“The Piute will come in. The four who are behind the boulders will spring out and capture him--_capture_ him, mind, for I want to talk with the rascally imp before anything else is done with him.” The white man hid himself, and the Apache rode back. Little Cayuse, his black eyes glimmering like a snake’s, watched the Apaches trail into the smaller defile. He made after them. At the entrance to the defile he listened. From around a turn he could hear the pattering hoofs of the ponies. Swiftly he passed into the smaller defile--and then, almost before he could realize what had happened--he was set upon from every side, flung down, and bound at the wrists. He struggled, but what availed the struggles of one Piute boy against four brawny, full-grown Apaches? Physically, he was not injured. His chief hurt was to his pride. What would Pa-e-has-ka say when he learned what had happened? Jerking Cayuse to his feet, two of the bucks caught his bound hands and pulled him farther along the defile to a place where it ran into a blind wall, rising high into the air. At this place the white man was waiting. Who the white man was, Cayuse did not know; but he began to understand, dimly, that the white man had helped the Apaches entrap him. The white man, stepping angrily up to the boy, drew back the flat of his hand and struck him in the face. Cayuse reeled with the blow, but not a sound came from his lips. “You’re Little Cayuse, huh?” demanded the man fiercely. “Wuh!” answered the boy, his black eyes darting lightning. “Pard of Buffalo Bill’s?” Little Cayuse straightened his shoulders and threw back his head proudly. “Wuh! Me all same pard Pa-e-has-ka’s.” “Why were you trailin’ the Apaches?” Cayuse did not answer. Instead, he looked straight into the eyes of the white ruffian with studied insolence and defiance. The white man pulled a revolver from his belt and pressed it against the boy’s breast. “Answer, or I’ll blow a hole through ye!” he threatened. Cayuse did not open his lips. He continued to dare the man with his eyes, however, even more insolently and defiantly. “Blast ye!” raged the man, lowering his revolver and giving the helpless boy a kick that threw him to the ground. “Ye won’t talk, huh? Waal, ye needn’t! I know Buffalo Bill sent ye to trail the reds, an’ I reckon Buffalo Bill will be follerin’ ye, afore long, but that won’t do _you_ any good.” The ruffian turned and growled an order to the Indians. Immediately the entire five mounted their horses and began climbing to the top of the wall of the defile. Cayuse, breathless from the kick he had received, lay on the ground and watched. In a little while he saw the five Indians on the top of the steep wall which closed in the end of the defile. One of them lowered a rope. The ruffian thereupon grabbed Cayuse by the shoulders and dragged him to the foot of the wall. The next moment he had made the swinging rope fast to the bonds that secured Cayuse’s wrists.