“I suppose you’ve spent the afternoon sleeping,” said Obed.

“I might have done so, but we had a visitor.”

“A visitor?  What kind of a visitor?”

“A jaguar.  He wanted to eat our horse and as the horse could not get away, being tethered strongly, I had to shoot his jaguarship.”

He showed Obed the body, and his comrade approved highly of the shot.

“And now for the history of my own life and adventures during the afternoon,” said Obed.  “The country to the eastward is not rough, and I made good time through it.  Sure enough the army of Cos is there, about five miles away, camped in a plain.  It was beaten about a good deal by the storm, and it keeps poor guard, because it is in its own country far from any expected foe, and because the Mexicans are Mexicans.  I think, Ned, that we can lift a horse without great trouble or excessive danger.  We’ll go over there about midnight.”

“And we’d better take our present horse with us,” said Ned, “or other jaguars may come.”

They remained in their own valley until the appointed time, and then set out on a fairly dark night, each taking his turn at riding the horse.  They halted at the crest of a low hill, from which they saw the flash of camp fires.

“That’s Cos and his army,” said Obed.  “They’re down there, sprawled all about the valley, and I imagine that by this time they’re all asleep, including a majority of the sentinels, and that’s our opportunity.”

They tethered their own horse and crept down the slope.  Soon they came to the edge of the woods and saw the camp fires more plainly.  All had burned low, but they made out the shapes of tents, and, nearer by, a dark mass which they concluded to be the horses belonging to the lancers and other cavalry.  They approached within a hundred yards, and saw no sentinels by the horses, although they were able to discern several moving figures farther on.

“Now, Ned,” said Obed, “you stay here and I’ll try to cut out a horse, the very best that I can find.  Sit down on the ground, and have your rifle ready.  If I’m discovered and have to run for it you shoot the first of my pursuers.”

Ned obeyed and Obed stole down toward the horses.  Ned knew his comrade’s skill, and he believed he would employ the soft whistle that had been so effective with the first horse.  He watched the dark figure stealing forward, and he admired Obed’s skill.  It would be almost impossible for anyone to notice so faint a shadow in the darkness.  Nevertheless, his heart beat heavily.  Despite all that Obed had said it was a dangerous task, requiring both skill and luck.

The faint shadow reached the black blur of the horses and disappeared.  Ned waited five minutes, ten, fifteen minutes, while the little pulses beat hard in his temples.  Then he saw a shadow detach itself from the black blur.  It was the figure of a man and he was on horseback.  Obed had succeeded.