The war began about Cottonwood, and ran like wildfire that licked up all the ranches in its course. Then the whites came strongly against the Paiutes at the Stone Corral, and made an end of the best of their fighting men. Then the Indians broke out in the north, and at last it came to such a pass that the very boys must do fighting, and the women make bowstrings. The cattlemen turned in to Baker's ranch as a centre, and all the northern campoodies gathered together to attack them. They had not much to hope for, only to do as much killing as possible before the winter set in with the hunger and the deep snows.
By this time Joe's father was dead, and his mother had brought the boy a quiver full of arrows and a new bowstring, and sent him down to the battle.
And Joe went hotly enough to join the men of the other village, nursing his bow with great care, remembering his father, but when he came to counsel and found where the fight must be, his heart turned again, for he remembered his friend. The braves camped by Little Round Valley, and he thought of the talk he and Walter had there; the war party went over the tongue of hills, and Joe saw Winnedumah shining whitely on Waban, and remembered his boyish errand, the mystery of the tall, strange warrior that came upon them in the night, their talk in the hut of the arrow-maker, and the vow that came afterward.
The Indians came down a ravine toward Tres Pinos, and there met a band of horses which some of their party had run in from the ranches; among them was a pinto pony which Walter had used to ride, and it came to Joe's hand when he called. Then the boy wondered if Walter might be dead, and leaned his head against the pony's mane; it turned its head and nickered softly at his ear.
The war party stayed in the ravine until it grew dark, and Joe watched how Winnedumah swam in a mist above the hills long after the sun had gone quite down, as if in his faithfulness he would outwatch the dark; and then the boy's heart was lifted up to the great chief standing still by Tinnemaha. "I will not forget," he said. "I, too, will be faithful." Perhaps at this moment he expected a miracle to help him in his vow as it had helped Winnedumah.
