"I shouldn't wonder a bit, now, if that isn't it exactly," said Fred, who was quite taken with the ingenious theory of his friend. "It seems to me that the best thing that we can do is to ride on as fast as we can."

"We've got to run the risk of it being all wrong, and fetching up in the bosom of the spalpeens; but it's moighty sure we don't make anything by standing here."

The Irishman turned his horse as near the middle of the canon as possible.

Fred kept close to his side, his mustang behaving so splendidly that he gave him his unreserved confidence. The average width of the pa.s.s was about a hundred yards, so it will be understood that if a detachment of men were caught within it they would be compelled to fight at a fearful disadvantage.

The plan of Mickey and Fred, as they discussed it while riding along, was to keep up the moderate gallop until close upon the fire. They would then put their animals to the highest speed and pa.s.s the dangerous point as speedily as possible. They felt no little misgiving as they drew near the dangerous place, and they continually glanced upward at the rocks overhead, expecting that a party of Indians would suddenly make their appearance and open fire.

The first plan was, as they drew near, to run in as close as possible beneath the rocks on the left, in the belief that, as they overhung so much, the Indians above could not reach them with a shot. But before the time came to make the attempt, it was seen that it would not do.

Accordingly, Mickey, who had maintained a line as close as possible to the centre of the canon, suddenly sheered his mustang to the right, until he nearly grazed the wall there. Then he put him on a dead run, Fred Munson doing the same, with very little s.p.a.ce between the two steeds. A few plunges brought them directly opposite the signal-fire, and every nerve was strained.

Both beasts were capable of magnificent speed and the still air became like a hurricane as the hors.e.m.e.n cut their way through it. Fred glanced upward at the crest of the rocks on the left and fancied that he saw figures standing there, preparing to fire. He hammered his heels against the ribs of his mustang and leaned forward upon his neck, in the hope of making the aim as difficult as possible.

Still no reports of guns were heard; and, after continuing the terrific gait for a quarter of a mile, they gradually decreased it until it became a moderate walk, and the riders again found themselves side by side. Both had looked behind them a dozen times since pa.s.sing the dangerous point, but had not obtained a glimpse of an Indian.

"I thought I saw a number just as we were opposite," said Fred; "but, if so, what has become of them?"

"Ye didn't obsarve any at all, for I kipt raising me eye that way, and they weren't there. The whole thing is a moighty _puzzle_, as our tacher used to remark when the sum in addition became so big that he had to set down one number and carry anither. The spalpeens must have manufactured that fire for our benefit, and where's the good that it has done them?"

"Can't it be that it was for something else? Can't it be that they took us for Indians, or perhaps they haven't seen us at all, and don't know that we've pa.s.sed?"

"It does seem as if something of the kind might be, and yet that don't sthrike me as the Injin style of doing business."

They continued their moderate pace for quite a distance further, continually looking back toward the camp-fire, the smoke from which continued to ascend with the same distinct regularity as before, but nothing resembling a warrior was detected. Finally a curve in the gorge shut out the troublesome signal, and they were left to continue their way and conjecture as much as they chose as to the explanation of what had taken place.

A little later, and when the afternoon was about half gone, they reached a portion of the pa.s.s which was remarkably straight, so that the eye took in a half mile of it, from the beginning to the point where another turn intervened. The two friends were galloping over this exact section and speculating as to how soon they would strike the open prairie, when all their calculations were knocked topsy-turvy. A party of hors.e.m.e.n charged around the bend in front, all riding at a sweeping gallop directly toward the alarmed Mickey and Fred, who instantly halted and surveyed them. A second glance showed them to be Indians, undoubtedly Apaches, and very probably Lone Wolf himself and some of his warriors.

"We must turn back," said the Irishman, wheeling his horse about and striking him into a rapid gait. "We've got to have a dead run for it, and I think we can win. Holy saints presarve us!"

This e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n was caused by seeing, at that moment, another party of hors.e.m.e.n appear directly in their front, as they turned on the back trail.

Thus they were shut in on both sides, and fairly caught between two fires.

CHAPTER XV.

ON THE DEFENSIVE.

AT the moment of reining up their mustangs, the fugitives were about equidistant between the two fires, and it was just as dangerous to advance as to retreat. For one second the Irishman meditated a desperate charge, in the hope of breaking through the company that first appeared in his path, and, had he been alone, or accompanied by a man, he would have done so. But, slight as was his own prospect of escape, he knew there was absolutely none for the boy in such a desperate effort, and he determined that it should not be made.

"Can't we make a dash straight through them?" asked Fred, reading the thought of Mickey, as he glanced from one to the other, and noted the fearfully rapid approach of the redskins.

"It can't be done," replied the Irishman. "There is only one thing left for us."

"What is that?"

"Do as I do. Yonder is an opening that may serve us for awhile."

As he spoke, he slipped off his steed, leaving him to work his own will.

Fred did not hesitate a moment, for there was not a moment to spare.

As he sprang to the ground, he pulled the beautiful Apache blanket from the back of the mustang that had served him so well. Dragging that with him, the two hurried to the right, making for a wooded crevice between the rocks, which seemingly offered a chance for them to climb to the surface above, if, in the order of things, they should gain the opportunity to do so. Mickey O'Rooney, as a matter of course, took the lead and in a twinkling he was among the gnarled and twisted saplings, the interlacing vines, and the rolling stones and rattling gravel. As soon as he had secured a foothold, he reached out his hand to help his young friend.

"Never mind me. I can keep along behind you. Go as fast as you can."

"Let me have the blanket," said Mickey, drawing it from his grasp. "Now come ahead, for we have got to go it like monkeys."

He turned and bent to his task with the recklessness of despair, for, even in that dreadful crisis, he thought more of the little fellow than he did of himself. If he could have been a.s.sured of his safety, he would have been ready to wheel about and meet his score or more of foes, and fight them single-handed, as Leonidas and his band did at Thermopylae. But the fate of the two was linked together, and, sink or swim, it must be fulfilled in company.

The narrow, wooded ravine, in which they had taken enforced refuge, was only three or four feet in width, the bottom sloping irregularly upward, at an angle of forty five degrees. So long as this continued, so long could they maintain their laboring ascent to the top. Mickey had strong hopes that, with the advantage of the start, they might reach that point far enough in advance of their pursuers to secure some other concealment that would serve them till nightfall, when they could steal out and try their chances again.

The saplings growing at every inclination afforded them much a.s.sistance, as they were able to seize hold with one or both hands, and thus help themselves along. But the vines in many places were of a peculiar running nature and they frequently caught their feet and stumbled; but they were instantly up and at it again. All at once Mickey, who was scarcely an arm's length in advance, halted so abruptly that Fred ran plump against him.

"Why don't you go on?" asked the panting lad.

"I can't. Here's the end."

So it was, indeed. While pressing forward with undiminished effort, the Irishman found himself suddenly confronted with a solid, perpendicular wall of rock. The narrow chasm, or fissure, terminated.

It was like a fugitive, his heart beating high with hope, checked in his flight by the obtrusion of the Great Chinese Wall across his path. Mickey looked upward. As he stood, he could, with outstretched arms, touch the wall on his right and left, and kick the one in front--the only open route being in the rear, which was commanded by the Apache party. As he did so, he saw, through the interstices of the interweaving, straggling branches, the clear, blue sky, with the edge of the fissure fully forty feet above his head. His first hope was that some of the saplings around him were lofty enough to permit him to use them as a ladder; but the tallest did not approach within a half dozen yards of the top. They were shut in on every hand.

"We can't run any further," said the Irishman, after a hasty glance at the situation. "We are cotched as fairly as ever was a mouse in a trap, and it now remains for us to peg away, and go under doing the best we can. Have ye your pistol?"

"Yes; I picked it up again, after throwing it in the face of the grizzly, but it isn't loaded."

"Then it ain't of much account, as me mither used to say in her affectionate references to me father; but if one of the spalpeens happen to come onto ye too suddent like, ye might scare him by shoving that into his eyes. I've got the powder for the same, but the bullets won't fit it, so I'll have to do the shooting."

They were at bay and the Irishman was right in his declaration that they could do nothing but fight it out as best they might. The question of further flight was settled by the trap in which they were caught.

They paused, expecting to hear the tramp of the Indians behind them, but, as it continued quiet, Mickey ventured upon a more critical inspection of their fortress, as it may be termed. He found little which has not already been mentioned, except the fact that the wall on their left sloped inward, as it ascended, to such a degree that the width at the top was several feet less than at the bottom. This was an important advantage, for, in case they were attacked from above, it was in their power to place themselves beyond the immediate reach of a whole war party by any means at their command.

"Do ye hear anything?" asked Mickey, bending his head to listen.

They were silent a few minutes, during which the occasional tramp of a horse's hoof was noted. Beyond a doubt, the entire war-party of Apaches were at the mouth of the fissure and probably a number had already entered it.

"They haven't tried to rush in pell-mell, head-over-heels," added Mickey, after they had stood thus a short time; but they are sneaking along, just as they always do when they're on the thrack of a gintleman."

"How soon do you think they will be here?" asked Fred, who had recovered his breath, and who began to feel something like a renewal of hope, faint though it might be, at the continued silence of their foes.

"Can't say, me laddy; but they may come any minute, and we must keep eyes and ears open, and be ready to do the last act in style. Don't ye mind that we're very much in the same fix that we was when cotched in the cave, barring that we're worse off here than we were there? If some one should let a la.s.so down from the top, we might climb up just as we did there; but that's one of the things that ain't likely to happen."

"Suppose we creep back a ways to see what the Indians are doing," ventured Fred, who was puzzled at the silence of their enemies, which had now continued for some time.

"No need of doing that just yet. They'll let us know what they're at and what they mane--whisht!"

At that juncture the Irishman detected a movement among the wood and undergrowth of the ravine, and his rifle was at his shoulder like a flash.