Then came a scene of bustle. No words were spoken; no further orders given. With the skill of long practice the men gathered their few belongings, shook out the dingy horse-blankets and then, carefully folding, laid them creaseless back of the gaunt withers of their faithful mounts. The worn old saddles were deftly set, the crude buckles of the old days, long since replaced by cincha loop, snapped into place; lariats coiled and swung from the cantle-rings; dusty old bits and bridles adjusted; then came the slipping into carbine-slings and thimble-belts, the quick lacing of Indian moccasin or canvas legging, the filling of canteens in the tepid tanks below, while all the time the cooks and packers were flying about gathering up the pots and pans and storing rations, bags, and blankets on the roomy _apparejos_. Drummond was in the act of swinging into saddle when his sergeant hastened up. "Beg pardon, lieutenant, but shall I leave a small guard with the pack-train or can they come right along?" "They'll go with us, of course. We can't leave them here. We must head for Ceralvo's at once. How could those Indians have got over that way?" "It is beyond me to say, sir. I didn't know they ever went west of the Santa Maria." "I can hardly believe it now, but there's no doubting that signal; it is to call us thither at all speed wherever we may be, and means only one thing,--'Apaches here.' Sergeant Wing is not the man to get stampeded. Can they have jumped the stage, do you think, or attacked some of Ceralvo's people?" "Lord knows, sir. I don't see how they could have swung around there; there's nothing to tempt them along that range until they get to the pass itself. They must have come around south of Moreno's." "I think not, sergeant." The words were spoken in a very quiet voice. Drummond turned in surprise, his foot in the stirrup, and looked at the speaker, a keen-eyed trooper of middle age, whose hair was already sprinkled with gray. "Why not, Bland?" "Because we have been along the range for nearly fifty miles below here, sir, and haven't crossed a sign, and because I understand now what I couldn't account for at two o'clock,--what I thought must be imagination." "What was that?" "Smoke, sir, off towards the Gila, north of Ceralvo's, I should say, just about north of west of where we are." "Why didn't you report it?" "You were asleep, sir, and by the time I got the glasses and looked it had faded out entirely; but it's my belief the Indians are between us and the river, or were over there north of Ceralvo's to-day. If not Indians, who?"