CHAPTER XVIII
A STRANGER GOING
At the first faint flush of dawn the little train of pack mules, with
the rations for the beleaguered command at Sunset Pass, was started on
its stony path. Once out of the valley of the Beaver it must clamber
over range after range and stumble through deep and tortuous canons. A
road there was--the old trail by Snow Lake, thence through the famous
Pass and the Sunset crossing of the Colorado Chiquito to old Fort
Wingate. It wormed its way out of the valley of the broader stream
some miles further to the north and in face of the Red Rock country to
the northeast, but it had not been traveled in safety for a year. Both
Byrne and Plume believed it beset with peril, watched from ambush by
invisible foes who could be relied upon to lurk in hiding until the
train was within easy range, then, with sudden volley, to pick off the
officers and prominent sergeants and, in the inevitable confusion,
aided by their goatlike agility, to make good their escape. Thirty
sturdy soldiers of the infantry under a veteran captain marched as
escort, with Plume's orders to push through to the relief of Sergeant
Brewster's command, and to send back Indian runners with full account
of the situation. The relief of Wren's company accomplished, the next
thing was to be a search for Wren himself, then a determined effort to
find Blakely, and all the time to keep a lookout for Sanders's troop
that must be somewhere north of Chevlon's Fork, as well as for the two
or three little columns that should be breaking their way through the
unblazed wilderness, under the personal direction of the general
himself.
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