"I don't think he was intentionally uncivil. He seemed afraid."
"Evidently. He did not know what we were, and feared to commit himself. However, we have learned something. We are on Mejia's track. He was at Tres Cruces three days since, and if we push on we may fall in with him before sunset, or, at any rate, to-morrow morning."
"Is it not possible that this man may have been purposely deceiving us, or be himself misinformed?" I asked.
"Quite. But as we had already decided to go on it does not matter a great deal whether he is right or wrong. I think, though, he knew more about the others than he cared to tell. All the more reason for keeping a sharp lookout and riding slowly."
"Exactly. We may have to ride for our lives before the sun goes down. And now let us mount and march."
Our course was almost due west, and the sun being now a little past the zenith, its ardent rays--which shone right in our faces--together with the reverberations from the ground, made the heat almost insupportable. The stirrup-irons burned our feet; speech became an effort; we sat in our saddles, perspiring and silent; our horses, drooping their heads, settled into a listless and languid walk. The glare was so trying that I closed my eyes and let Pizarro go as he would. Open them when I might, the outlook was always the same, the same yellow earth and blue sky, the same lifeless, interminable plain, the same solitary sombrero palms dotting the distant horizon.
This went on for an hour or two, and I think I must have fallen into a doze, for when, roused by a shout from Gahra, I once more opened my eyes the sun was lower and the heat less intense.
"What is it," asked Carmen, who, like myself, had been half asleep. "I see nothing."
"A cloud of dust that moves--there!" (pointing).
"So it is," shading his eyes and looking again. "Coming this way, too. Behind that cloud is a body of horsemen. Be they friends or enemies--Mejia and his people or loyalist guerillas?"
"That is more than I can say, señor. Mejia, I hope."
"I also. But hope is not certainty, and until we can make sure we had better hedge away toward the north, so as to be nearer the hills in case we have to run for it."
"You think we had better make for the hills in that case?" I asked.