ier breached. With a shout and heads
down, we dashed towards this and vaulted across the flaming wall, our
horses snorting and screaming with pain as we landed on the smoking turf
of the other side. I gulped a great breath of the fresh air into my
suffocating lungs, tore the buckskin covering from my broncho's head and
we raced on in a swirl of smoke, always following the dust which
revealed the tracks of the retreating Sioux. There was a whiff of singed
hair, as if one of the horses had been burnt, and Little Fellow gave a
shout. Looking back I saw his horse sinking on the blackened patch; but
La Robe Noire and I rode on. The fugitives were ascending rising ground
to the south. They were beating their horses in a rage of cruelty; but
we gained at every pace. I counted twenty riders. A woman seemed to be
strapped to one horse. Was this Miriam? We were on moist grass and I
urged La Robe Noire to ride faster and drove spurs in my own beast,
though I felt him weakening under me. The Sioux had now reached the
crest of the hill. Our horses were nigh done, and to jade the fagged
creatures up rising ground was useless.

When we finally reached the height, the Sioux were far down in the
valley. It was utterly hopeless to try to overtake them. Ah! It is easy
to face death and to struggle and to fight and to triumph! But the
hardest of all hard things is to surrender, to yield to the inevitable,
to turn back just when the goal looms through obscurity!

I still had Diable in my power. We headed about and crawled slowly back
by unburnt land towards the buffalo hunters.

Little Fellow, we overtook limping homeward afoot. Burnt Earth and
Ringing Thunder awaited us near the ravine. The carts were already out
gathering hides, tallow, flesh and tongues. We made what poor speed we
could among the buffalo carcasses to the spot where we had left Le Grand
Diable. It was Little Fellow, who was hobbling ahead, and the Indian
suddenly turned with such a cry of baffled rage, I knew it boded
misfortune. Running forward, I could hardly believe my eyes. Fools that
we were to leave the captive unguarded! The great buffalo lay
unmolested; but there was no Le Grand Diable. A third time had he
vanished as if in league with the powers of the air. Closer examination
explained his disappearance. A wet, tattered moccasin, with the
appearance of having been chewed, lay on the turf. He had evidently
bitten through his gag, raised his arms to his mouth, ea