“I’m glad we didn’t have to kill any of these Apaches.”
“We were lucky, General. I’ll bet McKinney will burn powder before he stops thet Matazel an’ his braves. Bad youngsters.”
“Do you know Matazel, sergeant?” inquired Crook.
“I’ve seen him. Strappin’ young buck. Only Indian I ever saw with grey eyes. He’s said to be one of Geronimo’s sons.”
“Wal, McKinney won’t stand any monkey business from thet outfit,” added Willis. “He’s collared them by this time. Huett knows the country. He’ll track them to some hole in the woods.”
“Good scout, Logan Huett, for so young a man. He has been invaluable in this campaign. I shall recommend him to my successor.”
“Huett is through with army scout service after this campaign. He’ll be missed if old Geronimo breaks out an’ goes on the warpath. Fine woodsman. Best rifle shot I ever saw.”
“What is Huett going to do?”
“Told me he wanted to go home to Missouri for a while. He’s got a girl, I reckon. But he’s hipped on the West an’ will soon be back.”
“He surely will,” added the other officer. “Logan Huett was cut out for a pioneer.”
“The West needs such men more than the Army. . . . Hello, I hear shouts from above.”
“Bet thet’s McKinney now,” said Willis, rising.
“Sure enough. I see horses an’ army blue through the trees,” added the sergeant.
Presently a squad of soldiers rode down into the glade. They had three mounted Indians with them and another on foot, a tall lithe brave, straight as an arrow, whose bearing was proud. These captives were herded with the others. Sergeant McKinney reported to General Crook that he had secured Matazel and three of his companions. The others got away on foot.
“Any shooting?” queried the general.
“Yes, sir. We couldn’t surprise them an’ they showed fight. We have two men wounded, not serious.”
“I hope you didn’t kill any Indians.”
“We didn’t, to our knowledge.”
“Send Huett to me.”
The scout approached. He was a young man about twenty-three years old, dark of face. In fact he bore somewhat of a resemblance to Matazel, and he was so stalwart and powerfully built that he did not look tall.
“What’s your report, Huett?”
“General, we made sure of getting Matazel alive,” replied the scout, “otherwise none of them would have escaped. . . . I guessed where Matazel’s bunch was headed for. We cut in behind them, chased them into a box canyon, where we cornered them. They had but little ammunition, or we’d had a different story to tell.”
“Don’t dodge the main point, as McKinney did. Were there any Indians killed?”
“We couldn’t find any dead ones.”
“Willis, fetch this Apache to me.”
In a few moments Matazel stood before the general, his arms crossed over his ragged buckskin shirt, his sombre eyes steady and inscrutable.
“You understand white man talk?” queried General Crook.
“No savvy,” replied Matazel, sullenly.
“General, he can understand you an’ speak a little English,” spoke up the sergeant who knew Matazel.
“Did my soldiers kill any of your people?”
The Apache shook his head.
“But you would have killed us,” said the general, severely.
Matazel made a magnificent gesture that embraced the forest and the surrounding wilderness.
“White man steal red man’s land,” he said, loudly. “Pen Indian up. No horse. No gun. No hunt.”
General Crook had no ready answer for that retort.
“You Indians will be taken care of,” he said presently. “It’s better for you to stay peaceably on the reservation with plenty to eat.”
“No!” thundered the Apache. “Geronimo say better fight—better die!”
“Take him away,” ordered the general, his face red. “Captain Willis, according to this Apache, it sounds as if old Geronimo will break out all right. You had it figured.”
Before the sergeant led Matazel away the Indian bent a piercing glance upon the scout, Logan Huett, and stretching out a lean red hand he tapped Huett on the breast.
“You no friend Apache.”
“What do you want, redskin?” demanded Huett, surprised and nettled. “I could have shot you. But I didn’t. I obeyed orders though I think the only good Indian is a dead one.”
“You track Apache like wolf,” said the Indian, bitterly. His eagle eyes burned with a superb and piercing fire. “Matazel live get even!”
It was Autumn before Logan Huett was released from his military duties, once more free to ride where he chose. Leaving the reservation with light pack behind his saddle he crossed the Cibeque and headed up out of the manzanita, scrub oak and juniper to the cedars and piñons of the Tonto Rim.
The trail climbed gradually. That same day he reached the pines and the road General Crook had cut along the ragged edge of the great basin. Huett renewed his strong interest in this mesa. From the rim, its highest point some eight thousand feet above sea level, it sloped back sixty miles to the desert. A singular feature about this cliff was that it sheered abruptly down into the black Tonto Basin on the south while the canyons that headed within a stone’s throw of the crest all ran north. A few miles from their source they were deep grassy valleys with heavily timbered slopes. The ridges between the canyons bore a growth of pine and spruce, and the open parks and hollow swales had groves of aspen and thickets of maple. The region was a paradise for game. It had been the hunting grounds of the Apache, and they had burned the grass and brush every year, making the forest open.
Back toward the Cibeque several cattle combines, notably the Hashknife outfit, ran herds of doubtful numbers on the lower slopes. At Pleasant Valley sheepmen and cattlemen were at odds over the grazing. Sooner or later they would clash.
Huett left that country far behind to the east. He traveled leisurely, camping in pretty spots, and on the third night reached the canyon-head where he had brought Matazel and his Apache comrades to General Crook, which service practically ended the campaign.
He found where the soldiers had built their camp-fires, little heaps of white and lilac ashes in the grass. He thought of the sombre-eyed Matazel and remembered his threat.
At this lonely camp Huett fell back wholly into the content of his pondering dream. He had not enjoyed the military service. The range life he had led before his campaign suited him better. But he had long dreamed of being a cowboy for himself. The hard riding, the camp fare, the perilous work and adventure were much to his liking, but he had revolted against the noisy, bottle-loving, improvident louts with whom he had to ride.
He broiled turkey over the red coals of his dying aspenwood fire. With salt, a hard biscuit, and a cup of coffee he thought he fared sumptuously. In that still autumn close of day, in the whispering forest Logan Huett found himself. He might have been aware of the surpassing beauty of the glade, of the giant pines and silver spruce, of the white and gold aspen grove on the slope, of the spot of scarlet maple higher up, but he did not think of it that way. He was alone again. Slowly the pondering thought of his long-cherished plan faded into sensorial perceptions. The gusto with which he ate the hot turkey meat, the smell of the woodsmoke, the changing of the colored shadows all about him, the tinkle of the little stream, the crack of deer or