"Bub, do you know where we are?" asked Pike--"this draw slants south and has brought us fair into the Palomitas trail where it comes into the old Yaqui trail, and on south to hell."
"To hell it is, if it's the slavers again after women," said Kit. "Come quiet."
They reached the summit where cacti and greasewood served as shield, and slightly below them they saw, against the low purple hills, clouds of dust making the picture like a vision and not a real thing, a line of armed horsemen as outpost guards, and men with roped arms stumbling along on foot slashed at occasionally with a _reata_ to hasten their pace. Women and girls were there, cowed and drooping, with torn garments and bare feet. Forty prisoners in all Kit counted of those within range, ere the trail curved around the bend of a hill.
"But that scream?" muttered Kit. "All those women are silent as death, but that scream?" Then he saw.
One girl was in the rear, apart from the rest of the group. A blond-bearded man spurred his horse against her, and a guard lashed at her to keep her behind. Her scream of terror was lest she be separated from that most woeful group of miserables. The horse was across the road, blocking it, as the man with the light beard slid from the saddle and caught her.
Kit's gun was thrown into position as Pike caught his hand.
For the Indian girl was quicker far. From the belt of her assailant she grasped a knife and lunged at his face as he held her. His one hand went to his cheek where the blood streamed, and his other to his revolver.
But even there she was before him, for she held the knife in both hands against her breast, and threw herself forward in the haze of dust.
The other guard dismounted and stared at the still figure on the trail, then kicked her over until he could see her face. One look was enough. He jerked the knife from the dead body, wiped it on her _manta_, and turned to tie a handkerchief over the cheek of the wounded horseman.
Kit muttered an oath of horror, and hastily drew the field glass from its case to stare at the man whose beard, a false one, had been torn off in the struggle. It was not easy to re-adjust it so that it would not interfere with the bandage, and thus he had a very fair view of the man's features, and his thoughts were of Billie's words to Conrad concerning slave raids in Sonora. Had Billie really suspected, or had she merely connected his Mexican friends with reports of raids for girls in the little Indian pueblos?