The Captain uttered an exclamation of surprise. "Quick! mount!" he commanded. "Not a word as you value your lives." Trained to instant obedience, the troopers sprang into their saddles. They did not know what the order portended, nor did they care. The Captains manner meant that there was excitement ahead and that a brush with the red skins was more than likely at no distant moment. "Red skins?" asked the young Lieutenant, in a low voice, riding up beside his superior officer. "Worse," was his laconic reply. "James, and he was alone when I saw him. I think he is out reconnoitering. We'll bag him this time I hope." "That ought to be easy if he is alone," returned the Lieutenant. "Humph," snorted the Captain. "You'll learn more as you grow older. I'd rather hunt savages than those Missouri outlaws, for when it comes to devilish tricks, the Missourians can give the Indians points blindfolded. "Halt! Dismount! "Tether your ponies." "Where away?" asked the Lieutenant softly. "To the north. He should be near us providing he has not changed his course and I don't think he has, for very good reasons too." "Why, Captain." "Because, young man, on one side is an Indian village full of savages thirsting for his blood, and on the other a sheer precipice dropping down a few hundred feet only. We are on the third side, and, unless he turns back there is only one course open for him--to run into us. "Throw your men out into a circle. Conceal them behind boulders. We should get him in the circle that way, and once there I don't think he will get away. "Catch him alive if you can. Kill him if you have to." Silence again fell over the night. The troopers trained to tread on velvet feet, slipped along like so many silent shadows. But every first right finger trembled on a trigger. They knew the man they had to deal with, and the mere click of a gunlock on their part might mean instant death at the hand of the great bandit. They lay down. Each tree and rock beyond seemed to hold a lurking shadow, so tensely strained were their nerves and vivid their imaginations. A twig snapped among the trees in the dense shadows. But not a man stirred. For long minutes they waited there, scarcely drawing a free breath. The men needed no orders from their captain, no imposition for silent caution. They were trained too finely in Indian warfare to need such injunctions. If indeed it were the great outlaw himself who stood under the spreading trees whence had come the warning sound, they knew he would not move for some time. Not until he had waited the effect of his incautious step would he move a muscle of his body, and perhaps he would be standing with one foot poised in the air, every sense keenly alert, his eyes piercing the shadows with almost superhuman vision. To such extremes are men's senses trained, who live in momentary expectation of the blinding crash and the bullet between the eyes. The troopers heard no further sound.