The Red Rock country and the northward spurs
of the Mogollon seemed fraught with some strange, superstitious terror
in their eyes, and if the "nerve" of a dozen would desert them when
ordered east of the Verde, what could be expected of Blakely's two? No
wonder, then, the elders at Sandy were sorely troubled!
But the Bugologist had nothing else to choose from. All the reliable,
seasoned scouts were already gone with the various field columns. Only
Apache Yumas remained, and only the least promising of the Apache
Yumas at that. Bridger remembered how reluctantly these two had obeyed
the summons to go. "If they don't sneak away and come back swearing
they have lost the lieutenant, I'm a gopher," said he, and gave orders
accordingly to have them hauled before him should they reappear.
Confidently he looked to see or hear of them as again lurking about
the commissary storehouse after the manner of their people, beggars to
the backbone. But the week went by without a sign of them. "There's
only one thing to explain that," said he. "They've either deserted to
the enemy or been cut off and killed." What, then, had become of
Blakely? What fate had befallen Wren?
By this time, late Saturday night, acting for the department commander
now lost somewhere in the mountains, Byrne had re-enforced the guards
at the agency and the garrison at Sandy with infantry drawn from Fort
Whipple at Prescott, for thither the Apaches would never venture.
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