Sunset Pass | Page 8

bowlder and darkness now. The early morning wind was sighing
through the pines up the mountain side at the south. All else was
silence.
Presently they heard him hail:
"Come on! Here we are!"
Jim touched up his wearied team and soon, under the captain's guidance,
was bumping up a little side trail. A hundred yards off the road they
halted and Gwynne called back into the darkness:
"How's Manuelito getting on, Pike?"

No answer.
The captain stepped back a few yards and listened. Not a sound of hoof
or wheel.
"Pike!" he called. "Where are you?"
No answer at all.
"Quick, Jim, give me the lantern," he called, and in a moment the
glimmering light went bounding down the rocky trail, back to the road.
And there the two soldiers met--Pike trotting up rapidly from the west,
the captain swinging his lantern in the Pass.
"Where's Manuelito?" was the fierce demand.
[Illustration: "WHERE'S MANUELITO?"]
"Gone, sir. Gone and taken the mules with him. The wagon's back there
four hundred yards up the road."
"My God! Pike. Give me your horse quick. You stay and guard my
babies."
CHAPTER III.
ON THE ALERT.
Obedient to the captain's order, Pike had dismounted and given him the
horse, but it was with a sense of almost sickening dread that he saw
him ride away into darkness.
"Take care of the babies," indeed! The old trooper would shed his
heart's blood in their defence, but what would that avail against a gang
of howling Apaches? It could only defer the moment of their capture
and then--what would be the fate of those poor little ones and of honest
old Kate? Jim, of course, would do his best, but there remained now
only the two men to defend the captain's children and their nurse

against a swarm of bloodthirsty Tontos who were surely on their trail.
There was no telling at what moment their hideous war-cry might wake
the echoes of the lonely Pass.
With all his loyalty, Pike was almost ready to blame his employer and
old commander for riding off in pursuit of the Mexican. It was so dark
that no trail could be seen. He could not know in which direction
Manuelito had fled. It was indeed a blind chase, and yet the captain had
trotted confidently back past the deserted wagon as though he really
believed he could speedily overtake and recapture the stolen mules.
Pike thought that the captain should stay with his children and let him
go in pursuit or rather search, but every one who knew Gwynne knew
how self-confident he was and how much higher he held his own
opinion than that of anybody else. "It is his confounded
bull-headedness that has got us into this scrape," thought poor Pike, for
the twentieth time, but the soldier in him came to the fore and
demanded action--action.
Knowing the habits of the Apaches it was his hope that they would not
follow in pursuit until broad daylight and that it would be noon before
they could reach the Pass. By that time, with or without the mules,
Captain Gwynne would certainly be back. Meanwhile his first duty
seemed to be to get the provisions from the wagon up to the little
fastness among the great bowlders where the children, guarded by poor,
trembling but devoted Kate, were now placidly sleeping--worn out with
the fatigue of their jolting ride from Snow Lake. She kept Black Jim
with a loaded rifle close by the side of the family wagon and prevented
his falling asleep at his post, in genuine darkey fashion, by insisting on
his talking with her in low tones. She kept fretting and worrying about
the absence of the captain and the non-arrival of Manuelito with his
wagon. She asked Jim a hundred questions as to the cause of the delay,
but he could give no explanation. It was with joy inexpressible,
therefore, that she heard Pike's well-known voice hailing them in
cheery tones. He wanted Jim.
[Illustration: HIS FIRST DUTY SEEMED TO BE TO GET THE
PROVISIONS FROM THE WAGON.]

"Where's the captain and the wagon?" demanded Kate in loud whisper.
"Up the road a piece," answered Pike in the most off-hand way
imaginable. "We'll have it here presently but Jim'll have to help. We've
lost a linch-pin in the dark. Come along, Jim."
"Shure you're not going to take Jim away and leave me alone with the
poor children. Oh, corporal, for the love of the blessed saints don't do
that!"
"Sho! Kate. We won't be any distance away and there ain't an Indian
within ten miles. They wouldn't dare come prowling around at night.
Here, you take Jim's gun and blow the top of the head off the first
Apache that shows up. We'll be back in