But to return to the time of their arrival in camp. Screetah seemed in no hurry to resume her journey through the burning desert; and, as Captain Castleton said, he would no doubt have retained her by force rather than let her drag the poor child through the waterless wastes into sure destruction. He had given them an old tent after they had been with their Mexican friends for nearly a week; and when these same Mexicans left the camp, the two women were given possession of their house. Here it became a source of never-ending delight to the old Indian that all the choice things by which she set such store, and which among her "civilized" Indian friends had been so scarce, as coffee, sugar, and bacon, were served out to her as though they rained down from the sky. But to do Screetah justice, the sweetest side of bacon and the biggest bagful of sugar never gave her half the pleasure that she felt when one of the soldiers gave to Juanita a lank, ragged pony, which, on a scout, he had bought, borrowed, or stolen from an Indian at the Maricopa Wells. Her time was now pretty equally divided between the rosary and the pony, which, in time, lost its ragged, starved appearance, under her treatment, and retained only its untamable wildness, and the unconquerable disposition to throw up its hindlegs when running at full tilt, as though under apprehension that the simple act of running did not give an adequate idea of its abilities. At first, Captain Castleton, highly amused, would call for his horse when he saw Juanita battling with her vicious steed on the plain near camp, in order to witness the struggles of "the wild little Indian" near by. But, after awhile, they would ride forth together, and dash over the level ground or climb up to the highest point of the hill--Juanita's voice ringing back to the camp almost as long as she was in sight, chanting some wild anthem, in which seemed blended the joyous strains of the heavenly band and the wild song of the savage when he flies like an arrow through his native plains.