Page:Thirty-One Years on the Plains and in the Mountains.djvu/288

220 two shots apiece in succession and then put spurs to our horses and ran nearly a mile, when, on. looking back, we saw that we were outriding them. We rode a mile further to the next ridge, just dropped over out of sight, and stopped and reloaded the empty chambers of our revolvers.

We knew now that we had the best horses, and the boys were all anxious to give them another round; so we waited until they were in pistol shot—as we felt more bold, knowing that if we could not whip them we could outrun them—and taking good aim this time we fired three shots each, making fifteen shots in all.

We saw a number of Indians fall to the ground, but did not stay to count them as we were just then in somewhat of a hurry.

We rode on again, they continuing to follow us. When we were far enough ahead again and in a suitable place, we stopped, reloaded and waited for them to come up, but they seemed to have changed their minds and didn't appear as anxious to ride in our company as they had on the start, for now they kept out of pistol shot. One of the boys dismounted and said: "I believe I can reach them from here," and taking a rest over his horse's back, fired and killed a horse. This caused a scattering among them, and if our horses had been fresh we would have tried to kill the whole outfit.

George Jones remarked that he guessed the red devils had enough of it already, and we rode on. They made two circles around us, keeping out of gunshot, and then rode away.

We pushed on with all haste possible, expecting that