A mischievous cackle, and the dark form of the Shoshone girl glided round the outside of the _teepe_. Vipan, entering thoroughly into his _role_, started boldly in pursuit. So well did he act up to it that a group of squaws whom he passed within ten yards screamed with laughter at the sight of a stalwart buck larking after the Sun Queen's hideous slave, no less than at the broad jests which he was gruffly hurling after her as she ran. The dark figure still glided on between the _teepes_, hardly visible in the falling gloom. To those who did see it the sight was an everyday one, so that beyond a shout of mirth and a boisterous wish for his success, no notice was taken of it. The last line of _teepes_ was passed. In front lay the timber belt, then a subdued "crunch, crunch," betokened the proximity of a group of ponies. The dark figure of the Shoshone girl had disappeared. "The nearest," his deliverer had said. His lariat rope was ready. Gently, soothingly, he approached the one he reckoned the best. Up went the perverse brute's head with a resentful snort, as it sidled and backed away. He tried another, with the same result. His heart was in his mouth. The ponies had stopped feeding, and were gazing at him in alarm. The least thing might stampede the herd and arouse the attention of its owners. There was no time to lose. Whirling the noose around his head he let fly. The coils tautened out. The affrighted animal thus noosed, plunged, and fell heavily. He was upon it like lightning. Avoiding the kicking hoofs, he wrenched a bight of the rope into its mouth, jerked the trembling and terrified steed to its feet, and was on its back like a circus-rider. The rest of the herd trotted away, snorting and throwing up their heels. Suddenly a wild, shrill whoop went up from the village. Ah! now for the race for life; but what were the odds in his favour? They had discovered his flight. On, through the darkness, the fugitive urged his unwilling steed, whose bucking and plunging would have unseated any less skilful horseman. And as he fled, carefully picking his ground with the instinct of a consummate plainsman, he strained his ears through the darkness to catch the first sounds of pursuers behind, of a possible manoeuvre to outflank and head him in front. But the discovery had not, in fact, been made. The wild shouts were the yells of the scalp-dance just beginning. Fainter and fainter behind him sounded the savage chorus, then died away, and amid the solitude of the grim mountain waste only the soft hoof-beats of his steed, and the occasional scream of a panther among the craggy heights, broke upon the dead and ghostly silence of the night. CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN. BETWEEN THE LIVING AND THE DEAD.