He glanced sharply at his companions for fear they might laugh at this
childish weakness, but there was no laughter and by their starved eyes
he knew that every one of them was riding over the horizon in
imagination, on the back of the chestnut.



CHAPTER IX

THE STAMPEDE

The grey mare made no effort to draw away when Alcatraz sprinted up
beside her. She gave him not so much as a toss of the head or a swish of
the tail but kept her gaze on the far Western mountains for she was
still sick with the scent of blood; and she maintained a purposeful,
steady, lope. It was far other with the stallion. He kept at her side
with his gliding canter but he was not thinking of the peace and the
shelter from man which they might find in the blue valleys of yonder
mountains. His mind was back at the slaughter of Mingo Lake hearing the
crackle of the rifles and seeing his comrades fall and die. It was
nothing that he had known the band only since morning. They were his
kind, they were his people, they had accepted his rule; and now he was
emptyhearted, a king without a people. The grey mare, the fleetest and
the wisest of them all, remained; but she was only a reminder of his
vanished glory.

Remembering how Cordova had been served, might he not find a way of
harming those men even as they had harmed him? He slackened to a trot
and finally halted. His companion kept on until he neighed. Then she
came obediently enough but swinging her head up and down to indicate her