"It is all I can do for you, Jack," he said tenderly, "and it will give you protection against the cold. You will be able to find a few blades of grass here and there where the snow has not covered them, and the buds of the trees will give some help. The snow will prevent your suffering much from want of water. Perhaps a good long rest will improve your ankle so that you can use it. If it does," and here the young rancher spoke impressively, as though he expected his steed to understand his words, "I want you to start for the fort; don't forget that!" He touched his lips to the forehead of his faithful ally, who looked after his young master, as he walked away, with an expression almost human in its affection. But there was no help for it, and with a sad heart, but the determination to do his utmost, Warren Starr resumed his journey toward Fort Meade. Not long after parting with his pony he came upon something which caused him surprise. In the snow directly in front appeared the footprints of a single horse that had passed over the ground on a run, taking the same direction that the youth was following. His experience with horses told the youth at a first glance that the animal was travelling at his utmost speed. The trail swerved inward from the open plain, as though the rider had sought the base of the ridge for his protection. Had there been several ponies coursing ahead of him, he would not have found it so hard to understand matters, for he would have concluded that they were an independent party, making all haste to reach some point, but he could not read the meaning of a single warrior speeding in this fashion. "Whoever he was he lost no time," mused Warren, breaking into a loping trot, for his own haste was great. Had he not known that poor Jared Plummer was no longer among the living, he would have thought it possible that he was making for Fort Meade. He wondered whether it could not be a white man engaged on a similar errand. The probabilities were against this supposition. He knew of no rancher in the neighborhood of his old home, and it would seem that no white man would ride with such desperation unless pursued by a relentless enemy, and he saw no evidence of such a contest of speed. True, the pursuers might have been farther out on the prairie, but their trail would have joined that of the fugitive ere long, so as to make the line more direct; but though the young rancher trotted a full half mile before checking himself and looking around, he discovered no signs of others. The last advance of Warren brought him close to the precipitous section which, knowing well, he had feared would prove too difficult for his pony. Raising his eyes to survey it and fix upon the best line to follow, he caught sight of the horseman he had been following.