We have had two more brushes with Tonto Apaches, resulting in the breaking up of two rancheri-as and the scattering of the band, leaving several dead in each affair, also a few wounded bucks and squaws that I had to leave, as we had no means of sending them to the post or caring for them in any way. Sergeant Payne, Corporal Smith, G, and Troopers Schreiter and Wenzel, wounded, are doing as well as can be expected, but must remain at this point under a small guard while we follow the renegades. The scouts report many signs toward the Black Mesa, and we shall strike wherever we find the hostiles, but I shall have but twenty-five men with me now, and barely forty rounds per man. Instructions sent by bearer may reach me among the foothills toward Diamond Butte. Otherwise, we shall return by the way we came. Trooper Hanson, died of wounds in the affair previously reported, was buried here. Respectfully, TURNER, Commanding. "Then the other runner failed to get in," said Archer gravely. "There was a fight before this. Turner's found a raft of Indians. This despatch is two days old now. Have we nobody who can talk with this Indian?" "Nobody, I fear, sir," answered Strong, bending over the scout and examining the brass identification tag worn by each of those regularly employed and mustered. "He's a Hualpai. No. 21. Even Harris doesn't know that tongue, sir." "If anybody here does, it's one of those two that got in from Verde last evening," said Archer reflectively. "Turner evidently had no idea the hostiles were all about us, and he thinks the previous despatch must have reached us. Corporal, go find the couriers and fetch them here. Be seated, gentlemen," he continued, in his courtly way, then turning from everybody, stepped out on the sandy level between his quarters and the office building, and began pacing slowly up and down. What was to be done? No word had come from Stannard. Stirring, yet disquieting news they now had from Turner, whose wounded lay in need of medical attention a long day's march through stony wilds, with jealous and savage eyes watching every trail. Here at Almy he had two companies of sturdy foot, capable of covering ground almost as fast as the cavalry, but wearing out shoe leather much faster. Twenty of these fellows could fight their way through to the Tonto, but might have just as many more wounded to care for, and be unable to transport them. Moreover, with so many hostiles on every side, was he justified in stripping the post of its defenders? It was no pleasant situation. It was more than perplexing. Presently he turned and, using such signs as he thought might be comprehensible, asked the impassive runner if he knew where the first fight took place, and the Hualpai, as would almost any Indian partially gathering the drift of a question, began a rambling reply, pointing as he spoke, with shifting finger, all over the range to the south-east.