Cayuse’s service with the army had given him a good knowledge of the topography of that part of the country, and he lead the scout and Dell toward a spring with which he was well acquainted.
The spring was in a little valley, hemmed in on all sides by granite bluffs.
Before descending into the valley, the scout and his pards made a careful survey of the spring from a safe distance. Water was a precious quantity in those parts, and its presence was quite apt to draw the roving bands of red trouble-makers.
Careful scouting failed to reveal the presence of any Apaches, and the three riders picked their way down the valley’s slope and reached the spring.
The spring was merely a scant dribble of water from a crevice in one of the bluffs. Under it, however, a basin-shaped rock formed a pool. This reservoir had filled, and there was sufficient water for the horses as well as their riders.
The riders, naturally, drank first. Buffalo Bill, Dell, and Cayuse all knelt at the brim and assuaged their thirst at the same time.
“Queer taste to the water, don’t you think?” remarked Dell.
The scout had noticed the acrid taste, but supposed that it was perhaps due to a touch of alkali.
“Do you remember, Cayuse,” Buffalo Bill asked, as he straightened up at the brink of the pool, “whether this particular spring always has this peculiar taste?”
“Him Arizona spring all kind tastes, all kinds smell,” observed the boy philosophically. “Better so you drink and be glad what you drink is _wet_. Huh?”
“I reckon that about hits it,” laughed the scout, leading up his horse.
Bear Paw, the scout’s black charger, nosed about in the pool for some time, slapping the water with his muscular upper lip. Thirsty as he was, for several moments the horse refused to drink, but at last, apparently deciding to make the best of it, took a few sparing swallows.
Silver Heels and Navi acted very much in the same way, but cut short their objections and went to their refreshment much more quickly than had Bear Paw.
“The animals don’t like it, either,” commented Dell.
“I don’t blame them,” said Buffalo Bill, “but water is water in this region, and, as Cayuse says, if it’s wet, neither man nor beast should demand more.”
The horses, freed of their saddles, were roped out in the scant grass which grew along the overflow from the pool. While they grazed, the scout and his companions took their first meal off their rations.