The Boy Ranchers Among the Indians Part 27

As yet, you must understand, Rosemary and her brother were unaware of the ident.i.ty of the attackers.

Rosemary started up from where she was sitting in their extemporized and miserable prison cave. It was evidently her intention to put into operation at once her desperate plan.

"Wait a minute!" exclaimed her brother.

"What for?" she questioned.

"I'm not so sure that it is the best thing to do," he answered.

Floyd was rather less impulsive than his sister--that is on occasions.

There were times when he could be more hot headed.

"Well, what else is there to do?" Rosemary asked.

She was going to be perfectly fair about it, and if Floyd had anything better to offer as a suggestion she would listen to him.

"Let's think about it a bit longer," he finally said, with a long intaking of breath, which told more plainly than words, how the situation was oppressing him. "I'm sure it's mighty plucky of you, Rosemary, to lay out such a plan as this, but I don't believe I ought to let you try it. Something might happen."

"Something is going to happen anyhow," she said, with ominous quiet, and a grim tightness showed in the lines of her mouth. "I believe these Indians have just about reached the end of their rope. They have been very patient with us--that is patient from their standpoint. Now they have met with opposition, and they must know if they are overpowered it will be to our advantage, and that our friends, or whoever is out there firing, will take revenge."

"That's so," agreed Floyd.

"Well then, we've just _got_ to do something!" said Rosemary, desperately. "And I'm going to do it."

Again she started up.

"Wait a minute!" exclaimed her brother again.

He seemed to be listening. He leaned forward, and then softly arose from where he was sitting and went forward.

"What is it?" asked his sister in a low voice.

"I thought I heard voices--good old United States voices, and not this jargon of Mexican and Spanish," was the reply. "Maybe some of the attackers, whoever they are, have broken through."

A look of delighted joy came over the face of Rosemary. But a moment later it faded away and she seemed hopeless.

"It can't be," she said. "There'd be a lot of yelling and shouting if any of those who are attacking the Yaquis had broken through their lines," she went on. "There's no use waiting, Floyd. Let's try my plan!"

But her brother was not yet convinced.

"It will be all right if it works," he agreed. "But if it fails, and they only have the laugh on us, we'll be treated so much the worse. I don't mind on my own account--but yours!" and he glanced at his sister.

"I hadn't thought of that," spoke Rosemary in a low voice. "If it should--fail--why--"

She did not complete the sentence.

"It would only make them more angry, I'm afraid," went on Floyd.

There was silence, for a time, between brother and sister. It was broken only by occasional and distant shouts, punctuated, now and again, by a shot. But the heavy fusillade had subsided for a time.

"Well?" questioned Rosemary.

She was eager to get some action.

"This is what I'll do," said Floyd, after some tense consideration, "I'll take a look around and see how matters shape up."

"Then what?" asked Rosemary.

She was evidently not going to let the matter go by default.

"Well, then if I can't see anything better to do then what you proposed, we'll go to it!" decided Floyd. "You sit here and I'll scurry around. I won't be long."

"No, please don't," begged Rosemary. "If we're going to do anything we'll have to do it very soon. This can't last--much longer!"

Floyd did not stop to ask his sister just what she meant. In fact he did not dare question her as to what it was that could not last "much longer." He had a desperate fear that it was Rosemary's own spirit that was on the point of breaking.

Up to now she had kept up her courage remarkably well. But there was a limit, and if the breaking point had been reached Floyd did not know what would follow.

He shot a quick look at the girl before he started out on what he thought might be a last desperate venture. He felt that he might discover something to do--some way of escape--that would not make it necessary for his sister to virtually rush into danger.

And he was relieved when he saw the calm and cool look that was on Rosemary's face.

"She isn't going to give up!" decided Floyd.

There was an exultant feeling in his heart.

During this talk between brother and sister the dirty Indian detailed to guard the captives had sauntered within view of them every now and then. To quiet his suspicions, in case he should have any, Rosemary and Floyd had spoken most casually on these occasions.

The lad waited until the guard had come on one of his periodic trips of inspection and had dropped out of sight on a ledge of rock, and then Floyd started out.

"Don't be too long!" called Rosemary in a low voice.

"I won't!" he promised.

Walking as aimlessly as he could pretend, Floyd started toward a break in the natural wall that ran in front of the prison cavern. He wanted to see if he could catch a glimpse of the Yaquis below him.

"And I'd give a whole lot of money--if I had it--to see who is fighting them," thought Floyd. "But I haven't much left."

He glanced ruefully down at his now soiled and torn garments. And as he thrust his hands into his pockets he missed many a trinket and possession. For nearly everything had been taken away by Paz, Mike or some of their rascally followers.

Two or three Indians, some of them wounded, were coming back "from the front," so to speak. One of them glanced scowlingly at Floyd, as he pa.s.sed the lad, evidently a.s.sociating his wounds with the presence of the prisoner.

"I'd give you a whole lot worse than that if I had a chance--Ugly Face!" thought Floyd.

Another member of the renegade band grinned or--Floyd took it for a grin--as he pa.s.sed. But none of them seemed to care where the lad went or what he did, and for this Floyd was glad.

"I seem to be getting somewhere," he murmured. "Whether I can hit on any scheme to beat Rosemary's is a question, but I don't want her to take the risk unless there's nothing else to do."