Three days later, just at sundown, the loungers at Sancho's were treated to a sensation. Up from the south—the old Tucson trail—came, dusty, travel-stained and weary, half a troop of cavalry, escorting, apparently, some personage of distinction, for he was an object of the utmost care and attention on part of the lieutenant commanding and every man in the detachment. As the cavalcade approached the dun-colored walls of the corral and, without a word or sign to the knot of curious spectators gathered at the bar-room door, filed away to the spot where wandering commands of horse were accustomed to bivouac for the night (tents would have been superfluous in that dry, dewless atmosphere), the women whispering together behind their screened window place, stared the harder at sight of the leaders. One was Lieutenant Blake—no mistaking him, the longest legged man in Arizona. Another was big Sergeant Feeney, a veteran who bad seen better days and duties, but served his flag in the deserts of the Gila as sturdily as ever he fought along the Shenandoah three years before. Between these two, dapper, slender, natty, with his hat set jauntily on one side and his mustache and imperial twirled to the proportions of toothpicks, rode a third cavalier whom every one recognized instantly as the fugitive of Camp Cooke, the urgently-sought Captain Nevins. And, though Nevins' arms and legs were untrammeled by shackles of any kind, it was plain to see that he was a helpless prisoner. He had parted with his belt and revolver. His spurs were ravished from his heels, and his bridle-rein, cut in two, was shared between Blake and his faithful sergeant. Behind these three rode another set. Sandwiched between two troopers was a man whom Sancho's people well remembered as Nevins' clerk and assistant, despite the fact that a bushy beard now covered the face that was smooth-shaven in the halcyon days of the supply camp. Then came some thirty horsemen in long, straggling column of twos, while, straight from the flank to the gate of the corral, silent and even somber, rode the engineer, Lieutenant Loring. To him Sancho whipped off his silver-laced sombrero and bowed, while two jaded-looking vaqueros, after one long yet furtive stare, glanced quickly at each other and sidled away to the nearest aperture in the wall of the ranch, which happened to be the dining-room door. Loring mechanically touched his hat-brim in recognition of the ranch-keeper's obeisance, but there was no liking in his eye. At the gate he slowly, somewhat stiffly, dismounted, for it was evident he had ridden long and far. The roan with hanging head tripped eagerly, yet wearily, to his accustomed stall, and a swarthy Mexican unloosed at once the cincha and removed the horsehair bridle. Thus Sancho and the engineer were left by themselves, though inquisitive ranch folk sauntered to the gateway and peered after them into the corral. Over at the little clump of willows Blake's men were throwing their carbines across their shoulders and dismounting as they reached the old familiar spot, and Loring cast one look thither before he spoke.
"Who were the two men who followed me?" he calmly asked, and his eyes, though red-rimmed and inflamed by the dust of the desert, looked straight into the dark face of the aggrieved Sancho.
"Surely I know not, SeÑor Teniente"—he had dropped the "capitan" as too transparent flattery.
"Don't lie, Sancho. There's ten more dollars," and Loring tossed an eagle into the ready palm. "That's thirty, and I shall want that horse again in the morning."
"To-morrow, seÑor! Why, he will not be fit to go."
But to this observation Mr. Loring made no reply. Straight from Sancho's side he walked down the corral, halted behind two rangy, hard-looking steeds that showed still the effects of recent severe usage, and these he studied coolly and thoroughly a few minutes, while peering from two narrow slits in the ranch wall between the windows two sun-tanned frontiersmen as closely studied him. With these latter, peeping from the shaded window, was "the wife of my brother," exchanging with them comments in low, guarded tones. In the adjoining room, a bedroom, a girl of perhaps sixteen, slender, graceful and dark-eyed, peeped in the opposite direction, over toward the willows where Blake's men were now unsaddling—whence presently, with giant strides came Blake himself, stalking over the sand. Sancho, despite his anxious scrutiny of Loring's silent movements, saw the coming officer and prepared his countenance for smiles. But with a face set and forbidding Blake went sternly by, taking no notice of the proprietor, and made directly for the little group now muttering at the dining-room door. The loungers, some of whom had deserted the supper-table for a sight of the captives and the cavalcade, sidled right and left as though to avoid his eye, for into each face, most of them hang-dog visages, he gazed sharply as though in search of some one, yet never faltered in his stride. Back from her barred window shrank the young girl as the tall soldier came within a dozen paces. To one side or another, smoke inhaling, and striving to look unconcerned, edged the swarthy constituents of the group, and with never a word to one of them, straight through their midst and the doorway beyond went Blake, catching the three peepers, "the wife of my brother" and the brace of palpable cutthroats at their loopholes. So unexpected was the move that it had not even occurred to one of the creatures at the door to mutter a word of warning. So engrossed were the three in their scrutiny that Blake's entrance was unheard. True, he had discarded boots and spurs, and his feet were encased in soft Apache moccasins. The floor, too, was earthen, but he had made no effort at stealth, and in the gloom and shadow of the low-roofed room it was for a moment difficult to distinguish the human figures against the opposite wall. It was his ear that first gave warning, for low, yet distinct, he heard the words:
"If he'd taken any horse but that roan—or knew less about riding—we'd 'a caught him twenty miles out, and they'd never 'a caught Nevins. Dash, dash the whole dashed blue-bellied outfit, and be dash, dash, dashed to their quadruple dashed souls!" and the concentrated spite and hatred of the speaker hissed in every syllable.
"'Taint a question of what we couldn't do. What can we do? He's got money and plenty of it cached somewhere about the old camp, and five hundred dollars of it's mine. That's what I want. I don't care a damn what they do with him so long as they don't send him to prison where we can't nail him. That's what that bloody court will do though, an' I know it."
"How d'ye know?" fiercely demanded the other; "'nless you've been in the army—which you swear you haven't. Where'd you desert from? Come, own up now," and, turning for an instant from his peephole, the speaker became suddenly aware of the silent form of Lieutenant Blake.
"None of your dashed business," began the other, when a harsh "Shut up!" brought him around in amaze and he, too, confronted the dark figure standing like a sign post between them and the violet light beyond the open doorway. Instinctively the hands of both men sought their pistol-butts, but Blake made never a move. The woman, looking around for the cause of the sudden silence, caught sight of the statuesque intruder and, with a low cry, threw her shawl over her head and, bending almost double, with outstretched, groping hands, scurried to where the mission-made blanket hung at the doorway of the bedroom and darted through the aperture like a rabbit to its form, the folds of the heavy wool falling behind her.
And still the tall lieutenant neither spoke nor moved. His revolver hung at his right hip, his hunting-knife slept in its sheath, but his hands sat jauntily on his thighs. The stern, set look of his clear-cut face had given place to something like a grin of amusement. First at one, then at the other, of the two bewildered worthies he gazed, looking each deliberately from head to foot as they hovered there, both irresolute and disconcerted, one of them visibly trembling. There was a doorway leading into the room in which was set the table for stage passengers of the better class, officers and the few ladies who had ventured to follow their lords into far-away Arizona, or the gente fine, which included Amazons whose money could pay their way pretty much anywhere and was made pretty much anyhow. But that room was empty and the one beyond it, the bar, had only one or two occupants, too far away to see what was going on. There was a doorway and a swinging screen of dirty canvas just beyond the loophole lately occupied by "the wife of my brother," a doorway that gave on the corral, and to each of these each silent "tough" had given a quick, furtive glance, but not a step was taken. How long the strain of the situation might have lasted there is no saying. It was broken by the sudden lifting of that dirty canvas screen, as sudden and perceptible a start on part of each of the confronted men and the quick entrance of the engineer. For another second or two no word was spoken. Loring's eyes were evidently unable at the instant to penetrate the gloom. Then he recognized Blake, then gradually the two men at the wall, and then at last Blake spoke.
"There are your followers, Loring."
A moment's careful scrutiny, then a nod of assent was Loring's answer.
"Now, then, you two," said Blake. "I've suspected you before. Now I more than suspect you. You—the long villain—I warn never to come nosing about our camp again, and you, the shorter, I'll trouble to come into camp forthwith. No, don't draw that pistol unless you want a dozen bullets through you. Half a troop is right here at my back. Your soldier name was Higgins and you're a deserter from Cram's battery, New Orleans."
For a moment there was a silence, broken only by the hard breathing of the two cornered men, then came a flash, a sharp report, a piercing scream as the lithe Mexican girl sprang forth from behind the blanket and hurled herself on Blake, a panther-like leap of the accused man under cover of the flash and smoke, a thwack like the sound of the bat when it meets a new baseball full in the middle, and Loring's fist had landed full on Higgins' jowl and sent him like a log to the floor.
