Page:Thirty-One Years on the Plains and in the Mountains.djvu/694

554 stead of going direct to the settlement in order to ascertain whether the depredations were committed by Apaches or Pimas.

The fifth day out we struck the settlement, but did not cross the Indian trail, which led me to think that the work was done by Pimas and not Apaches.

When we arrived there no one could tell us how many Indians there were nor what they looked like, but when I came to find out the truth of the matter there had been no families massacred, nor had the two girls been taken prisoners, but there had been two boys killed that were herding stock.

We remained there one day in order to learn what we could in regard to the trouble and then struck the trail of the Indians and followed it two days, but it was so old that we gave it up, as it was then twelve days since the depredations were committed and we knew that the Indians were a long ways off by that time. We took a different route on our return, and the second day we saw a small band of Indians traveling toward the settlement, which we had left four days previous. We started in pursuit of them and struck their trail before it was dark. I was confident that they would camp at the first water they came to, which was about seven or eight miles from there, so we staked our horses out on good grass, sat down and ate our lunch while we waited for the clear moon to make its appearance and light us across the country where we might find the noble red men of the plains and entertain them for a while at least. We thought that it would take us about all night to track