“That worked to perfection and threw the horse. Long Hair plunged into the water, but was out again before we got there.” The men did not tell Price of the counting incident, and the sensational way in which Buffalo Bill had drawn their fire, and then scared them into the wood with a few shots of his own. Price was in a rage and asked for Bloody Ike. “He is the only one of you to be depended on, and he can’t seem to do the thing right,” he stormed. Then the leader went on: “The devil is to pay. The Washington end has sent a man on here to shut us off, and wants us to keep dark for a time until the excitement blows over. But we can’t shut down until we get rid of Cody and his band. They know altogether too much, and we’ve got to get rid of them before we can keep dark. “We captured an Indian boy last night that was spying on us at the hide-out. He is here to trail the Indians for Buffalo Bill, he told us, and I scared him into telling us a lot of Cody’s plans. So now if we don’t settle Mr. Buffalo Bill’s hash we’re a poor lot of tools. “This Indian boy says Buffalo Bill has a hiding place near the upper ford on the Gallatin River, and I made him describe the country around there to see if he was lying. He told us of seeing Fighting Dan capture Red Dick and how many men each side had. He says Buffalo Bill has ten men with him, and they are going to meet here next week, if they don’t change plans because he is missing. Now, my opinion is that Cody will be in Bozeman within a day or two hunting for the Indian kid, and then is the time we must fix him.” “How do you propose to do it?” one of the men asked. “I want you fellows to cut loose and find Ike for me. He can do the job if we can locate the place where Cody stops when he comes to town.” “That ought to be easy.” “Yes; that other job was easy, but why didn’t you fellows make good? Now, get busy, and keep your eyes peeled for Buffalo Bill or any of his men, and report to headquarters at once.” “What did you do with the Indian?” “He’s in the cellar out at the hide-out. We are going to turn him over to Ten Rattles and his red cutthroats. They’ll take him up the Yellowstone and ‘lose’ him.” Little Cayuse was indeed in the cellar of the hut where he had played eavesdropper and had dropped through the roof. The shrewd Piute had pretended to be badly scared, and had told a rambling story of what Pa-e-has-ka had planned to do and where he was now and would be in the future, every word of it misleading. Little Cayuse had taken this part upon himself, hoping Price might think he would be useful to them later and would leave an opportunity for the Piute to learn something more of their plans. The Indian youth was willing to undergo any hardship if he believed he was serving Pa-e-has-ka. He had faith that he could escape when the proper time should arrive, and contented himself with putting Price on the wrong trail.