ten-mile running fight. Four
dead men, one of whom was her husband, were inside the coach, and
another was on the box with the driver. The latter was wounded, and the
mules fairly bristled with arrows. The stage itself was shivered and
splintered in every part by the shower of lead that had been poured into
it, and many a blood-stained letter from its mail-sacks afterwards
carried a shudder into distant Eastern homes.

This, then, was the work of the war-party who were gathered about Glen
Eddy; and, even now, they were impatiently awaiting the appearance of
the stage from the east that was due that day. For this occasion they
had planned a new form of attack. It was not to be made until the stage
reached the ranch. There, while its mules were being changed, and its
occupants were off their guard, the Indians proposed to dash out from
the nearest place of concealment and attempt the capture of both it and
the station at the same time. It was a well-conceived plan, and might
have been successfully carried out, but for the arrival of the three
scouts, who were now so proudly exhibiting their prisoner and telling
the story of his capture. Before they had half finished, a few dazzling
flashes of light from the mirrors of the distant lookouts announced that
the eastern stage was in sight.

A minute later the warriors were mounted and riding cautiously towards a
point but a short distance from the ranch, where they could still remain
concealed from it until the moment of making their final dash. The three
scouts, being on other duty, were not expected to take part in the
fight, nor had they any intention of so doing, much as they would have
liked to; but they could not resist the temptation to witness it. So
they, with their prisoner, followed close behind the others to their new
place of concealment. When they reached it, these three, with Glen,
stood a little apart from the rest, so as not to interfere with their
movements.

Up to this moment, the boy had not the least idea of what was about to
take place, nor where he was. There was nothing to indicate that a stage
ranch and a well-travelled wagon road lay just beyond the ridge before
him. He wondered what these Indians were up to; but he wondered still
more when they would go into camp, and give him a chance to dismount
from the back of that hard-trotting mule; for his aches and pains had
again become very hard to bear. In spite of his thoughts being largely
centred up