"But you can go to Prescott."

"Prescott!" in a tone of great contempt; "twenty-seven log cabins and five stores, and not a boy in the place--only a dozen Pike County, Missouri, girls."

"And we can't go there with any comfort since Texas d.i.c.k and Jumping Jack stole Sancho and Chiquita," added Frank.

Further conversation on this subject was temporarily interrupted by the arrival of the expressman. A roan bronco galloped up the slope, bearing a youthful rider wearing a light buck-skin suit and a soft felt hat with a narrow brim. He was armed with a breech-loading carbine and two revolvers, and carried, attached to his saddle, a roll of blankets, a haversack, and a mail-pouch.

Dismounting, he detached the pouch, at the same time answering questions and giving us items of news later than any contained in his despatches.

After handing his pouch to the quartermaster-sergeant, his eyes fell upon the boy sergeants.

"I saw Texas d.i.c.k and Juan Brincos at Cisternas Negras," he said, addressing them.

"My! Did you, Mr. Hudson?" exclaimed Henry, springing to his feet and approaching the courier. "Did they have our ponies?"

"You know I never saw your ponies; but d.i.c.k was mounted on a black, with a white star in his forehead, and Juan on a cream-color, with a brown mane and tail."

"Sancho!" said Frank.

"Chiquita!" said Henry.

"Do you know where they were bound?" asked Captain Bayard.

"I did not speak to them, nor did they see me; I thought it would be better to keep out of the way of such desperate characters in a lonely place. I learned from a friend of theirs at Date Creek that they intend to open a monte bank at La Paz."

"Then they are likely to remain there for some time."

"Can't something be done to get the ponies back, sir?" asked Frank.

"Perhaps so. I will consider the matter."

The mail was taken to my office and soon distributed through the command. Among my letters was one from Colonel Burton, the father of the boy sergeants. He said he had been expecting to send for his sons by this mail, but additional detached service had been required of him which might delay their departure from Whipple for another month, if not longer. He informed me that a detail I had received to duty as professor of military science and tactics in a boys' military school had been withheld by the department commander until my services could be spared at Fort Whipple, and that he thought the next mail, or the one following it, would bring an order relieving me and ordering me East. This would enable me to leave for the coast about the first week in November.

Frank and Henry shared my quarters with me, and that evening, seated before an open fire, I read their father's letter, and remarked that perhaps I should be able to accompany them to San Francisco, and, if the colonel consented to their request to go to the military school with me, we might take the same steamer for Panama and New York.

"Oh, won't that be too fine for anything!" exclaimed the younger sergeant. "Then I'll not have to leave Vicky here, after all."

Vic, upon hearing her name called, left her rug at my feet and placed her nose on Henry's knee, and the boy stroked and patted her in his usual affectionate manner.

"Then you have been dreading to leave the doggie?" I asked.

"Yes; I dream all sorts of uncomfortable things about her. She's in trouble, or I am, and I cannot rescue her and she cannot help me.

Usually we are parting, and I see her far off, looking sadly back at me."

"Henry is not the only one who dreads to part with Vic," said Frank.

"We boys can never forget the scenes at Los Valles Grandes, Laguna, and the Rio Carizo. She saved our lives, helped recover Chiquita, and she helped rescue Manuel, Sapoya, and Henry from the Navajos."

"Yes; but for her I might have lost my brother at La Roca Grande,"

remarked Henry. "That was probably her greatest feat. Nice little doggie--good little Vicky--are you really to go to San Francisco and the East with us?"

"I believe if I only had Sancho back, and Henry had Chiquita, I should be perfectly happy," observed the elder brother.

After a slight pause, during which the boy seemed to have relapsed into his former depression, Henry asked:

"Do they have cavalry drill at that school?"

"Yes, the superintendent keeps twenty light horses, and allows some of the cadets to keep private animals. All are used in drill."

"And if we get our ponies back, I suppose we shall have to leave them here. Do you think, sir, there is any chance of our seeing them again?" asked Frank.

"Not unless some one can go to La Paz for them. Captain Bayard is going to see me after supper about a plan of his to retake them."

"I wonder what officer he will send?"

"Perhaps I shall go."

"Father could never stand the expense of sending them to the States, I suppose," said Henry, despondently.

"They could easily be sent to the Missouri River without cost," I observed.

"How, please?"

"There is a quartermaster's train due here in a few weeks. It would cost nothing to send the ponies by the wagon-master to Fort Union, and then they could be transferred to another train to Fort Leavenworth."

"Frank, I've a scheme!" exclaimed the younger boy.

"What is it?"

"If Mr. Duncan finds Sancho and Chiquita, let's send them to Manuel Perea and Sapoya on the Rio Grande. When they go to the military school they can take our horses and theirs, and we'll join the cavalry."

"That's so," said Frank. "Manuel wrote that if he went to school he should cross the plains with his uncle, Miguel Otero, who is a freighter. He could take the whole outfit East for nothing. There would remain only the cost of shipping them from Kansas City to the school."

"Yes, but before you cook a hare you must catch him," said I.

"And our two hares are on the other side of the Xuacaxella[1] Desert,"

said Frank, despondently. "I suppose there is small chance of our ever seeing them again."

[Footnote 1: p.r.o.nounced Hwar-car-hal-yar.]

Our two boy sergeants had found life in Arizona scarcely monotonous, for the hostile Apaches made it lively enough, compelling us to build a defensible post and look well to the protection of our stock. A few years later a large force, occupying many posts, found it difficult to maintain themselves against those Indians, so it cannot seem strange to the reader that our small garrison of a hundred soldiers should find it difficult to do much more than act on the defensive. Close confinement to the reservation chafed the boys.

A ride to Prescott, two miles distant, was the longest the boys had taken alone. Two weeks before this chapter opens they had been invited to dine with Governor Goodwin, the Governor of the Territory, and he had made their call exceedingly pleasant. When, at an advanced hour in the evening, the boys took leave of their host and went to the stable for their horses, they found them gone, with their saddles and bridles.

Inquiries made next day in town elicited the information that two notorious frontier scamps, Texas d.i.c.k and Juan Brincos, an American and Mexican, were missing, and it was the opinion of civil and military authorities that they had stolen the ponies. The boys took Vic to the Governor's, and, showing her the tracks of her equine friends, she followed them several miles on the Skull Valley trail. It was plainly evident that the thieves had gone towards the Rio Colorado.

After supper I accompanied the commanding officer to his quarters. He told me that the express had brought him a communication from the department commander, stating that, since Arizona had been transferred to the Department of the Pacific, our stores would hereafter be shipped from San Francisco to the mouth of the Rio Colorado, and up that stream by the boats of the Colorado Steam Navigation Company to La Paz. He said he had decided to send me to La Paz to make arrangements with a freighter for the transportation of the supplies from the company's landing to Fort Whipple.

"And while you are in La Paz," said the captain, "look after those horse-thieves, and turn them over to the civil authorities; but, whether you capture them or not, be sure to bring back the boys'