Yet somebody else was there and close at hand. The shadow of the
westward heights had gradually risen to the crest of the rocky cliffs
across the stream. A soft, prolonged call of distant trumpet summoned
homeward, for the coming night, the scattered herds and herd guards of
the post, and, rising with a sigh of disappointment, the girl turned
toward her now impatient pony when her ear caught the sound of a
smothered hand-clap, and, whirling about in swift hope and surprise,
her face once more darkened at sight of an Indian girl, Apache
unquestionably, crouching in the leafy covert of the opposite willows
and pointing silently down stream. For a moment, without love or fear
in the eyes of either, the white girl and the brown gazed at each
other across the intervening water mirror and spoke no word. Then,
slowly, the former approached the brink, looked in the direction
indicated by the little dingy index and saw nothing to warrant the
recall. Moreover, she was annoyed to think that all this time,
perhaps, the Indian girl had been lurking in that sheltering grove and
stealthily watching her. Once more she turned away, this time with a
toss of her head that sent the russet-brown tresses tumbling about her
slim back and shoulders, and at once the hand-clap was repeated, low,
but imperative, and Tonto, the biggest of the two big hounds, uplifted
one ear and growled a challenge.
"What do you want?" questioned the white girl, across the estranging
waters.
For answer the brown girl placed her left forefinger on her lips, and
again distinctly pointed to a little clump of willows a dozen rods
below, but on the westward side.
"Do you mean--someone's coming?" queried the first.
"Sh-sh-sh!" answered the second softly, then pointed again, and
pointed eagerly.
The soldier's daughter glanced about her, uncertainly, a moment, then
slowly, cautiously made her way along the sandy brink in the direction
indicated, gathering the folds of her long skirt in her gauntleted
hand and stepping lightly in her slender moccasins. A moment or two,
and she had reached the edge of a dense little copse and peered
cautiously within. The Indian girl was right. Somebody lay there,
apparently asleep, and the fair young intruder recoiled in obvious
confusion, if not dismay. For a moment she stood with fluttering heart
and parting lips that now permitted reassuring glimpse of pearly
white teeth. For a moment she seemed on the verge of panicky retreat,
but little by little regained courage and self-poise. What was there
to fear in a sleeping soldier anyhow? She knew who it was at a glance.
She could, if she would, whisper his name. Indeed, she had been
whispering it many a time, day and night, these last two weeks
until--until certain things about him had come to her ears that made
her shrink in spite of herself from this handsome, petted young
soldier, this Adonis of her father's troop, Neil Blakely, lieutenant
of cavalry.