Yes, Julie saw a little of what her mistress was aiming at; and
reposed perfect trust in Annette's ability to do everything with
skill and success. The beasts were tethered, and dark as was that
prairie night, these two girls with skill as unerring as the instinct
of a pair of night-hawks could come back and find them. Then they
struck out through the long grass, and made for the bluff where lay
the Stonies and their prisoners.
"Now, if we can find their ponies!" Annette said.
"Wherefore look for their ponies, mademoiselle?"
"You soon shall see. Ah, here they are; stay you there, Julie, I
will come to you again presently." But Julie followed her mistress. A
little shudder passed through her heart as she saw the dull glitter
of something in her mistress' hand.
"I don't like to do this cruel thing; but then I spill only brute
blood; and I do so to save the shedding of human blood." Julie now
surmised what her mistress was about; and drew her own knife. Annette
had already passed from one of the ponies, after pausing for a few
seconds stooped by its hinder legs, to another; and with the knife
still gleaming in her hand, performed upon the second beast what she
had done to the first.
"You just cut the tendons of the hinder legs, I suppose,
mademoiselle?" Julie enquired in a whisper.
"What, are you at work too, Julie?"
"Oui mademoiselle; I have cut yonder one, and yon;" and she darted
away to continue the work of mutilation. In a few minutes the uncanny
task was ended, and with a shudder at their hearts the girls wiped
their knives and led away from the flock of lamed and bleeding beasts
the horses of Captain Stephens and his brother captive. These they
tethered beside their own, and again returned. They then proceeded
with noiseless tread towards the hostile camp.
The fire had burnt lower, but the glow was still strong enough to
reveal the condition of the camp. After Annette had counted every
Indian, and convinced herself that one and all were soundly sleeping,
and that Jean in his tent was the deepest slumberer of all, she
whispered softly.
"Remain you here, Julie. Should I be discovered fly instantly and
take horse. Don't tarry for me. Peace, ma petite amie; I go."
And softly as sleep she went away, and in among the trees till she
stood within a pace of where her deliverer lay. He had been on the
border land that divides the world from the realm of dreams; but
through the wavering senses of his eye and ear, he was sensible of
the faintest stir among the leaves, of a shadow moving near him.
Instantly his eyes were wide open; and the dull glow of the embers
revealed standing above him with his finger on his lips, the figure
of the beautiful Indian boy who had saved his life before. The next
moment, the boy is leaning over him; in another moment his bonds are
severed, and he is free.