dollars in cash and George Harvey’s precious daughters!  It was indeed a rich haul,—­one that in all the dread history of the Morales gang had never been equalled.  Even had they failed to secure the safe the richer booty was theirs in having seized the girls.  But few people in Arizona—­as Arizona then was constituted—­would make great effort to overhaul a gang of robbers whose only victim was Uncle Sam and “his liveried hirelings.”  Nobody in Sonora would fail to regard them with envious eyes; but in the deed of rapine that made them the captors and possessors of those defenceless sisters each man had put a price upon his head, a halter round his neck, for “Gringo” and “Greaser,” American and Mexican alike, would spring to arms to rescue and avenge.

As the rearmost of the little party of pursuers disappeared in the darkness and the wearied pack-mules went jogging sullenly after, urged on by the goad of their half-Mexican driver, the sergeant left in charge of the detachment at the corral looked at his watch and noted that it was just half-past two o’clock.  The dawn would be creeping on at four.

Wearied as were his men he did not permit them all to rest.  The condition of his wounded and the instructions left him by Lieutenant Drummond made it necessary that they should have constant attention.  It was sore trouble for him to look at the old paymaster, whose life seemed ebbing away, lying there so pallid and moaning at times so pitifully, but Feeny lay torpid, breathing, yet seeming to suffer not at all.  Both were in desperate need of surgical attendance, but where could surgeon be found?  The nearest was at Stoneman, the little cantonment across the Christobal, thirty miles to the east; and though a gallant fellow had volunteered to make the ride alone through the Apache-infested pass and carry the despatch that Drummond had hurriedly pencilled, there was no possibility of doctors reaching them before the coming night, and the thought of all they might have to suffer through the fierce white heat of the intervening day was one that gave the sergeant deep concern.  Then, too, who could say whether the solitary trooper would succeed in running the gauntlet and making his way through?  He was a resolute old frontiersman, skilled in Indian warfare, and well aware that his best chance was in the dark, but speed as he might the broad light of day would be on him long before he could get half-way through the range.  The stage from the west would probably come along about sunset, but nothing could be hoped for sooner.  No troops were nearer than the Colorado in that direction except the little signal-post at the Picacho.  Corporal Fox and two men had been sent thither to inquire what the signal meant, and it would soon be time for them to come riding in with their report.  How he wished Wing were here!  Wing knew something about everything.  He was an expert veterinarian, something of a doctor, knew more of mineralogy than all the officers put together, and could speak Spanish better than any man in the regiment.  When it became necessary to have a signal-station at the peak and it was found that no one knew anything about the business, Wing got one of the old red manuals, studied the system, and inside of a week was signalling with the expert sent down from San Francisco.