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Updated: May 19, 2025
"And you," she hesitated, "must protect me." "Yes, miss," and the sergeant repeated his gesture of solemn affirmation. "Perhaps I will say more some time." He saluted again, and seeing that she had nothing to add, retired quietly. For two nights there was little sleep for Clara. She passed them in pondering Thurstane's chances, or in listening for his returning footsteps.
His voice was friendly, sympathetic, and quite calm, as he stepped up by Thurstane's side and said, "We shall have a tough time of it. The land is only about ten miles away. At this rate we shall strike it inside of three hours. I don't see how it can be helped." "Where shall we strike?" "Smack into the Bay of Monterey, between the town and Point Pinos. "Can I do anything?"
At Thurstane's reprimand he trotted close up to him with exactly the air of a circus Jocko who expects a whipping, but who hopes to escape it by grinning. "Why haven't you fired?" repeated his commander. "Liftinint, I dasn't," answered Sweeny, in the rapid, jerking, almost inarticulate jabber which was his usual speech.
Every time that Clara's glance said, "I trust you," Thurstane's responded, "I will die for you." It was a perilous sort of dialogue, and liable to involve the two souls which looked out from these sparkling, transparent windows.
It will be remembered how the bushwhacker sat in ambush; how, just as he was about to fire at his proposed victim, his horse whinnied; and how this whinny caused Thurstane's mule to rear suddenly and violently. The rearing saved the rider's life, for the bullet which was meant for the man buried itself in the forehead of the beast, and in the darkness the assassin did not discover his error.
The chase after the spare mules carried Texas Smith several miles from the scene of the ambush, so that when he at last caught the frightened beasts, he decided not to go back and cut Thurstane's throat, but to set off at once westward and put himself by morning well on the road to California.
Immediately on the shot came a yell as of a hundred demons, a furious trampling of the feet of many horses, and a cloud of the Tartars of the American desert. In advance of the rush flew the two Mexican vedettes, screaming, "Apaches! Apaches!" When the Apache tornado burst out of the cañon upon the train, Thurstane's first thought was, "Clara!"
Then the meek-eyed woman reappeared, removed the dishes, returned once more, and looked fixedly at Thurstane's bloody sleeve. "Certainly!" said Aunt Maria. "Let her dress your arm. I have no doubt that unpretending woman knows more about surgery than all the men doctors in New York city. Let her dress it." Thurstane partially threw off his coat and rolled up his shirt sleeve.
Every way he seemed to be that being that a woman most wants, a potential and devoted protector. Whenever Clara looked in his face her eyes said, without her knowledge, "I trust you." Now, as we have already stated, Thurstane's eyes were uncommonly fine and expressive.
"I remember," said Clara, who had not recollected him at first because she was looking solely for Thurstane. "You passed us in the desert." "Yes, I took your soldiers away from you, and you declined my escort. I was anxious about you afterwards. Well, it has ended right in spite of me. Of course you have heard of Thurstane's escape."
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