Another bullet pierced Gian-nah-tah’s body. Weak from loss of blood and from the shock of wounds he could no longer stand, kneeling, he held the pass against fifty men. A fourth bullet passed through him—through his right lung—and, coughing blood, he turned them back again. Through the yelling and the chaos of the fight the troop commander had been trying to extricate himself from the melee and call his men back. Finally he succeeded. The troop was drawn off a few yards. “Sergeant,” said the captain, “dismount and use your carbine on that fellow. Don’t miss!” Gian-nah-tah, kneeling, saw what they were doing; but he did not care. He had held them. His people were safe! The sergeant knelt and took careful aim. “Usen has remembered his people at last,” whispered Gian-nah-tah. The sergeant pressed his trigger; and Gian-nah-tah fell forward on his face, a bullet through his brain. When Captain Cullis led his troop through that narrow pass a moment later he saluted as he passed the dead body of a courageous enemy. That night Geronimo camped beyond the summit, in the State of Chihuahua. Shoz-Dijiji sat in silence, his head bowed. No one mentioned the name of Gian-nah-tah. None of them had seen him die, but they knew that he was dead. He alone was missing. A girl, lying upon her blanket, sobbed quietly through the night. In the morning the band separated into small parties and, scattering, led the pursuing troops upon many wild and fruitless chases. Geronimo, with six men and four women, started north toward the United States. Shoz-Dijiji, silent, morose, was one of the party. Even these small bands often broke up for a day or two into other, smaller parties. Often the men hunted alone, but always there were meeting places designated ahead. Thus Geronimo and his companions ranged slowly northward through Chihuahua. Cutting wood in the mountains near Casa Grande in Sonora had become too hazardous an occupation since Geronimo had been ranging the country; and so Luis Mariel, the son of Pedro Mariel, the woodchopper of Casa Grande, had come over into Chihuahua to look for other work. He had never cared to be a woodchopper but longed, as a youth will, for the picturesque and romantic life of a vaquero; and at last, here in Chihuahua, his ambition had been gratified and today, with three other vaqueros, he was helping guard a grazing herd upon the lower slopes of the Sierra Madre. The four were youths, starting their careers with the prosaic duties of day herding and whiling away the hours with cigarettes and stories. Luis was quite a hero to the others, for he alone had participated in a real battle with Apaches. Chihuahua seemed a very dull and humdrum country after listening to the tales that Luis told of Apache raids and battles in wild Sonora. He told them of the Apache Devil and boasted that he was an old friend of the family.