When they had seen the troopers change their direction and rush madly after the fleeing bandits, the savages had checked their pursuit, all but the five whom Jesse had sent to the Happy Hunting Ground.
No love did they bear for the soldiers and they were not eager to mingle with them, even though they were engaged in the chase of a common foe.
Hurriedly Great Bear had passed the word for silence and, sitting on their ponies like statues, they had advanced at a walk.
Not even the roar of the carbines had induced the chieftain to increase the pace.
But when he saw the forms of the cavalrymen mounting the farther edge of the ravine, he became interested.
"Jess Jame fool um paleface!" he grunted, his eyes twinkling with delight. "Sojers no get Jess. Injun got chance."
If the bandits had, indeed, taken to the plains across the gorge, Great Bear knew that he and his braves were as likely to find them as the troopers. But because he was wise in his generation, the wily old warrior again enjoined his braves to silence that they might surprise the little band had they doubled on their tracks as he more than half suspected.
The shoeless hoofs of their ponies making scarcely no sound because of the thunderous charge of the cavalry on the farther plains, the redskins bore down on the ravine.
But, as the reader knows, Jesse had seen them and, with his pals, was scurrying from their path.
The Indians slowed up as they reached the edge of the ravine, then descended, crossed, mounted the other side, and swept on in the trail of the soldiers.
Pausing as he heard the bucks plunge into the gorge, Jesse parted the bushes at his side, peering at the dark, tossing forms.
Cautiously his pals followed his example.
Never had men seemed to move so slowly as did the Indians in crossing the gulch.
But at last only a few stragglers had not mounted to the plains.
"Quick, boys! Crawl to the top of the bank, only keep under cover!" whispered the world-famous desperado.
A rod he led them, still on their hands and knees, after they had gained the level.
"There's no danger of our being seen now, I reckon," he declared, rising to his feet. "But we won't run any risk by showing too much of ourselves.
"Come on! While the Injuns and troopers are searching the other side of the ravine, we'll get back to the cliffs on this."