Of course, the grove was surrounded to prevent any sudden dash for escape, but shortly after the rising sun began his work upon the mist the encircling force moved slowly nearer. The main body moved together until they were about a hundred yards from the outer shrubbery. Then they halted, and a single brave, a chief of rank, dismounted and went forward on foot, holding out his right hand with the palm up, in token of a wish for truce and conference.
The eyes of his band were upon the messenger and he walked steadily, although all the while believing himself to be covered by the unerring aim of Texan sharp-shooters. His nerves were very good. No sooner, however, did he reach the trees than Great Bear and his column moved forward again.
On strode the solitary herald of peace, or of treachery, but no rifle cracked, no mustang neighed, no Texan came out of a bush. It was the strangest affair, to the mind of a man who was absolutely sure that his enemies were there.
On he marched until he stood by the fire at the spring, and glanced fiercely around him. It was too much! His hand went to his mouth, and he uttered a whoop which brought every Comanche within hearing pell-mell toward the grove.
Such a rush would have been their best chance for crushing Bowie"s men in any case, but the charging warriors found no Texans to crush. Wild were the whoops of wrath and disappointment, but Great Bear himself was equal to the occasion. His face expressed strong admiration of such a feat of generalship, and he said, loudly,--
"Ugh! Big Knife great chief! Getaway heap! Comanche tired now. Find Texan by and by."
There was no help for it. The only thing to do was to rest and to eat, for immediate pursuit was out of the question.
Miles and miles away, an hour or so later, in another camping place as good as the one they had left, the white riflemen also were taking it easy. They had plenty of buffalo cutlets to broil; they had distanced their pursuers, and they were contented.
"Boys," remarked Colonel Bowie, "we"ve gained a whole day"s ride on "em if we work it right."
"All right, colonel," responded Joe; "but when that young Lipan rid in last night I begun to wish I was back in the Alamo. My skelp felt loose."
"He"s a buster," remarked Jim Cheyne; "but I"m right down glad his dad is here. Best guide we could git."
As for Red Wolf himself, he was sitting apart from the rest. After all, he was only a boy and all these others were distinguished warriors.
CHAPTER XI.
THE CHARGE OF THE LANCERS.
Days that go by with nothing in them but steady riding, buffalo-killing, and undisturbed camps at the end of each day may be very pleasant but they are not exciting. As Colonel Bowie remarked to his men, however,--
"A squad like ours, mounted as we are, can get ahead faster than a big band like Great Bear"s. They"ll send scouting-parties ahead, but we can keep out of their way. We"re making first-rate time."
So they were, and they were also carefully keeping their horses in good condition for any required run. They carried no baggage, and they had now, they thought, a long "start" ahead of their Comanche pursuers.
The most silent rider among them, not excepting Castro himself, was Red Wolf, and it was not altogether because he was a boy. The fact was that he had been seeing and hearing a great deal, and that he was full to bursting with the spirit of adventure which all the while spoke out in the talk of the Texans.
They told wild stories of old war-paths; of fights of every kind, and of visits to cities and towns of the white men. They talked, too, about gold and silver and what could be done with money, so that the young Lipan grew more and more interested in an idea he never had before,--the idea of riches. It did not yet take complete shape in his mind, excepting in one form, given by Big Knife, the hero. It was what he said about the great gun in the plaza of the Alamo, and the money it would cost to kill Mexicans with that and the other cannon. The "heap guns" themselves had cost a great deal of money. In that shape, or even in the shape of rifles or horses, Red Wolf could now understand it fairly well. He thought of the bags in the hole in the _adobe_ wall, but these, he believed, belonged to Big Knife and the Texans. They could not be the property of a Lipan boy, and he never thought of such a thing for a moment. Very vaguely, moreover, he had gathered that this present war-party expected to find gold and silver and to bring it back with them, after killing enemies and winning glory in fights.
It was all new and it was all wonderful, but there was no use in talking about it, so he kept still and was inclined to ride ahead, or else to linger some distance behind his party.
As yet there had been no sign of any pursuers near them, but toward the close of one long, bright day Red Wolf had fallen so far behind that he was almost out of sight of his pale-face friends.
The swift mustang under him was in fine condition. So very well did he feel that he was restive, and a deer that sprang out of a covert of hazel-bushes as he was going by made him jump and throw up his heels.
Not that he was at all afraid of a deer, but that it was curious, perhaps, to find himself carrying a hunter who would not so much as send an arrow after such capital game.
"Ugh!" exclaimed Red Wolf, and it came out sharply, from utter surprise.
In his sudden prancing his pony had wheeled around, and there, coming over a rise of ground not two hundred yards away, rode three Comanches.
The instant they were discovered they uttered fierce whoops and dashed forward.
"Wh-oo-p!" yelled the young Lipan, lashing his too spirited pony to a run. "Comanche dog! Red Wolf!"
There was no more to be said just then, however. The warm wind from the south seemed to whistle past him. Far to the right and far to the left yet other war-whoops were sounding. Not the whole band of Great Bear, he thought, but a sufficient number of their best mounted braves to make trouble for Bowie and his men.
There is no such thing as mistaking a war-whoop for any other sound, and now Red Wolf exclaimed "Ugh!" again in still greater astonishment.
He knew that there was no bugle among the Texans with Big Knife, but he had heard the sound of one at the fort and afterwards. "Heap whistle"
would have been a good translation of his Lipan word for bugle music, and he uttered it loudly. It came from the left, and it was faint at first, but in a few moments it was repeated more sonorously, and he wheeled his mustang in that direction.
At that very moment Castro himself, riding at the head of the squad, lifted his left hand as if pointing and exclaimed,--
"Ugh! Big Knife hear! Mexicans!"
"It"s a cavalry bugle, colonel!" shouted Jim Cheyne. "I can ketch it.
Thar it comes ag"in----"
"Wheel to the right! Gallop!" replied Bowie. "It"s Bravo"s lancers.
They are this side of the Rio! Now, boys, the chief was just saying we were only a half-hour"s ride from the hacienda. His Lipans are there."
Were they? It is not always that a man can give the whereabouts of other men from whom he has been several days absent. A ride of half an hour is also to be measured by the speed of a horse, rather than by feet and inches. Very near them, therefore, if the distance were that of a swift horse on a run, a mule and his rider had halted on the northerly bank of a broad and very muddy river.
Directly across the river, on a low bluff of seemingly bare, sandy ground, there was a long range of low-built houses, part of them surrounded by a wall. They were altogether like a vast number of other Mexican-Spanish _haciendas_, or head-quarters of important country estates. If this, however, were the Hacienda Dolores, and if Castro"s Lipans were there, they had raised over the largest of the _adobe_ structures the eagle flag of Mexico. They had stationed uniformed sentinels here and there, and they had picketed horses, with saddles and military trappings, in long rows near at hand.
"Tetzcatl counts more than four hundred," said the man on the mule.
"The Lipans are safe, but the Mexicans must not catch Bowie."
He spoke in Spanish and his voice was quiet enough, but his face was all one quiver of rage and hate as he stared across the river. What if his entire plan was to be broken up and his red and white allies destroyed by this unexpected activity of his Mexican enemies? It was, moreover, a dangerous place of waiting for a solitary old man, to whom no quarter would be given if he were found there by Mexican soldiers.
"Too long! Too long!" he exclaimed. "They ought to be here. It is time!"
At that moment the mule under him stretched his neck and head to send forth a loud and seemingly uncalled-for bray. He had an abundance of ears, but what could he have heard? His white-headed master at first heard nothing at all, but then he drove his spurs into the sides of his trumpeting beast in a way that cut off braying.
"Bowie!" he shouted. "Running. He is trapped by Bravo"s men!"
There, indeed, racing as if for life, were the six Texans and Castro, but where was their young Lipan scout, and what was he doing?
Castro was asking that question, and so was the colonel, only the moment before, but now they pulled in their horses to look across the river, in blank dismay, at the flag over the hacienda.
"They"ve got us this time, colonel!" roared a broad-chested ranger.
"Our call has come. Let"s die game!"
"You bet we will," said Joe, "but we ain"t dead yit. Something"s a-goin" on away back yonder. I heard an Injin yell sure"s you live."
If he and his friends had not been running away so fast they might have heard a number of Indians yell.
Red Wolf had ridden toward the bugle, not away from it. Hardly three minutes of so swift a run had been required to bring him out in full view of a strong party of mounted men in the brilliant uniform of the Mexican regular lancers. It was just as they obeyed the musical order to go forward at a charging gait. They were splendid hors.e.m.e.n and they moved together in perfect array, but it was not to make a dash upon one Indian boy. They had some reasons for expecting an encounter with the band of Lipans which had quartered, during several days, in and around the deserted hacienda. Here these were now, they thought, apparently ready to be pounced upon and overwhelmed, but this nearest brave upon the mustang showed no sign of hostility. On the contrary, he pulled in, almost halted, and waved his hand to them before pointing back, as if he would say,--
"Your enemies and mine are there. Be ready for them."