"Bravo's lancers," he said, "sweeping the whole country." "Fact!" said Jim, but Tetzcatl now pointed northward. "Great Bear and his Comanches all the way to the Alamo." "That's about so," came from one of the rangers. "We can't git through 'em." Once more Tetzcatl turned, and now he pointed westward. "Apaches!" he said. "Bowie must come with me. A few days' ride. Then he will come back with his ponies loaded." He spoke with some difficulty, and at the end of his very pointed remarks he spurred his mule, as if he were going his own way whether or not the Texans were to follow. "Boys," said Bowie, "what do you say?" "Thar isn't a word to say," growled Joe. "We've jest got to git. Come on, fellers. This crowd's travelling gold or no gold." "The coast 'll be clear by the time we want to come back," said the colonel. "We shall hardly meet an enemy going or coming." So they turned and rode on after the old Tlascalan. Behind them quietly followed the Lipan boy. His young face was clouded with sorrow, but the only words that escaped him were,-- "Castro! Great chief of the Lipans! Gone! Red Wolf will strike the Comanches!" CHAPTER XIII. THE LAST OF TETZCATL. A week had gone by and a little cavalcade rode slowly on along a fairly well marked forest road. In front was a man on a fine-looking horse, but at his side a mule was carrying a rider who almost lay down, with his arms around the animal's neck. "Can you stand it to get there?" asked the man on the horse. "Bowie, you are in the valley now," was the faint-voiced response. "Ride on, Tetzcatl cannot die but in the house of Huitzilopochtli." "Pretty nigh gone, old chap?" was the not unkindly inquiry from the next horseman behind them. "We'll git you thar. You may pull through. You're as tough as a hickory knot." They could have seen how beautiful was the valley they were riding through if they had not been in it. As soon, however, as the path they were in began to climb a steep ascent and they could look back through the trees, they broke out into strong expressions of admiration. "It was a'most worth while comin'," said Jim Cheyne, "if 'twas only to see this 'ere. If Americans got hold of sech a country as this is they'd make something out of it." "They never will," remarked Bowie. "Best timber. Best farm land in the world. Fine climate----" "Gold! gold! Silver!" gasped the sufferer on the mule. "Americans--all men will come some day. I die, but the lands of the Montezumas will not be held by the Spaniards." It was as if he could bear the idea of leaving his mountains and valleys and their riches to any other race than the one which had broken the empire of its ancient kings and destroyed the temples of the Aztec gods.