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Updated: May 17, 2025
"Let him wave," returned Mrs. Stanley, weary, disconsolate, and out of patience with everything. "I must say it's a poor place to be waving hands." Meantime Thurstane had beckoned a couple of muleteers to follow him, and set off to beat the enclosure for a spring, or for a spot where it would be possible to sink a well with good result.
He too must work; he must not trust altogether to Texas Smith; the scoundrel might flinch, or might fail. Something must be done to separate Clara and Thurstane. What should it be? Here we are almost ashamed of Coronado. The trick that he hit upon was the stalest, the most threadbare, the most commonplace and vulgar that one can imagine.
He levelled at the centre of the clattering, yelling column. It fluctuated; the warriors who were there did not like to be aimed at; they began to zigzag, caracole, and diverge to right or left; several halted and commenced using their bows. At one of these archers, whose arrow already trembled on the string, Thurstane let fly, sending him out of the saddle.
Thurstane swept his field-glass around once more, searching for some outlet besides the horrible cañon, and searching in vain. "We must wait a day or so for our wounded," he said. "Then we must start back on our old trail. I don't see anything else before us."
Thurstane had the same sense of profound depression; but he called up his courage and sought to cheer his comrades. "We must do our best to come to life," he said. "Mr. Glover, can nothing be done with the boat?" "Can't fix it," replied the skipper, fingering the ragged hole. "Nothin' to patch it with." "There are the bearskins," suggested Thurstane.
Then she passed the day in ascending and descending between heights of happiness and abysses of anxiety. Her existence henceforward was a Jacob's ladder, which had its foot on a world of crime and sorrow, and its top in heavens passing description. As for Thurstane, he had to think and act, for something must be done with Texas Smith.
"It is very well, this night-watching," he once observed, "but what we have most to fear is the open daylight. These mounted Indians seldom attack in the darkness." Thurstane knew all this, but he did not say so; for he was a wise, considerate commander already, and he had learned not to chill an informant. He looked at Coronado inquiringly, as if to say, What do you propose?
Coronado took off his hat and made a bow of submission and regret, which was lost in the darkness. "I must say," Thurstane went on grumbling, "that, for a man who claims to know this country, your management has been very singular." Clara, fearful of a quarrel, slightly pressed his arm and checked this volcano with the weight of a feather.
But in spite of this easing the vessel labored a good deal, and heavy spurts of spray began to fly over the quarter-deck rail. "I think, Miss, you had better go below unless you want to get wet," observed the skipper, coming up to Clara. "We shall have a splashing night of it." Taking the nautical arm, Clara slid and tottered away, leaving Thurstane lying on the sloppy deck.
Thus he would get rid of Thurstane, and at the same time have the air of avenging him, while ridding himself of his dangerous bravo. But he rejected this plan almost as soon as he thought of it. He did not feel sure of bringing down Texas at the first fire, and if he did not, his own life was not worth a second's purchase.
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