tayed down there, with the horses.

"They'll search a while. That means we're safe for a bit," panted
Frank. "Now come on. We'd better lose no time in putting more rocks
between them and us."

Even in the hurry some of the men chuckled over the game that had been
played on the enemy. The Sioux and the Cheyennes would be sorely
disappointed in their hope of scalps. They had made a water haul; had
killed the horses, and gained nothing.

It was a tough climb in a country where white man apparently had never
been before. Gruard and Big Bat did not slacken. The mountains
opposed with timber and rock and precipices. All the file gasped; the
air was heavy with thunderstorms; overcoats, blouses, everything was
thrown aside, except the rifles and the ammunition. The Indians might
follow, and might not; but distance was the only safety.

The two scouts led without another stop until midnight; then the little
company camped amidst the rocks on the very top of a peak. A terrific
storm of wind and hail swept over them, so that the falling trees
sounded like the crashes of artillery. The temperature almost reached
freezing; yet this was no time for complaining. They might have been
lying, colder still, among the horses.

At first daylight they stumbled on. Gruard and Big Bat saw no rest
until within touch of General Crook. The course turned southward,
along the crests of the mighty range. They arrived at a canyon so
steep that the tired troopers could not clamber down into it. Frank
found a sort of a trail by way of a valley, to a crossing of the river
at the canyon's bottom; and they needs must hustle madly, to cross and
get out before any Indians discovered them in the pocket.

The main camp was now twenty-five miles south-east, Gruard thought.
The plains were in sight through the gaps; but there would likely be
Indians down on those plains. Gruard and Big Bat guided up the
opposite side of the canyon. They had to cling like squirrels,
following a sheep trail not more than a foot wide, five hundred feet
above the stream, and two hundred feet below the rim.

But they got out. Gruard swung more eastward, toward the foothills.
Beyond the foothills lay the camp of the Crook column. Presently the
men were gasping for water. Everybody was pinched with hunger, for
there had been nothing to eat and nothing to drink, since they had
retreated just in time from the net.

It was decided to venture into a valley of