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They had lived in the mountain niche some three weeks when Alchise and Kut-le left the camp one afternoon, Alchise on a turkey hunt, Kut-le on one of his mysterious trips for supplies. Alchise returned at dusk with a beautiful bird which Rhoda and Molly roasted with enthusiasm. But Kut-le did not appear at supper time as he had promised.
The old man protested at first but on the repeated use of Kut-le's name he finally nodded and Alchise carried Rhoda into the campos. A squaw kindled a fire which, blazing up brightly, showed a huge, dark room, canvas-roofed and dirt-floored, quite bare except for the soiled blankets on the floor. Rhoda was laid in the center of the hut. The old buck knelt beside her. He was very old indeed.
You are safer here with me!" Rhoda turned from him impatiently. "It's quite useless," she said to Jim; "no pleading or threat will move him. But I do thank you " her voice breaking a little. "Go back with Alchise and tell them to come for me quickly!" Some responsive flash of sympathy came to Jim's bleared eyes. Rhoda stood watching Alchise marshall him out of the camp.
It is the most potent thing in the world. It shall " "Kut-le!" Alchise rode forward, pointing to the right. Rhoda followed his look. It was nearly dawn. At the right was the sheer wall of a mesa as smooth and impregnable to her eyes as a wall of glass. Moving toward them, silent as ghosts in the veil-like dawn, and cutting them from the mesa, was a group of horsemen.
"In the darkness a bit of the trail gave way, dropped me into a cañon and laid my leg open. I was unconscious a long time and lost a lot of blood, so it has taken me the rest of the night to get here. Would you mind getting Alchise to help me up the trail?" "Alchise has gone to look for you. Lean on me," said Rhoda simply.
Alchise turned back to his view of the desert. "I'm behind the bush here," whispered the voice. "I'm a prospector. Saw you make camp. I don't know where any of the search parties are but if you can crawl round to me I'll guarantee to get you to 'em somehow. Slip out of your blankets and leave 'em, rounded up as if you was still under 'em. Quick now and careful!"
Suddenly Alchise seized Molly's black hair and with a violent jerk pulled the woman backward. Rhoda forgot her stiffened muscles, forgot her gentle ancestry. She sprang at Alchise with catlike fury and struck his fingers from Molly's hair. "You fiend! I wish I could shoot you!" she panted, her fingers twitching. Alchise retreated a step. "She try help 'em run!" he said sullenly. "She was not!
"Dear one!" and she closed her eyes quietly. During this time the Indians sat silent and watchful. Kut-le turned to Alchise. "You cursed fool!" he said. "She get well now," replied Alchise anxiously. "Alchise save her for you. Molly tell you where come."
Alchise would have relieved him of his burden, willingly, but Kut-le would not listen to it. Molly trotted anxiously by the young Apache's side, constantly moistening the girl's lips with water. Rhoda was quite delirious now. She murmured and sometimes sobbed, trying to free herself from Kut-le's arms. "I'm not sick!" she said, looking up into the Indian's face with unseeing eyes.
Each moment Rhoda felt less certain of her seat. Each moment the motion of the horse grew more painful. At last a faint odor of pine-needles roused her sinking senses and she opened her heavy eyes. They had left the sickening edge of the cañon and Alchise was leading them into a beautiful growth of pines where the mournful hooting of owls gave a graveyard sadness to the moon-flecked shadows.
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