She is younger by over two years than her brave sister.  Tall though she has grown, Ruth is but a child, and now in all her excitement and anxiety, worn out with the long strain, she begins to cry.  She strives to hide it, strives to control the weakness, and, failing in both, strives to turn away.  All to no purpose.  An arm in a sling is of little avail at such a moment.  Whirling quickly about, Drummond brings his other into action.  Before the weeping little maid is well aware what is happening her waist is encircled by the strong arm in the dark-blue sleeve, and how can she see that she is drawn to his breast, since now her face is buried in both her hands and those hands in the flannel of his hunting-shirt,—­just as high as his heart?  Small wonder is it that Corporal Costigan, hurrying in at the mouth of the cave, stops short at sight of this picturesque partie carree.  Any other time he would have sense enough to face about and tiptoe whence he came, but now there’s no room left for sentiment. Tableaux-vivants are lovely in their way, even in a cave lighted dimly by a hurricane-lamp, but sterner scenes are on the curtain.  Drummond’s voice is murmuring soothing, yes, caressing words to his sobbing captive.  Drummond’s bearded lips, unrebuked, are actually pressing a kiss upon that childish brow when Costigan, with a preliminary clearing of his throat that sounds like a landslide and makes the rock walls ring again, startles Ruth from her blissful woe and brings Drummond leaping to the mouth of the cave.

“Lieutenant, there’s something coming out over our trail.”

“Thank God!” sighs Wing, as he raises his eyes to those of his fair nurse.  “Thank God! for your sakes!”

“Thank God, Ruth!” cries Fanny, extending one hand to her sister while the other is unaccountably detained.  “Thank God! it’s father and the Stoneman party and Doctor Gray.”

And Ruth, throwing herself upon her knees by her sister’s side, buries her head upon her shoulder and sobs anew for very joy.

And then comes sudden start.  All in an instant there rings, echoing down the canon, the sharp, spiteful crack of rifles, answered by shrieks of terror from the cave where lie the Moreno women, and by other shots out along the range.  Three faces blanch with sudden fear, though Wing looks instantly up to say,—­

“They can’t harm you, and our men will be here in less than no time.”

Out in the gorge men are springing to their feet and seizing their ready arms; horses are snorting and stamping; mules braying in wild terror.  Two of the ambulance mules, breaking loose from their fastenings, come charging down the resounding rock, nearly annihilating Moreno, who, bound and helpless, praying and cursing by turns, has rolled himself out of his nook and lies squarely in the way of everything and everybody.  But above all the clamor, the ring of carbine, the hiss and spat of lead flattening upon the rocks, Drummond’s voice is heard clear and commanding, serene and confident.