Directly above his head he saw a branch. He slipped the strap of his rifle over his head and shoulder, thus leaving his hands free, seized the branch, and drew himself up carefully as an acrobat does when he “chins” the horizontal bar. Without a sound, or the rattle of a button or an accouterment, the scout drew himself into the tree. Three branches sprang from the butt low down, so furnishing him a splendid nest.
He removed his gun and stood it upright, wedged in a niche. Then he lay down along the lower branch, his body in the darkness merely adding a darker shadow to it, and watched and listened. No mountain cat was better ambushed for a foe. His guns he loosened in their scabbards, and then, drawing his bowie, he stuck it softly into the branch within easy reach of his hand.
At that instant there was a soft rustling in the leaves which covered the ground below. Cody craned his neck to see. The Indian in a stooping posture came into view. He halted directly under the limb on which the scout lay. It seemed too dark for him to see any mark that the scout might have left, yet he seemed wonderfully interested in the tree and the ground beneath it.
Cody could see the outline of his figure very well indeed. How much sharper the red’s vision might be he did not know; but he was not taking any chances. He noted that the red scamp faced the tree trunk and was apparently examining the rough bark for recently broken places. Was it possible that the fellow was really stumbling upon the truth--that a man had climbed this tree? Or was he feeling for the marks of a bear’s claws?
However, Cody decided the red had gone far enough. Besides, the fellow was temptingly near. He was a small, wiry man weighing little more than a hundred pounds.
Cody stooped suddenly, and both his muscular hands clutched the Indian around the neck--one before, one behind. And with this awful grip--which cut short any attempt to breathe, let alone to cry out--he lifted the redskin off his feet!
As was only natural, the red dropped his gun and clutched with both hands at the hand which pinched his windpipe. He kicked vainly for freedom. Before he could drop his hand to his knife and draw that, Cody jerked him upward till the top of his head struck with fearful force against the under side of the tree branch. He could actually hear the redskin’s crown crack!