Kate Sanders 
 bide with you ! " 
 
 No, she would not she could not go home. Like 
 every other soul in all Camp Sandy she seemed to long to 
 be just there. Some few had even gone out further, be 
 yond the sentries, to the point of the low bluff, and there, 
 chatting only in whispers, huddled together, listening in 
 anxiety inexpressible for the muffled sound of galloping 
 hoofs on soft and sandy shore. No, she dare not, for 
 within the four walls of that little white room what 
 dreams and visions had the girl not seen? and, wakening 
 shuddering, had clung to faithful Kate and sobbed her 
 heart out in those clasping, tender, loyal arms. No 
 beauty, indeed, was Kate, as even her fond mother rue 
 fully admitted, but there was that in her great, gentle, 
 unselfish heart that made her beloved by one and all. 
 Yet Kate had pleaded with Angela in vain. Some 
 strange, forceful mood had seized the girl and steeled 
 and strengthened her against even Janet Wren s author 
 ity. She would not leave the little band of watchers. 
 She was there when, toward half-past twelve, at last the 
 
210 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 message came. Plume s own horse came tearing through 
 the flood, and panting, reeking, trembling into their 
 midst, and his rider, little Fifer Lanigan, of Company 
 " C," sprang from saddle and thrust his dispatch into 
 Truman s outstretched hand. 
 
 With women and children crowding about him, and 
 men running to the scene from every side, by the light of 
 a lantern held in a soldier s shaking hand, he read aloud 
 the contents: 
 
 " BIVOUAC AT PICACHO, 9 P. M. 
 "C. O. CAMP SANDY: 
 
 " Reached this point after hard march, but no active opposition, 
 at 8 P. M. First party sent to build fire on ledge driven in by 
 hostiles. Corporal Welch shot through left side serious. Threw 
 out skirmishers and drove them off after some firing, and about 
 9.20 came suddenly upon Indian boy crouching among rocks, 
 who held up folded paper which I have read and forward here 
 with. We shall, of course, turn toward Snow Lake, taking boy 
 as guide. March at 3 A. M. Will do everything possible to 
 reach Wren on time. 
 
 (Signed) " STOUT, Commanding." 
 
 Within was another slip, grimy and with dark stains. 
 And Truman s voice well-nigh failed him as he read : 
 
 " November th. 
 "C. O. CAMP SANDY: 
 
 "Through a friendly Apache who was with me at the reservation 
 I learned that Captain Wren was lying wounded, cutoff from his 
 troop and with only four of his men, in a canon southwest of 
 Snow Lake. With Indian for guide we succeeded reaching him 
 second night, but are now surrounded, nearly out of ammunition 
 and rations. Three more of our party are wounded and one, 
 Trooper Kent, killed. If not rushed can hold out perhaps three 
 days more, but Wren sorely needs surgical aid. 
 
 (Signed) " BLAKELY." 
 
A STRANGER GOING 211 
 
 That was all. The Bugologist with his one orderly, 
 and apparently without the Apache Yuma scouts, had 
 gone straightway to the rescue of Wren. Now all were 
 cut off and surrounded by a wily foe that counted on, 
 sooner or later, overcoming and annihilating them, and 
 even by the time the Indian runner slipped out (some 
 faithful spirit won by Blakely s kindness and humanity 
 when acting agent), the defense had been reduced just 
 one-half. Thank God that Stout with his supplies and 
 stalwart followers was not more than two days march 
 away, and was going straightway to the rescue ! 
 
 It was nearly two when Plume and his half-hundred 
 came drifting back to the garrison, and even then some 
 few of the watchers were along the bluff. Janet Wren, 
 having at last seen pale-faced, silent Angela to her room 
 and bed, with Kate Sanders on guard, had again gone 
 forth to extract such further information as Major Plume 
 might have. Even at that hour men were at work in the 
 corrals, fitting saddles to half a dozen spare horses, 
 about all that were left at the post, and Miss Wren 
 learned that Colonel Byrne, with an orderly or two, had 
 remained at Arnold s ranch, that Arnold himself, with 
 six horsemen from the post, was to set forth at four, join 
 the colonel at dawn, and together all were to push for 
 ward on the trail of Stout s command, hoping to over 
 take them by nightfall. She whispered this to sleepless 
 Kate on her return to the house, for Angela, exhausted 
 with grief and long suspense, had fallen, apparently, into 
 deep and dreamless slumber. 
 
AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 But the end of that eventful night was not yet. Ar 
 nold and his sextette slipped away soon after four o clock, 
 and about 4.50 there came a banging at the major s door. 
 It was the telegraph operator. The wire was patched at 
 last, and the first message was to the effect that the guard 
 had been fired on in Cherry Creek canon that Private 
 Forrest was sorely wounded and lying at Dick s deserted 
 ranch, with two of their number to care for him. Could 
 they possibly send a surgeon at once? 
 
 There was no one to go but Graham. His patients at 
 the post were doing fairly well, but there wasn t a horse 
 for him to ride. " No matter," said he, " I ll borrow 
 Punch. He s needing exercise these days." So Punch 
 was ordered man-saddled and brought forthwith. The 
 orderly came back in ten minutes. " Punch aint there, 
 sir," said he. " He s been gone over half an hour." 
 
 " Gone ? Gone where ? Gone how ? " asked Graham 
 in amaze. 
 
 " Gone with Miss Angela, sir. She saddled him her 
 self and rode away not twenty minutes after Arnold s 
 party left. The sentries say she followed up the Beaver." 
 
CHAPTER XIX 
 
 BESIEGED 
 
 DEEP down in a ragged cleft of the desert, with 
 shelving rock and giant bowlder on every side, 
 without a sign of leaf, or sprig of grass, or 
 tendril of tiny creeping plant, a little party of haggard, 
 hunted men lay in hiding and in the silence of exhaustion 
 and despond, awaiting the inevitable. Bulging outward 
 overhead, like the counter of some huge battleship, a 
 great mass of solid granite heaved unbroken above them, 
 forming a recess or cave, in which they were secure 
 against arrow, shot, or stone from the crest of the lofty, 
 almost vertical walls of the vast and gloomy canon. Well 
 back under this natural shelter, basined in the hollowed 
 rock, a blessed pool of fair water lay unwrinkled by even 
 a flutter of breeze. Relic of the early springtime and the 
 melting snows, it had been caught and imprisoned here 
 after the gradually failing stream had trickled itself into 
 nothingness. One essential, one comfort then had not 
 been denied the beleaguered few, but it was about the 
 only one. Water for drink, for fevered wounds and 
 burning throats, they had in abundance; but the last 
 " hard-tack " had been shared, the last scrap of bacon 
 long since devoured. Of the once-abundant rations only 
 coffee grains were left, Of the cartridge-crammed 
 
 313 
 
214 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 " thimble belts," with which they had entered the canon 
 and the Apache trap, only three contained so much as a 
 single copper cylinder, stopped by its forceful lead. 
 These three belonged to troopers, two of whom, at least 
 would never have use for them again. One of these, 
 poor Jerry Kent, lay buried beneath the little cairn of rocks 
 in still another cavelike recess a dozen yards away, hidden 
 there by night, when prowling Apaches could not see the 
 sorrowing burial party and crush them with bowlders 
 heaved over the precipice above, or shoot them down with 
 whistling lead or steel-tipped arrow from some safe covert 
 in the rocky walls. 
 
 Cut off from their comrades while scouting a side 
 ravine, Captain Wren and his quartette of troopers had 
 made stiff and valiant fight against such of the Indians 
 as permitted hand or head to show from behind the rocks. 
 They had felt confident that Sergeant Brewster and the 
 main body would speedily miss them, or hear the sound 
 of firing and turn back au secowrs, but sounds are queerly 
 carried in such a maze of deep and tortuous clefts as 
 seamed the surface in every conceivable direction through 
 the wild basin of the Colorado. Brewster s rearmost files 
 declared long after that never the faintest whisper of 
 affray had reached their ears, already half deadened by 
 fatigue and the ceaseless crash of iron-shod hoofs on 
 shingly rock. As for Brewster himself, he was able to 
 establish that Wren s own orders were to " push ahead " 
 and try to make Sunset Pass by nightfall, while the cap 
 tain, with such horses as seemed freshest, scouted right 
 
BESIEGED 215 
 
 and left wherever possible. The last seen of Jerry Kent, 
 it later transpired, was when he came riding after them 
 to say the captain had gone into the mouth of the gorge 
 opening to the west, and the last message borne from the 
 commander to the troop came through Jerry Kent to 
 Sergeant Dusold, who brought up the rear. They had 
 passed the mouths of half a dozen ravines within the 
 hour, some on one side, some on the other, and Dusold 
 " passed the word " by sending Corporal Slater clatter 
 ing up the caiion, skirting the long drawn-out column of 
 files until, far in the lead, he could overtake the senior 
 sergeant and deliver his message. Later, when Brew- 
 ster rode back with all but the little guard left over his 
 few broken-down men and mounts in Sunset Pass, Dus 
 old could confidently locate in his own mind the exact 
 spot where Kent overtook him; but Dusold was a drill- 
 book dragoon of the Prussian school, consummately at 
 home on review or parade, but all at sea, so to speak, in 
 the mountains. They never found a trace of their loved 
 leader. The clefts they scouted were all on the wrong 
 side. 
 
 And so it happened that relief came not, that one after 
 another the five horses fell, pierced with missiles or 
 crushed and stunned by rocks crashing down from above, 
 that Kent himself was shot through the brain, and Wren 
 skewered through the arm by a Tonto shaft, and plugged 
 with a round rifle ball in the shoulder. Sergeant Car- 
 mody bound up his captain s wound as best he could, and 
 by rare good luck, keeping up a bold front, and answer- 
 
216 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 ing every shot, they fought their way to this little refuge 
 in the rocks, and there, behind improvised barricades or 
 bowlders, " stood off " their savage foe, hoping rescue 
 might soon reach them. 
 
 But Wren was nearly wild from wounds and fever 
 when the third day came and no sign of the troop. An 
 other man had been hit and stung, and though not seri 
 ously wounded, like a burnt child, he now shunned the 
 fire and became, perforce, an ineffective. Their scanty 
 store of rations was gone entirely. Sergeant Carmody 
 and his alternate watchers were worn out from lack of 
 sleep when, in the darkness of midnight, a low hail in 
 their own tongue came softly through the dead silence, 
 the voice of Lieutenant Blakely cautioning, " Don t fire, 
 Wren. It s the Bugologist," and in another moment he 
 and his orderly afoot, in worn Apache moccasins, but 
 equipped with crammed haversacks and ammunition 
 belts, were being welcomed by the besieged. There was 
 little of the emotional and nothing of the melodramatic 
 about it. It was, if anything, rather commonplace. 
 Wren was flighty and disposed to give orders for an im 
 mediate attack in force on the enemy s works, to which 
 the sergeant, his lips trembling just a bit, responded with 
 prompt salute : " Very good, sir, just as quick as the men 
 can finish supper. Loot nent Blakely s compliments, sir, 
 and he ll be ready in ten minutes," for Blakely and his 
 man, seeing instantly the condition of things, had fresh 
 ened the little fire and begun unloading supplies. Sola- 
 lay, their Indian guide, after piloting them through the 
 
BESIEGED 217 
 
 woodland southwest of Snow Lake, had pointed out the 
 canon, bidden them follow it and, partly in the sign lan 
 guage, partly in Spanish, partly in the few Apache terms 
 that Blakely had learned during his agency days, man 
 aged to make them understand that Wren was to be found 
 some five miles further on, and that most of the besieging 
 Tontos were on the heights above or in the canon below. 
 Few would be encountered, if any, on the up-stream side. 
 Then, promising to take the horses and the mules to 
 Camp Sandy, he had left them. He dared go no farther 
 toward the warring Apaches. They would suspect and 
 butcher him without mercy. 
 
 But Solalay had not gone without promise of further 
 aid. Natzie s younger brother, Alchisay, had recently 
 come to him with a message from her, and should be com 
 ing with another. Solalay thought he could find the boy 
 and send him to them to be used as a courier. Blakely s 
 opportune coming had cheered not a little the flagging 
 defense, but, not until forty-eight hours thereafter, by 
 which time their condition had become almost desperate 
 and the foe almost daring, did the lithe, big-eyed, swarthy 
 little Apache reach them. Blakely knew him instantly, 
 wrote his dispatch and bade the boy go with all speed, 
 with the result we know. " Three more of our party are 
 wounded," he had written, but had not chosen to say that 
 one of them was himself. 
 
 A solemn sight was this that met the eyes of the Bug- 
 ologist, as Carmody roused him from a fitful sleep, with 
 the murmured words, "Almost light, sir. They ll be on 
 
218 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 us soon as they can see." Deep in under the overhang 
 and close to the pool lay one poor fellow whose swift, 
 gasping breath told all too surely that the Indian bullet 
 had found fatal billet in his wasting form. It was Chal 
 mers, a young Southerner, driven by poverty at home 
 and prospect of adventure abroad to seek service in the 
 cavalry. It was practically his first campaign, and in all 
 human probability his last. Consciousness had left him 
 hours ago, and his vagrant spirit was fast loosing every 
 earthly bond, and already, in fierce dreamings, at war 
 with unseen and savage foe over their happy hunting 
 grounds in the great Beyond. Near him, equally shel 
 tered, yet further toward the dim and pallid light, lay 
 Wren, his strong Scotch features pinched and drawn with 
 pain and loss of blood and lack of food. Fever there was 
 little left, there was so little left for it to live upon. Weak 
 and helpless as a child in arms he lay, inert and silent. 
 There was nothing he could do. Never a quarter hour 
 had passed since he had been forced to lie there that some 
 one of his devoted men had not bathed his forehead and 
 cooled his burning wounds with abundant flow of blessed 
 water. Twice since his gradual return to consciousness 
 had he asked for Blakely, and had bidden him sit and tell 
 him of Sandy, asking for tidings of Angela, and faltering 
 painfully as he bethought himself of the last instructions 
 he had given. How could Blakely be supposed to know 
 aught of her or of the household bidden to treat him 
 practically as a stranger ? Now, he thought it grand that 
 the Bugologist had thrown all consideration of peril to 
 
BESIEGED 219 
 
 the wind and had hastened to their aid to share their des 
 perate fortunes. But Wren knew not how to tell of it. 
 He took courage and hope when Blakely spoke of Sola- 
 lay s loyalty, of young Alchisay s daring visit and his 
 present mission. Apaches of his band had been known 
 to traverse sixty miles a day over favorable ground, and 
 Alchisay, even through such a labyrinth of rock, ravine, 
 and precipice, should not make less than thirty. Within 
 forty-eight hours of his start the boy ought to reach the 
 Sandy valley, and surely no moment would then be lost 
 in sending troops to find and rescue them. But four days 
 and nights, said Blakely to himself, was the least time in 
 which they could reasonably hope for help, and now only 
 the third night had gone, gone with their supplies of 
 every kind. A few hours more and the sun would be 
 blazing in upon even the dank depths of the canon for 
 his midday stare. A few minutes more and the Apaches, 
 too, would be up and blazing on their own account. 
 " Keep well under shelter," were Blakely s murmured or 
 ders to the few men, even as the first, faint breath of the 
 dawn came floating from the broader reaches far down 
 the rocky gorge. 
 
 In front of their cavelike refuge, just under the shelv 
 ing mass overhead, heaped in a regular semicircle, a 
 rude parapet of rocks gave shelter to the troopers guard 
 ing the approaches. Little loopholes had been left, three 
 looking down and two northward up the dark and tor 
 tuous rift. In each of these a loaded carbine lay in 
 readiness. So well chosen was the spot that for one 
 
220 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 hundred yards southeastward down stream the nar 
 row gorge was commanded by the fire of the defense, 
 while above, for nearly eighty, from wall to wall, the ap 
 proach was similarly swept. No rush was therefore 
 possible on part of the Apaches without every probability 
 of their losing two or three of the foremost. The 
 Apache lacks the magnificent daring of the Sioux or 
 Cheyenne. He is a fighter from ambush; he risks noth 
 ing for glory s sake ; he is a monarch in craft and guile, 
 but no hero in open battle. For nearly a week now, day 
 after day, the position of the defenders had been made 
 almost terrible by the fierce bombardment to which it had 
 been subjected, of huge stones or bowlders sent thunder 
 ing down the almost precipitous walls, then bounding 
 from ledge to ledge, or glancing from solid, sloping face 
 diving, finally, with fearful crash into the rocky bed at the 
 bottom, sending a shower of fragments hurtling in every 
 direction, oft dislodging some section of parapet, yet 
 never reaching the depths of the cave. Add to this 
 nerve-racking siege work the instant, spiteful flash of 
 barbed arrow or zip and crack of bullet when hat or hand 
 of one of the defenders was for a second exposed, and it 
 is not difficult to fancy the wear and tear on even the 
 stoutest heart in the depleted little band. 
 
 And still they set their watch and steeled their nerves, 
 and in dogged silence took their station as the pallid light 
 grew roseate on the cliffs above them. And with dull 
 and wearied, yet wary, eyes, each soldier scanned every 
 projecting rock or point that could give shelter to lurking 
 
THE KIGHT I2T THE CANON" 
 
BESIEGED 221 
 
 foe, and all the time the brown muzzles of the carbines 
 were trained low along the stream bed. No shot could 
 now be thrown away at frowsy turban or flaunting rag 
 along the cliffs. The rush was the one thing they had to 
 dread and drive back. It was God s mercy the Apache 
 dared not charge in the dark. 
 
 Lighter grew the deep gorge and lighter still, and soon 
 in glorious radiance the morning sunshine blazed on the 
 lofty battlements far overhead, and every moment the 
 black shadow on the westward wall, visible to the defense 
 long rifle-shot southeastward, gave gradual way before 
 the rising day god, and from the broader open reaches 
 beyond the huge granite shoulder, around which wound 
 the canon, and from the sun-kissed heights, a blessed 
 warmth stole softly in, grateful inexpressibly to their 
 chilled and stiffened limbs. And still, despite the grow 
 ing hours, neither shot nor sign came from the accus 
 tomed haunts of the surrounding foe. Six o clock was 
 marked by Blakely s watch. Six o clock and seven, and 
 the low moan from the lips of poor young Chalmers, or 
 the rattle of some pebble dislodged by the foot of 
 crouching guardian, or some murmured word from man 
 to man, some word of wonderment at the unlooked for 
 lull in Apache siege operations, was the only sound to 
 break the almost deathlike silence of the morning. There 
 was one other, far up among the stunted, shriveled pines 
 and cedars that jutted from the opposite heights. They 
 could hear at intervals a weird, mournful note, a single 
 whistling call in dismal minor, but it brought no new sig- 
 
222 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 nificance. Every day of their undesired and enforced 
 sojourn, every hour of the interminable day, that raven- 
 like, hermit bird of the Sierras had piped his unmelodious 
 signal to some distant feathered fellow, and sent a chill 
 to the heart of more than one war-tried soldier. There 
 was never a man in Arizona wilds that did not hate the 
 sound of it. And yet, as eight o clock was noted and 
 still no sight or sound of assailant came, Sergeant Car- 
 mody turned a wearied, aching eye from his loophole and 
 muttered to the officer crouching close beside him : " I 
 could wring the neck of the lot of those infernal cat 
 crows, sir, but I ll thank God if we hear no worse sound 
 this day." 
 
 Blakely rose to his feet and wearily leaned upon the 
 breastworks, peering cautiously over. Yesterday the 
 sight of a scouting hat would have brought instant whiz 
 of arrow, but not a missile saluted him now. One arm, 
 his left, was rudely bandaged and held in a sling, a rifle 
 ball from up the cliff, glancing from the inner face of the 
 parapet, had torn savagely through muscle and sinew, but 
 mercifully scored neither artery nor bone. An arrow, 
 whizzing blindly through a southward loophole, had 
 grazed his cheek, ripping a straight red seam far back 
 as the lobe of the ear, which had been badly torn. 
 Blakely had little the look of a squire of dames as, thus 
 maimed and scarred and swathed in blood-stained cotton, 
 he peered down the deep and shadowy cleft and searched 
 with eyes keen, if yet unskilled, every visible section of 
 the opposite wall. What could their silence mean ? Had 
 
BESIEGED 223 
 
 they found other game, pitifully small in numbers as 
 these besieged, and gone to butcher them, knowing well 
 that, hampered by their wounded, these, their earlier vic 
 tims, could not hope to escape? Had they got warning 
 of the approach of some strong force of soldiery Brew- 
 ster scouting in search of them, or may be Sanders him 
 self? Had they slipped away, therefore, and could the 
 besieged dare to creep forth and shout, signal, or even 
 fire away two or three of these last precious car 
 tridges in hopes of catching the ear of searching com 
 rades ? 
 
 Wren, exhausted, had apparently dropped into a fitful 
 doze. His eyes were shut, his lips were parted, his long, 
 lean fingers twitched at times as a tremor seemed to shoot 
 through his entire frame. Another day like the last or 
 at worst like this, without food or nourishment, and even 
 such rugged strength as had been his would be taxed to 
 the utmost. There might be no to-morrow for the sturdy 
 soldier who nad so gallantly served his adopted country, 
 his chosen flag. As for Chalmers, the summons was al 
 ready come. Far from home and those who most loved 
 and would sorely grieve for him, the brave lad was dying. 
 Carmody, kneeling by his side, but the moment before 
 had looked up mutely in his young commander s 
 face, and his swimming, sorrowing eyes had told the 
 story. 
 
 Nine o clock had come without a symptom of alarm or 
 enemy from without, yet death had invaded the lonely 
 refuge in the rocks, claiming one victim as his tribute for 
 
224: AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 the day and setting his seal upon still another, the pros 
 pective sacrifice for the dismal morrow, and Blakely could 
 stand the awful strain no longer. 
 
 " Sergeant," said he, " I must know what this means. 
 We must have help for the captain before this sun goes 
 down, or he may be gone before we know it." 
 
 And Carmody looked him in the face and answered : " I 
 am strong yet and unhurt. Let me make the try, sir. 
 Some of our fellows must be scouting near us, or these 
 beggars wouldn t have quit. I can find the boys, if any 
 one can." 
 
 Blakely turned and gazed one moment into the deep 
 and dark recess where lay his wounded and the dying. 
 The morning wind had freshened a bit, and a low, mur 
 murous song, nature s ^Eolian, came softly from the 
 swaying pine and stunted oak and juniper far on high. 
 The whiff that swept to their nostrils from the lower 
 depths of the canon told its own grewsome tale. There, 
 scattered along the stream bed, lay the festering remains 
 of their four-footed comrades, first victims of the ambus 
 cade. Death lurked about their refuge then on every 
 side, and was even invading their little fortress. Was 
 this to be the end, after all ? Was there neither help nor 
 hope from any source? 
 
 Turning once again, a murmured prayer upon his lips, 
 Blakely started at sight of Carmody. With one hand up 
 lifted, as though to caution silence, the other concaved at 
 his ear, the sergeant was bending eagerly forward, his 
 eyes dilating, his frame fairly quivering. Then, on a 
 
BESIEGED 
 
 sudden, up he sprang and swung his hat about his head. 
 " Firing, sir ! Firing, sure ! " he cried. Another sec 
 ond, and with a gasp and moan he sank to earth trans 
 fixed ; a barbed arrow, whizzing from unseen space, had 
 pierced him through and through. 
 
CHAPTER XX 
 
 WHERE IS ANGELA? 
 
 FOR a moment as they drew under shelter the 
 stricken form of the soldier, there was nothing 
 the defense could do but dodge. Then, leav 
 ing him at the edge of the pool, and kicking before them 
 the one cowed and cowering shirker of the little band, 
 Blakely and the single trooper still unhit, crept back to 
 the rocky parapet, secured a carbine each and knelt, star 
 ing up the opposite wall in search of the foe. And not a 
 sign of Apache could they see. 
 
 Yet the very slant of the arrow as it pierced the young 
 soldier, the new angle at which the bullets bounded from 
 the stony crest, the lower, flatter flight of the barbed 
 missiles that struck fire from the flinty rampart, all told 
 the same story. The Indians during the hours of dark 
 ness, even while dreading to charge, had managed to 
 crawl, snake-like, to lower levels along the cliff and to 
 creep closer up the stream bed, and with stealthy, noise 
 less hands to rear little shelters of stone, behind which 
 they were now crouching invisible and secure. With the 
 illimitable patience of their savage training they had then 
 waited, minute after minute, hour after hour, until, lulled 
 at last into partial belief that their deadly foe had slipped 
 away, some of the defenders should be emboldened to 
 
 236 
 
WHERE IS ANGELA? 227 
 
 venture into view, and then one well-aimed volley at the 
 signal from the leader s rifle, and the vengeful shafts of 
 those who had as yet only the native weapon, would fall 
 like lightning stroke upon the rash ones, and that would 
 end it. Catlike they had crouched and watched since 
 early dawn. Catlike they had played the old game of 
 apparent weariness of the sport, of forgetfulness of their 
 prey and tricked their guileless victims into hope and 
 self-exposure, then swooped again, and the gallant lad 
 whose last offer and effort had been to set forth in des 
 perate hope of bringing relief to the suffering, had paid 
 for his valor with his life. One arrow at least had gone 
 swift and true, one shaft that, launched, perhaps, two 
 seconds too soon for entire success, had barely an 
 ticipated the leader s signal and spoiled the scheme of 
 bagging all the game. Blakely s dive to save his fallen 
 comrade had just saved his own head, for rock chips and 
 spattering lead flew on every side, scratching, but not seri 
 ously wounding him. 
 
 And then, when they " thought on vengeance " and the 
 three brown muzzles swept the opposite wall, there fol 
 lowed a moment of utter silence, broken only by the faint 
 gasping of the dying man. " Creep back to Carmody, 
 you," muttered Blakely to the trembling lad beside him. 
 " You are of no account here unless they try to charge. 
 Give him water, quick." Then to Stern, his one unhurt 
 man, " You heard what he said about distant firing. 
 Did you hear it ? " 
 
 " Not I, sir, but I believe they did an be damned to 
 
223 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 them ! " And Stern s eyes never left the opposite cliff, 
 though his ears were strained to catch the faintest sound 
 from the lower canon. It was there they last had seen the 
 troop. It was from that direction help should come. 
 " Watch them, but don t waste a shot, man. I must speak 
 to Carmody," said Blakely, under his breath, as he backed 
 on hands and knees, a painful process when one is sore 
 wounded. Trembling, whimpering like whipped child, 
 the poor, spiritless lad sent to the aid of the stricken and 
 heroic, crouched by the sergeant s side, vainly striving to 
 pour water from a clumsy canteen between the sufferer s 
 pallid lips. Carmody presently sucked eagerly at the 
 cooling water, and even in his hour of dissolution seemed 
 far the stronger, sturdier of the two seemed to feel so in 
 finite a pity for his shaken comrade. Bleeding internally, 
 as was evident, transfixed by the cruel shaft they did not 
 dare attempt to withdraw, even if the barbed steel would 
 permit, and drooping fainter with each swift moment, he 
 was still conscious, still brave and uncomplaining. His 
 dimmed and mournful eyes looked up in mute appeal to 
 his young commander. He knew that he was going fast, 
 and that whatever rescue might come to these, his surviv 
 ing fellow-soldiers, there would be none for him ; and yet 
 in his supreme moment he seemed to read the question 
 on Blakely s lips, and his words, feeble and broken, were 
 framed to answer. 
 
 " Couldn t you hear em, lieutenant? " he gasped. " I 
 can t be mistaken. I know the old Springfield sure! 
 I heard em way off south a dozen shots," and then a 
 
WHERE IS ANGELA? 229 
 
 spasm of agony choked him, and he turned, writhing, to 
 hide the anguish on his face. Blakely grasped the dying 
 soldier s hand, already cold and limp and nerveless, and 
 then his own voice seemed, too, to break and falter. 
 
 " Don t try to talk, Carmody ; don t try ! Of course 
 you are right. It must be some of our people. They ll 
 reach us soon. Then we ll have the doctor and can help 
 you. Those saddlebags ! " he said, turning sharply to 
 the whimpering creature kneeling by them, and the lad 
 drew hand across his streaming eyes and passed the worn 
 leather pouches. From one of them Blakely drew forth 
 a flask, poured some brandy into its cup and held it to the 
 soldier s lips. Carmody swallowed almost eagerly. He 
 seemed to crave a little longer lease of life. There was 
 something tugging at his heartstrings, and presently he 
 turned slowly, painfully again. " Lieutenant," he gasped, 
 " I m not scared to die this way anyhow. There s no 
 one to care but the boys but there s one thing " and 
 now the stimulant seemed to reach the failing heart and 
 give him faint, fluttering strength " there s one thing I 
 ought I ought to tell. You ve been solid with the boys 
 you re square, and I m not I haven t always been. 
 Lieutenant I was on guard the night of the fire and 
 Elise, you know the French girl she she s got most 
 all I saved most all I won, but she was trickin me 
 all the time, lieutenant me and Downs that s gone and 
 others. She didn t care. You you aint the only one 
 
 I I " 
 
 " Lieutenant ! " came in excited whisper, the voice of 
 
230 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 Stern, and there at his post in front of the cave he knelt, 
 signaling urgently. " Lieutenant, quick ! " 
 
 " One minute, Carmody ! I ve got to go. Tell me a 
 little later." But with dying strength Carmody clung to 
 his hand. 
 
 " I must tell you, lieutenant now. It wasn t 
 Downs s fault. She she made " 
 
 " Lieutenant, quick ! for God s sake ! They re com 
 ing ! " cried the voice of the German soldier at the wall, 
 and wrenching his wrist from the clasp of the dying man, 
 Blakely sprang recklessly to his feet and to the mouth of 
 the cave just as Stern s carbine broke the stillness with 
 resounding roar. Half a dozen rifles barked their instant 
 echo among the rocks. From up the hillside rose a yell 
 of savage hate and another of warning. Then from be 
 hind their curtaining rocks half a dozen dusky forms, 
 their dirty white breechclouts streaming behind them, 
 sprang suddenly into view and darted, with goat-like ease 
 and agility, zigzagging up the eastward wall. It was a 
 foolish thing to do, but Blakely followed with a wasted 
 shot, aimed one handed from the shoulder, before he could 
 regain command of his judgment. In thirty seconds the 
 cliff was as bare of Apaches as but the moment before it 
 had been dotted. Something, in the moment when their 
 savage plans and triumph seemed secure, had happened 
 to alarm the entire party. With warning shouts and 
 signals they were scurrying out of the deep ravine, scat 
 tering, apparently, northward. But even as they fled to 
 higher ground there was order and method in their re- 
 
WHERE IS ANGELA? 231 
 
 treat. While several of their number clambered up the 
 steep, an equal number lurked in their covert, and 
 Blakely s single shot was answered instantly by half a 
 dozen, the bullets striking and splashing on the rocks, the 
 arrows bounding or glancing furiously. Stern ducked 
 within, out of the storm. Blakely, flattening like hunted 
 squirrel close to the parapet, flung down his empty carbine 
 and strove to reach another, lying loaded at the southward 
 loop-hole, and at the outstretched hand there whizzed an 
 arrow from aloft whose guiding feather fairly seared the 
 skin, so close came the barbed messenger. Then up the 
 height rang out a shrill cry, some word of command in 
 a voice that had a familiar tang to it, and that was almost 
 instantly obeyed, for, under cover of sharp, well-aimed fire 
 from aloft, from the shelter of projecting rock or stranded 
 bowlder, again there leaped into sight a few scattered, 
 sinewy forms that rushed in bewildering zigzag up the 
 steep, until safe beyond their supports, when they, too, 
 vanished, and again the cliff stood barren of Apache 
 foemen as the level of the garrison parade. It was science 
 in savage warfare against which the drill book of the 
 cavalry taught no method whatsoever. Another minute 
 and even the shots had ceased. One glimpse more had 
 Blakely of dingy, trailing breechclouts, fluttering in the 
 breeze now stirring the fringing pines and cedars, and all 
 that was left of the late besiegers came clattering down 
 the rocks in the shape of an Indian shield. Stern would 
 have scrambled out to nab it, but was ordered down. 
 " Back, you idiot, or they ll have you next ! " And then 
 
232 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 they heard the feeble voice of Wren, pleading for water 
 and demanding to be lifted to the light. The uproar of 
 the final volley had roused him from an almost death-like 
 stupor, and he lay staring, uncomprehending, at Carmody, 
 whose glazing eyes were closed, whose broken words had 
 ceased. The poor fellow was drifting away into the 
 shadows with his story still untold. 
 
 " Watch here, Stern, but keep under cover," cried 
 Blakely. " I ll see to the captain. Listen for any shot 
 or sound, but hold your fire," and then he turned to his 
 barely conscious senior and spoke to him as he would to 
 a helpless child. Again he poured a little brandy in his 
 cup. Again he held it to ashen lips and presently saw the 
 faint flutter of reviving strength. " Lie still just a mo 
 ment or two, Wren," he murmured soothingly. " Lie 
 still. Somebody s coming. The troop is not far off. 
 You ll soon have help and home _and Angela " even 
 then his tongue faltered at her name. And Wren heard 
 and with eager eyes questioned imploringly. The quiv 
 ering lips repeated huskily the name of the child he loved. 
 "Angela where?" 
 
 " Home safe where you shall be soon, old fellow, 
 only brace up now. I must speak one moment with 
 Carmody," and to Carmody eagerly he turned. "You 
 were speaking of Elise and the fire of Downs, ser 
 geant " His words were slow and clear and distinct, 
 
 for the soldier had drifted far away and must be recalled. 
 " Tell me again. What was it ? " 
 
 But only faint, swift gasping answered him. Carmody 
 
WHERE IS ANGELA? 233 
 
 either heard not, or, hearing, was already past all pos 
 sibility of reply. " Speak to me, Carmody. Tell me what 
 I can do for you ? " he repeated. " What word to Elise ? " 
 He thought the name might rouse him, and it did. A 
 feeble hand was uplifted, just an inch or two. The eye 
 lids slowly fluttered, and the dim, almost lifeless eyes 
 looked pathetically up into those of the young commander. 
 There was a moment of almost breathless silence, broken 
 only by a faint moan from Wren s tortured lips and the 
 childish whimpering of that other the half-crazed, terror- 
 stricken soldier. 
 
 " Elise," came the whisper, barely audible, as Carmody 
 strove to lift his head, " she promised " but the head 
 sank back on Blakely s knee. Stern was shouting at the 
 stone gate shouting and springing to his feet and swing 
 ing his old scouting hat and gazing wildly down the canon. 
 " For God s sake hush, man ! " cried the lieutenant. " I 
 must hear Carmody." But Stern was past further shout 
 ing now. Sinking on his knees, he was sobbing aloud. 
 Scrambling out into the daylight of the opening, but still 
 shrinking within its shelter, the half-crazed, half-broken 
 soldier stood stretching forth his arms and calling wild 
 words down the echoing gorge, where sounds of shouting, 
 lusty-lunged, and a ringing order or two, and then the 
 clamor of carbine shots, told of the coming of rescue and 
 new life and hope, and food and friends, and still Blakely 
 knelt and circled that dying head with the one arm left 
 him, and pleaded and besought even commanded. But 
 never again would word or order stir the soldier s willing 
 
234 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 pulse. The sergeant and his story had drifted together 
 beyond the veil, and Blakely, slowly rising, found the 
 lighted entrance swimming dizzily about him, first level 
 and then up-ended; found himself sinking, whither he 
 neither knew nor cared ; found the canon filling with many 
 voices, the sound of hurrying feet and then of many rush 
 ing waters, and then how was it that all was dark with 
 out the cave, and lighted lantern-lighted here within? 
 They had had no lantern, no candle. Here were both, 
 and here was a familiar face old Heartburn s bending 
 
 reassuringly over Wren, and someone was Why, 
 
 where was Carmody? Gone! And but a moment ago 
 that dying head was there on his knee, and then it was 
 daylight, too, and now why, it must be after nightfall, 
 else why these lanterns? And then old Heartburn came 
 bending over him in turn, and then came a rejoiceful 
 word: 
 
 " Hello, Bugs ! Well, it is high time you woke up ! 
 Here, take a swig of this ! " 
 
 Blakely drank and sat up presently, dazed, and Heart 
 burn went on with his cheery talk. " One of you men 
 out there call Captain Stout. Tell him Mr. Blakely s up 
 and asking for him," and, feeling presently a glow of 
 warmth coursing in his veins, the Bugologist roused to a 
 sitting posture and began to mumble questions. And then 
 a burly shadow appeared at the entrance, black against 
 the ruddy firelight in the canon without, where other 
 forms began to appear. Down on his knee came Stout to 
 clasp his one available hand and even clap him on the back 
 
WHERE IS ANGELA? 23(5 
 
 and send unwelcome jar through his fevered, swollen 
 arm. " Good boy, Bugs ! You re coming round fa 
 mously. We ll start you back to Sandy in the morning, 
 you and Wren, for nursing, petting, and all that sort of 
 thing. They are lashing the saplings now for your litters, 
 and we ve sent for Graham, too, and he ll meet you on the 
 the way, while we shove on after Shield s people." 
 
 " Shield Raven Shield?" queried Blakely, still half 
 dazed. " Shield was killed at Sandy," and yet there 
 was the memory of the voice he knew and heard in this 
 very canon. 
 
 " Shield, yes ; and now his brother heads them. Didn t 
 he send his card down to you, after the donicks, and be 
 damned to him ? You foregathered with both of them at 
 the agency. Oh, they re all alike, Bugs, once they re 
 started on the warpath. Now we must get you out into 
 the open for a while. The air s better." 
 
 And so, an hour later, his arm carefully dressed and 
 bandaged, comforted by needed food and fragrant tea and 
 the news that Wren was reviving under the doctor s minis 
 trations, and would surely mend and recover, Blakely lay 
 propped by the fire and heard the story of Stout s rush 
 through the wilderness to their succor. Never waiting 
 for the dawn, after a few hours rest at Beaver Spring, the 
 sturdy doughboys had eagerly followed their skilled and 
 trusted leader all the hours from eleven, stumbling, but 
 never halting even for rest or rations, and at last had 
 found the trail four miles below in the depths of the canon. 
 There ome scattering shots had met them, arrow and 
 
236 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 rifle both, from up the heights, and an effort was made to 
 delay their progress. Wearied and footsore though were 
 his men, they had driven the scurrying foe from rock to 
 rock and then, in a lull that followed, had heard the dis 
 tant sound of firing that told them whither to follow on. 
 Only one man, Stern, was able to give them coherent word 
 or welcome when at last they came, for Chalmers and 
 Carmody lay dead, Wren in a stupor, Blakely in a death 
 like swoon, and " that poor chap yonder " loony and hys 
 terical as a crazy man. Thank God they had not, as they 
 had first intended, waited for the break of day. 
 
 Another dawn and Stout and most of his men had 
 pushed on after the Apaches and in quest of the troop at 
 Sunset Pass. By short stages the soldiers left in charge 
 were to move the wounded homeward. By noon these 
 latter were halted under the willows by a little stream. 
 The guards were busy filling canteens and watering pack 
 mules, when the single sentry threw his rifle to the posi 
 tion of " ready " and the gun lock clicked loud. Over the 
 stony ridge to the west, full a thousand yards away, came 
 a little band of riders in single file, four men in all. Wren 
 was sleeping the sleep of exhaustion. Blakely, feverish 
 and excited, was wide awake. Mercifully the former 
 never heard the first question asked by the leading rider 
 Arnold, the ranchman as he came jogging into the noon 
 day bivouac. Stone, sergeant commanding, had run for 
 ward to meet and acquaint him with the condition of the 
 rescued men. " Got there in time then, thank God ! " he 
 cried, as wearily he flung himself out of saddle and 
 
WHERE IS ANGELA? 237 
 
 glanced quickly about him. There lay Wren, senseless 
 and still between the lashed ribs of his litter. There lay 
 Blakely, smiling feebly and striving to hold forth a wasted 
 hand, but Arnold saw it not. Swiftly his eyes flitted from 
 face to face, from man to man, then searched the little 
 knot of mules, sidelined and nibbling at the stunted herb 
 age in the glen. " I don t see Punch," he faltered. " Wh- 
 where s Miss Angela ? 
 
CHAPTER XXI 
 
 OUR VANISHED PRINCESS 
 
 THEN came a story told in fierce and excited 
 whisperings, Arnold the speaker, prompted 
 sometimes by his companions; Stone, and the 
 few soldiers grouped about him, awe-stricken and dis 
 mayed. Blakely had started up from his litter, his face 
 white with an awful dread, listening in wordless agony. 
 At six the previous morning, loping easily out from 
 Sandy, Arnold s people had reached the ranch and found 
 the veteran colonel with his orderlies impatiently waiting 
 for them. These latter had had abundant food and 
 coffee and the colonel was fuming with impatience to 
 move, but Arnold s people had started on empty stomachs, 
 counting on a hearty breakfast at the ranch. Jose could 
 have it ready in short order. So Byrne, with his men, 
 mounted and rode ahead on the trail of the infantry, say 
 ing the rest could overtake him before he reached the 
 rocky and dangerous path over the first range. For a few 
 miles the Beaver Valley was fairly wide and open. Not 
 twenty minutes later, as Arnold s comrades sat on the 
 porch on the north side of the house, they heard swift 
 hoof-beats, and wondered who could be coming now. 
 But, without an instant s pause, the rider had galloped by, 
 and one of the men, hurrying to the corner of the ranch, 
 
 238 
 
OUR VANISHED PRINCESS 239 
 
 was amazed to see the lithe, slender form of Angela Wren 
 speeding her pet pony like the wind up the sandy trail. 
 Arnold refused to believe at first, but his eyes speedily 
 told him the same story. He had barely a glimpse of her 
 before she was out of sight around a grove of willows up 
 the stream. " Galloping to catch the colonel," said he, 
 and such was his belief. Angela, he reasoned, had has 
 tened after them to send some message of love to her 
 wounded father, and had perhaps caught sight of the trio 
 far out in the lead. Arnold felt sure that they would 
 meet her coming back, sure that there was no danger for 
 her, with Byrne and his fellows well out to the front. 
 They finished their breakfast, therefore, reset their saddles, 
 mounted and rode for an hour toward the Mogollon and 
 still the pony tracks led them on, overlying those of the 
 colonel s party. Then they got among the rocks and only 
 at intervals found hoof-prints ; but, far up along the range, 
 caught sight of the three horsemen, and so, kept on. It 
 was after ten when at last they overtook the leaders, and 
 then, to their consternation, Angela Wren was not with 
 them. They had neither seen nor heard of her, and Byrne 
 was aghast when told that, alone and without a guide, she 
 had ridden in among the foothills of those desolate, path 
 less mountains. " The girl is mad," said he, " and yet it s 
 like her to seek to reach her father." 
 
 Instantly they divided forces to search for her. Gorges 
 and canons innumerable seamed the westward face of this 
 wild spur of the Sierras, and, by the merest luck in the 
 world, one of Arnold s men, spurring along a stony ridge, 
 
240 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 caught sight of a girlish form far across a deep ravine, 
 and quickly fired two shots in signal that he had 
 " sighted " the chase. It brought Arnold and two of his 
 men to the spot and, threading their way, sometimes afoot 
 and leading their steeds, sometimes in saddle and urging 
 them through the labyrinth of bowlders, they followed 
 on. At noon they had lost not only all sight of her, but 
 of their comrades, nor had they seen the latter since. 
 Byrne and his orderlies, with three of the party that 
 " pulled out " from Sandy with Arnold in the morning, had 
 disappeared. Again and again they fired their Henrys, 
 hoping for answering signal, or perhaps to attract An 
 gela s attention. All doubt as to her purpose was now 
 ended. Mad she might be, but determined she was, and 
 had deliberately dodged past them at the Beaver, fearing 
 opposition to her project. At two, moreover, they found 
 that she could " trail " as well as they, for among the 
 stunted cedars at the crest of a steep divide, they found 
 the print of the stout brogans worn by their infantry com 
 rades, and, down among the rocks of the next ravine, 
 crushed bits of hardtack by a " tank " in the hillside. She 
 had stopped there long enough at least to water Punch, 
 then pushed on again. 
 
 Once more they saw her, not three miles ahead at four 
 o clock, just entering a little clump of pines at the top of 
 a steep acclivity. They fired their rifles and shouted 
 loud in hopes of halting her, but all to no purpose. Night 
 came down and compelled them to bivouac. They built a 
 big fire to guide the wanderers, but morning broke with- 
 
OUR VANISHED PRINCESS 241 
 
 out sign of them ; so on they went, for now, away from the 
 rocks the trail was often distinct, and once again they 
 found the pony hoof-prints and thanked God. At seven 
 by Arnold s watch, among the breaks across a steep divide 
 they found another tank, more crumbs, a grain sack with 
 some scattered barley, more hardtack and the last trace of 
 Angela. Arnold s hand shook, as did his voice, as he drew 
 forth a little fluttering ribbon the " snood " poor Wren 
 so loved to see binding his child s luxuriant hair. 
 
 They reasoned she had stopped here to feed and water 
 her pony, and had probably bathed her face and flung 
 loose her hair and forgotten later the binding ribbon. 
 They believed she had followed on after Stout s hard- 
 marching company. It was easy to trail. They counted 
 on finding her when they found her father, and now here 
 lay Wren unconscious of her loss, and Blakely, realizing 
 it all cruelly, feverishly realizing it yet so weakened by 
 his wounds as to be almost powerless to march or mount 
 and go in search of her. 
 
 No question now as to the duty immediately before 
 them. In twenty minutes the pack mules were again 
 strapped between the saplings, the little command was 
 slowly climbing toward the westward heights, with Arnold 
 and two of his friends scouting the rough trail and hill 
 sides, firing at long intervals and listening in suspense al 
 most intolerable for some answering signal. The other 
 of their number had volunteered to follow Stout over the 
 plateau toward the Pass and acquaint him with the latest 
 news. 
 
242 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 While the sun was still high in the heavens, far to the 
 northward, they faintly heard or thought they heard two 
 rifle shots. At four o clock, as they toiled through a 
 tangle of rock and stunted pine, Arnold, riding well to 
 the front, came suddenly out upon a bare ledge from which 
 he could look over a wild, wide sweep of mountain side, 
 stretching leagues to north and south, and there his 
 keen and practiced eye was greeted by a sight that thrilled 
 him with dread unspeakable. Dread, not for himself or 
 his convoy of wounded, but dread for Angela. Jutting, 
 from the dark fringe of pines along a projecting bluff, 
 perhaps four miles away, little puffs or clouds of smoke, 
 each separate and distinct, were sailing straight aloft in 
 the pulseless air Indian signals beyond possibility of 
 doubt. Some Apaches, then, were still hovering about 
 the range overlooking the broad valley of the Sandy, some 
 of the bands then were prowling in the mountains between 
 the scouting troops and the garrisoned post. Some must 
 have been watching this very trail, in hopes of intercept 
 ing couriers or stragglers, some must have seen and seized 
 poor Angela. 
 
 He had sprung from saddle and leveled his old field 
 glass at the distant promontory, so absorbed in his search 
 he did not note the coming of the little column. The 
 litter bearing Blakely foremost of the four had halted 
 close beside him, and Blakely s voice, weak and strained, 
 yet commanding, suddenly startled him with demand to 
 be told what he saw, and Arnold merely handed him the 
 glass and pointed. The last of the faint smoke puffs was 
 
SIGXALS JJETONX* POSSIBILITY OF A 
 
OUR VANISHED PRINCESS 243 
 
 just soaring into space, making four still in sight. 
 Blakely never even took the binocular. He had seen 
 enough by the unaided eye. 
 
 With uplifted hand the sergeant had checked the com 
 ing of the next litter, Wren s, and those that followed it. 
 One of the wounded men, the poor lad crazed by the perils 
 of the siege, was alert and begging for more water, but 
 Wren was happily lost to the world in swoon or slumber. 
 To the soldier bending over him he seemed scarcely 
 breathing. Presently they were joined by two of Arnold s 
 party who had been searching out on the left flank. They, 
 too, had seen, and the three were now in low-toned 
 conference. Blakely for the moment was unnoted, for 
 gotten. 
 
 " That tank where we found the ribbon was just 
 about two miles yonder," said Arnold, pointing well down 
 the rugged slope toward the southwest, where other rocky, 
 pine-fringed heights barred the view to the distant Sandy. 
 " Surely the colonel or some of his fellows must be, along 
 here. Ride ahead a hundred yards or so and fire a couple 
 of shots," this to one of his men, who silently reined his 
 tired bronco into the rude trail among the pine cones and 
 disappeared. The others waited. Presently came the 
 half-smothered sound of a shot and a half-stifled cry from 
 the rearmost litter. Every such shock meant new terror 
 to that poor lad, but Wren never stirred. Half a minute 
 passed without another sound than faint and distant echo ; 
 then faint, and not so distant, came another sound, a pro 
 longed shout, and presently another, and then a horseman 
 
244 A\ APACHK 
 
 hove in sight among the trees across a nearly mile-wide 
 dip. Arnold and his friends rode on to meet him. leaving 
 the litters at the crest. In five minutes one of the riders 
 reappeared and called: " It s Horn, of the orderlies. He 
 reports Colonel P.yrne just ahead. Come on!" and 
 turning, dove hack down the twisted trail. 
 
 The colonel might have hecn just ahead when last seen, 
 but when they reached the tank he was far aloft again, 
 scouting from another height to the northward, and 
 while the orderly went on to find and tell him. Arnold and 
 his grave-faced comrade dismounted there to await the 
 coming of the litters. Graver were the faces even than 
 before. The news that had met them was most ominous. 
 Two of those who searched with Colonel Pvrne had found 
 pony tracks leading northward leading in the very di 
 rection in which they had seen the smoke. There was no 
 other pony shoe in the Sandy valley. It could be none 
 other than Angela s little friend and comrade Punch. 
 
 Ami this news they told to Ulakely as the foremost lit 
 ter came. He listened with hardly a word of comment; 
 then asked for his scouting notebook. He was sitting up 
 now. They helped him from his springy couch to a seat 
 on the rocks, and gave him a cup of the cold water. One 
 by one the other litters were led into the little amphitheater 
 and unlashed. F.vervone seemed to know that here must 
 be the bivouac for the night, their abiding place for an 
 other day. perhaps, unless they should hud the captain s 
 daughter. They spoke, when they spoke at all. in muffled 
 tones, these rough, war-worn men of the desert and the 
 
DTK VANISHED PRIMJ>- 245 
 
 mountain. They bent over the wounded with sorrowing 
 eyes, and wondered why no surgeon had come out to 
 meet them. Heartburn, of course, had done his best, 
 dressing and rebandaging the wounds at dawn, but then 
 he had to go on with Stout and the company, while one 
 of the Apache Yumas was ordered to dodge his way in 
 to Sandy, with a letter urging that Graham be sent out to 
 follow the trail and meet the returning party. 
 
 Meanwhile the sun had dropped behind the westward 
 heights ; the night would soon be coming down, chill and 
 overcast. Byrne was still away, but he couldn t miss the 
 tank, said one of the troopers who had ridden with him. 
 Twice during the morning they had all met there and 
 then gone forth again, searching searching. Punch s 
 little hoof-tracks, cutting through a sandy bit in the north 
 ward ravine, had drawn them all that way, but nothing 
 further had been found. His horse, too, said the orderly, 
 was lame and failing, so he had been bidden to wait by 
 the water and watch for couriers either from the front 
 or out from the post. Byrne was one of those never- 
 give-up men, and they all knew him. 
 
 Barley was served out to the animals, a little fire 
 lighted, lookouts were stationed, and presently their sol 
 dier supper was ready, and still Blakely said nothing. 
 He had written three notes or letters, one of which seemed 
 to give him no little trouble, for one after another he 
 thrust two leaves into the fire and started afresh. At 
 length they were ready, and he signaled to Arnold. 
 " You can count, I think, on Graham s getting here. 
 
246 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 within a few hours," said he. " Meantime you re as good 
 a surgeon as I need. Help me on with this sling." And 
 still they did not fathom his purpose. He was deathly 
 pale, and his eyes were eloquent of dread unspeakable, 
 but he seemed to have forgotten pain, fever, and prostra 
 tion. Arnold, in the silent admiration of the frontier, 
 untied the support, unloosed the bandages, and together 
 they redressed the ugly wound. Then presently the Bug- 
 ologist stood feebly upon his feet and looked about him. 
 It was growing darker, and not another sound had come 
 from Byrne. 
 
 " Start one of your men into Sandy at once," said 
 Blakely, to the sergeant, and handed him a letter ad 
 dressed to Major Plume. " He will probably meet the 
 doctor before reaching the Beaver. These other two I ll 
 tell you what to do with later. Now, who has the best 
 horse?" 
 
 Arnold stared. Sergeant Stone quickly turned and 
 saluted. " The lieutenant is not thinking of mounting, I 
 hope," said he. 
 
 Blakely did not even answer. He was studying the 
 orderly s bay. Stiff and a little lame he might be, but, re 
 freshed and strengthened by abundant barley, he was a 
 better weight-carrier than the other, and Blakely had 
 weight. " Saddle your horse, Horn," said he, " and 
 fasten on those saddle-bags of mine." 
 
 " But, lieutenant," ventured Arnold, " you are in no 
 shape to ride anything but that litter. Whatever you 
 think of doing, let me do." 
 
OUR VANISHED PRINCESS 247 
 
 " What I am thinking of doing nobody else can do," 
 said Blakely. " What you can do is, keep these two let 
 ters till I call for them. If at the end of a week I fail to 
 call, deliver them as addressed and to nobody else. Now, 
 before dark I must reach that point younder," and he in 
 dicated the spot where in the blaze of the westering sun 
 a mass of rock towered high above the fringing pine and 
 mournful shadows at its base, a glistening landmark 
 above the general gloom at the lower level and at that 
 hour of the afternoon. " Now," he added quietly, " you 
 can help me into saddle." 
 
 * But for God s sake, lieutenant, let some of us ride 
 with you," pleaded Arnold. " If Colonel Byrne was here 
 he d never let you go." 
 
 " Colonel Byrne is not here, and I command, I believe," 
 was the brief, uncompromising answer. " And no man 
 rides with me because, with another man, I d never find 
 what I m in search of." For a moment he bent over 
 Wren, a world of wordless care, dread, and yet determina 
 tion in his pale face. Arnold saw his wearied eyes close 
 a moment, his lips move as though in petition, then he 
 suddenly turned. " Let me have that ribbon," said he 
 bluntly, and without a word Arnold surrendered it. Stone 
 held the reluctant horse, Arnold helped the wounded sol 
 dier into the saddle. " Don t worry about me any of 
 you," said Blakely, in brief farewell. " Good-night," and 
 with that he rode away. 
 
 Arnold and the men stood gazing after him. " Grit 
 clean through," said the ranchman, through his set teeth, 
 
248 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 for a light was dawning on him, as he pondered over 
 Blakely s words. " May the Lord grant I don t have to 
 deliver these ! " Then he looked at the superscriptions. 
 One letter was addressed to Captain, or Miss Janet, Wren 
 the other to Mrs. Plume. 
 
CHAPTER XXII 
 
 SUSPENSE 
 
 SANDY again. Four of the days stipulated by 
 Lieutenant Blakely had run their course. The 
 fifth was ushered in, and from the moment he rode 
 away from the bivouac at the tanks no word had come 
 from the Bugologist, no further trace of Angela. In all 
 its history the garrison had known no gloom like this. 
 The hospital was filled with wounded. An extra sur 
 geon and attendants had come down from Prescott, but 
 Graham was sturdily in charge. Of his several patients 
 Wren probably was now causing him the sorest anxiety, 
 for the captain had been grievously wounded and was 
 pitiably weak. Now, when aroused at times from the las 
 situde and despond in which he lay, Wren would persist 
 in asking for Angela, and, not daring to tell him the 
 truth, Janet, Calvinist that she was to the very core, had 
 to do fearful violence to her feelings and lie. By the ad 
 vice of bluff old Byrne and the active connivance of the 
 post commander, they had actually, these stern Scotch 
 Presbyterians, settled on this as the deception to be prac 
 ticed that Angela had been drooping so sadly from anx 
 iety and dread she had been taken quite ill, and Dr. Gra 
 ham had declared she must be sent up to Prescott, or some 
 equally high mountain resort, there to rest and recuperate. 
 
250 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 She was in good hands, said these arch-conspirators. 
 She might be coming home any day. As for the troop 
 and the campaign, he mustn t talk or worry or think about 
 them. The general, with his big field columns, had had 
 no personal contact with the Indians. They had scattered 
 before him into the wild country toward the great Colo 
 rado, where Stout, with his hickory-built footmen, and 
 Brewster, with most of Wren s troop, were stirring up 
 Apaches night and day, while Sanders and others were 
 steadily driving on toward the old Wingate road. Stout 
 had found Brewster beleaguered, but safe and sound, 
 with no more men killed and few seriously wounded. They 
 had communicated with Sanders s side scouts, and were 
 finding and following fresh trails with every day, when 
 Stout was surprised to receive orders to drop pursuit and 
 start with Brewster s fellows and to scout the west face of 
 the mountains from the Beaver to the heights opposite 
 the old Indian reservation. There was a stirring scene at 
 bivouac when that order came, and with it the explana 
 tion that Angela Wren had vanished and was probably 
 captured; that Blakely had followed and was probably 
 killed. " They might shoot Blakely in fair fight," said 
 Stout, who knew him, and knew the veneration that lived 
 for him in the hearts of the Indian leaders, " but they at 
 least would never butcher him in cold blood. Their un 
 restrained young men might do it." Stout s awful dread, 
 like that of every man and woman at Sandy, and every 
 soldier in the field, was for Angela. The news, too, had 
 been rushed to the general, and his orders were instant. 
 
SUSPENSE 251 
 
 " Find the chiefs in the field," said he to his interpreter 
 and guide. " Find Shield s people, and say that if a hair 
 of her head is injured I shall hunt them down, braves, 
 women, and children I shall hunt them anyhow until 
 they surrender her unharmed." 
 
 But the Apaches were used to being hunted, and some 
 of them really liked the game. It was full of exhilara 
 tion and excitement, and not a few chances to hunt and 
 hit back. The threat conveyed no terror to the renegades. 
 It was to the Indians at the reservation that the tidings 
 brought dismay, yet even there, so said young Bridger, 
 leaders and followers swore they had no idea where the 
 white maiden could be, much less the young chief. They, 
 the peaceable and the poor servants of the great Father 
 at Washington, had no dealings with these others, his 
 foes. 
 
 About the post, where gloom and dread unspeakable 
 prevailed, there was no longer the fear of possible at 
 tack. The Indian prisoners in the guard-house had 
 dropped their truculent, defiant manner, and become again 
 sullen and apathetic. The down-stream settlers had re 
 turned to their ranches and reported things undisturbed. 
 Even the horse that had been missing and charged to 
 Downs had been accounted for. They found him graz 
 ing placidly about the old pasture, with the rope halter 
 trailing, Indian-knotted, from his neck, and his gray hide 
 still showing stains of blood about the mane and withers. 
 They wondered was it on this old stager the Apaches had 
 borne the wounded girl to the garrison she who still lay 
 
262 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 under the roof of Mother Shaughnessy, timidly visited at 
 times by big-eyed, shy little Indian maids from the reser 
 vation, who would speak no word that Sudsville could un 
 derstand, and few that even Wales Arnold could interpret. 
 All they would or could divulge was that she was the 
 daughter of old Eskiminzin, who was out in the moun 
 tains, and that she had been wounded " over there," and 
 they pointed eastward. By whom and under what circum 
 stances they swore they knew not, much less did they 
 know of Downs, or of how she chanced to have the scarf 
 once worn by the Frenchwoman Elise. 
 
 Then Arnold s wife and brood had gone back to their 
 home up the Beaver, while he himself returned to the 
 search for Angela and for Blakely. But those four days 
 had passed without a word of hope. In little squads a 
 dozen parties were scouring the rugged canons and cliffs 
 for signs, and finding nothing. Hours each day Plume 
 would come to the watchers on the bluff to ask if no 
 courier had been sighted. Hours each night the sentries 
 strained their eyes for signal fires. Graham, slaving with 
 his sick and wounded, saw how haggard and worn the 
 commander was growing, and spoke a word of caution. 
 Something told him it was not all on account of those 
 woeful conditions at the front. From several sources 
 came the word that Mrs. Plume was in a state bordering 
 on hysteric at department headquarters, where sympa 
 thetic women strove vainly to comfort and soothe her. 
 It was then that Elise became a center of interest, for 
 Elise was snapping with electric force and energy. " It 
 
SUSPENSE 253 
 
 is that they will assassinate madame these monsters," 
 she declared. " It is imperative, it is of absolute need, 
 that madame be taken to the sea, and these wretches, un 
 feeling, they forbid her to depart." Madame herself, it 
 would seem, so said those who had speech with her, de 
 clared she longed to be again with her husband at Sandy. 
 Then it was Elise who demanded that they should move. 
 Elise was mad to go Elise, who took a turn of her own, 
 a screaming fit, when the news came of the relief of 
 Wren s little force, of the death of their brave sergeant, of 
 the strange tale that, before dying, Carmody had breathed 
 a confession to Lieutenant Blakely, which Blakely had re 
 duced to writing before he set forth on his own hapless 
 mission. It was Mrs. Plume s turn now to have to play 
 nurse and comforter, and to strive to soothe, even to the 
 extent of promising that Elise should be permitted to 
 start by the very next stage to the distant sea, but when 
 it came to securing passage, and in feverish, nervous 
 haste the Frenchwoman had packed her chosen belong 
 ings into the one little trunk the stage people would con 
 sent to carry, lo! there came to her a messenger from 
 headquarters where Colonel Byrne, grim, silent, saturnine, 
 was again in charge. Any attempt on her part to leave 
 would result in her being turned over at once to the civil 
 authorities, and Elise understood and raved, but risked 
 not going to jail. Mullins, nursed by his devoted Norah, 
 was sitting up each day now, and had been seen by Colo 
 nel Byrne as that veteran passed through, ten pounds 
 lighter of frame and heavier of heart than when he set 
 
254 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 forth, and Mullins had persisted in the story that he had 
 been set upon and stabbed by two women opposite Lieu 
 tenant Blakely s quarters. What two had been seen out 
 there that night but Clarice Plume and her Gallic shadow, 
 Elise? 
 
 Meantime Aunt Janet was " looking ghastly," said the 
 ladies along that somber line of quarters, and something 
 really ought to be done. Just what that something should 
 be no two could unite in deciding, but really Major Plume 
 or Dr. Graham ought to see that, if something wasn t done, 
 she would break down under the awful strain. She had 
 grown ten years older in five days, they declared was 
 turning fearfully gray, and they were sure she never slept 
 a wink. Spoken to on this score, poor Miss Wren was 
 understood to say she not only could not sleep, but she 
 did not wish to. Had she kept awake and watched An 
 gela, as was her duty, the child could never have suc 
 ceeded in her wild escapade. The " child," by the way, 
 had displayed rare generalship, as speedily became known. 
 She must have made her few preparations without a be 
 traying sound, for even Kate Sanders, in the same room, 
 was never aroused Kate, who was now well-night heart 
 broken. They found that Angela had crept downstairs 
 in her stockings, and had put on her riding moccasins 
 and leggings at the kitchen steps. There, in the sand, 
 were the tracks of her long, slender feet. They found 
 that she had taken with her a roomy hunting-pouch that 
 hung usually in her father s den. She had filled it, ap 
 parently, with food, tea, sugar, even lemons, for half a 
 
SUSPENSE 255 
 
 dozen of this precious and hoarded fruit had disappeared. 
 Punch, too, had been provided for. She had " packed " 
 a half-bushel of barley from the stables. There was no 
 one to say Miss Angela nay. She might have ridden off 
 with the flag itself and no sentry would more than think 
 of stopping her. Just what fate had befallen her no one 
 dare suggest. The one thing, the only one, that roused 
 a vestige of hope was that Lieutenant Blakely had gone 
 alone on what was thought to be her trail. 
 
 Now here was a curious condition of things. If any 
 one had been asked to name the most popular officer at 
 Sandy, there would have been no end of discussion. Per 
 haps the choice would have lain between Sanders, Cutler, 
 and old Westervelt good and genial men. Asked to 
 name the least popular officer, and, though men, and 
 women, too, would have shrunk from saying it, the name 
 that would have occurred to almost all was that of 
 Blakely. And why? Simply because he stood alone, 
 self-poised, self-reliant, said his few friends, " self-cen 
 tered and selfish" said more than Mrs. Bridger, whereas 
 a more generous man had never served at Sandy. That, 
 however, they had yet to learn. But when a man goes 
 his way in the world, meddling with no one else s busi 
 ness, and never mentioning his own, courteous and civil, 
 but never intimate, studying a good deal but saying little, 
 asking no favors and granting few, perhaps because sel 
 dom asked, the chances are he will win the name of being 
 cold, indifferent, even repellent, " too high, mighty, and 
 superior." His very virtues become a fault, for men and 
 
256 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 women love best those who are human like themselves, 
 however they may respect. Among the troopers Blakely 
 was as yet something of an enigma. His manner of 
 speaking to them was unlike that of most of his fellows it 
 was grave, courteous, dignified, never petulant or irritable. 
 In those old cavalry days most men better fancied some 
 thing more demonstrative. " I like to see an officer flare 
 up and say things," said a veteran sergeant. " This 
 here bug-catcher is too damned cold-blooded." They re 
 spected him, yes ; yet they little understood and less loved 
 him. They had known him too short a time. 
 
 But among the Indians Blakely was a demi-god. 
 Grave, unruffled, scrupulously exact in word and deed, 
 he made them trust him. Brave, calm, quick in moments 
 of peril, he made them admire him. How fearlessly he 
 had stepped into the midst of that half-frenzied sextette, 
 tiswin drunk, and disarmed Kwonagietah and two of his 
 fellow-revelers! How instant had been his punishment 
 of that raging, rampant, mutinous old medicine man, 
 Skiminzin, who dared to threaten him and the agency! 
 (That episode only long years after reached the ears of 
 the Indian Advancement Association in the imaginative 
 East.) How gently and skillfully he had ministered to 
 Shield s younger brother, and to the children of old Chief 
 Toyah ! It was this, in fact, that won the hate and envy 
 of Skiminzin. How lavish was Blakely s bounty to the 
 aged and to the little ones, and Indians love their children 
 infinitely ! The hatred or distrust of Indian man or woman, 
 once incurred, is venomous and lasting. The trust, above 
 
SUSPENSE 
 
 all the gratitude, of the wild race, once fairly won, is to 
 the full as stable. Nothing will shake it. There are 
 those who say the love of an Indian girl, once given, sur 
 passes that of her Circassian sister, and Bridger now was 
 learning new stories of the Bugologist with every day of 
 his progress in Apache lore. He had even dared to bid 
 his impulsive little wife " go slow," should she ever again 
 be tempted to say spiteful things of Blakely. " If what 
 old Toyah tells me is true," said he, " and I believe him, 
 Hualpai or Apache Mohave, there isn t a decent Indian in 
 this part of Arizona that wouldn t give his own scalp to 
 save Blakely." Mrs. Bridger did not tell this at the 
 time, for she had said too much the other way; but, on 
 this fifth day of our hero s absence, there came tidings 
 that unloosed her lips. 
 
 Just at sunset an Indian runner rode in on one of Ar 
 nold s horses, and bearing a dispatch for Major Plume. 
 It was from that sturdy campaigner, Captain Stout, who 
 knew every mile of the old trail through Sunset Pass long 
 years before even the th Cavalry, the predecessors of 
 Plume, and Wren, and Sanders, and what Stout said no 
 man along the Sandy ever bade him swear to. 
 
 " Surprised small band, Tontos, at dawn to-day. They had 
 saddle blanket marked W. A. [Wales Arnold], and hat and un 
 derclothing marked Downs. Indian boy prisoner says Downs 
 was caught just after the big burning at Camp Sandy [Lieu 
 tenant Blakely s quarters]. He says that Alchisay, Blakely s boy 
 courier, was with them two days before, and told him Apache 
 Mohaves had more of Downs s things, and that a white chief s 
 daughter was over there in the Red Rocks. Sanders, with three 
 troops, is east of us and searching that way now. This boy says 
 
2o8 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 Alchisay knew that Natzie and Lola had been hiding not far from 
 Willow Tank on the Beaver trail our route but had fled from 
 there same time Angela disappeared. Against her own people 
 Natzie would protect Blakely, even were they demanding his life 
 in turn for her Indian lover, Shield s. If these girls can be 
 tracked and found, I believe you will have found Blakely and 
 will find Angela." 
 
 That night, after being fed and comforted until even 
 an Indian could eat no more, the messenger, a young 
 Apache Mohave, wanted papel to go to the agency, but 
 Plume had other plans. " Take him down to Shaugh- 
 nessy s," said he to Truman, " and see if he knows that 
 girl." So take him they did, and at sight of his swarthy 
 face the girl had given a low cry of sudden, eager joy; 
 then, as though reading warning in his glance, turned her 
 face away and would not talk. It was the play of almost 
 every Apache to understand no English whatever, yet 
 Truman could have sworn she understood when he asked 
 her if she could guess where Angela was in hiding. The 
 Indian lad had shaken his head and declared he knew 
 nothing. The girl was dumb. Mrs. Bridger happened 
 in a moment later, coming down with Mrs. Sanders to 
 see how the strange patient was progressing. They stood 
 in silence a moment, listening to Truman s murmured 
 words. Then Mrs. Bridger suddenly spoke. "Ask her 
 if she knows Natzie s cave," said she. " Natzie s cave," 
 she repeated, with emphasis, and the Indian girl guile 
 lessly shook her head, and then turned and covered her 
 face with her hands. 
 
CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 AN APACHE QUEEN 
 
 IN the slant of the evening sunshine a young girl, an 
 Indian, was crouching among the bare rocks at the 
 edge of a steep and rugged descent. One tawny 
 little hand, shapely in spite of scratches, was uplifted to 
 her brows, shading her keen and restless eyes against the 
 glare. In the other hand, the right, she held a little, cir 
 cular pocket-mirror, cased in brass, and held it well down 
 in the shade. Only the tangle of her thick, black hair 
 and the top of her head could be seen from the westward 
 side. Her slim young body was clothed in a dark-blue, 
 well-made garment, half sack, half skirt, with long, 
 loose trousers of the same material. There was fanciful 
 embroidery of bead and thread about the throat. There 
 was something un-Indian about the cut and fashion of the 
 garments that suggested civilized and feminine super 
 vision. The very way she wore her hair, parted and roll 
 ing back, instead of tumbling in thick, barbaric " bang " 
 into her eyes, spoke of other than savage teaching; and 
 the dainty make, of her moccasins ; the soft, pliant folds of 
 the leggins that fell, Apache fashion, about her ankles, all 
 told, with their bead work and finish,, that this was no un 
 sought girl of the tribespeople. Even the sudden gesture 
 with which, never looking back, she cautioned some fol- 
 
 259 
 
260 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 lower to keep down, spoke significantly of rank and 
 authority. It was a chief s daughter that knelt peering 
 intently over the ledge of rocks toward the black shadows 
 of the opposite slope. It was Natzie, child of a warrior 
 leader revered among his people, though no longer spared 
 to guide them Natzie, who eagerly, anxiously searched 
 the length of the dark gorge for sign or signal, and 
 warned her companion to come no further. 
 
 Over the gloomy depths, a mile away about a jutting 
 point, three or four buzzards were slowly circling, dis 
 turbed, yet determined. Over the broad valley that ex 
 tended for miles toward the westward range of heights, 
 the mantle of twilight was slowly creeping, as in his ex 
 pressive sign language the Indian spreads his extended 
 hands, palms down, drawing and smoothing imaginary 
 blanket, the robe of night, over the face of nature. Far 
 to the northward, from some point along the face of the 
 heights, a fringe of smoke was drifting in the soft breeze 
 sweeping down the valley from the farther Sierras. Wild, 
 untrodden, undesired of man, the wilderness lay out 
 spread miles and miles of gloom and desolation, save 
 where some lofty scarp of glistening rock, jutting from 
 among the scattered growth of dark-hued pine and cedar, 
 caught the brilliant rays of the declining sun. 
 
 Behind the spot where Natzie knelt, the general slope 
 was broken by a narrow ledge or platform, bowlder- 
 strewn from which, almost vertically, rose the rocky 
 scarp again. Among the sturdy, stunted fir trees, beard 
 ing the rugged face, frowned a deep fissure, dark as a 
 
AN APACHE QUEEN 261 
 
 wolf den, and, just in front of it, wide-eyed, open- 
 mouthed, crouched Lola Natzie s shadow. Rarely in 
 reservation days, until after Blakely came as agent, were 
 they ever seen apart, and now, in these days of exile and 
 alarm, they were not divided. Under a spreading cedar, 
 close to the opening, a tiny fire glowed in a crevice of the 
 rocks, sending forth no betraying smoke. About it were 
 some rude utensils, a pot or two, a skillet, an earthen 
 olla, big enough to hold perhaps three gallons, two bowls 
 of woven grass, close plaited, almost, as the famous fiber 
 of Panama. In one of these was heaped a store of 
 pinons, in the other a handful or two of wild plums. Sign 
 of civilization, except a battered tin teapot, there was 
 none, yet presently was there heard a sound that told 
 of Anglo-Saxon presence the soft voice of a girl in 
 low-toned, sweet-worded song song so murmurous 
 it might have been inaudible save in the intense 
 stillness of that almost breathless evening song so low 
 that the Indian girl, intent in her watch at the edge of the 
 cliff, seemed not to hear at all. It was Lola who heard 
 and turned impatiently, a black frown in her snapping 
 eyes, and a lithe young Indian lad, hitherto unseen, 
 dropped noiselessly from a perch somewhere above them 
 and, filling a gourd at the olla, bent and disappeared in 
 the narrow crevice back of the curtain of firs. The low 
 song ceased gradually, softly, as a mother ceases her 
 crooning lullaby, lest the very lack of the love-notes stir 
 the drowsing baby brain to sudden waking. 
 
 With the last words barely whispered the low voice 
 
262 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 died away. The Indian lad came forth into the light 
 again, empty-handed ; plucked at Lola s gown, pointed to 
 Natzie, for the moment forgotten, now urgently beckon 
 ing. Bending low, they ran to her. She was pointing 
 across the deep gorge that opened a way to the south 
 ward. Something far down toward its yawning mouth 
 had caught her eager eye, and grasping the arm of the 
 lad with fingers that twitched and burned, she whispered 
 in the Apache tongue : 
 
 " They re coming." 
 
 One long look the boy gave in the direction pointed, 
 then, backing away from the edge, he quickly swept 
 away a Navajo blanket that hung from the protruding 
 branches of a low cedar, letting the broad light into the 
 cavelike space beyond. There, on a hard couch of rock, 
 skin, and blanket, lay a fevered form in rough scouting 
 dress. There, with pinched cheeks, and eyes that heavily 
 opened, dull and suffused, lay the soldier officer who had 
 ridden forth to rescue and to save, himself now a crippled 
 and helpless captive. Beside him, wringing out a wet 
 handkerchief and spreading it on the burning forehead, 
 knelt Angela. The girls who faced each other for the 
 first time at the pool the daughter of the Scotch- Ameri 
 can captain the daughter of the Apache Mohave chief 
 were again brought into strange companionship over the 
 unconscious form of the soldier Blakely. 
 
 Resentful of the sudden glare that caused her patient 
 to shrink and toss complainingly, Angela glanced up al 
 most in rebuke, but was stilled by the look and attitude 
 
SLOWLY THEY SAW HER RAISE HER RIGHT HAJTD, STILU 
 CAUTIOUSLY HOLDING THE LITTLE MIRROR " 
 
AN APACHE QUEEN 263 
 
 of the young savage. He stood with forefinger on his 
 closed lips, bending excitedly toward her. He was cau 
 tioning her to make no sound, even while his very coming 
 brought disturbance to her first thought her fevered 
 patient. Then, seeing both rebuke and question in her 
 big, troubled eyes, the young Indian removed his finger 
 and spoke two words : " Patchie come," and, rising, she 
 followed him out to the flat in front. 
 
 Natzie at the moment was still crouching close to the 
 edge, gazing intently over, one little brown hand ner 
 vously grasping the branch of a stunted cedar, the other 
 as nervously clutching the mirror. So utterly absorbed 
 was she that the hiss of warning, or perhaps of hatred, 
 with which Lola greeted the sudden coming of Angela, 
 seemed to fall unnoted on her ears. Lola, her black eyes 
 snapping and her lips compressed, glanced up at the 
 white girl almost in fury. Natzie, paying no heed what 
 ever to what was occurring about her, knelt breathless at 
 her post, watching, eagerly watching. Then, slowly, 
 they saw her raise her right hand, still cautiously holding 
 the little mirror, face downward, and at sight of this the 
 Apache boy could scarcely control his trembling, and 
 Lola, turning about, spoke some furious words, in low, 
 intense tone, that made him shrink back toward the 
 screen. Then the wild girl glared again at Angela, as 
 though the sight of her were unbearable, and, with as 
 furious a gesture, sought to drive her, too, again to the 
 refuge of the dark cleft, but Angela never stirred. Pay 
 ing no heed to Lola, the daughter of the soldier gazed 
 
264 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 only at the daughter of the chief, at Natzie, whose hand 
 was now level with the surface of the rock. The next 
 instant, far to the northwest flashed a slender beam of 
 dazzling light, another another. An interval of a sec 
 ond or two, and still another flash. Angela could see the 
 tiny, nebulous dot, like will- o-the-wisp, dancing far over 
 among the rocks across a gloomy gorge. She had never 
 seen it before, but knew it at a glance. The Indian girl 
 was signaling to some of her father s people far over 
 toward the great reservation, and the tale she told was 
 that danger menaced. Angela could not know that it 
 told still more, that danger menaced not only Natzie, 
 daughter of one warrior chief, and the chosen of another 
 now among their heroic dead it threatened those whom 
 she was pledged to protect, even against her own people. 
 
 Somewhere down that deep and frowning rift to the 
 southwest, Indian guides were leading their brethren on 
 the trail of these refugees among the upper rocks. Some 
 where, far over among the uplands to the northwest, 
 other tribesfolk, her own kith and kin, were lurking, and 
 these the Indian girl was summoning with all speed, to 
 her aid. 
 
 And in the slant of that same glaring sunshine, not 
 four miles away, toiling upward along a rocky slope, fol 
 lowing the faint sign here and there of Apache moccasin, 
 a little command of hardy, war-worn men had nearly 
 reached the crest when their leader signaled backward 
 to the long column of files, and, obedient to the excited 
 gestures of the young Hualpai guide, climbed to his side 
 
AN APACHE QUEEN 265 
 
 and gazed intently over. What he saw on a lofty point 
 of rocks, well away from the tortuous " breaks " through 
 which they had made most of their wearying marches 
 from the upper Beaver, brought the light of hope, the fire 
 of battle, to his somber eyes. " Send Arnold up here/ 
 he shouted to the men below, and Arnold came, clamber 
 ing past rock and bowlder until he reached the captain s 
 side, took one look in the direction indicated, and brought 
 his brown hand down with resounding swat on the butt 
 of his rifle. "Treed em!" said he exultantly; then, 
 with doubtful, backward glance along the crouching file 
 of weary men, some sitting now and fanning with their 
 broad-brimmed hats, he turned again to the captain 
 and anxiously inquired : " Can we make it before 
 dark?" 
 
 " We must make it ! " simply answered Stout. 
 
 And then, far over among the heights between them 
 and the reservation, there went suddenly aloft one, two, 
 three compact little puffs of bluish smoke. Someone 
 was answering signals flashed from the rocky point 
 someone who, though far away, was promising aid. 
 " Let s be the first to reach them, lads," said Stout, him 
 self a wearied man. And with that they slowly rose and 
 went stumbling upward. The prize was worth their 
 every effort, and hope was leading on. 
 
 An hour later, with barely half the distance traversed, 
 so steep and rocky, so wild and winding, was the way, 
 with the sun now tangent to the distant range afar across 
 the valley, they faintly heard a sound that spurred them 
 
266 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 on two shots in quick succession from unseen depths 
 below the lofty point. And now they took the Indian jog 
 trot. There was business ahead. 
 
 Between them and that gleaming promontory now lay 
 a comparatively open valley, less cumbered with bowlders 
 than were the ridges and ravines through which they had 
 come, less obstructed, too, with stunted trees. Here was 
 opportunity for horsemen, hitherto denied, and Stout 
 called on Brewster and his score of troopers, who for 
 hours had been towing their tired steeds at the rear of 
 column. " Mount and push ahead ! " said he. " You are 
 Wren s own men. It is fitting you should get there 
 first." 
 
 " Won t the captain ride with us now ? " asked the 
 nearest sergeant. 
 
 " Not if it robs a man of his mount," was the answer. 
 Yet there was longing in his eye and all men saw it. 
 He had led them day after day, trudging afoot, because 
 his own lads could not ride. Indeed, there had been few 
 hours when any horse could safely bear a rider. There 
 came half a dozen offers now. " I ll tramp afoot if the 
 captain 11 only take my horse," said more than one 
 man. 
 
 And so the captain was with them, as with darkness 
 settling down they neared the great cliff towering against 
 the southeastward sky. Then suddenly they realized 
 they were guided thither only just in time to raise a well- 
 nigh fatal siege. Thundering down the mountain side a 
 big bowlder came tearing its way, launched from the very 
 
AN APACHE QUEEN 267 
 
 point that had been the landmark of their eager coming, 
 and with the downward crashing of the rock there burst 
 a yell of fury. 
 
 Midway up the steep incline, among the straggling 
 timber, two lithe young Indians were seen bounding out 
 of a little gully, only just in time to escape. Two or three 
 others, farther aloft, darted around a shoulder of cliff as 
 though scurrying out of sight. From the edge of the 
 precipice the crack of a revolver was followed by a second, 
 and then by a scream. " Dismount ! " cried Brewster, as 
 he saw the captain throw himself from his horse; then, 
 leaving only two or three to gather in their now excited 
 steeds, snapping their carbines to full cock, with blazing 
 eyes and firm-set lips, the chosen band began their final 
 climb. " Don t bunch. Spread out right and left," were 
 the only cautions, and then in long, irregular line, up the 
 mountain steep they clambered, hope and duty still lead 
 ing on, the last faint light of the November evening 
 showing them their rocky way. Now, renegadoes, it is 
 fight or flee for your lives ! 
 
 Perhaps a hundred yards farther up the jagged face the 
 leaders came upon an incline so steep that, like the Tontos 
 above them, they were forced to edge around to the south 
 ward, whither their comrades followed. Presently, issu 
 ing from the shelter of the pines, they came upon a bare 
 and bowlder-dotted patch to cross which brought them 
 plainly into view of the heights above, and almost in 
 stantly under fire. Shot after shot, to which they could 
 make no reply, spat and flattened on the rocks about them, 
 
268 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 but, dodging- and ducking instinctively, they pressed 
 swiftly on. Once more within the partial shelter of the 
 pines across the open, they again resumed the climb, com 
 ing suddenly upon a sight that fairly spurred them. 
 There, feet upward among the bowlders, stiff and swollen 
 in death, lay all that the lynxes had left of a cavalry 
 horse. Gose at hand was the battered troop saddle. 
 Caught in the bushes a few rods above was the folded 
 blanket, and, lodged in a crevice, still higher, lay the felt- 
 covered canteen, stenciled with the number and letter of 
 Wren s own troop. It was the horse of the orderly, 
 Horn the horse on which the Bugologist had ridden 
 away in search of Angela Wren. It was all the rescuers 
 needed to tell them they were now on the trail of both, 
 and now the carbines barked in earnest at every flitting 
 glimpse of the foe, sending the wary Tontos skipping and 
 scurrying southward. And, at last, breathless, panting, 
 well-nigh exhausted, the active leaders found themselves 
 halting at a narrow, twisting little game trail, winding 
 diagonally up the slope, with that gray scarp of granite 
 jutting from the mountain side barely one hundred yards 
 farther; and, waving from its crest, swung by unseen 
 hands, some white, fluttering object, faintly seen in the 
 gathering dusk, beckoned them on. The last shots fired 
 at the last Indians seen gleamed red in the autumn gloam 
 ing. They, the rescuers, had reached their tryst only 
 just as night and darkness shrouded the westward valley. 
 The last man up had to grope his way, and long before 
 that last man reached the ledge the cheering word was 
 
AN APACHE QUEEN 269 
 
 passed from the foremost climber : " Both here, boys, and 
 safe!" 
 
 An hour later brought old Heartburn to the scene, 
 scrambling up with the other footmen, and speedily was 
 he kneeling by the fevered officer s side. The troopers 
 had been sent back to their horses. Only Stout, the doc 
 tor, Wales Arnold, and one or two sergeants remained at 
 the ledge, with rescued Angela, the barely conscious pa 
 tient, and their protectors, the Indian girls. Already the 
 boy had been hurried off with a dispatch to Sandy, and 
 now dull, apathetic, and sullen, Lola sat shrouded in her 
 blanket, while Arnold, with the little Apache dialect he 
 knew, was striving to get from Natzie some explanation 
 of her daring and devotion. 
 
 Between tears and laughter, Angela told her story. It 
 was much as they had conjectured. Mad with anxiety on 
 her father s account, she said, she had determined to reach 
 him and nurse him. She felt sure that, with so many 
 troops out between the post and the scene of action, there 
 was less danger of her being caught by Indians than of 
 being turned back by her own people. She had purposely 
 dashed by the ranch, fearing opposition, had purposely 
 kept behind Colonel Byrne s party until she found a way 
 of slipping round and past them where she could feel sure 
 of speedily regaining the trail. She had encountered 
 neither friend nor foe until, just as she would have ridden 
 away from the Willow Tanks, she was suddenly con 
 fronted by Natzie, Lola, and two young Apaches. Natzie 
 eagerly gesticulated, exclaiming, "Apaches, Apaches," 
 
270 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 and pointing ahead up the trail, and, though she could 
 speak no English, convincing Angela that she was in des 
 perate danger. The others were scowling and hateful, 
 but completely under Natzie s control, and between them 
 they hustled her pony into a ravine leading to the north 
 and led him along for hours, Angela, powerless to prevent, 
 riding helplessly on. At last they made her dismount, 
 and then came a long, fearful climb afoot, up the steepest 
 trail she had ever known, until it brought her here. And 
 here, she could not tell how many nights afterwards it 
 seemed weeks, so had the days and hours dragged here, 
 while she slept at last the sleep of exhaustion, they had 
 brought Mr. Blakely. He lay there in raging fever when 
 she was awakened that very morning by Natzie s crying 
 in her ear some words that sounded like: " Hermano 
 iriene! Hermano viene!" 
 
 Stout had listened with absorbing interest and to the 
 very last word. Then, as one who heard at length full 
 explanation of what he had deemed incredible, his hand 
 went out and clutched that of Arnold, while his deep eyes, 
 full of infinite pity, turned to where poor Natzie crouched, 
 watching silently and in utter self-forgetfulness the doc 
 tor s ministrations. 
 
 "Wales," he muttered, "that settles the whole busi 
 ness. Whatever you do, don t let that poor girl know 
 that they " and now he warily glanced toward Angela 
 " they are not brother and sister." 
 
TH:EV HUSTLED HER POXY IXTO A KA.VIXE 
 
CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 THE MEETING AT SANDY 
 
 DECEMBER, and the noonday sun at Sandy still 
 beat hotly on the barren level of the parade. 
 The fierce and sudden campaign seemed ended, 
 for the time, at least, as only in scattered remnants could 
 the renegade Indians be found. Eastward from the Agua 
 Fria to the Chiquito, and northward from the Salado to 
 the very cliffs of the grand canon, the hard-worked 
 troopers had scoured the wild and mountainous country, 
 striking hard whenever they found a hostile band, striv 
 ing ever, through interpreters and runners, to bring the 
 nervous and suspicious tribes to listen to reason and to 
 return to their reservations. This for long days, how 
 ever, seemed impossible. The tragic death of Raven 
 Shield, most popular of the young chiefs, struck down, as 
 they claimed, when he was striving only to defend Natzie, 
 daughter of a revered leader, had stirred the savages to 
 furious reprisals, and nothing but the instant action of the 
 troops in covering the valley had saved the scattered set 
 tlers from universal massacre. Enough had been done 
 by one band alone to thrill the West with horror, but 
 these had fled southward into Mexico and were safe be 
 yond the border. The settlers were slowly creeping back 
 now to their abandoned homes, and one after another the 
 
 271 
 
272 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 little field detachments were marching to their accustomed 
 stations. Sandy was filling up again with something be 
 sides the broken down and wounded. 
 
 First to come in was Stout s triumphant half hundred, 
 the happiest family of horse and foot, commingled, ever 
 seen upon the Pacific slope, for their proud lot it had been 
 to reach and rescue Angela, beloved daughter of the regi 
 ment, and Blakely, who had well-nigh sacrificed himself 
 in the effort to find and save her. Stout and his thirty 
 "doughboys," Brewster, the sergeant, with his twenty 
 troopers, had been welcomed by the entire community as 
 the heroes of the brief campaign, but Stout would none of 
 their adulation. 
 
 " There is the one you should thank and bless, * said he, 
 his eyes turning to where stood Natzie, sad and silent, 
 watching the attendants who were lifting Neil Blakely 
 from the litter to the porch of the commanding officer. 
 
 They had brought her in with them, Lola and Alchisay 
 as well the last two scowling and sullen, but ruled by 
 the chieftain s daughter. They had loaded her with 
 praise and thanks, but she paid no heed. Two hours after 
 Stout and his troopers had reached the cliff and driven 
 away the murderous band of renegades Tontos and 
 Apache Yumas bent on stealing her captives, there had 
 come a little party of her own kindred in answer to her 
 signals, but these would have been much too late. 
 Blakely would have been butchered. Angela and her 
 benefactors, too, would probably have been the victims of 
 their captors. Natzie could look for no mercy from them 
 
THE MEETING AT SANDY 273 
 
 now. Through Wales Arnold, the captain and his men 
 had little by little learned the story of Natzie s devotion. 
 In the eyes of her father, her brother, her people, Blakely 
 was greater even than the famous big chief, Crook, the 
 Gray Fox, who had left them, ordered to other duties but 
 the year gone by. Blakely had quickly righted the wrongs 
 done them by a thieving agent. Blakely had given fair 
 trial to and saved the life of Mariano, that fiery brother, 
 who, ironed by the former agent s orders, had with his 
 shackled hands struck down his persecutor and then 
 escaped. Blakely had won their undying gratitude, and 
 Stout and Arnold saw now why it was that one young 
 brave, at least, could not share the love his people bore 
 for Gran Capitan Blanco that one was Quonothay 
 the Chief Raven Shield. They saw now why poor Natzie 
 had no heart to give her Indian lover. They saw now 
 why it was that Natzie wandered from the agency and 
 hovered for some days before the outbreak there around 
 the post. It was to be near the young white chief whom 
 she well-nigh worshiped, whom she had been accustomed 
 to see every day of her life during his duties at the agency. 
 They saw now why it was the savage girl had dared the 
 vengeance of the Apaches by the rescue of Angela. She 
 believed her to be Blakely s sister, yet they could not give 
 the reason why. They knew very little of Neil Blakely, 
 but what they did know made them doubt that he could 
 ever have been the one at fault. Over this problem both 
 ranchman and soldier, Arnold and Stout, looked grave 
 indeed. It was not like Blakely that he should make a 
 
274 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 victim of this young Indian girl. She was barely six 
 teen, said Arnold, who knew her people well. She had 
 never been alone with Blakely, said her kinsfolk, who 
 came that night in answer to her signals. She had saved 
 Angela, believing her to be Blakely s own blood, had led 
 her to her own mountain refuge, and then, confident that 
 Blakely would make search for it and for his sister, had 
 gone forth and found him, already half-dazed with fever 
 and exhaustion, and had striven to lead his staggering 
 horse up that precipitous trail. It was the poor brute s 
 last climb. Blakely she managed to bring in safety to 
 her lofty eerie. The horse had fallen, worn out in the 
 effort, and died on the rocks below. She had roused An 
 gela with what she thought would be joyful tidings, even 
 though she saw that her hero was desperately ill. She 
 thought, of course, the white girl knew the few words of 
 Spanish that she could speak. All this was made evident 
 to Arnold and Stout, partly through Natzie s young 
 brother, who had helped to find and support the white 
 chief, partly through the girl herself. It was evident to 
 Arnold, too, that up to the time of their coming nothing 
 had happened to undeceive Natzie as to that relationship. 
 They tried to induce her to return to the agency, although 
 her father and brother were still somewhere with the 
 hostile bands, but she would not, she would go with them 
 to Sandy, and they could not deny her. More than once 
 on that rongh march of three days they found themselves 
 asking what would the waking be. Angela, daughter of 
 civilization, under safe escort, had been sent on ahead, 
 
THE MEETING AT SANDY 275 
 
 close following the courier who scurried homeward with 
 the news. Natzie, daughter of the wilderness, could not 
 be driven from the sight of Blakely s litter. The dumb, 
 patient, pathetic appeal of her great soft eyes, as she 
 watched every look in the doctor s face, was some 
 thing wonderful to see. But now, at last, the fevered 
 sufferer was home, still only semi-conscious, being borne 
 within the walls of the major s quarters, and she who had 
 saved him, slaved for him, dared for him, could only 
 mutely gaze after his prostrate and wasted form as it dis 
 appeared within the darkened hallway in the arms of his 
 men. Then came a light step bounding along the veranda 
 then came Angela, no longer clad in the riding garb in 
 which hitherto Natzie had seen her, but in cool and 
 shimmering white, with gladness and gratitude in her 
 beautiful eyes, with welcome and protection in her ex 
 tended hand, and the Indian girl looked strangely from 
 her to the dark hallway within which her white hero had 
 disappeared, and shrank back from the proffered touch. 
 If this was the soldier s sister should not she now be at 
 the soldier s side? Had she other lodge than that which 
 gave him shelter, now that his own was burned ? Angela 
 saw for the first time aversion, question, suspicion in the 
 great black eyes from which the softness and the plead 
 ing had suddenly fled. Then, rebuffed, disturbed, and 
 troubled, she turned to Arnold, who would gladly have 
 slipped away. 
 
 "Can t you make her understand, Mr. Arnold?" she 
 pleaded. " I don t know a word of her language, and I 
 
276 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 so want to be her friend so want to take her to my 
 home ! " 
 
 And then the frontiersman did a thing for which, when 
 she heard of it one sunset later, his better half said words 
 of him and to him that overstepped all bounds of parlia 
 mentary, usage, and that only a wife would dare to employ. 
 With the blundering stupidity of his sex, poor Arnold 
 " settled things " for many a day and well-nigh ruined 
 the sweetest romance that Sandy had ever seen the 
 birth of. 
 
 " Ah, Miss Angela ! only one place will ever be home to 
 Natzie now. Her eyes will tell you that." 
 
 And already, regardless of anything these women of the 
 white chiefs might think or say, unafraid save of seeing 
 him no more, unashamed save of being where she could 
 not heed his every look or call or gesture, the daughter 
 of the mountain and the desert stood gazing again after 
 the vanished form her eyes long months had worshiped, 
 and the daughter of the schools and civilization stood 
 flushing one-half moment, then slowly paling, as, without 
 another glance or effort, she turned silently away. Kate 
 Sanders it was who sprang quickly after her and en 
 circled the slender waist with her fond and clasping 
 arm. 
 
 That night the powers of all Camp Sandy were ex 
 hausted in effort to suitably provide for Natzie and her 
 two companions. Mrs. Sanders, Mrs. Bridger, even 
 Mother Shaughnessy and Norah pleaded successively 
 with this princess of the wilderness, and pleaded in vain. 
 
THE MEETING AT SANDY 277 
 
 Food and shelter elsewhere they proffered in abundance. 
 Natzie sat stubbornly at the major s steps, and sadly at 
 first, and angrily later, shook her head to every proposi 
 tion. Then they brought food, and Lola and Alchisay 
 ate greedily. Natzie would hardly taste a morsel. 
 Every time Plume or Graham or a soldier nurse came 
 forth her mournful eyes would study his face as though 
 imploring news of the sufferer, who lay unconscious of 
 her vigil, if not of her existence. Graham s treatment 
 was beginning to tell, and Blakely was sleeping the sleep 
 of the just. They had not let him know of the poor girl s 
 presence at the door. They would not let her in for fear 
 he might awake and see her, and ask the reason of her 
 coming. They would not send or take her away, for all 
 Sandy was alive with the strange story of her devotion. 
 The question on almost every lip was " How is this to 
 end?" 
 
 At tattoo there came a Mexican woman from one of the 
 downstream ranches, sent in by the post trader, who said 
 she could speak the Apache-Mohave language sufficiently 
 well to make Natzie understand the situation, and this 
 frontier linguist strove earnestly. Natzie understood 
 every word she said, was her report, but could not be made 
 to understand that she ought to go. In the continued 
 absence of Mrs. Plume, both the major and the post sur 
 geon had requested of Mrs. Graham that she should come 
 over for a while and " see what she could do," and, leav 
 ing her own sturdy bairnies, the good, motherly soul had 
 come and presided over this diplomatic interview, propos- 
 
278 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 ing various plans for Natzie s disposition for the night. 
 And other ladies hovering about had been sympathetic 
 ally suggestive, but the Indian girl had turned deaf ear 
 to everything that would even temporarily take her from 
 her self-appointed station. At ten o clock Mother 
 Shaughnessy, after hanging uneasily about the porch a 
 moment or two, gave muttered voice to a suggestion that 
 other women had shrunk from mentioning : 
 
 " Has she been tould Miss Angela and him is no 
 kin at all, at all?" 
 
 " I don t want her told," said Mrs. Graham briefly. 
 
 And so Natzie was still there, sitting sleepless in the 
 soft and radiant moonlight, when toward twelve o clock 
 Graham came forth from his last visit for the night, and 
 she lifted up her head and looked him dumbly in the face, 
 dumbly, yet imploring a word of hope or comfort, and 
 it was more than the soft-hearted Scot could bear. 
 " Major," said he, as he gently laid a big hand upon the 
 black and tangled wealth of hair, " that lad in yonder 
 would have been beyond the ken of civilization days ago 
 if it hadn t been for this little savage. I m thinking he ll 
 sleep none the worse for her watching over him. Todd s 
 there for the night, the same that attended him before, 
 and she won t be strange with him or I m mistaken." 
 
 " Why? " asked Plume, mystified. 
 
 " I m not saying, until Blakely talks for himself. For 
 one reason I don t know. For another, he s the man to 
 tell, if anybody," and a toss of the head toward the dark 
 doorway told who was meant by " he." 
 
THE MEETING AT SANDY 279 
 
 " D you mean you d have this girl squatting there by 
 Blakely s bedside the rest of the night ? " asked the com 
 mander, ruffled in spirit. " What s to prevent her sing 
 ing their confounded death song, or invoking heathen 
 spirits, or knifing us all, for that matter ? " 
 
 " What was to prevent her from knifing the Bugologist 
 and Angela both, when she had em ? " was the sturdy 
 reply. " The girl s a theoretical heathen, but a practical 
 Christian. Come with us, Natzie," he finished, one hand 
 extended to aid her to rise, the other pointing to the open 
 doorway. She was on her feet in an instant, and, silently 
 signing her companions to stay, followed the doctor into 
 the house. 
 
 And so it happened that when Blakely wakened, hours 
 later, the sight that met him, dimly comprehending, was 
 that of a blue-coated soldier snoozing in a reclining chair, 
 a blue-blanketed Indian girl seated on the floor near the 
 foot of his bed, looking with all her soul in her gaze 
 straight into his wondering eyes. At his low whisper, 
 " Natzie," she sprang to her feet without word or sound ; 
 seized the thin white hand tremulously extended toward 
 her, and, pillowing her cheek upon it, knelt humbly by the 
 bedside, her black hair streaming to the floor. A pathetic 
 picture it made in the dim light of the newborn day, forc 
 ing itself through the shrouded windows, and Major 
 Plume, restless and astir the hour before reveille, stood un 
 noted a moment at the doorway, then strode back through 
 the hall and summoned from the adjoining veranda 
 another sleepless watcher, gratefully breathing the fra- 
 
280 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 grance of the cool, morning air; and presently two dim 
 forms had softly tiptoed to that open portal, and now 
 stood gazing within until their eyes should triumph over 
 the uncertain light the post commander in his trim- 
 fitting undress uniform, the tall and angular shape of 
 Wren s elderly sister the " austere vestal " herself. It 
 may have been a mere twitch of the slim fingers under her 
 tawny cheek that caused Natzie to lift her eyes in search 
 of those of her hero and her protector. Instantly her own 
 gaze, startled, was turned straight to the door. Then in 
 another second she had sprung to her feet, and with fury 
 in her face and attitude confronted the intruders. As 
 she did so the sudden movement detached some object 
 that hung within the breast of her loose-fitting sack 
 something bright and gleaming that clattered to the floor, 
 falling close to the feet of the drowsing attendant, while 
 another a thin, circular case of soft leather, half-rolled, 
 half-bounded toward the unwelcome visitors at the 
 door. 
 
 Todd, roused to instant action at sight of the post com 
 mander, bent quickly and nabbed the first. The girl her 
 self darted after the second, whereat the attendant, mis 
 judging her motive, dreading danger to his betters or 
 rebuke to himself, sprang upon her as she stooped, and 
 dropping his first prize, dared to seize the Apache girl 
 with both hands at the throat. There was a warning cry 
 from the bed, a flash of steel through one slanting ray of 
 sunshine, a shriek from the lips of Janet Wren, and with 
 a stifled moan the luckless soldier sank in his tracks, while 
 
THE MEETING AT SANDY 281 
 
 Natzie, the chieftain s daughter, a dripping blade in her 
 uplifted hand, a veritable picture of fury, stood in savage 
 triumph over him, her flashing eyes fixed upon the amazed 
 commander, as though daring him, too, to lay hostile 
 hands upon her. 
 
CHAPTER XXV 
 
 RESCUE REQUITED 
 
 A3HANGE had come over the spirit of Camp 
 Sandy s dream. The garrison that had gone to 
 bed the previous night, leaving Natzie silent, 
 watchful, wistful at the post commander s door, had hardly 
 a thought that was not full of sympathy and admiration- 
 for her. Even women who could not find it possible to 
 speak of her probable relations with Neil Blakely dwelt 
 much in thought and word upon her superb devotion and 
 her generosity. That he had encouraged her passionate 
 and almost savage love for him there were few to doubt, 
 whatsoever they might find it possible to say. That men 
 and women both regarded her as, beyond compare, the 
 heroic figure of the campaign there was none to gainsay. 
 Even those who could not or did not talk of her at all 
 felt that such was the garrison verdict. There were no 
 men, and but few women, who would have condemned the 
 doctor s act in leading her to Blakely s bedside. Sandy 
 had spoken of her all that wonderful evening only to 
 praise. It woke to hear the first tidings of the new day, 
 and to ask only What was the cause? What had led 
 to her wild, swift vengeance? for Todd had in turn been 
 carried to hospital, a sore-stricken man. The night be 
 fore Natzie was held a queen : now she was held a captive. 
 
 282 
 
RESCUE REQUITED 283 
 
 It all happened so suddenly that even Plume, who wit 
 nessed the entire incident, could not coherently explain it. 
 Reveille was just over and the men were going to break 
 fast when the major s voice was heard shouting for 
 the guard. Graham, first man to reach the scene, had 
 collided with Janet Wren, whimpering and unnerved, 
 as he bounded into the hallway. His first thought 
 was that Plume s prophecy about the knifing had come 
 true, and that Blakely was the victim. His first sight, 
 when his eyes could do their office in that darkened room, 
 was of Blakely wresting something from the grasp of the 
 Indian girl, whose gaze was now riveted on that writhing 
 object on the floor. 
 
 " See to him, doctor," he heard Blakely say, in feeble, 
 but commanding tone. " I will see to her." But Blakely 
 was soon in no condition to see to her or to anybody. The 
 flicker of strength that came to him for a second or two at 
 sight of the tragedy, left him as suddenly left him 
 feebler than before. He had no voice with which to pro 
 test when the stretchermen, who bore away poor Todd, 
 were followed instantly by stout guardsmen who bore 
 away Natzie. The dignity of the chieftain s daughter had 
 vanished now. She had no knife with which to deal 
 death to these new and most reluctant assailants Graham 
 found it under Blakely s pillow, long hours later. But, 
 with all her savage, lissome strength she scratched and 
 struck and struggled. It took three of their burliest to 
 carry her away, and they did it with shame-hidden faces, 
 while rude comrades chaffed and jeered and even shouted 
 
284 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 laughing encouragement to the girl, whose screams of 
 rage had drawn all Camp Sandy to the scene. One doc 
 tor, two men, and the steward went with their groaning 
 burden one way to the hospital. One officer, one ser 
 geant, and half a dozen men had all they could do to take 
 their raging charge another way to the guard-house. Ah, 
 Plume, you might have spared that brave girl such indig 
 nity! But, where one face followed the wounded man 
 with sympathetic eyes, there were twenty that never 
 turned from the Indian girl until her screams were dead 
 ened by the prison doors. 
 
 " She stabbed a soldier who meant her no harm/ was 
 Plume s sullen and stubborn answer to all appeals, for 
 good and gentle women went to him, begging permission 
 to go to her. It angered him presently to the extent of 
 repeating his words with needless emphasis and additions 
 when Mother Shaughnessy came to make her special ap 
 peal. Shure she had learned how to care for these poor 
 creatures, was her claim, along o having little Paquita on 
 her hands so many days, " and now that poor girl beyant 
 will be screaming herself into fits ! " 
 
 " Let her scream," said Plume, unstrung and shaken, 
 " but hold you your tongue or I ll find a separate cell for 
 you. No woman shall be knifing my men, and go un 
 punished, if I can help it," and so saying he turned wrath- 
 fully from her. 
 
 " Heard you that now ? " stormed Mother Shaughnessy, 
 as he strode away. " Who but he has helped his women 
 to go unpunished " and the words were out and heard 
 
RESCUE REQUITED 286 
 
 before the sergeant major could spring and silence her. 
 Before another day they were echoing all over the post 
 were on their way to Prescott, even, and meeting, almost 
 at the northward gateway, the very women the raging 
 laundress meant. Of her own free will Clarice Plume 
 was once again at Sandy, bringing with her, sorely against 
 the will of either, but because a stronger will would have 
 it so and sent his guards to see to it a cowed and scared 
 and semi-silent companion of whom much ill was spoken 
 now about the garrison Elise Lebrun. 
 
 The news threw Norah Shaughnessy nearly into 
 spasms. " Twas she that knifed Pat Mullins ! " she cried. 
 " Twas she drove poor Downs to dhrink and desartion. 
 Twas she set Carmody and Shannon to cuttin each other s 
 throats " which was news to a garrison that had seen 
 the process extend no further than to each other s acquaint 
 ance. And more and stormier words the girl went on to 
 say concerning the commander s household until Mullins 
 himself mildly interposed. But all these things were 
 being told about the garrison, from which Lola and 
 Alchisay had fled in terror to spread the tidings that their 
 princess was a prisoner behind the bars. These were 
 things that were being told, too, to the men of Sanders s 
 returning troop before they were fairly unsaddled at the 
 stables ; and that night, before ever he sought his soldier 
 pillow, Shannon had been to " C " Troop s quarters in 
 search of Trooper Stern and had wrung from him all that 
 he could tell of Carmody s last fight on earth of his last 
 words to Lieutenant Blakely. 
 
286 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 Meantime a sorely troubled man was Major Plume. 
 That his wife would have to return to Sandy he had 
 learned from the lips of Colonel Byrne himself. Her own 
 good name had been involved, and could only be com 
 pletely cleared when Wren and Blakely were sufficiently 
 recovered to testify, and when Mullins should be so thor 
 oughly restored as to be fit for close cross-examination. 
 Plume could in no wise connect his beloved wife with 
 either the murderous assault on Mullins or the mysterious 
 firing of Blakely s quarters, but he knew that Sandy could 
 not so readily acquit her, even though it might saddle the 
 actual deed upon her instrument Elise. He had ordered 
 that Blakely should be brought to his own quarters be 
 cause there he could not be reached by any who were un 
 acceptable to himself, the post commander. There were 
 many things he wished to know about and from Blakely s 
 lips alone. He could not stoop to talk with other men 
 about the foibles of his wife. He knew that iron box in 
 Truman s care contained papers, letters, or something of 
 deep interest to her. He knew full well now that, at some 
 time in the not far distant past, Blakely himself had been 
 of deep interest to her and she to Blakely. He had 
 Blakely s last letter to himself, written just before the 
 lonely start in quest of Angela, but that letter made no 
 reference to the contents of the box or to anything con 
 cerning their past. He had heard that Wales Arnold had 
 been intrusted with letters for Blakely to Clarice, his wife, 
 and to Captain, or Miss Janet, Wren. Arnold had not 
 been entirely silent on the subject. He did not too much 
 
RESCUE REQUITED 287 
 
 like the major, and rather rejoiced in this opportunity 
 to show his independence of him. Plume had gone so far 
 as to ask Arnold whether such letters had been intrusted 
 to him, and Wales said, yes; but, now that Blakely was 
 safely back and probably going to pull through, he should 
 return the letters to the writer as soon as the writer was 
 well enough to appreciate what was being done. Last, 
 but not least, Plume had picked up near the door in 
 Blakely s room the circular, nearly flat, leather-covered 
 case which had dropped, apparently, from Natzie s gown, 
 and, as it had neither lock nor latch, Plume had opened it 
 to examine its contents. 
 
 To his surprise it contained a beautifully executed 
 miniature, a likeness of a fair young girl, with soft blue 
 eyes and heavy, arching brows, a delicately molded face 
 and mouth and chin, all framed in a tumbling mass of 
 tawny hair. It was the face of a child of twelve or thir 
 teen, one that he had never seen and of whom he knew 
 nothing. Neither cover, backing, nor case of the minia 
 ture gave the faintest clew as to its original or as to its 
 ownership. What was Natzie doing with this? and to 
 whom did it belong ? A little study satisfied him there was 
 something familiar in the face, yet he could not place it. 
 
 The very night of her coming, therefore, he told his 
 wife the story and handed her the portrait. One glance 
 was enough. " I know it, yes," said Mrs. Plume, 
 " though I, too, have never seen her. She died the winter 
 after it was taken. It is Mr. Blakely s sister, Ethel," and 
 Mrs. Plume sat gazing at the sweet girl features, with 
 
288 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 strange emotion in her aging face. There was something 
 some story behind all this that Plume could not 
 fathom, and it nettled him. Perhaps he, too, was yielding 
 to a fit of nerves. Elise, the maid, had been remanded to 
 her room, and could be heard moving about with heavy, 
 yet uncertain tread. " She is right over Blakely," quoth 
 the major impatiently. " Why can t the girl be quiet? 
 
 " Why did you bring him here, then ? " was the weary 
 answer. " I cannot control Elise. They have treated 
 her most cruelly." 
 
 " There are things you cannot explain and that she 
 must," said he, and then, to change the subject, stretched 
 forth his hand to take again the picture. She drew it 
 back one moment, then, remembering, surrendered it. 
 
 " You saw this in St. Louis, I suppose," said he 
 awkwardly. He never could bear to refer to those days 
 the days before he had come into her life. 
 
 " Not that perhaps, but the photograph from which it 
 was probably painted. She was his only sister. He was 
 educating her in the East." And again her thoughts 
 were drifting back to those St. Louis days, when, but for 
 the girl sister he so loved, she and Neil Blakely had been 
 well-nigh inseparable. Someone had said then, she re 
 membered, that she was jealous even of that love. 
 
 And now again her husband was gazing fixedly at the 
 portrait, a light coming into his lined and anxious face. 
 Blakely had always carried this miniature with him, for 
 he now remembered that the agent, Daly, had spoken of 
 it. Natzie and others might well have seen it at the reser- 
 
RESCUE REQUITED 289 
 
 vation. The agent s wife had often seen it and had 
 spoken of his sorrow for the sister he had lost. The 
 picture, she said, stood often on his little camp table. 
 Every Indian who entered his tent knew it and saw it. 
 Why, surely; Natzie, too, mused the major, and then 
 aloud : 
 
 " I can see now what we have all been puzzling over. 
 Angela Wren might well have looked like this four 
 years ago." 
 
 " There is not the faintest resemblance," said Clarice, 
 promptly rising and quitting the room. 
 
 It developed with another day that Mrs. Plume had no 
 desire to see Miss Wren, the younger. She expressed 
 none, indeed, when policy and the manners of good so 
 ciety really required it. Miss Janet had come in with 
 Mrs. Graham and Mrs. Sanders to call upon the wife of 
 4ie commanding officer and say what words of welcome 
 were possible as appropriate to her return. " And An 
 gela," said Janet, for reasons of her own, " will be com 
 ing later." There was no response, nor was there to the 
 next tentative. The ladies thought Mrs. Plume should 
 join forces with them and take Natzie out of the single 
 cell she occupied. " Can she not be locked at the hospital, 
 under the eye of the matron, with double sentries ? It is 
 hard to think of her barred in that hideous place with 
 Apache prisoners and rude men all about her." But 
 again was Mrs. Plume unresponsive. She would say no 
 word of interest in either Angela or Natzie. At the mo 
 ment when her husband was in melting mood and when 
 
290 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 a hint from her lips would have secured the partial re 
 lease of the Indian girl, the hint was withheld. It would 
 have been better for her, for her husband, for more than 
 one brave lad on guard, had the major s wife seen fit to 
 speak, but she would not. 
 
 So that evening brought release that, in itself, brought 
 much relief to the commanding officer and the friends 
 who still stood by him. 
 
 Thirty-six hours now had Natzie been a prisoner behind 
 the bars, and no one of those we know had seen her face. 
 At tattoo the drums and fifes began their sweet, old- 
 fashioned soldier tunes. The guard turned out; the 
 officer of the day buckled his belt with a sigh and started 
 forth to inspect, just as the foremost soldiers appeared on 
 the porch in front, buttoning their coats and adjusting 
 their belts and slings. Half their number began to form 
 ranks ; the other half " stood by," within the main room, 
 to pass out the prisoners, many of whom wore a clanking 
 chain. All on a sudden there arose a wild clamor shouts, 
 scuffling, the thunder of iron upon resounding woodwork, 
 hoarse orders, curses, shrieks, a yell for help, a shot, a 
 mad scurry of many feet, furious cries of " Head em off ! " 
 " Shoot ! " " No, no, don t shoot ! You ll kill our own ! " 
 A dim cloud of ghostly, shadowy forms went tearing away 
 down the slope toward the south. There followed a tre 
 mendous rush of troop after troop, company after com 
 pany, the whole force of Camp Sandy in uproarious 
 pursuit, until in the dim starlight the barren flats below 
 the post, the willow patches along the stream, the plashing 
 
RESCUE REQUITED 291 
 
 waters of the ford, the still and glassy surface of the 
 shadowy pool, were speedily all alive with dark and dart 
 ing forms intermingled in odd confusion. From the east 
 ward side, from officers row, Plume and his white-coated 
 subordinates hastened to the southward face, realizing in 
 stantly what must have occurred the long-prophesied 
 rush of Apache prisoners for freedom. Yet how hope 
 less, how mad, how utterly absurd was the effort ! What 
 earthly chance had they poor, manacled, shackled, ball- 
 burdened wretches to escape from two hundred fleet- 
 footed, unhampered, stalwart young soldiery, rejoicing 
 really in the fun and excitement of the thing? One after 
 another the shackled fugitives were run down and over 
 hauled, some not half across the parade, some in the 
 shadows of the office and storehouses, some down among 
 the shrubbery toward the lighted store, some among the 
 shanties of Sudsville, some, lightest weighted of all, far 
 away as the lower pool, and so one after another, the 
 grimy, sullen, swarthy lot were slowly lugged back to the 
 unsavory precincts wherein, for long woeks and months, 
 they had slept or -stealthily communed through the hours 
 of the night. Three or four had been cut or slashed. 
 Three or four soldiers had serious hurts, scratches or 
 bruises as their fruits of the affray. But after all, the 
 malefactors, miscreants, and incorrigibles of the Apache 
 tribe had profited little by their wild and defiant essay- 
 profited little, that is, if personal freedom was what they 
 sought. 
 But was it? said wise heads of the garrison, as they 
 
292 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 looked the situation over. Shannon and some of his ilk 
 were doing much independent trailing by aid of their lan 
 terns. Taps should have been sounded at ten, but wasn t 
 by any means, for " lights out " was the last thing to be 
 thought of. Little by little it dawned upon Plume and 
 his supporters that, instead of scattering, as Indian tactics 
 demanded on all previous exploits of the kind, there had 
 been one grand, concerted rush to the southward 
 planned, doubtless, for the purpose of drawing the whole 
 garrison thither in pursuit, while three pairs of moccasined 
 feet slipped swiftly around to the rear of the guard-house, 
 out beyond the dim corrals, and around to a point back of 
 " C " Troop stables, where other little hoofs had been im 
 patiently tossing up the sands until suddenly loosed and 
 sent bounding away to where the North Star hung low 
 over the sheeny white mantle of San Francisco mountain. 
 Natzie, the girl queen, was gone from the guard-house: 
 Punch, the Lady Angela s pet pony, was gone from the 
 corral, and who would say there had not been collusion ? 
 
 " One thing is certain," said the grave-faced post com 
 mander, as, with his officers, he left the knot of troopers 
 and troopers wives hovering late about the guard-house, 
 " one thing is certain ; with Wren s own troopers hot on 
 the heels of Angela s pony we ll have our Apache princess 
 back, sure as the morning sun." 
 
 " Like hell ! " said Mother Shaughnessy. 
 
CHAPTER XXVI 
 
 MORE morning suns than could be counted in 
 the field of the flag had come, and gone, but 
 not a sign of Natzie. Wren s own troopers, 
 hot on Punch s flashing heels, were cooling their own as 
 best they could through the arid days that followed. 
 Wren himself was now recovered sufficiently to be told of 
 much that had been going on, not all, and it was Angela 
 who constantly hovered about him, for Janet was taking 
 a needed rest. Blakely, too, was on the mend, sitting 
 up hours of every day and " being very lovely " in 
 manner to all the Sanders household, for thither had he 
 demanded to be moved even sooner than it was prudent 
 to move him at all. Go he would, and Graham had to 
 order it. Pat Mullins was once again " for duty." Even 
 Todd, the bewildered victim of Natzie s knife, was 
 stretching his legs on the hospital porch. There had 
 come a lull in all martial proceedings at the post, and only 
 two sensations. One of these latter was the formal in 
 vestigation by the inspector general of the conditions 
 surrounding the stabbing at Camp Sandy of Privates 
 Mullins and Todd of the th U. S. Cavalry. The other 
 was the discovery, one bright, brilliant, winter morning 
 that Natzie s friend and savior, Angela s Punch, was 
 
 293 
 
294 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 back in his stall, looking every bit as saucy and " fit " as 
 ever he did in his life. What surprised many folk in the 
 garrison was that it surprised Angela not at all. " I 
 thought Punch would come back," said she, in demure 
 unconcern, and the girls at least, began to understand, 
 and were wild to question. Only Kate Sanders, however, 
 knew how welcome was the pet pony s coming. But 
 what had come that was far from welcome was a cold 
 ness between Angela and Kate Sanders. 
 
 Byrne himself had arrived, and the " inquisition " had 
 begun. No examinations under oath, no laborious re 
 cordings of question and answer, no crowd of curious 
 listeners. The veteran inspector took each man in turn 
 and heard his tale and jotted down his notes, and, where 
 he thought it wise, cross-questioned over and again. 
 One after another, Truman and Todd, Wren and Mul- 
 lins, told their stories, bringing forth little that was new 
 beyond the fact that Todd was sure it was Elise he heard 
 that night " jabbering with Downs " on Blakely s porch. 
 Todd felt sure that it was she who brought him whisky, 
 and Byrne let him prattle on. It was not evidence, yet 
 it might lead the way to light. In like manner was Mul- 
 lins sure now " Twas two ladies " stabbed him when he 
 would have striven to stop the foremost. Byrne asked did 
 he think they were ladies when first he set eyes on them, 
 and Pat owned up that he thought it was some of the girls 
 from Sudsville; it might even be Norah as one of them, 
 coming home late from the laundresses quarters, and 
 trying to play him a trick. He owned to it that he 
 
" WOMAN-WALK-NO-MORE " 295 
 
 grabbed the foremost, seeing at that moment no other, and 
 thinking to win the forfeit of a kiss, and Byrne gravely 
 assured him twas no shame in it, so long as Norah never 
 found it out. 
 
 But Byrne asked Plume two questions that puzzled 
 and worried him greatly. How much whisky had he 
 missed? and how much opium could have been given 
 him the night of Mrs. Plume s unconscious escapade? 
 The major well remembered that his demijohn had 
 grown suddenly light, and that he had found him 
 self surprisingly heavy, dull, and drowsy. The retrospect 
 added to his gloom and depression. Byrne had not re- 
 occupied his old room at Plume s, now that madame and 
 Elise were once more under the major s roof, and even 
 in extending the customary invitation, Plume felt confi 
 dent that Byrne could not and should not accept. The 
 position he had taken with regard to Elise, her lady 
 ship s companion and confidante, was sufficient in itself to 
 make him, in the eyes of that lady, an unacceptable guest, 
 but it never occurred to her, although it had to Plume, 
 that there might be even deeper reasons. Then, too, the 
 relations between the commander and the inspector, al 
 though each was scrupulously courteous, were now neces 
 sarily strained. Plume could not but feel that his con 
 duct of post affairs was in a measure a matter of 
 scrutiny. He knew that his treatment of Natzie was 
 disapproved by nine out of ten of his command. He 
 felt, rather than knew, that some of his people had con 
 nived at her escape, and though that escape had been a 
 
296 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 relief to everybody at Sandy, the manner of her taking 
 off was to him a mystery and a rankling sore. 
 
 Last man to be examined was Blakely, and now indeed 
 there was light. He had been sitting up each day for sev 
 eral hours ; his wounds were healing well ; the fever and 
 prostration that ensued had left him weak and very thin 
 and pale, but he had the soldier s best medicine the con 
 sciousness of duties thoroughly and well performed. He 
 knew that, though Wren might carry his personal an 
 tipathy to the extent of official injustice, as officers higher 
 in rank than Wren have been known to do, the truth con 
 cerning the recent campaign must come to light, and his 
 connection therewith be made a matter of record, as it 
 was already a matter of fact. Wren had not yet submit 
 ted his written report. Wren and the post commander 
 were still on terms severely official ; but, to the few 
 brother officers witti whom the captain talked at all upon 
 the stirring events through which he and his troop had so 
 recently passed, he had made little mention of Blakely. 
 Not so, however, the men; not so Wales Arnold, the 
 ranchman. To hear these worthies talk, the Bugologist, 
 next to " Princess Natzie," was the central figure of the 
 Red Rock campaign the one officer, " where all had 
 done so well," whose deeds merited conspicuous mention. 
 Byrne knew this better than Wren. Plume knew it not 
 as well as Byrne, perhaps. Sanders, Lynn, and Duane 
 had heard the soldier stories in a dozen ways, and it 
 stung them that their regimental comrade should so dog 
 gedly refuse to open his lips and give Blakely his due. 
 
" WOMAN-WALK-NO-MORE " 297 
 
 It is not silence that usually hurts a man, it is speech ; yet 
 here was a case to the contrary. 
 
 Now just in proportion as the Wrens would have noth 
 ing to say in praise of Blakely, the Sanders household 
 would have nothing but praise to say. Kate s honest 
 heart was hot with anger at Angela, because the girl 
 shrank from the subject as she would from evil speaking, 
 lying, and slandering, and here again, to paraphrase the 
 Irishman, too much heat had produced the coldness 
 already referred to. Sanders scoffed at the idea of Nat- 
 zie s infatuation being sufficient ground for family ostra 
 cism. " If there is a man alive who owes more than 
 Wren does to Blakely, I m a crab," said he, " and as soon 
 as he s well enough to listen to straight talk he ll get it 
 from me." " If there s a girl in America as heartless as 
 Angela Wren," said Mrs. Sanders, " I hope I never shall 
 have to meet her." But then Mrs. Sanders, as we know, 
 had ever been jealous of Angela on account of her own 
 true-hearted Kate, who refused to say one word on the 
 subject beyond what she said to Angela herself. And 
 now they had propped their patient in his reclining-chair 
 and arranged the little table for " the inquisitor general," 
 as Mrs. Bridger preferred to refer to him, and left them 
 alone together behind closed doors, and had then gone 
 forth to find that all Camp Sandy seemed to wait with 
 bated breath for the outcome of that interview. 
 
 Sooner than was believed possible it came. An hour, 
 probably, before they thought the colonel could have 
 gathered all he wished to know, that officer was on the 
 
298 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 front piazza and sending an orderly to the adjutant s 
 office. Then came Major Plume, with quick and nervous 
 step. There was a two-minute conference on the piazza ; 
 then both officers vanished within, were gone five min 
 utes, and then Plume reappeared alone, went straight to 
 his home, and slammed the door behind him, a solecism 
 rarely known at Sandy, and presently on the hot and 
 pulseless air there arose the sound of shrill protestation 
 in strange vernacular. Even Wren heard the voice, and 
 found something reminiscent in the sound of weeping and 
 wailing that followed. The performer was unquestion 
 ably Elise she that had won the ponderous, yet descrip 
 tive, Indian name " Woman- Walk-in-the-Night." 
 
 And while this episode was still unexpired the orderly 
 went for Lieutenant Truman, and Truman, with two or 
 derlies, for a box, a bulky little chest, strapped heavily 
 with iron, and this they lugged into Sanders s hall and 
 came out heated and mystified. Three hours later, close- 
 veiled and in droopy desolation, " Mademoiselle Lebrun " 
 was bundled into a waiting ambulance and started under 
 sufficient escort, and the care of the hospital matron, 
 en route for Prescott, while Dr. Graham was summoned 
 to attend Mrs. Plume, and grimly went. " The mean 
 part of the whole business," said Mrs. Bridger, " is that 
 nobody knows what it means." There was no one along 
 the line, except poor Mrs. Plume, to regret that sudden 
 and enforced departure, but there was regret universal 
 all over the post when it was learned, still later in the 
 afternoon, that one of the best soldiers and sergeants in 
 
" WOMAN- WALK-NO-MORE " 299 
 
 the entire garrison had taken the horse of one of the herd 
 guard and galloped away on the trail o<f the banished one. 
 Sergeant Shannon, at sunset parade, was reported absent 
 without leave. 
 
 Major Plume had come forth from his quarters at the 
 sounding of the retreat, accurately dressed as ever, white- 
 gloved, and wearing his saber. He seemed to realize 
 that all eyes would be upon him. He had, indeed, been 
 tempted again to turn over the command to the senior 
 captain, but wisely thought better of it, and determined 
 to face the music. He looked very sad and gray, how 
 ever. He returned scrupulously the salute of the four 
 company commanders as, in turn, each came forward to 
 report the result of the evening roll-call; Cutler and 
 Westervelt first, their companies being the nearest, then 
 Lieutenant Lynn, temporarily in charge of Wren s troop, 
 its captain and first lieutenant being still " on sick re 
 port." The sight of this young officer set the major to 
 thinking of that evening not so many moons agone when 
 Captain Wren himself appeared and in resonant, far- 
 carrying tone announced " Lieutenant Blakely, sir, is 
 absent." He had been thinking much of Blakely through 
 the solemn afternoon, as he wandered nervously about his 
 darkened quarters, sometimes tiptoeing to the bedside of 
 his feebly moaning, petulant wife, sometimes pacing the 
 library and hall. He had been again for half an hour 
 closeted with Byrne and the Bugologist, certain letters 
 being under inspection. He hardly heard the young of 
 ficer, Lynn, as he said " Troop C, all present, sir." He 
 
300 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 was looking beyond him at Captain Sanders, coming 
 striding over the barren parade, with import in his eye. 
 Plume felt that there was trouble ahead before ever San 
 ders reached the prescribed six paces, halted, raised his 
 hand in salute, and, just as did Wren on that earlier occa 
 sion, announced in tones intended to be heard over and 
 beyond the post commander : " Sergeant Shannon, sir, 
 with one government horse, absent without leave." 
 
 Plume went a shade white, and bit his lips before he 
 could steady himself to question. Well he knew that 
 this new devilment was due in some way to that spirit of 
 evil so long harbored by his wife, and suffered by him 
 self. All the story of the strife she had stirred in the gar 
 rison had reached him days before. Downs s drunken 
 ness and desertion, beyond doubt, were chargeable to her, 
 as well as another and worse crime, unless all indications 
 were at fault. Then there was the breach between Car- 
 mody and Shannon, formerly stanch friends and com 
 rades, and now Carmody lay buried beneath the rocks in 
 Bear Canon, and Shannon, as gallant and useful a ser 
 geant as ever served, had thrown to the winds his record 
 of the past and his hopes for the future, and gone in mad 
 pursuit of a worthless hoyden. And all because Clarice 
 would have that woman with her wherever she might go. 
 
 " When did this happen ? " he presently asked. 
 
 " Just after stable call, sir. The horses were all re 
 turned to the corral except the herd guard s. The men 
 marched over, as usual, with their halters. Shannon fell 
 out as they entered the gate, took young Bennett s rein 
 
" WOMAN-WALK-NO-MORE " 301 
 
 as he stood ready to lead in after them, mounted and rode 
 round back of the wall, leaving Bennett so surprised that 
 he didn t know what to say. He never suspected any 
 thing wrong until Shannon failed to reappear. Then he 
 followed round back of the corral, found the sergeant s 
 stable frock lying halfway out toward the bluff, and saw 
 a streak of dust toward Bowlder Point. Then he came 
 and reported." 
 
 Plume, after a moment s silence, turned abruptly. He 
 had suffered much that day, and to think of his wife lying 
 stricken and whimpering, professing herself a sorely in 
 jured woman because compelled at last to part with her 
 maid, angered him beyond the point of toleration. Toss 
 ing his saber to the China boy, he went straightway aloft, 
 failing to note in the dim light that two soft-hearted 
 sympathizers were cooing by the gentle sufferer s 
 side. 
 
 " Well, Clarice," he broke in abruptly, " we are never 
 to hear the end of that she-cat s doings ! My best ser 
 geant has stolen a horse and gone galloping after her." 
 It is always our best we lose when our better half is to 
 blame, nor is it the way of brutal man to minimize the 
 calamity on such occasions. It did not better matters 
 that her much-wronged ladyship should speedily reply: 
 " It s a wonder you don t charge the Indian outbreak to 
 poor Elise. I don t believe she had a thing to do with 
 your sergeant s stealing." 
 
 " You wouldn t believe she stole my whisky and gave 
 it to Downs, though you admitted she told you she had 
 
302 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 to go back that night for something she d dropped. You 
 wouldn t believe she married that rascally gambler at St. 
 Louis before her first husband was out of the way ! You 
 shielded and swore by her, and brought her out here, and 
 all the time the proofs were here in Blakely s hands. It 
 was she, I suppose, who broke off " 
 
 But here, indeed, was it high time to break off. The 
 visitors were now visibly rising in all proper embarrass 
 ment, for Mrs. Plume had started up, with staring eyes. 
 " Proofs ! " she cried, " in Blakely s hands ! Why, she 
 
 told me my own letters! my " And then brutal 
 
 man was brought to his senses and made to see how 
 heartless and cruel was his conduct, for Mrs. Plume went 
 into a fit and Mrs. Lynn for the doctor. 
 
 That was a wild night at Sandy. Two young matrons 
 had made up their minds that it was shameful to leave 
 poor Mrs. Plume without anybody to listen to her, when 
 she might so long .for sympathetic hearers, and have so 
 much to tell. They had entered as soon as the major 
 came forth and, softly tapping at the stricken one s door, 
 had been with her barely five minutes when he came tear 
 ing back, and all this tremendous scene occurred before 
 they could put in a word to prevent, which, of course, 
 they were dying to do. But what hadn t they heard in 
 that swift moment ! Between the two of them and Mrs. 
 Bridger was the other their agitation was such that it 
 all had to be told. Then, like the measles, one revelation 
 led to another, but it was several days before the garrison 
 settled down in possession of an array of facts sufficient 
 
" WOMAN-WALK-NO-MORE 303 
 
 to keep it in gossip for many a month. Meanwhile, many 
 a change had come over the scene. 
 
 At Prescott, then the Territorial capital, Elise Layton, 
 nee Lebrun, was held without bail because it couldn t be 
 had, charged with obtaining money under false pretenses, 
 bigamy as a side issue, and arson as a possible backstop. 
 The sleep-walking theory, as advanced in favor of Mrs. 
 Plume, had been reluctantly abandoned, it appearing that, 
 however dazed and " doped " she may have been through 
 the treatment of that deft-fingered, unscrupulous maid, 
 she was sufficiently wide awake to know well whither she 
 had gone at that woman s urging, to make a last effort to 
 recover certain letters of vital importance. At Blakely s 
 door Clarice had " lost her nerve " and insisted on return 
 ing, but not so Elise. She went again, and had well-nigh 
 gotten Downs drunk enough to do as she demanded. 
 Frankly, sadly, Plume went to Blakely, told him of his 
 wife s admissions, and asked him what papers of hers he 
 retained. For a moment Blakely had blazed with indig 
 nation, but Plume s sorrow, and utter innocence of wrong 
 intent, stilled his wrath and led to his answer : " Every 
 letter of Mrs. Plume s I burned before she was married, 
 and I so assured her. She herself wrote asking me to 
 burn rather than return them, but there were letters and 
 papers I could not burn, brought to me by a poor devil 
 that woman Elise had married, tricked into jail, and then 
 deserted. He disappeared afterward, and even Pinker- 
 ton s people haven t been able to find him. Those papers 
 are his property. You and Colonel Byrne are the only 
 
304 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 men who have seen them, though they were somewhat 
 exposed just after the fire. She made three attempts to 
 get me to give them up to her. Then, I believe, she 
 strove to get Downs to steal them, and gave him the 
 money with which to desert and bring them to her. He 
 couldn t get into the iron box; couldn t lug it out, and 
 somehow, probably, set fire to the place, scratching 
 matches in there. Perhaps she even persuaded him to 
 do that as a last resort. He knew I could get out safely. 
 At all events, he was scared out of his wits and deserted 
 with what he had. It was in trying to make his way east 
 ward by the Wingate road that there came the last of 
 poor Ups and Downs." 
 
 And so the story of this baleful influence over a weak, 
 half-drugged girl, her mistress, became known to Plume 
 and gradually to others. It was easy for Elise to make 
 her believe that, in spite of the word of a gentleman, her 
 impulsive love letters were still held by Blakely because 
 he had never forgiven her. It was Elise, indeed, who 
 had roused her jealousy and had done her best to break 
 that engagement with Blakely and to lead to the match 
 with the handsome and devoted major. Intrigue and 
 lying were as the breath of the woman s nostrils. She 
 lived in them. But Sandy was never to see her again. 
 " Woman- Walk-in-the-Night " was " Woman-Walk-no- 
 More." 
 
 And now the friendless creature stood charged with 
 more crimes than would fill the meager space of a Terri 
 torial jail, and yet the one originally laid at her door, 
 
" WOMAN-WALK-NO-MORE " 305 
 
 though never publicly announced, was now omitted en 
 tirely that of assault with deadly weapon, possibly with 
 intent to kill. Even Mother Shaughnessy and Norah 
 were silenced, and Pat Mullins put to confusion. Even 
 the latest punctured patient at the hospital, Private Todd, 
 had to serve as evidence in behalf of Elise, for Graham, 
 post surgeon, had calmly declared that the same weapon 
 that so nearly killed Pat Mullins had as nearly and neatly 
 done the deed for Todd the keen Apache knife of Prin 
 cess Natzie. 
 
 " The heathen child was making her usual night visit 
 to her white lover," said Wren grimly, having in mind 
 the womanly shape he had seen that starlit morning- at 
 Blakely s rear door. 
 
 " You re right in one guess, R-robert Wren," was the 
 prompt answer of his friend and fellow Scot, who glared 
 at Janet rather than his convalescent as he spoke. "And 
 ye re wrang in twanty. She was tryin , and didn t know 
 the way. She was tryin , for she had his watch and 
 pocketbook. You re wrang if ye think she was ever 
 there before or after. The slut you saw cryin at his back 
 door was that quean Elise, an ye well know there was no 
 love lost between them. Go say yer prayers, man, for 
 every wicked thought ye ve had of him or of that poor 
 child. Between them they saved your Angela ! " 
 
CHAPTER XXVII 
 
 THE PARTING BY THE WATERS 
 
 day I may tell Miss Angela but never 
 you," had Mr. Blakely said, before setting forth 
 on his perilous essay to find Angela s father, and 
 with native tenacity Miss Wren the elder had remembered 
 the words and nourished her wrath. It was strange, in 
 deed, that Plume, an officer and a gentleman, should have 
 bethought him of the " austere vestal " as a companion 
 witness to Blakely s supposed iniquity ; but, between these 
 two natures, one strong, one weak, there had sprung 
 up the strange sympathy that is born of a common, deep- 
 rooted, yet ill-defined antipathy one for which neither 
 she nor he could yet give good reason, and of which each 
 was secretly ashamed. Each, for reasons of her or his 
 own, cordially disliked the Bugologist, and each could not 
 but welcome evidence to warrant such dislike. It is hu 
 man nature. Janet Wren had strong convictions that the 
 man was immoral, if for no other reason than that he 
 obviously sought Angela and as obviously avoided her. 
 Janet had believed him capable of carrying on a liaison 
 with the dame who had jilted him, and had had to see 
 that theory crushed. Then she would have it that, if not 
 the mistress, he dallied with the maid, and when it Began 
 to transpire that virulent hatred was the only passion felt 
 
 306 
 
THE PARTING BY THE WATERS 307 
 
 for him by that baffling and detestable daughter of Belial, 
 there came actual joy to the soul of the Scotchwoman 
 that, after all, her intuition had not been at fault. He 
 was immoral as she would have him, even more so, for 
 he had taken base advantage of the young and presumably 
 innocent. She craved some proof, and Plume knew it, 
 and, seeing her there alone in her dejection, had bidden 
 her come and look with the result described. 
 
 His own feeling toward Blakely is difficult to explain. 
 Kind friends had told him at St. Louis how inseparable 
 had been Clarice and this very superior young officer. 
 She had admitted to him the " flirtation," but denied all 
 regard for Blakely, yet Plume speedily found her moody, 
 fitful, and unhappy, and made up his mind that Blakely 
 was at the bottom of it. Her desire to go to far-away 
 Arizona could have no other explanation. And though 
 in no way whatever, by look, word, or deed, had Blakely 
 transgressed the strictest rule in his bearing toward the 
 major s wife, both major and wife became incensed at 
 him, Plume because he believed the Bugologist still 
 cherished a tender passion for his wife or she for him ; 
 Clarice, it must be owned, because she knew well he did 
 not. Plume sought to find a flaw in his subordinate s 
 moral armor to warrant the aversion that he felt, and was 
 balked at every turn. It was with joy almost fierce he 
 discovered what he thought to be proof that the subaltern 
 was no saint, and, never stopping to give his better nature 
 time to rise and rebuke him, he had summoned Janet. 
 It was to sting Blakely, more than to punish the girl, he 
 
308 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 had ordered Natzie to the guard-room. Then, as the 
 hours wore on and he realized how contemptible had been 
 his conduct, the sense of shame well-nigh crushed him, 
 and though it galled him to think that some of his own 
 kind, probably, had connived at Natzie s escape, he 
 thanked God the girl was gone. And now having con 
 vinced herself that here at last she had positive proof of 
 Mr. Blakely s depravity, Aunt Janet had not scrupled to 
 bear it to Angela, with sharp and surprising result. A 
 good girl, a dutiful girl, was Angela, as we have seen, 
 but she, too, had her share of fighting Scotch blood and 
 a bent for revolt that needed only a reason. For days 
 Aunt Janet had bidden her shun the young man, first 
 naming Mrs. Plume and then Elsie as the cause and 
 corespondent. One after another Graham had demol 
 ished these possibilities, to the end that even Wren was 
 ashamed of his unworthy suspicions. Then it was Nat 
 zie who was the prey of Blakely s immorality, and for 
 that, Janet declared, quite as much as for stabbing the sol 
 dier, the girl had been sent to the cells. It was late in the 
 day when she managed to find Angela away from her 
 father, who, realizing what Natzie had done and suffered 
 to save his own ewe lamb, was now in keen distress of 
 mind because powerless to raise a hand to aid her. He 
 wondered that Angela seemed so unresponsive that she 
 did not flare up in protest at such degrading punishment 
 for the girl who had saved her life. He little knew how 
 his daughter s heart was burning within her. He never 
 dreamed that she, too, was suffering torn by conflicting 
 
THE PARTING BY THE WATERS 309 
 
 emotions. It was a sore thing to find that in her benefac 
 tress lived an unsuspected rival. 
 
 Just before sunset she had left him and gone to her 
 room to change her dress for the evening, and Janet s 
 first swoop was upon her brother. Once before during 
 the exciting day she had had a moment to herself and 
 him. She had so constantly fanned the flame of his be 
 lief in Blakely s gallantries as even to throttle the sense of 
 gratitude he felt, and, in spite of herself, that she felt for 
 that officer s daring and successful services during the 
 campaign. She felt, and he felt, that they must disap 
 prove of Blakely must stamp out any nascent regard that 
 Angela might cherish for him, and to this end would 
 never in her presence admit that he had been instrumental 
 in the rescue of his captain, much less his captain s daugh 
 ter. Hurriedly Janet had told him what she and Plume 
 had seen, and left him to ponder over it. Now she came 
 to induce him to bid her tell it all to Angela. " Now that, 
 that other affair seems disproved," said she, " she ll be 
 thinking there s no reason why she shouldn t be thinking 
 of him," and dejectedly the Scotchman bade her do as 
 seemed best. Women, he reasoned, could better read 
 each other s hearts. 
 
 And so Janet had gone and had thought to shock, and 
 had most impressively detailed what she had witnessed 
 I fear me Janet scrupled not to embroider a bit, so much 
 is permissible to the " unco guid " when so very much is 
 at stake. And Angela went on brushing out her beauti 
 ful hair without a sign of emotion. To the scandal of 
 
310 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 Scotch maidenhood she seemed unimpressed by the de 
 pravity of the pair. To the surprise of Aunt Janet she 
 heard her without interruption to the uttermost word, and 
 then wished to know if Aunt Janet thought the major 
 would let her send Natzie something for supper. 
 
 Whatever the girl may have thought of this new and 
 possible complication, she determined that no soul should 
 read that it cost her a pang. She declined to discuss it. 
 She did what she had not done before that day went 
 forth in search of Kate Sanders. Aunt Janet was aston 
 ished that her niece should wish to send food to that 
 that trollop. What would she have thought could she 
 have 4ieard what passed a few moments later ? In the 
 dusk and the gloaming Kate Sanders was in conversation 
 on the side veranda with a tall sergeant of her father s 
 troop. "Ask her?" Kate was saying. "Of course I ll 
 ask her. Why, here she comes now ! " Will it be believed 
 that Sergeant Shannon wished Miss Angela s permission 
 to " take Punch out for a little exercise," a thing he had 
 never ventured to ask before, and that Angela Wren 
 eagerly said, " Yes." Poor Shannon ! He did not know 
 that night how soon he would be borrowing a horse on 
 his own account, nor that two brave girls would nearly 
 cry their eyes out over it, when they were barely on 
 speaking terms. 
 
 Of him there came sad news but the day after his 
 crack-brained, Quixotic essay. Infatuated with Elise, 
 and believing in her promise to marry him, he had placed 
 his savings in her hands, even as had Downs and Car- 
 
THE PARTING BY THE WATERS 311 
 
 mody. He had heard the story of her visiting Blakely 
 by night, and scouted it. He heard, in a maze of aston 
 ishment, that she was being sent to Prescott under guard 
 for delivery to the civil authorities, and taking the first 
 horse he could lay hands on, he galloped in chase. He 
 had overtaken the ambulance on Cherry Creek, and with 
 moving tears she had besought him to save her. Faith 
 ful to their trust, the guard had to interpose, but, late at 
 night, they reached Stammer s ranch ; were met there by 
 a relief guard sent down by Captain Stout; and the big 
 sergeant who came in charge, with special instructions 
 from Stout s own lips, was a new king who knew not 
 Joseph, and who sternly bade Shannon keep his dis 
 tance. Hot words followed, for the trooper sergeant 
 would stand no hectoring from an equal in rank. Shan 
 non s heart was already lost, and now he lost his head. 
 He struck a fellow-sergeant who stood charged with an 
 important duty, and even his own comrades could not in 
 terpose when the infantrymen threw themselves upon the 
 raging Irish soldier and hammered him hard before they 
 could subdue and bind him, but bind him they did. Sadly 
 the trooper guard went back to Sandy, bringing the " bor 
 rowed " horse and the bad news that Shannon had been 
 arrested for assaulting Sergeant Bull, and all men knew 
 that court-martial and disgrace must follow. It was 
 Shannon s last run on the road he knew so well. Soldiers 
 of rank came forward to plead for him and bear witness 
 to his worth and services, and the general commanding 
 remitted most of the sentence, restoring to him every- 
 
312 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 thing the court had decreed forfeited except the chevrons. 
 They had to go, yet could soon be regained. But no 
 man could restore to him the pride and self-respect that 
 went when he realized that he was only one of several 
 plucked and deluded victims of a female sharper. While 
 the Frenchwoman ogled and languished behind the bars, 
 Shannon wandered out into the world again, a deserter 
 from the troop he was ashamed to face, an unfollowed, 
 unsought fugitive among the mining camps in the Sier 
 ras. " Three stout soldiers stricken from the rolls two 
 of them gone to their last account," mused poor Plume, 
 as at last he led his unhappy wife away to the sea, " and 
 all the work of one woman ! " 
 
 Yes, Mrs. Plume was gone now for good and all, 
 her devoted, yet sore-hearted major with her, and Wren 
 was sufficiently recovered to be up and taking the air on 
 his veranda, where Sanders sometimes stopped to see 
 him, and " pass the time o day," but cut his visits short 
 and spoke of everything but what was uppermost in his 
 mind, because his better half persuaded him that only ill 
 would come from preaching. Then, late one wonderful 
 day, the interesting invalid, Mr. Neil Blakely himself, 
 was " paraded " upon the piazza in the Sanders s special 
 reclining-chair, and Kate and Mrs. Sanders beamed, while 
 nearly all society at the post came and purred and con 
 gratulated and took sidelong glances up the row to where 
 Angela but a while before was reading to her grim old 
 father, but where the father now read alone, for Angela 
 had gone, as was her custom at the hour, to her own little 
 
THE PARTING BY THE WATERS 313 
 
 room, and thither did Janet conceive it her duty to follow, 
 and there to investigate. 
 
 " It won t be long now before that young man will be 
 hobbling around the post, I suppose. How do you ex 
 pect to avoid him ? " said the elder maiden, looking with 
 uncompromising austerity at her niece. Angela as before 
 had just shaken loose her wealth of billowy tresses and 
 was carefully brushing them. She did not turn from the 
 contemplation of her double in the mirror before her ; she 
 did not hesitate in her reply. It was brief, calm, and to 
 the point. 
 
 " I shall not avoid him." 
 
 "Angela! And after all I your father and I have 
 told you ! " And Aunt Janet began to bristle. 
 
 " Two-thirds of what you told me, Aunt Janet, proved 
 to be without foundation. Now I doubt the rest of it." 
 And Aunt Janet saw the big eyes beginning to fill; saw 
 the twitching at the corners of the soft, sensitive lips ; saw 
 the trembling of the slender, white hand, and the ominous 
 tapping of the slender, shapely foot, but there wasn t a 
 symptom of fear or flinching. The blood of the Wrens 
 was up for battle. The child was a woman grown. The 
 day of revolt had come at last. 
 
 "Angela Wr-r-ren!" rolled Aunt Janet. " D you 
 mean you re going to see him ? speak to him ? " 
 
 " I m going to see him and thank him, Aunt Janet." 
 And now the girl had turned and faced the astounded 
 woman at the door. " You may spare yourself any words 
 upon the subject." 
 
314 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 The captain was seated in loneliness and mental per 
 turbation just where Angela had left him, but no longer 
 pretending to read. His back was toward the southern 
 end of the row. He had not even seen the cause of the 
 impromptu reception at the Sanders s. He read what 
 was taking place when Angela began to lose her voice, 
 to stumble over her words ; and, peering at her under his 
 bushy eyebrows, he saw that the face he loved was flush 
 ing, that her young bosom was swiftly rising and falling, 
 the beautiful brown eyes wandering from the page. Even 
 before the glad voices from below came ringing to his 
 ears, he read in his daughter s face the tumult in her 
 guileless heart, and then she suddenly caught herself and 
 hurried back to the words that seemed swimming in space 
 before her. But the effort was vain. Rising quickly, 
 and with brave effort steadying her voice, she said, " I ll 
 run and dress now, father, dear," and was gone, leaving 
 him to face the problem thrust upon him. Had he known 
 that Janet, too, had heard from the covert of the screened 
 and shaded window of the little parlor, and then that she 
 had followed, he would have shouted for his German 
 " striker " and sent a mandate to his sister that she could 
 not fail to understand. He did not know that she had 
 been with Angela until he heard her footstep and saw her 
 face at the hall doorway. She had not even to roll her 
 r s before the story was told. 
 
 Two days now he had lived in much distress of mind. 
 Before quitting the post Major Plume had laboriously 
 gone the rounds, saying good-by to every officer and lady. 
 
THE PARTING BY THE WATERS 315 
 
 Two officers he had asked to see alone the captain and 
 first lieutenant of Troop " C." Janet knew of this, and 
 should have known it meant amende and reconciliation, 
 perhaps revelation, but because her brother saw fit to sit 
 and ponder, she saw fit to cling unflinchingly to her pre 
 conceived ideas and to act according to them. With 
 Graham she was exceeding wroth for daring to defend 
 such persons as Lieutenant Blakely and "that Indian 
 squaw." It was akin to opposing weak-minded theories 
 to positive knowledge of facts. She had seen with her 
 own eyes the ignorant, but no less abandoned, creature 
 kneeling at Blakely s bedside, her black head pillowed 
 close to his breast. She had seen her spring up in fury 
 at being caught what else could have so enraged her 
 that she should seek to knife the intruders ? argued Janet. 
 She believed, or professed to believe, that but for the 
 vigilance of poor Todd, now quite happy in his conva 
 lescence, the young savage would have murdered both the 
 major and herself. She did not care what Dr. Graham 
 said. She had seen, and seeing, with Janet, was believing. 
 
 But she knew her brother well, and knew that since 
 Graham s impetuous outbreak he had been wavering 
 sadly, and since Plume s parting visit had been plunged 
 in a mental slough of doubt and distress. Once before 
 his stubborn Scotch nature had had to strike its colors 
 and surrender to his own subaltern, and now the same 
 struggle was on again, for what Plume said, and said in 
 presence of grim old Graham, fairly startled him: 
 
 " You are not the only one to whom I owe amende 
 
316 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 and apology, Captain Wren. I wronged you, when you 
 were shielding my wife at no little cost to yourself. 
 I wronged Blakely in several ways, and I have had to go 
 and tell him so and beg his pardon. The meanest thing 
 I ever did was bringing Miss Wren in there to spy on 
 him, unless it was in sending that girl to the guard-house. 
 I d beg her pardon, too, if she could be found. Yes, I 
 see you look glum, Wren, but we ve all been wrong, I 
 reckon. There s no mystery about it now." 
 
 And then Plume told his tale and Wren meekly list 
 ened. It might well be, said he, that Natzie loved 
 Blakely. All her people did. She had been watching 
 him from the willows as he slept that day at the pool. 
 He had forbidden her following him, forbidden her 
 coming to the post, and she feared to wake him, yet when 
 she saw the two prospectors, that had been at Hart s, ride 
 over toward the sleeping officer she was startled. She 
 saw them watching, whispering together. Then they 
 rode down and tied their horses among the trees a hun 
 dred yards below, and came crouching along the bank. 
 She was up in an instant and over the stream at the shal 
 lows, and that scared them off long enough to let her 
 reach him. Even then she dare not wake him for fear of 
 his anger at her disobedience, but his coat was open, his 
 watch and wallet easy to take. She quickly seized them 
 the little picture-case being within the wallet at the 
 moment and sped back to her covert. Then Angela had 
 come cantering down the sandy road ; had gone on down 
 stream, passing even the prowling prospectors, and after 
 
THE PARTING BY THE WATERS 317 
 
 a few minutes had returned and dismounted among the 
 willows above where Blakely lay Angela whom poor 
 Natzie believed to be Blakely s sister. Natzie supposed 
 her looking for her brother, and wondered why she 
 waited. Natzie finally signaled and pointed when she 
 saw that Angela was going in disappointment at not find 
 ing him. Natzie witnessed Angela s theft of the net and 
 her laughing ride away. By this time the prospectors 
 had given up and gone about their business, and then, 
 while she was wondering how best to restore the prop 
 erty, Lola and Alchisay had come with the annoying 
 news that the agent was angered and had sent trailers 
 after her. They were even then only a little way up 
 stream. The three then made a run for the rocks to the 
 east, and there remained in hiding. That night Natzie 
 had done her best to find her way to Blakely with the 
 property, and the rest they knew. The watch was 
 dropped in the struggle on the mesa when Mullins was 
 stabbed, the picture-case that morning at the major s 
 quarters. 
 
 "Was it Blakely told you all this, sir?" Wren had 
 asked, still wrong-headed and suspicious. 
 
 "No, Wren. It was I told Blakely. All this was 
 given me by Lola s father, the interpreter, back from 
 Chevlon s Fork only yesterday. I sent him to try to per 
 suade Natzie and her kinsfolk to return. I have prom 
 ised them immunity." 
 
 Then Plume and Graham had gone, leaving Wren to 
 brood and ponder, and this had he been doing two mortal 
 
318 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 days and nights without definite result, and now came 
 Janet to bring things to a head. In grim and ominous 
 silence he listened to her recital, saying never a word un 
 til her final appeal : 
 
 " R-r-robert, is our girlie going daft, do you think ? 
 She solemnly said to me to me but a minute ago, I 
 mean to go to him myself and thank him ! " 
 
 And solemnly the soldier looked up from his reclining- 
 chair and studied his sister s amazed and anxious face. 
 Then he took her thin, white hand between his own thin, 
 brown paws and patted it gently. She recoiled slowly as 
 she saw contrition, not condemnation, in his blinking eyes. 
 
 " God forgive us all, Janet ! It s what I ought to have 
 done days ago." 
 
 Another cloudless afternoon had come, and, under the 
 willows at the edge of the pool, a young girl sat day 
 dreaming, though the day was nearly done. All in the 
 valley was wrapped in shadow, though the cliffs and tur 
 rets across the stream were resplendent in a radiance of 
 slanting sunshine. Not a whisper of breeze stirred the 
 drooping foliage along the sandy shores, or ruffled the 
 liquid mirror surface. Not a sound, save drowsy hum of 
 beetle or soft murmur of rippling waters among the peb 
 bly shadows below, broke the vast silence of the scene. 
 Just where Angela was seated that October day on which 
 our story opened, she was seated now, with the grey 
 hounds stretched sprawling in the warm sands at her 
 
THE PARTING BY THE WATERS 319 
 
 feet, with Punch blinking lazily and switching his long 
 tail in the thick of the willows. 
 
 And somebody else was there, close at hand. The 
 shadows of the westward heights had gradually risen to 
 the crest of the rocky cliffs across the stream. A soft, 
 prolonged call of distant trumpet summoned homeward 
 for the coming night the scattered herds and herd guards 
 of the post, and, rising suddenly, her hand upon a swift- 
 throbbing heart, her red lips parted in eagerness or ex 
 citement uncontrollable, Angela stood intently listening. 
 Over among the thickets across the pool the voice of an 
 Indian girl was uplifted in some weird, uncanny song. 
 The voice was shrill, yet not unmusical. The song was 
 savage, yet not lacking some crude harmony. She could 
 not see the singer, but she knew. Natzie s people had 
 returned to the agency, accepting the olive branch that 
 Plume had tendered them Natzie herself was here. 
 
 At the first sound of the uplifted voice an Apache boy, 
 crouching in the shrubbery at the edge of the pool, rose 
 quickly to his feet, and, swift and noiseless, stole away 
 into the thicket. If he thought to conceal himself or his 
 purpose his caution was needless. Angela neither saw 
 nor heard him. Neither was it the song nor the singer 
 that now arrested her attention. So still was the air, so 
 deep was the silence of nature, that even on such sandy 
 roads and bridlepaths as traversed the winding valley, 
 the faintest hoof-beat was carried far. Another horse, 
 another rider, was quickly coming. Tonto, the big hound 
 nearest her, lifted his shapely head and listened a mo- 
 
320 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 ment, then went bounding away through the willows, fol 
 lowed swiftly by his mate. They knew the hoof-beats, 
 and joyously ran to meet and welcome the rider. Angela 
 knew them quite as well, but could neither run to meet, 
 nor could she fly. 
 
 Only twice, as yet, had she opportunity to see or to 
 thank Neil Blakely, and a week had passed since her 
 straightforward challenge to Aunt Janet. As soon as he 
 could walk unaided, save by his stick, Wren had gone 
 stumping down the line to Sanders s quarters and asked 
 for Mr. Blakely, with whom he had an uninterrupted 
 talk of half an hour. Within two days thereafter Mr. 
 Blakely in person returned the call, being received with 
 awful state and solemnity by Miss Wren herself. An 
 gela, summoned by her father s voice, came flitting down 
 a moment later, and there in the little army parlor, where 
 first she had sought to " entertain " him until the captain 
 should appear, our Angela was once again brought face 
 to face with him who had meanwhile risked his life in the 
 effort to rescue her father, and again in the effort to find 
 and rescue her. A fine blush mantled her winsome face 
 as she entered, and, without a glance at Janet, went 
 straightway to their visitor, with extended hand. 
 
 " I am so glad to see you again, Mr. Blakely," she 
 
 bravely began. " I have so much to thank you " 
 
 but her brown eyes fell before the fire in the blue and her 
 whole being thrilled at the fervor of his handclasp. She 
 drew her hand away, the color mounting higher, then 
 snuggled to her father s side with intent to take his arm ; 
 
THE PARTING BY THE WATERS 321 
 
 but, realizing suddenly how her own was trembling, 
 grasped instead the back of a chair. Blakely was saying 
 something, she knew not what, nor could she ever recall 
 much that anyone said during the brief ten minutes of 
 his stay, for there sat Aunt Janet, bolt upright, after the 
 fashion of fifty years gone by, a formidable picture in 
 deed, and Angela wondered that anyone could say any 
 thing at all. 
 
 Next time they met she was riding home and he sat on 
 the south veranda with Mrs. Sanders and Kate. She 
 would have ridden by with just a nod and smile ; but, at 
 sight of her, he " hobbled " down the steps and came 
 hurriedly out to speak, whereupon Mrs. Sanders, who 
 knew much better, followed to " help him," as she said. 
 " Help, indeed ! " quoth angry Kate, usually most dutiful 
 of daughters. " You d only hinder ! " But even that 
 presence had not stopped his saying : " The doctor prom 
 ises I may ride Hart s single-footer in a day or two, Miss 
 Angela, and then " 
 
 And now it was a " single-footer " coming, the only one 
 at Sandy. Of course it might be Hart, not Blakely, and 
 yet Blakely had seen her as she rode away. It was 
 Blakely s voice how seldom she had heard, yet how well 
 she knew it ! answering the joyous welcome of the hounds. 
 It was Blakely who came riding straight in among the 
 willows, a radiance in his thin and lately pallid face 
 Blakely who quickly, yet awkwardly, dismounted, for it 
 still caused him pain, and then, forgetful of his horse, 
 came instantly to her as she stood there, smiling, yet 
 
322 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 tremulous. The hand that sought hers fairly shook, but 
 that, said Angela, though she well knew better, might 
 have been from weakness or from riding. For a moment 
 he did not speak. It was she who began. She thought 
 he should know at once. 
 
 " Did you hear her singing too ? " she hazarded. 
 
 " Hear ? Who ? " he replied, grudgingly letting go the 
 hand because it pulled with such determination. 
 
 " Why Natzie, I suppose. At least I haven t seen 
 her," she stammered, her cheeks all crimson now. 
 
 " Natzie, indeed ! " he answered, in surprise, turning 
 slowly and studying the opposite willows. " It is only a 
 day or two since they came in. I thought she d soon be 
 down." Obviously her coming caused him neither em 
 barrassment nor concern. " She still has a notecase of 
 mine. I suppose you heard ? " And his clear blue eyes 
 were fastened on her lovely, downcast face. 
 
 " Something. Not much," she answered, drawing 
 back a little, for he stood so close to her she could have 
 heard the beating of his heart but for her own. All was 
 silence over there in the opposite willows, but so it was 
 the day Natzie had so suddenly appeared from nowhere, 
 and he saw the hurried glance she sent across the pool. 
 
 " Has she worried you ? " he began, " has she been " 
 
 spying, he was going to say, and she knew it, and grew 
 redder still with vexation. Natzie could claim at least 
 that she was not without a shining example had she come 
 there to spy, but Blakely had that to say to her that de 
 served undivided attention, and there is a time when 
 
THE PARTING BY THE WATERS 323 
 
 even one s preserver and greatest benefactor may be de 
 trop. 
 
 "Will you wait one moment?" he suddenly asked. 
 "I ll go to the rocks yonder and call her," and then, 
 almost as suddenly, the voice was again uplifted in 
 the same weird, barbaric song, and the singer had gone 
 from the depths of the opposite thicket and was some 
 where farther up stream, still hidden from their gaze 
 still, possibly, ignorant of Angela s presence. The brown 
 eyes were at the moment following the tall, white form, 
 moving slowly through the winding, faintly-worn path 
 way toward the upper shallows where, like stepping 
 stones, the big rocks stretched from shore to shore, and 
 she was startled to note that the moment the song began 
 he stopped short a second or two, listened intently, then 
 almost sprang forward in his haste to reach the crossing. 
 Another minute and he was out of sight among the shrub 
 bery. Another, and she heard the single shot of a re 
 volver, and there he stood at the rocky point, a smoking 
 pistol in his hand. Instantly the song ceased, and then 
 his voice was uplifted, calling, " Natzie ! Natzie ! " With 
 breathless interest Angela gazed and, presently, parting 
 the shrubbery with her little brown hands, the Indian girl 
 stepped forth into the light and stood in silence, her great 
 black eyes fixed mournfully upon him. Could this be 
 their mountain princess the daring, the resolute, the 
 commanding? Could this be the fierce, lissome, panther- 
 like creature before whose blow two of their stoutest men 
 had fallen? There was dejection inexpressible in her 
 
324 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 very attitude. There was no longer bravery or adorn 
 ment in her dress. There was no more of queen of 
 chieftain s daughter in this downcast child of the desert. 
 He called again, " Natzie," and held forth his hand. 
 Her head had drooped upon her breast, but, once again, 
 she looked upon him, and then, with one slow, hesitant, 
 backward glance about her, stepped forward, her little, 
 moccasined feet flitting from rock to rock across the 
 murmuring shallows until she stood before him. Then 
 he spoke, but she only shook her head and let it droop 
 again, her hands passively clasping. He knew too little 
 of her tongue to plead with her. He knew, perhaps, too 
 little of womankind to appreciate what he was doing. 
 Finding words useless, he gently took her hand and drew 
 her with him, and passively she obeyed, and for a moment 
 they disappeared from Angela s view. Then presently 
 the tall, white form came again in sight, slowly leading 
 the unresisting child, until, in another moment, they 
 stepped within the little open space among the willows. 
 At the same instant Angela arose, and the daughter of the 
 soldier and the daughter of the savage, the one with timid 
 yet hopeful welcome and greeting in her lovely face, the 
 other with sudden amaze, scorn, passion, and jealous fury 
 in her burning eyes, stood a breathless moment con 
 fronted. Then, all in a second, with one-half stifled, in 
 articulate cry, Natzie wrenched her hand from that of 
 Blakely, and, with the spring of a tigress, bounded away. 
 Just at the edge of the pool she halted, whirled about, 
 tore from her bosom a flat, oblong packet and hurled it at 
 
> 4 
 
 
 e o 
 
 K) P3 
 
THE PARTING BY THE WATERS 325 
 
 his feet; then, with the dart of a frightened deer, drove 
 through the northward willows. Angela saw her run 
 blindly up the bank, leaping thence to the rocks below, 
 bounding from one to another with the wild grace of the 
 antelope. Another instant and she had reached the oppo 
 site shore, and there, tossing her arms wildly above her 
 head, her black tresses streaming behind her, with a cry 
 that was almost a scream, she plunged into the heart of 
 the thicket ; the stubborn branches closed behind her, and 
 our Apache queen was gone. As they met, so had they 
 parted, by the waters of the pool. 
 
 When Blakely turned again to Angela she, too, was 
 gone. He found her a little later, her arms twined about 
 her pony s neck, her face buried in his mane, and sob 
 bing as though her heart would break. 
 
 On a soft, starlit evening within the week, no longer 
 weeping, but leaning on Blakely s arm, Angela stood at the 
 edge of the bluff, looking far out over the Red Rock coun 
 try to the northeast. The sentry had reported a distant 
 signal fire, and several of the younger people had strolled 
 out to see. Whatever it was that had caused the report 
 had vanished by the time they reached the post, so, pres 
 ently, Kate Sanders started the homeward move, and now 
 even the sentry had disappeared in the darkness. When 
 Angela, too, would have returned, his arm restrained. 
 She knew it would. She knew he had not spoken that 
 evening at the willows because of her tears. She knew 
 he had been patient, forbearing, gentle, yet well she knew 
 he meant now to speak and wait no longer. 
 
326 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 " Do you remember," he began, " when I said that some 
 day I should tell you but never your aunt who it was 
 that came to my quarters that night and why she came? " 
 and though she sought to remove her hand from his arm 
 he would not let it go. 
 
 " You did tell me," she answered, her eyelids droop 
 ing. 
 
 "I did\ when?" 
 
 Though the face was downcast, the sensitive lips began 
 to quiver with merriment and mischief. 
 
 The same day you took me for your mother and 
 asked me to sing for you." 
 
 " Angela ! " he cried, in amaze, and turning quickly 
 toward her, " What can you mean ? " 
 
 " Just what I say. You began as though I were your 
 sister, then your mother. I think, perhaps, if we d had 
 another hour together it would have been grandmother." 
 She was shaking with suppressed laughter now, or was it 
 violent trembling, for his heart, like hers, was bounding. 
 
 " I must indeed have been delirious," he answered now, 
 not laughing, not even smiling. He had possessed him 
 self of that other hand, despite its fluttering effort. His 
 voice was deep and grave and tremulous. " I called you 
 anything but what I most longed to call you what I pray 
 God I may call you, Angela my wife ! " 
 
L ENVOI 
 
 THERE was a wedding at Sandy that winter 
 when Pat Mullins took his discharge, and his 
 land warrant, and a claim up the Beaver, and 
 Norah Shaughnessy to wife. There was another, many a 
 mile from Sandy, when the May blossoms were showering 
 in the orchard of a fair old homestead in the distant East, 
 and then Neil Blakely took his bride to see "the land of the 
 leal " after the little peep at the lands that now she shared 
 with him. There is one room in the beautiful old Colonial 
 mansion that they soon learned to call " father s," in an 
 ticipation of the time when he should retire and come 
 to hang the old saber on the older mantel and spend his 
 declining years with them. There is another, sacred to 
 Aunt Janet, where she was often welcomed, a woman 
 long since reconciled to Angela s once " obnoxious," but 
 ever devoted admirer. There were some points in which 
 Aunt Janet suffered sore. She had views of her own 
 upon the rearing and management of children, and these 
 views she did at first oppose to those of Angela, but not 
 for long. In this, as in her choice of a husband, Angela 
 had to read her declaration of independence to the elder 
 woman. 
 
 There is another room filled with relics of their frontier 
 days, Indian weapons, blankets, beadwork, and among 
 
 327 
 
328 AN APACHE PRINCESS 
 
 these, in a sort of shrine of its own, there hangs a por 
 trait made by a famous artist from a little tintype, taken 
 by some wandering photographer about the old Apache 
 reservation. Wren wrote them, ere the regiment left 
 Arizona, that she who had been their rescuer, and then so 
 long disappeared, finally wedded a young brave of the 
 Chiricahua band and went with him to Mexico. That 
 portrait is the only relic they have of a never forgotten 
 benefactress Natzie, their Apache Princess. 
 
 THE END, 
 
A DAUGHTER of the Sioux 
 
 BY GENERAL CHARLES KING 
 
 A Tale of the Indian Frontier 
 Illustrations by Frederic Remington and Edwin Willard Deming 
 
 SOME PRESS NOTES 
 
 The Chicago Dally News 
 A stronger story than any he has writ 
 ten for many years. 
 
 The Philadelphia Item 
 
 A genuinely delightful tale, clean, 
 wholesome, thoroughly enjoyable. . . 
 
 The Baltimore American 
 
 Is full of interest, and equals, if not 
 surpasses, his best previous efforts. 
 
 The Portland (Me.) Press 
 
 Thig captivating novel is quite per 
 fect of its kind and there is not one 
 dull line from start to finish. 
 
 The Burlington Hawk eye 
 
 la one of General King s best works 
 and withal a most entertaining and 
 fascinating story of army life. 
 
 The San Francisco Chronicle 
 
 The story is full of life and move 
 ment, and all the details of army life 
 are described with that perfect knowl 
 edge which carries conviction to the 
 reader. 
 
 The Cleveland Leader 
 
 It is the strongest and most enter 
 taining story he has written for many 
 a day. ... It gets a grip on the read 
 er in the first chapters and holds it to 
 the end. 
 
 The World, New York City 
 
 A soldier s story told with a soldier s 
 swing. ... Is capitally illustrated 
 and has a particularly handsome and 
 tasteful cover portrait of the heroine 
 in colors. 
 
 The Pittsburg Leader 
 
 There is a naturalness about the 
 story that makes it of decided interest, 
 and every one who reads it will lay the 
 book down with a feeling of regret 
 that the end has been reached so soon. 
 
 The Minneapolis Tribune 
 
 Is the best pieca of work General 
 King has given his admiring public 
 in a long time. Is full of incident and 
 romance, and its central theme con 
 tains a dramatic power worthy of sub 
 ject and author. 
 
 The Literary World 
 
 To General King we are deeply in 
 debted for much information concern 
 ing family life at fort and trading post. 
 In these days of the problem novel and 
 the yellow journal, it is a mental pleas 
 ure and a moral profit to read of men 
 who are in love with their own wives, 
 of women who adore their own hus 
 bands. 
 
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 LD 21-95m-7, 37 
 
THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY