"I say, there!" the Colonel called out. "Are we going to stop here very long?"
"No, Colonel; no!" came the answer. "We're changing engines, that's all. I'm going along to have a word with my mare. I reckon she's missing me."
"Oh, it's you, Silk, is it?" laughed the Colonel. "I didn't know you with your overcoat on. Won't you come in along with us here? Sir George is anxious to have a yarn with you, and I'm sure you'll be more comfortable here than in that third-class."
"Thank you, Colonel," returned Silk, "but I've changed my plans. I've got to go back to Macleod with a man who is rather ill. Good-night!"
He said nothing of who the man was, and no one on the train knew then or even afterwards anything of the danger that they had escaped. But that was Sergeant Silk's way.
If there was one thing more than another that Percy Rapson and Dan Medlicott coveted, it was an opportunity to accompany Sergeant Silk on one of his police expeditions on the Rattlesnake patrol. But such an opportunity came very seldom, and it was quite an exceptional circumstance that Dan happened to be able to make himself of use on the occasion when Red Derrick was captured in White Wolf Gulch.
The way it all happened was this—
Two men were riding along the trail, one on a piebald broncho, the other on a black mustang. They were on their way to the meeting place appointed by their leader, Red Derrick. Everything had been well planned, but they were not fully certain that they were safe, and they were both nervously anxious. As they came out from the gloom of a pineforest into the open, the man on the piebald broncho looked searchingly into the night darkness over his left shoulder. Then he shifted his grip on the reins and glanced uneasily at his companion.
"Say, Bill," he inquired, "you plumb sure as we ain't bein' follered?"
Bill Allison's hand went as by instinct to his revolver.
"Follered, Hen?" he questioned, looking around and listening. "Did you see anythin'?—hear anythin'?"
"Well," returned Hen, "I just notioned a while ago as I caught the clip of a horse's hoof agin a stone, way back thar. Might ha' bin a' echo. Dessay it was."
"Couldn't ha' bin anythin' else," Bill assured him. "Thar's no Injuns messin' around. Th' Mounted P'lice is busy somewhere else. Nobody knows where we are, or where we're goin'—nobody, 'cept Red Derrick hisself. No, pard, we ain't bein' follered. Guess you're right 'bout its bein' a' echo."
He jabbed his pony's flank with a spurredheel and the two broke into a quicker pace. For a couple of miles or so they continued riding side by side, along the indistinct trail, neither speaking. But within the gloom of a dark, wooded bluff they slowed down, turned abruptly from the beaten track, and pursued their way quietly, stealthily, in single file, through the long grass, descending into the hollow of a secluded coulee, where they came to a halt.
"Jim said as he'd show a light," said Bill. "Watch for it over yonder. D'ye make out the old shack?"
He pointed across the coulee to a small log hut, so overgrown with tangled creepers that in the darkness it could hardly be distinguished from the surrounding bush.
Hen Faxon nodded.
"Queer sort of a crib ter bring us to," he observed, preparing to dismount. "Makes a fellow feel some scared. Why couldn't Jim ha' done the business when he was along east yesterday?"
Bill gave a sneering little laugh.
"Pr'aps you've an idea as he'd bin wiser ter discuss the biz in the public saloon at Hickory Crossing, with a crowd of ranchers an' cowpunchers, and maybe one of the Mounted P'lice fer audience?" he suggested. "But Jim Derrick ain't that sort. He ain't no novice tenderfoot ter let any trampoosin' stranger know what cards he holds. And I reckon he holds a straight flush this game, see?"
"Um!" muttered Hen.
The two men dismounted and hobbled their ponies.
"We'll wait here till he gives a sign," said Bill, taking out his pipe.
They lay in the grass, smoking, with their eyes directed towards the dark shape of the dilapidated, deserted log cabin, which was their appointed meeting-place. After a long time of waiting, Bill Allison's broncho threw up its head and stood alert with twitching ears.
"Reckon Jim's thar now," decided Bill. "Yes, he's strikin' a light, see! Leave the ponies where they are."
He stood up and led the way across the coulee. Red Derrick met them at the ruined doorway.
"Yo're punctual, boys," he said. "Thought I heard you comin' t'other way. Everythin' all right?"
"Yep," Bill answered, following within the hut to where Derrick's lighted candle burnt in the neck of a bottle among the rank weeds that grew about the broken hearthstone.
"Sure?"
Bill nodded emphatically.
"It's all serene," he answered. "Nobody seen us start, and we ain't set eyes on a livin' human all along the trail."
"Good," said Derrick. "Y'see, I was some afraid as that all-fired, double-barrelled detective, Sergeant Silk, might ha' gotten wind of suthin'. Thar ain't a whole lot as he don't ferret out somehow. Say, he ain't been spyin' around any, has he?"
"Haven't seen him for weeks," reported Hen Faxon.
"Reckon he's gone off on another patrol," said Bill. "Anyhow, he ain't liable t' ha'gotten wind of this yer game we're startin' on, and that's sure."
"Then we're safe ter pull it off," declared Red Derrick, "and we kin lay our plans right now. But first, I suspicion you two boys is some dry, eh? Say, thar's suthin' in the shape of liquid refreshment here."
He opened his haversack and produced a bottle and a tin pannikin, and each of the three took a long drink in his turn. One of the fallen roof timbers served as a seat for Derrick and Allison. Hen Faxon seated himself on the earthen floor, with his back against one of the upright logs of the wall.
As he did so he was half-conscious of a rustling movement at the other side of the timber against which he leant. He drew himself forward an inch or two and looked round.
"Guess thar's a lynx or a fox or some sich critter sniffin' around outside," he muttered. He put his ear to a gap in the wall and listened. "Dessay it was only my fancy," he decided. "I'm some scared to-night.Allus am when thar's a risky job on hand. Give us another drink, Jim."
The sound which had disturbed him was not repeated, and his two companions paid no regard to his remark. Even if he had been correct in his surmise as to the cause of the rustling movement, there would be no possible danger in the circumstance of a fox or a lynx or any other species of wild creature sniffing around.
Nevertheless, Hen Faxon's sharp hearing had not altogether deceived him, and had his eyesight been as keen—had he put an eye instead of an ear to the open seam between the pine logs at his back—he might even in the darkness have discovered that the actual intruder was much more formidable and dangerous than was any prowling four-footed beast.
"Well, boys," began Red Derrick, pulling vigorously at his pipe. "I figure thar's no p'ticler need fer me ter say a whole lot. You've both of you got as much savee as I have how the thing's got ter be pulled off, and it's up to us ter pull it off successful. Y'see that thar stagecoach is bound ter keep schedule time. Alf Bulger'll see to it. Alf's our trump card. He'll join on and take charge of the stage, as per usual, at Soldier's Knee, drivin' his team clean into our arms, so ter speak. He'll be due along the Rattlesnake section an hour before sundown. Just when it's gettin' tolerable dark, he'll enter White Wolf Gulch. That's our point, see? That's whar we're shapin' ter hold him up and collar the boodle."
"Say, thar ain't no doubt 'bout that boodle bein' on board, is there?" Hen Faxon leant forward to inquire.
Red Derrick looked at him severely across the flickering candle-light.
"Not a ghost of a doubt," he said. "Not a shadder. That's the one thing more sartin than anythin' else in the whole biz. Fifty thousand dollars' worth. That's the value, 'cordin' ter Alf, and I reckon Alf should know, him bein' stage driver and in the company's confidence. And say, boys, you've got ter see as Alf don't get scratched."
"Any passengers?" inquired Bill Allison.
Derrick shrugged his broad shoulders.
"What odds if thar is?" he retorted. "We kin deal with 'em, sure—three of us, droppin' on 'em unawares, and Alf helpin' us. Nat'rally thar'll be the messenger in charge of the boodle," he explained, "some quill-drivin', white-collared bank clerk from Ottawa. Don't figure as he need count for a lot. He ain't liable ter be anyways handy with a gun; and Tom Mason'll see as the skunk's shooter is empty. Soon as Alf enters the gulch, drivin' slow, he'll give us the signal. He'll crack his whip ter let us know as everythin's serene. Then the fun'll begin."
"We got ter fire in the air, then?" questioned Bill Allison. "We got ter do nothin' but fill the atmosphere with yells an' smoke? Seems easy!"
"The more noise we makes the better," returned Red Derrick. "But we've got ter do more'n make a clatter. Y'see, Alf Bulger c'n hardly make out as he's been held up by a gang of desperate road agents if we don't give him the evidence of a considerable pepperin' of bullet holes in the panels of his coach. As fer Mister Bank-clerk, if he shows fight—well,you kin leave him t' me. Savvy? Him and any other passengers, while you two make off with the swag."
His two confederates signified their understanding of the bold scheme by which the stage coach was to be held up and robbed: and they had now only to discuss the details of their plan of attack.
While they discussed, they proceeded to empty the bottle of what Derrick had called liquid refreshment, and it was perhaps because of his anxiety to secure his full share of the drink that Hen Faxon failed to detect a repetition of the faint rustling sound outside the hut which had previously caught his attention. It is more probable, however, that the movement was so slight that even if he had been listening for it he could not have known that it was anything more than the mere whispering of the wind in the surrounding brush.
No Indian scout, skilled in the art of taking cover, could have accomplished his purpose more silently than did the man who hadstealthily crawled up to the rear of the ruined shanty to watch and listen.
Keeping still as a rock, lying at full length along the ground with an eye at a knot-hole in one of the timbers, hardly breathing lest he should betray his presence, he had heard every word that had been spoken; and now, knowing that he could discover nothing further, he was stealing away to make prompt use of his secret.
Very slowly, very silently, inch by inch, he crawled on hands and knees through the tangled brushwood and rank grass, working his way up the rising ground until he came to the edge of the coulee. Then he rose to his feet, looked back to assure himself that he had not been seen, and strode quickly but very cautiously through a belt of trees to where his horse was waiting, watching him as he approached.
"Quiet!" he whispered as he drew near, and the animal seemed to understand, for it made no movement, no slightest sound, but stood rigidly still until the rider had swung himself into the saddle.
"Steady, girlie!" he muttered. "No need to hurry, just yet."
He unbuttoned his military coat and under its cover dexterously struck a match on the milled edge of his watch. The tiny flame gleamed only for a moment upon his scarlet tunic, but in that moment he had seen the dial of his watch, with the fingers pointing to a quarter to eleven.
"Good!" he decided, as he seized the bridle rein. "We can take it easy, and yet get to Rattlesnake Ranch before sunrise."
"Stage comin' along, boys. Fifteen minutes inside of scheduled time."
The hotel at Soldier's Knee was thronged with ranchers and cowboys who had come into the little settlement to attend the stock market.
Some of the men were gambling at the card-tables, some were drinking at the bar, others stood in groups discussing the prospects of their crops of fruit and corn or the work of the lumber camps, and the air of the saloon was dense with pungent tobacco smoke and strong language. It was one seated on the sill of the open window who reported the coming of the mail.
"'Tain't often we sees sich a crowd of passengers this time of year," he added.
"Passengers? A crowd?"
Alf Bulger emptied his glass, took up his long-lashed driving-whip, andstrode towards the door, looking more like a western cowboy than a coach-driver, with his buckskin jacket and wide-rimmed hat, his leather leggings, and his brace of formidable-looking revolvers. He was to take charge of the express from Soldier's Knee east as far as Kananaskis, and he was naturally personally interested in the announcement concerning passengers.
"A crowd, eh?" he repeated in a tone of surprise.
Usually it did not greatly matter to him whether there were few passengers or many, or, indeed, if there were none at all. The Government mail-bags were his principal freight. Passengers were, as a rule, a secondary consideration.
He silently watched the lumbering coach approaching along the trail in a cloud of white dust, and he drew a deep breath of relief when he discovered that what his neighbour had announced as a crowd resolved itself into three individuals.
"Say, Alf," observed a young rancher at his elbow. "You'll need ter beon your Sunday best behaviour this trip. I see one of your passengers is a parson, and—yes, a female woman alongside of him. Guess she's his daughter. I allow she's the one as leads off with the camp meetin' hymns. A woman's voice fetches the boys every time. Wonder if they're shapin' to hold a revival meetin' in Soldier's Knee while the team's bein' changed!"
"Maybe they're figgerin' ter settle down right here," suggested Alf, his wish being father to the thought. "Thar's a consid'rable stock of all-round iniquity for 'em to work upon. What d'you make of the third passenger? Kinder commercial traveller, by the cut of him, I'd say."
"Yep. Guess that's his mark. I've seen him before, along this trail. Seen him a week ago, on the westbound stage. Comes from Ottawa."
"Ah!" nodded Alf Bulger with satisfaction. He, too, had seen the passenger before and knew him to be the bank messenger whom he hadexpected. "A nice, harmless, meek an' mild sort of chap. Looks as if he didn't know a pistol from an infant's feedin' bottle."
When the coach came to a halt in front of the hotel, Bulger strode forward to superintend the changing of the horses. While he did so he paid curious regard to his three passengers.
The elderly gentleman in clerical attire and blue goggles appeared to be sleepy or ill, or to be so well accustomed to travelling that the arrival at a new stopping-place had no interest for him. His girl companion was equally indifferent to her surroundings, excepting that she leant forward on the rail of the driver's seat to inspect the new team of horses.
As for the meek and mild young man at the rear, his attention was divided between cleaning his eyes of dust and guarding the heavy box on the seat beside him, as if he feared that it might mysteriously vanish if he were so much as to lift his elbow from its iron-clamped lid.
"Say, misters," Bulger called up. "Thar's time fer you ter git down ifyou wants suthin' t' eat. Thar's not many sich tip-top hotels along the trail."
It was the girl who answered, without lifting the thick blue gauze veil that hid her face.
"Thank you, driver," she said, "but we had refreshments at the last stopping-place, and we've lots of sandwiches. What's the name of this place?"
"Soldier's Knee, miss," answered Bulger.
"Dear me, what strange, outlandish names they do give to these stations!" the girl remarked. "Why Soldier's Knee instead of elbow, or ankle?"
Bulger shook his head and grinned.
"Dunno, missy," he responded. "Y'see, I warn't present at the christenin'."
The meek and mild young man leant over and spoke to him.
"If it's no trouble, driver," he said, "I wish you would order a cup of tea for me."
Bulger looked up at him with calculating curiosity, giving an eye at the same time to the strong box.
"Guess you'd best jump down an' have it at the bar," he suggested. "That yer dressin' case of yourn ain't got wings, I reckon. Still, if you'd ruther take it in the open air, I'll oblige."
And so deciding he disappeared into the saloon.
The girl turned half round, speaking for the first time to the man behind her.
"You are wise to keep your seat, stranger," she said softly.
He looked at her sharply, almost with suspicion.
"Why?" he questioned, glancing with even greater suspicion at her strangely silent and morose companion with the blue goggles.
"Oh, I don't just know," she returned lightly. "I suppose you have your orders not to let that box be out of your sight."
The young man went very red and was obviously confused.
"What do you know about the box?" he asked pointedly.
"Nothing but what I have observed," she replied. "It looks a kinderordinary box for carrying samples. But the canvas is worn at the corner, and I can see an iron band. When the coach lurched, crossing the divide, the box was so heavy that the seat creaked under its weight. Guess it ain't likely to be packed with feathers. I've seen the address label, too, and you wouldn't be takin' feathers to a bank in Ottawa. And, again, you're carryin' a six-shooter. I caught sight of it when you opened your coat to look at the time, a while back. Say, now, is it loaded, that pistol of yours? I do hope it won't explode, and me sittin' so near! But it ought to be loaded."
"Lucy!" Her companion in clerical attire spoke to her reprovingly. "Don't be so inquisitive. What does it matter to you whether the gentleman's pistol is loaded or not?"
"All right, dad," objected Lucy rather rudely. "Keep your hair on. It would matter a heap if we was to be attacked by Indians or—or road agents; and I should be a lot more comfortable if I knew it was loaded. I'm not just sure that it is."
The young man behind her appeared suddenly to be anxious on the same point, for he thrust his hand under the front of his coat and withdrew it quickly, staring in blank amazement at the weapon that it held.
"You minx!" he cried to the girl accusingly. "This is some conjuring trick of yours! This isn't my pistol at all. Mine was loaded—this is empty!"
Very smartly, very calmly, the girl's clerical companion laid a firm hand upon the weapon and took possession of it.
"Say nothing, Mr. Gaskell," he whispered. "I'll give it you back before we start. Here's the driver with your cup of tea. Don't drink it, d'you hear? It's liable to be drugged."
Alf Bulger climbed up by the wheel and handed Mr. Gaskell the steaming cup of tea. Gaskell paid him for it, thanked him, and raised the cup to his lips, alternately blowing into it and smelling at it, but not drinking.
"I believe you're right, sir," he said in an undertone when the driver had gone away, "but it beats me to know how you guessed it would bedrugged. Do you mind emptying it over the far side?"
"Shove it under the seat to cool," Lucy suggested. "Dad's sure to throw it on somebody's head if he empties it. He's some absent-minded, see?"
During the further time of waiting, Gaskell was occupied in closely watching his two travelling companions. He had already decided that there was something very queer about them, and he was more than a little suspicious.
The girl's voice, for one thing, had made him suspicious. It was more like the voice of a boy than of a girl, and her back hair, although hidden by the thick folds of her veil, seemed to be extraordinarily short. As for the man beside her, whom she called her "dad," it was difficult to make him out in any way, or to be sure of him.
In spite of his clerical attire, his long, grey beard, and his general appearance of a respectable clergyman, it was yet possible to believe that he was an impostor—a wolf in sheep's clothing, a disguised bandit,who had boarded this coach with the secret purpose of taking forcible possession of the treasure chest.
Looking at him very attentively, Gaskell became aware that the man's eyes behind their blue spectacles were extraordinarily alert, that his face was much younger than he had at first thought, and that his grey beard contrasted rather strangely with the darkness of his hair. Unquestionably he was disguised.
Gaskell became more and more nervous and desperately anxious for the safety of the treasure that he was guarding.
What if this strong-handed stranger and his girl companion should turn upon him and upon the driver in some lonely part of the trail, and, overpowering them both, make off with the strong box?
The driver, it was true, was armed, but then this man and the girl might also be prepared with weapons. And they might even have accomplices waiting for them at an appointed spot.
What puzzled Gaskell was that the stranger knew his name, and had warned him against drinking the tea, as if he were in some way anxious to protect him. But the fact remained that he had taken possession of his revolver.
Gaskell leant forward and touched his neighbour's arm. It was exceedingly muscular.
"Kindly give me back my pistol," he requested.
To his surprise, the weapon was politely handed back to him, with the remark—
"Why, cert'nly. You see, I have loaded it for you. You may need it later on. Keep it handy. Don't speak, either to me or the driver; and if anything happens, do what I tell you. I will see you through."
Gaskell leant back in his seat, wondering more than ever, but comfortably confident that whatever his travelling companions might be, they certainly had no designs against him. He resolved to trust them, while watching them carefully.
After the coach had started, they paid no further attention to him.Neither did they speak to each other or to the driver.
Nothing suspicious occurred until they were galloping at a steady pace along the old buffalo trail between Hilton's Jump and Rattlesnake Ranch, when the girl with her veil partly lifted, and her eyes fixed upon the distant homestead, took out a large white handkerchief and waved it three times over her head. Was this a signal to some confederate? It seemed to be, yet nothing came of it. Gaskell's eyes were not keen enough to see a girl standing on the far-off verandah steps.
At sunset the team was changed at Mosquito Crossing. At full dusk the coach was rattling across the prairie trail, and an hour afterwards it was again among the hills, making for White Wolf Gulch.
As they entered the mouth of the gloomy defile the pace was slackened.
The driver cracked his whip with two cracks which sounded like pistol shots, and were echoed repeatedly from the cliffs; but he still held in his team.
Gaskell then became aware that something was going to happen. The supposed clergyman threw off his black coat and false beard and stood up, revealing himself in the familiar military uniform of the North-West Mounted Police. He bent forward and pressed the cold ring of a revolver muzzle against the driver's neck.
"Go ahead, Bulger!" he commanded. "Keep hold of those reins. Drop them and you'll be dropped yourself. I've got you, sure."
Bulger turned and caught a dim glimpse of the soldier policeman's face, glowering at him above the scarlet tunic.
"Silk! Sergeant Silk!" he cried, aghast at the sight.
Sergeant Silk took no notice of his consternation.
"Keep him at it Dannie," he ordered.
And Dan Medlicott, who lived on Rattlesnake Ranch, and had long been a friend of Sergeant Silk, having thrown off his disguising veil and hat and cloak, covered the driver with his revolver.
"And now, Mr. Gaskell," the Sergeant added, "stand by to defend that box. If any one touches it, shoot."
The four horses increased their pace to a quick trot, and the coach lumbered on.
Halfway through the gulch three masked horsemen rode out from their ambush and waited for the approaching vehicle to slow down and stop. Instead of stopping, as they expected, Bulger, urged by Dan Medlicott, whipped up his team to a full racing gallop. Three shots flashed from the darkness. The bullets rattled against the coach and there was a smashing of glass as three further shots rang out.
Sergeant Silk replied to them very deliberately, showing himself to the men as he fired down upon them. He knew each one of the three, even in the dim light.
He saw Bill Allison's hat fall upon the trail, saw Hen Faxon's pistol drop from a shattered hand, while the third man, Red Derrick himself,plunged headlong from his saddle and rolled over, narrowly escaping the wheels as the coach dashed by.
"It's Sergeant Silk!" cried Bill Allison, in his surprise firing three harmless shots in quick succession.
Then Sergeant Silk sat down, calmly putting away his weapons, and adjusting his Stetson hat to complete his uniform.
"Your strong box is quite safe now, Mr. Gaskell," he said in his slow, level voice as he drew out his pipe. "Those three chaps will be arrested inside another hour. As for Bulger, here, their accomplice, he is already my prisoner."
"But you must have discovered their plot!" cried Gaskell. "You must have known all along that the rascals would be lying in wait for the coach!"
"Why, cert'nly," smiled Silk. "That is why I—why Lucy and I are here, your fellow-passengers."
"I say, Maple Leaf," Percy Rapson declared with boyish frankness, "you're lookin' awfully charmin' at this moment, standin' there peelin' those apples with the light of the settin' sun on you! I don't think you ever realise how good-lookin' you are. If I were an artist, I should want to paint a picture of you; only you should be dressed in fringed and beaded buckskins, and wear a feathered head-dress like a war-chief's daughter. Of course, I should never be able to do you justice, but your portrait would look rippin' fine on the top of a chocolate box."
The Indian girl's naturally ruddy cheeks took on a deeper tinge, which was not wholly due to the rosy glow from the western sky.
"Maple Leaf is glad that you are not an artist," she responded withdignity and a slightly contemptuous curl of her lip.
Percy stood near to her in the kitchen at Rattlesnake Ranch. He had one of a litter of bull pups on the dresser beside him, and was tempting the fat, ungainly animal to take more nourishment than it needed from a saucer of milk. He looked at the girl very closely and his eyes lingered, not for the first time, upon a curious scar in the smooth skin of her right temple. It was a long, very straight scar, that ran into the midst of the ebony black hair above her ear.
"Maple Leaf!" he said, after a considerable pause.
"Well?" She glanced aside at him.
"I've often wanted to ask you," he went on. "How did you get that wound on your temple? It's like the cut of a knife. It must have been a good deal more than a scratch to leave a mark like that. How was it done?"
Maple Leaf continued with her work of peeling and quartering apples. She had turned her back to him.
"Don't you want to tell me?" he asked. "Indians are usually proud of their wounds. At least, the men are, the chiefs and warriors and braves. I don't know about the women. Perhaps you got yours in some childish accident?"
"I have never told any one," she answered. And then, after a pause, she added: "And I am not going to. It is my secret. It is no business of yours."
Percy laughed awkwardly, feeling the rebuff, and took up his wriggling bull pup.
"All right," he said, knowing by experience that Maple Leaf was like the rest of her race and that wild horses couldn't drag from her anything that she did not wish to tell. "You can keep your secret, for all I care. But I could easily find out if I wanted, you know. I could even ask Sergeant Silk. I daresay Silk knows. There isn't much that he doesn't know about you and every one else on the Rattlesnake patrol."
She turned sharply and her dark eyes flashed. But only for an instant.
"You had better not ask Sergeant Silk," she said in a slow, levelvoice, which had in it something of warning. "He knows. Yes, he knows. But he would not tell you."
She watched him go out into the back garden towards the shed which he used as a kennel. When he was out of sight, she put forth her hand to the plate rack and drew a small square of looking-glass from behind a cracked dish.
Propping the mirror against the shelf, she drew aside the strands of black hair from above her ear in such a way that the scar was revealed more clearly, running upward and backward from her temple.
"Yes," she nodded with a smile of satisfaction at her own reflection, "it is still there. It will always be there. Maple Leaf is not sorry. She is glad. It helps her to remember."
She put the mirror back in its hiding-place and went to the door and looked out across the ripening cornfields and the more distant prairie to the blue foothills behind which the sun was sinking.
It was just such an evening as this, she reflected. And she recalledone by one the incidents of the adventure in which she had taken so prominent a part.
It had happened that her father, The Moose That Walks, and her brother, Rippling Water, had been absent many days from Mrs. Medlicott's ranch, where they lived and worked. The crops were not yet ready for harvesting, and there was not much for them to do on the farm lands, whereas the beaver were plentiful on the creeks and in their best condition; so the father and son had gone trapping on the head waters of the Bow River.
They had left word at the ranch that if they did not return within a stated time it would mean that they were having good luck, and that Maple Leaf was to go to them with some further supplies of the white man's food—tea, sugar, flour, with rifle cartridges, not forgetting tobacco.
So Maple Leaf had filled her saddle-bags, mounted her pony, and gone off on the trail alone to the trappers' dug-out on far-away Butterfly Creek.
It was a long and lonesome journey among the mountains, occupying two days; but she had the Indians' instinct for finding her way through unfamiliar places, and she reached her destination without adventure.
It was as she had expected. The Moose That Walks and Rippling Water had met with good luck. Their traps had yielded a rich harvest. Some hundreds of beautiful beaver skins had been dried and packed, and there were more to be taken. Now that fresh supplies of food and tobacco had come, it would be possible to continue trapping with success for many days.
"It is good medicine," said The Moose That Walks. "We will sleep seven more sleeps and then return with many beaver skins to our white friends. With the sun's rising you will go back, my daughter, for it is not well that you should be away when there is work to be done."
"And, say!" added Rippling Water, observing that she had come unarmed with any other weapon than the knife in her belt. "Don't you reckon thatyou'd be some wiser to carry a loaded gun along with you? You might need it, see? There's no knowing."
He offered her his own revolver, but the girl shook her head decisively.
"What d'you suppose I could want with a loaded gun?" she objected. "Nobody's going to touch me. There's no road-agents to rob me, even if I was worth robbing; and there's no grizzly bears or hungry wolves prowling around, this time of year. No, Rip. I'm safe enough. Don't you worry."
She had no fear, because she knew of no possible danger, and she started on her backward journey as confident of her personal safety as if she were riding among the familiar cornfields and orchards of Rattlesnake Ranch instead of in the gloomy wilds of the Rocky Mountains.
She had abundance of food and a good, sure-footed horse. She knew the landmarks and could not well go astray. In the noon-day heat she would halt at the side of some shady creek to rest; at night she would seek out some friendly shelter where she could build a fire, and, wrappingher blanket about her, sleep as comfortably and securely as in her little room under the roof at the Medlicott homestead.
Leaving the mountains behind, she crossed a belt of old sand-drift overgrown with pine. Beyond that, for a score of miles or so, there was no bush, but only a swell of golden grass rolling away to violet distances.
Late in the afternoon she came to Emerald Cañon, where, sunk three hundred feet below the plains, there was a chain of pools and an acre or so of green meadow starred with the ashes of old camp fires.
In this secluded cañon Maple Leaf hobbled her broncho and made camp for the night within sound of a high cascade of water, which fell noisily into a pool darkened by overhanging trees.
She shared her solitude with a family of little foxes at play on a grassy knoll and with a crane, which stood on one leg at the water's edge.
She watched the crane, wondering how long it would remain motionless in that position, and as she watched, a waft of smoke from her fire driftedtowards the bird, which rose into the air and flapped lazily away into the blue gloom.
Suddenly as she followed its flight the girl's quick eyes were drawn upward to the rim of the shadowed cañon, where a waving line of ripened grass glowed orange against the sky, and she became aware of a filmy cloud of dust, which rose from the high plain beyond.
She clasped her fingers tightly, drew back into the shadow, and crouched there, listening, watching.
The dust cloud thickened, and above the deep murmur of the waterfall she caught the unmistakable sound of the tramping of horses and the rumble of wagon wheels.
She thought of Indians and of the need of concealing her fire, lest they should discover her and perhaps steal her pony.
Earlier in the day she had come upon the marks of horses' hoofs in the prairie dust. The horses had not all been shod, and she had known by this that their riders were Indians. She began to wish that she hadtaken the loaded gun which Rippling Water had offered her. But her anxiety quickly left her.
Presently a mounted man came out upon the edge of the ravine. The sunlight shone warmly upon his chestnut horse and flamed upon his scarlet tunic. He had come to a halt not half-a-mile away from her, and he was looking down towards the drifting mist of her wood fire. For a moment he glanced back over his shoulder, then moved onward in her direction, followed, after a while, by some twenty riders, each with a carbine poised across the horn of his stock saddle. They were a troop of the North-West Mounted Police.
At a word of command the riders dismounted to lead their horses, while behind them there appeared five wagons, each with a driver and an off man. A pair of troopers in the rear waited for the dust to settle before they followed down the breakneck hill into the hollow of the cañon.
Maple Leaf watched them winding down the rocky slopes. Some wore suitsof brown canvas, some were dressed in fringed deer-skin with grey flannel shirts or old red jackets, with long boots, sombrero hats, belts glittering with brass cartridges, and big revolvers at their sides.
Hard-featured, weather-beaten, dusty, great big men they were, all having the same clear, far-searching eyes, the same pride of bearing, and the same swaggering gallantry and wild grace in their masterly horsemanship.
The trooper who had first appeared in sight waited for a while and spoke to the officer in command, then went on in advance of his companions. Even at a distance as he approached, Maple Leaf made out that he had a sergeant's triple chevron on the arm of his dusty red tunic. When he reached the level ground he vaulted into his saddle and rode across the long grass straight for the trees where her fire still burned smokily.
"Yes," she said to herself with a thrill of satisfaction. "It's sure Sergeant Silk." And he in his turn was as quick to recognise the Indian girl who did the chores at Rattlesnake Ranch.