were lyin'? Here's their wagon now,
that was burnt over their heads!"

At intervals of several paces, as they could best find points from
which to see without being seen from the northern side, the little
detachment lay sprawled along the crest, the brown barrels of the
carbines well forward. Graham and Connell, peering through their
field-glasses, their elbows resting on the turf, were side by side
about the centre. Behind them, nearly a hundred paces down the
southward slope, stood the horses in an irregular line, a corporal
remaining in charge, keenly watching the movements of his superiors,
yet keeping constant control of the four horse-holders, who, like
himself, remained in saddle. There could be no telling what moment they
might be needed.

For an odd and perplexing situation was this in which the young
commander was placed. Ordered to follow back the trail of the fugitive
hunters to the point where they claimed to have been "jumped" by
hostile Indians; ordered to find, if possible, the remains of the
victims, men and horses, and of the burned wagon and "outfit"; ordered
also to search for signs by which the assailants might be discovered,
the command had come suddenly in sight of a wagon and horses that
answered the description of those said to have been destroyed, and if
that wasn't a white man driving them, both binoculars were at fault.

But what did it mean that the captors should be coming southwestward
with their booty? Why had they not burned the wagon? They could never
use it at the reservation. Many young men, of course, were out and
afield with the ghost-dancers, but the elders, the native police, and
the agent would quickly hear of it, and trouble would follow for
somebody. George Sword, Sioux chief of police and stanch adherent of
General Crook--"Wichahnpi Yahmni" (Three Stars), as they called him
whom so long the Sioux had honored, and whom now they were so deeply
mourning--George Sword was a man who did his duty well; Geordie, as a
boy, had known him, and known how the general trusted him. A wagon like
this would be of no more use to the captors than a locomotive; yet here
they were, a dozen of them, urging it on, while others of their kind,
afar back down-stream, were darting about, little black dots of
horsemen scampering over the distant slopes, evidently watching some
parties still farther away and invisible to the lurking cavalry.

Could it be that they were trying to repeat an old-time de