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Page 5
"Echo--Echo Allen!" he murmured, fondly repeating the name. "No,
not Echo Allen, but Echo Lane, for Dick Lane has redeemed his
promise, and returns to claim you as his own."
As he gazed upon the shimmering heat waves which distorted and
displaced the objects within and beneath them, a group of
horsemen suddenly appeared to him in the distance, and as
suddenly vanished in thin air.
"Rurales!" ejaculated Lane. "I wonder if they are chasing
Apaches? That infernal mirage gives you no idea of distance or
direction. If the red devils have got away from Crook and
slipped by these Greaser rangers over the border, they'll sure be
making straight for the Ghost Range, and by this very trail. If
so, I'm at the best place on it to meet them, and here I stay
till the coast is clear." Turning to the red cross on the rock,
he reflected: "Perhaps, after all, it's a case of 'Nebo's lonely
mountain.'"
Lane had hardly reached this conclusion before he found it
justified by the sight of a mounted Apache in the regalia of war
emerging from a hidden dip in the trail below the fortification.
Lane dropped behind the parapet, evidently before he was
observed, as the steadily increasing number and loudness of the
hoof-beats on the rocky trail indicated to the listener.
Crawling back to his horse and burro, he made them lie down
against the upper wall, and picketed them with short lengths of
rope to the ground, for he foresaw that danger could come only
from the mountainside. Taking his Winchester, he returned to the
parapet, and, half-seated, half-reclining behind it, opened fire
on the unsuspecting Apaches. The leader, shot through the head,
fell from his horse, which reared and backed wildly down the
trail. Other bullets must have found their billets also, but,
because of the confusion which ensued among the Indians, the
prospector was unable to tell how many of them he had put out of
action. In a flash every rider had leaped off his horse, and,
protecting himself by its body, was scrambling with his mount to
the protecting declivity in the rear. The prospector was sorely
tempted to pump his cartridges into the group as it poured back
over the rim of the hollow, but he desisted from the useless
slaughter of horses alone, knowing that he could be attacked only
on foot, and that every one of his slender store of cartridges
must find a human mark if he would return to the States alive.
"They've got to put me out of business before they can go on," he
ruminated. "An Apache is a good deal of a coward when he's
fighting for pleasure, but just corner him, and, great snakes and
spittin' wildcats, what a game he does put up! I must save my
cartridges; for one thing's sure, they won't waste any of theirs.
They're not as good shots as white men, for ammunition is too
scarce with them for use in gun practise; so they won't fire till
they've got me dead to rights. Let me see; there's about a dozen
left in the party, and I have fifteen cartridges--that's three in
reserve for my own outfit, if some of the others fail to get
their men. Those red devils enjoy skinning an animal alive as
much as torturing a man, and you can bet they won't save me any
bullets by shooting Nance and Jinny."
Reasoning that the Indians would not dare to attack by way of the
open trail in front, and that it would take some time for them to
make the detour necessary to approach him from above, since they
would have to leave their ponies below and climb on hands and
knees over jutting ledges and around broken granite blocks, Lane
coolly proceeded to drink his coffee, and eat his lunch of hard
bread and cold bacon-rind. After he had finished, he gave a lump
of sugar to each of his animals, and pressed his cheek with an
affectionate hug against the side of his horse's head.
"Old girl," he said. "I'm sorry we can't take a parting drink,
for I'm afraid neither of us will reach our next water-hole. But
you can count on me that the red devils won't get you."
Then, going to his pack, he undid it, and took out a double
handful of yellow nuggets and a number of canvas bags. These he
deposited in the pot-hole, and, prying up the flat stone of the
fireplace, laid it over them, and covered the stone with embers.
"It's a ten to one shot that they finish me," he reflected; "but
the wages I've paid for by a year of hard work and absence from
her side, stay just as near Echo Allen as I can bring them alive,
and, if there's any truth in what they say about spirits
disclosing in dreams the place of buried treasure, with the
chance of my getting them to her after I am dead."
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