ined feathers would be found;
no beads or belts of wampum; no breech-clouts, bows, or quivers; no
tomahawks or spears. All have been "cached" in a cave among the rocks;
there to remain till needed for some future maraud, or massacre.

Around their camp-fire the freebooters are in full tide of enjoyment.
The dollars have been divided, and each has his thousands. Those at the
cards are not contented, but are craving more. They will be richer, or
poorer. And soon; playing "poker" at fifty dollars an "ante."

Gamesters and lookers on alike smoke, drink, and make merry. They have
no fear now, not the slightest apprehension. If pursued, the pursuers
cannot find the way to Coyote creek. If they did, what would they see
there? Certainly not the red-skinned savages, who plundered the San
Saba mission, but a party of innocent horse hunters, all Texans. The
only one resembling an Indian among them is the half-breed--Fernand.
But he is also so metamorphosed, that his late master could not
recognise him. The others have changed from red men to white; in
reverse, he has become to all appearance a pure-blooded aboriginal.

Confident in their security, because ignorant of what has taken place
under the live-oak, they little dream that one of their confederates is
in a situation, where he will be forced to tell a tale sure to thwart
their well-constructed scheme, casting it down as a house of cards.
Equally are they unaware of the revelation which their own prisoner, the
mulatto, could make. They suppose him and his master to be but two
travellers encountered by accident, having no connection with the San
Saba settlers. Borlasse is better informed about this, though not
knowing all. He believes Clancy to have been _en route_ for the new
settlement, but without having reached it. He will never reach it now.

In hope of getting a clearer insight into many things still clouded,
while his followers are engaged at their games, he seeks the tent to
which Jupiter has been consigned, and where he is now under the
surveillance of the half-blood, Fernand.

Ordering the mestizo to retire, he puts the prisoner through a course of
cross-questioning.

The mulatto is a man of no ordinary intelligence. He had the misfortune
to be born a slave, with the blood of a freeman in his veins; which,
stirring him to discontent with his ignoble lot, at length forced him to
become a fugitive. With a subtlety partly instinctive, but strengthen