The Spanish-Mexican hidalgo who had selected Santa Lucia had shown excellent judgment, although even in that day he probably had more or less trouble with his red neighbors. The present owners and occupants of the ranch had had none at all until the very hour when Sam Herrick found the prairie around him swarming with them.
As for Sam, he had now no suspicion how near he came to again meeting the very Apaches who had chased him and Cal and who were now hurrying to rejoin their band. They missed Sam and they brought news back with them which seemed to receive the approval of the very dignified warrior who had directed in the capture of the horses. He was a proud-looking commander now, as he sat upon one of Colonel Evans's best horses to listen to their report.
"Ugh!" he remarked. "Kah-go-mish is a great chief. Get ranch first. Then go for horses in timber."
There was pride in every tone and movement of Kah-go-mish, for he had performed a great exploit, and he and his band were no longer in poverty. There were many signs, however, that they had not been prosperous upon the Reservation, although the chief still wore the very high silk hat which had there been given him. He had tied a green veil around it to set off its beauty and his own. His only other garments were the well-worn buckskin leggings which covered him from the waist to the knee, and a pair of long red stockings through which he had thrust his arms to the shoulder. Openings in the soles let out the hands, with which he gesticulated in explanation of orders which were promptly obeyed.
About thirty warriors, now well mounted and all pretty well armed, whirled away northerly, with Kah-go-mish at their head, and their purpose did not require any explanation.
Half as many more braves and all the squaws, boys, and girls proceeded to complete the beef business. They did it with great rapidity and dexterity, and then they, with the horses, dogs, and children, trailed away in a caravan that was headed almost due south. It was a very picturesque caravan all the time, but it looked more so than ever when it halted, after a while, on the bank of Slater's Branch.
Some very good people had been interested in the reservation set apart for those Apaches, and had gathered contributions of civilized clothing for them. It had not been in rebellion against anything of that sort that Kah-go-mish and his people had run away, for the miscellaneous goods from away Down East helped the picture at Slater's Branch amazingly. The hat and stocking legs had helped the appearance of the chief himself, but other things had done more for a fat and very dark lady whom he had addressed as Wah-wah-o-be. The many-ribboned straw bonnet upon the head of the severe-faced wife of Kah-go-mish was fine. So was the blue calico dress with the red flannel skirt over it, and the pony she rode seemed to be afraid of the whole outfit. Near her, upon two other ponies, sat a boy and girl. They were apparently younger, a little, than Cal and Victoria Evans. They were hardly as good-looking, in some respects, and were dressed differently. Among the charities at the Reservation had been a bale of second-hand trousers, of the style worn nowadays by boys, reaching to the knee. The young lady wore a pair of these, and with them a dress of which any Mescalero girl might have been vain. A piece of yard-wide red cotton, three yards long, had a hole in the middle for the head to pass through. When proper armholes were added and a belt of embroidered antelope skin confined the loose cloth at the waist, what more was needed by the bright-eyed daughter of Kah-go-mish?