“I will take you to Camp Apache. There are soldiers at Camp Apache; and the White Mountains will be good to you if the soldiers don’t want you. We will all be chi-kis-n to you.” “Are you afraid of these soldiers, Micky?” “No; but I am afraid of the Tonto. Besides, I live with Chief Pedro’s people on the reservation near Camp Apache. I have no business off in this other direction.” “I have, though,” answered Jimmie. “I live at Camp Grant. Maybe these soldiers are marching back to Camp Grant, or Tucson, and they’ll take me there.” “Well,” replied Micky, “I will follow with you, Cheemie.” His one blue eye danced. “If there is a fight, I would like to see it. I would like to see those Tonto whipped. But don’t expect me to stay with the soldiers, Cheemie. That might make me trouble. Come on, but we must be very careful, or the Tonto will kill us, too.” After having surveyed the soldiers’ trail the Tontos had continued on beside it, and between it and the edge of the basin. But Micky crossed the soldiers’ trail and hurried away from it. He seemed much excited by the prospect of a fight, for he set such a pace that Jimmie half ran. Evidently he was going to circuit out and back again, to cut the trail farther ahead. Jimmie kept his ears sharp pricked for soldier sounds――voices, or the creak of saddle-leathers, or the tinkle of pack-mule bells; and also for the shooting of guns: but all was silence. Twice Micky and he struck the trail again. It wended right along, among the trees, and it was getting fresher. Indeed, the soldiers could not be far ahead, now. No Tonto trail had been cut; therefore the Tontos were still on the other side of the soldiers’ trail. The sun had sunk toward some high purplish ridges away yonder, bounding the basin in the west, and evening was near. The third time that Micky led in, to cut the trail, he and Jimmie got clear to the edge of the great basin without coming to any trail at all. For the last hundred yards they had crawled, with bunches of weeds tied to their heads, lest the Tontos should be in waiting, but nothing had happened. The big pines extended to the edge of the basin, and along the edge were large boulders, scattered among the trees here. Some of them were the size of a hut. They lay in twos and threes, as if dropped by a blast. Micky, with Jimmie close behind, wormed from the trees for two boulders that touched. They touched at an angle, so that they left a space, within which two boys might crouch, on the ground, and see out by peeping through the cracks, or by standing up. “We have come far enough, Cheemie,” whispered Micky. “It is a good place to stay, till the Tonto and the soldiers pass. And if they do not fight I am going back to my White Mountains. But I want to see the fight. Are you thirsty, Cheemie? You’ll have to drink a stone.” He picked up a round pebble and put it into his mouth. Jimmie did the same. A pebble in the mouth made the mouth wet. “Listen!” bade Jimmie. “I hear tinkle!”