"There! I reckon you won't go into the telegraph business again very soon!" he growled, as the inanimate body disappeared down the stream, and he coolly re-entered the canoe, which had floated but a short distance away. He had scarcely done this when a new idea struck him, and, hastening after the receding body, he carefully drew it into the boat again. Here it was the work of but a few minutes to place it in a sitting position in the stern in the most natural posture imaginable, so that any one looking upon the figure would not have suspected for an instant that it was anything but an animate being. Making sure that its pose could not be improved, the scout then turned the boat directly away from the bank, never changing its course until the very middle of the Gila was reached, when he began paddling in as leisurely a manner as if no danger threatened. It was a daring stratagem, but it is only by such means that men are enabled to escape from peril, and although fully aware of the danger he was incurring, he kept on his way with that coolness that years of experience had given him. As he approached a point opposite that where he had seen the first signal he did not turn his head, but he looked sideways and scanned the bank with the most searching scrutiny. Sure enough, at this moment he plainly discerned the figures of fully a half-dozen Indians standing upon the bluff and apparently watching the canoe with a curiosity that was natural. "All right," thought the hunter; "so long as you let me alone I won't hurt you." Had there been but the single occupant of the canoe the Apaches would not have stood debating in this fashion as to what they should do, if, indeed, they should do anything at all. Unity in the question would have shown that it was the identical individual for whom they were searching, for they knew that he was alone; but the fact that there were two, and both in the guise of Indians, could be explained upon no other hypothesis than that they were really what they seemed to be. "Hooh! Hooh!"