At that instant Trafford saw smoke issuing from a spot on the mountain opposite. He turned to the Indian: “Someone lives there”? he said.
“It is the home of the dead, but life is also there.”
But no reply came. The Indian pointed instead to the buffalo rumbling down the valley. Trafford forgot the smoke, forgot everything except that splendid quarry. Shon was excited. “Sarpints alive,” he said, “look at the troops of thim! Is it standin’ here we are with our tongues in our cheeks, whin there’s bastes to be killed, and mate to be got, and the call to war on the ground below! Clap spurs with your heels, sez I, and down the side of the turf together and give ‘em the teeth of our guns!” The Irishman dashed down the slope. In an instant, all followed, or at least Trafford thought all followed, swinging their guns across their saddles to be ready for this excellent foray. But while Pierre rode hard, it was at first without the fret of battle in him, and he smiled strangely, for he knew that the Indian had disappeared as they rode down the slope, though how and why he could not tell. There ran through his head tales chanted at camp-fires when he was not yet in stature so high as the loins that bore him. They rode hard, and yet they came no nearer to that flying herd straining on with white streaming breath and the surf of snow rising to their quarters. Mile upon mile, and yet they could not ride these monsters down!
Now Pierre was leading. There was a kind of fury in his face, and he seemed at last to gain on them. But as the herd veered close to a wall of stalwart pines, a horseman issued from the trees and joined the cattle. The horseman was in scarlet from head to foot; and with his coming the herd went faster, and ever faster, until they vanished into the mountain-side; and they who pursued drew in their trembling horses and stared at each other with wonder in their faces.
“In God’s name what does it mean”? Trafford cried.
“Is it a trick of the eye or the hand of the devil”? added Shon.
“In the name of God we shall know perhaps. If it is the hand of the devil it is not good for us,” remarked Pierre.
“Who was the man in scarlet who came from the woods”? asked Trafford of the half-breed.