They, the peaceable and the poor servants of the
great Father at Washington, had no dealings with these others, his
foes.
About the post, where gloom and dread unspeakable prevailed, there was
no longer the fear of possible attack. The Indian prisoners in the
guard-house had dropped their truculent, defiant manner, and become
again sullen and apathetic. The down-stream settlers had returned to
their ranches and reported things undisturbed. Even the horse that had
been missing and charged to Downs had been accounted for. They found
him grazing placidly about the old pasture, with the rope halter
trailing, Indian-knotted, from his neck, and his gray hide still
showing stains of blood about the mane and withers. They wondered was
it on this old stager the Apaches had borne the wounded girl to the
garrison--she who still lay under the roof of Mother Shaughnessy,
timidly visited at times by big-eyed, shy little Indian maids from the
reservation, who would speak no word that Sudsville could understand,
and few that even Wales Arnold could interpret. All they would or
could divulge was that she was the daughter of old Eskiminzin, who was
out in the mountains, and that she had been wounded "over there," and
they pointed eastward. By whom and under what circumstances they swore
they knew not, much less did they know of Downs, or of how she chanced
to have the scarf once worn by the Frenchwoman Elise.
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