ered why the
horses made so much noise just now. He and his people would come
to-morrow with Gray Fox.

And then he went inside the thicket again, and the willows looked as
innocent as ever. Crook and the captain rode away.

"My speech was just a little weak coming on top of a charge of cavalry,"
the General admitted. "And that fellow put his finger right on the
place. I'll give you my notion, captain. If I had said we had more
soldiers behind the hill, like as not this squaw of ours would have told
him I lied; she's an uncertain quantity, I find. But I told him the
exact truth--that I had no more--and he won't believe it, and that's
what I want."

So Glynn understood. The pack-train had been halted in a purposely
exposed position, which would look to the Indians as if another force
was certainly behind it, and every move was now made to give an
impression that the forty were only the advance of a large command.
Crook pitched his A tent close to the red men's village, and the troops
went into camp regardlessly near. The horses were turned out to graze
ostentatiously unprotected, so that the people in the thicket should
have every chance to notice how secure the white men felt. The mules
pastured comfortably over the shallow snow that crushed as they wandered
among the sage-bush, and the square bell hung once more from the neck of
the leader and tankled upon the hill. The shelter-tents littered the
flat above the wash-out, and besides the cook-fire others were built
irregularly far down the Malheur North Fork, shedding an extended
glimmer of deceit. It might have been the camp of many hundred. A little
blaze shone comfortably on the canvas of Crook's tent, and Sergeant
Keyser, being in charge of camp, had adopted the troop cook-fire for his
camp guard after the cooks had finished their work. The willow thicket
below grew black and mysterious, and quiet fell on the white camp. By
eight the troopers had gone to bed. Night had come pretty cold, and a
little occasional breeze, that passed like a chill hand laid a moment on
the face, and went down into the willows. Now and again the water
running through the ice would lap and gurgle at some air-hole. Sergeant
Keyser sat by his fire and listened to the lonely bell sounding from the
dark. He wished the men would feel more at home with him. With Jack
Long, satirical, old, and experienced, they were perfectly familiar,
because he was a civilian; but to Keyser, because he had b