United States or Heard Island and McDonald Islands ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Some of the spirit seemed to have left her thin, tense body, and she went without any more fight. Only when they came into full view of the ship did she falter. Travis heard her breathe a gasp of surprise. As they had planned, four of the Apaches Jil-Lee, Tsoay, Nolan, and Buck fanned out toward the heights about the ship.
Nolan was a quiet man who seldom spoke, and whose opinion Travis could not foretell. Tsoay would back Buck. Probably such a divided party was the best Travis could have hoped to gather. A delegation composed entirely of those who were ready to leave the past of the Redax a collection of Bucks and Jil-Lees was outside the bounds of possibility.
Flash ... flash ... he made the signal pattern just as his ancestors a hundred years earlier and far across space had used trade mirrors to relay war alerts among the Chiricahua and White Mountain ranges. If Tsoay had returned safely, and if Buck had kept the agreed lookout on that peak a mile or so ahead, then the clan would know that he was coming and with what escort.
When the rider was sighted they were to report back if the Apaches had not yet caught up. There was no visible agreement; the coyotes simply vanished through the wall of grass. "Then there are others here," Tsoay said as he and Travis began their return to the foothills. "Perhaps there was a second ship " "That horse," Travis said, shaking his head.
Therefore, do you take the back trail. Tell Buck what we have discovered and have him make the necessary precautions against either these Mongol outlaws or a Red thrust over the mountains." "And you?" "I stay to discover where the outlaws hide and learn all I can of this settlement. We may have reason to need friends " "Friends!" Tsoay spat. "The People need no friends!
Let him scout ahead of the party, taking the coyotes with him. Stay away from the camp for a while and speak small until the people on Buck's stairway were more closely united. "I go in the morning," Travis agreed. He could slip away tonight, but just now he could not force himself away from the fire, from the companionship. "You might take Tsoay with you," Buck continued.
And only half an hour before, Tsoay had reported by mirror what should have been welcome news: the Red helicopter was cruising as it had on the day they watched the hunters enter the uplands. There was an excellent chance of the fugitive's being sighted and picked up soon. Tsoay had also spotted a party of three Tatars watching the helicopter.
To one side of the water Buck stood, his arms folded across his chest, armed only with his belt knife. Grouped behind him were Deklay, Tsoay, Nolan, Manulito Travis tabulated hurriedly. Manulito and Deklay were to be classed together or had been when he was last in the rancheria. On Buck's stairway from the past, both had halted more than halfway down.
If it was overhanging the action area of the horsemen, they had either reined in or were searching a relatively small section of the foothills. Reluctantly Travis descended to the hollow where Jil-Lee stood with Nolan. Tsoay and Lupe and Rope were a little to one side as if the final orders would come from their seniors. "It would be well," Jil-Lee said slowly, "if we saw what weapons they have.
He was careful to speak in English so that the Tatars could hear all he was reporting to his own kind. And the Apaches listened blank-faced, though Tsoay must already have reported much of this. When Travis was done it was Deklay who asked a question: "What have we to do with these people?" And they have weapons such as make our bow cords bits of rotten string, our knives slivers of rust.
Word Of The Day