"
"Shield--Raven Shield?" queried Blakely, still half dazed. "Shield was
killed--at Sandy," and yet there was the memory of the voice he knew
and heard in this very canon.
"Shield, yes; and now his brother heads them. Didn't he send his card
down to you, after the donicks, and be damned to him? You foregathered
with both of them at the agency. Oh, they're all alike, Bugs, once
they're started on the warpath. Now we must get you out into the open
for a while. The air's better."
And so, an hour later, his arm carefully dressed and bandaged,
comforted by needed food and fragrant tea and the news that Wren was
reviving under the doctor's ministrations, and would surely mend and
recover, Blakely lay propped by the fire and heard the story of
Stout's rush through the wilderness to their succor. Never waiting for
the dawn, after a few hours' rest at Beaver Spring, the sturdy
doughboys had eagerly followed their skilled and trusted leader all
the hours from eleven, stumbling, but never halting even for rest or
rations, and at last had found the trail four miles below in the
depths of the canon. There some scattering shots had met them, arrow
and rifle both, from up the heights, and an effort was made to delay
their progress. Wearied and footsore though were his men, they had
driven the scurrying foe from rock to rock and then, in a lull that
followed, had heard the distant sound of firing that told them whither
to follow on.
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