range, occasionally killing
a horse.

He told off his fours and ordered the horses sent to the rear.

The fours led their horses back toward where they had left their
packmules when they had stopped for coffee at three o'clock.

But the fours had not gone half a mile when they were surrounded by a
mob of Indians that just closed in on them. Every man was killed--the
horses were galloped off by the women and children.

Custer now realized that he was caught in a trap. The ridge where his
men lay face down was half a mile long, and not more than twenty feet
across at the top. The Indians were everywhere--in the gullies, in the
grass, in little scooped-out holes. The bullets whizzed above the
heads of Custer's men as they lay there, flattening their bodies in
the dust.

The morning sun came out, dazzling and hot.

It was only nine o'clock.

The men were without food and without water. The Little Big Horn
danced over its rocky bed and shimmered in the golden light, only half
a mile away, and there in the cool, limpid stream they had been
confident they would now swim and fish, the battle over, while they
proudly held the disarmed Indians against General Terry's coming.

But the fight had not been won, and death lay between them and water.
The only thing to do was to await Reno or Terry. Reno might come at
any time, and Terry would arrive without fail at tomorrow's dawn--he
had said so, and his word was the word of a soldier.

Custer had blundered.

The fight was lost.

Now it was just a question of endurance. Noon came, and the buzzards
began to gather in the azure.

The sun was blistering hot--there was not a tree, nor a bush, nor a
green blade of grass within reach.

The men had ceased to joke and banter. The situation was serious. Some
tried to smoke, but their parching thirst was thus only
aggravated--they threw their pipes away.

The Indians now kept up an occasional shooting.

They were playing with the soldiers as a cat plays with a mouse.

The Indian is a cautious fighter--he makes no sacrifices in order to
win. Now he had his prey secure.

Soon the soldiers would run out of ammunition, and then one more day,
or two at least, and thirst and fatigue would reduce brave men into
old women, and the squaws could rush in and pound them on the head
with clubs.

The afternoon dragged along its awful length. Time dwindled and
dawdled.

At last the sun sank, a ball of fire in the West.

The moon c