liff, he saw a sight which froze his very
heart with a mortal terror.

The ravine by which he and his companion had entered was filled with
mounted Indians, who were riding silently into the little valley.

CHAPTER XV.
CHEATED OF THEIR PREY.

Literally dumb with terror, so weak that he could not rise, Pond saw
this strange cavalcade moving up toward the little lake, and looked to
the spot where the Texan had lain down to see if he had yet taken the
alarm.

To his wonder and redoubled alarm, he saw the Texan not alone, but with
a white man, dressed in buckskin, by his side, and a woman also,
apparently in friendly converse, calmly waiting the Indian advance.

Recognizing at a glance the woman as Addie Neidic, Pond realized that
the man must be no other than Persimmon Bill, and that his followers
were the blood-thirsty Sioux, whom he headed.

"Heaven help me! There is some fearful treachery here. Wild Bill and his
companions are lost if they are not warned in time. How can it be done?"

How strangely, as if by intuition, strategy, and cunning thought come to
some when environed by unlooked-for danger.

Without a moment's hesitation, Pond so arranged his blanket that if
glanced at it would appear he was yet sleeping under it, for he left his
hat on the stone where his head had been, and his rifle leaning against
the tree right over it.

Then, bare-headed, with no weapons but his pistols and knife in his
belt, he crept off up the hill-side with the silence and stealth of a
scout who had been a life-time in the business. He wondered at himself
as he began to scale the mountain-side, not daring to look back, how he
could creep up amid those fearful crags so noiselessly, and how he could
have got away unseen, when the Texan and those who were with him were
not a pistol shot away.

On, on he kept, ever seeking the shadowed spots, where no moonlight
could reveal his form, until at last he was on the very crest of the
hill. Looking down he plainly saw the camp-fires of the Black Hillers
below. They were most likely buried in slumber, and, if they had
sentinels out, his life would be endangered by a rapid approach. But of
this he seemed not to think as he hurried almost recklessly down through
thickets, over crags, and along rugged gulches.

How he got down he hardly knew, but he was down, and rushing toward the
nearest fire, when he heard a stern, short summons close in his front:

"Halt! Who comes there?"

A m