“Vacas! muchas,” repeated Juan carelessly.

“Lots of ’em, eh?  Well, I’d like to know where they are, my lily of the valley,” said Curly, for once almost incredulous.  And then he stopped and listened.—­“Hold on, boys, listen,” he said.  “Look out—­look out!  Here they come!”

Every ear caught the faint distant pattering, which grew into a rapid and insistent rumble.  “Cavalry, b’gad!” cried Battersleigh.  Franklin’s eyes shone.  He spurred forward fast as he could go, jerking loose the thong which held his rifle fast in the scabbard under his leg.

The tumultuous roaring rumble came on steadily, the more apparent by a widening and climbing cloud of dust, which betokened that a body of large animals was coming up through the “breaks” from the bed of the stream to the prairie on which the wagons stood.  Presently there appeared at the brink, looming through the white dust cloud, a mingling mass of tangled, surging brown, a surface of tossing, hairy backs, spotted with darker fronts, over all and around all the pounding and clacking of many hoofs.  It was the stampede of the buffalo which had been disturbed at their watering place below, and which had headed up to the level that they might the better make their escape in flight.  Head into the wind, as the buffalo alone of wild animals runs, the herd paid no heed to the danger which they sought to escape, but upon which they were now coming in full front.  The horses of the hunters, terrified at this horrid apparition of waving horned heads and shaggy manes, plunged and snorted in terror, seeing which the first rank of the buffalo in turn fell smitten of panic, and braced back to avoid the evil at their front.  Overturned by the crush behind them, these none the less served to turn the course of the remainder of the herd, which now broke away to the right, paralleling the course of the stream and leaving the wagons of the hunters behind them and at their left.  The herd carried now upon its flank three figures which clung alongside and poured sharp blue jets of smoke into the swirling cloud of ashy dust.

It was neck and neck for the three.  The cowboy, Curly, had slightly the advance of the others, but needed to spur hard to keep even with Battersleigh, the old cavalryman, who rode with weight back and hands low, as though it were cross country in old Ireland.  Franklin challenged both in the run up, riding with the confidence of the man who learned the saddle young in life.  They swerved slightly apart as they struck the flank of the herd and began to fire.  At such range it was out of the question to miss.  Franklin and Battersleigh killed two buffaloes each, losing other head by reason of delivering their fire too high up in the body, a common fault with the beginner on bison.  Curly ran alongside a good cow, and at the third shot was able to see the great creature stumble and fall.  Yet another he killed before his revolver was empty.  The butchery was sudden