“Bank, and head more into the east,” Perk heard the other saying, after a steady look.
“Then it’s the Sierra Madre okay, partner, I opine?” suggested the one at the stick, as he obeyed orders.
“No question about it,” Jack assured him “but I knew it was time for us to sight the ridge. I’ve pored over the map of this section, and charted it all out in blocks, so I can tell just what the lay of the land is, and how long it’s apt to take the colonel to get here with his galloping company. We’re going to drop down presently, and find shelter where we can lie low until the hour comes for making our ten strike.”
“How long might that be, boss?” asked Perk.
“It all depends on certain happenings. We can creep up close to the place, and watch how things move figuring out how to act when you get your first glimpse of a dust cloud away off toward where Hermosilla lies. I give the cavalry two days to reach here, if everything moves along smoothly.”
“Two long days—an’ say, we gotter eat all that time, don’t we, partner?”
“We surely can’t live on air, Perk; but I’ve provided for that—even should we run out of grub you laid in I’ve a little deposit of dried meat, real pemmican in fact, that will keep us from famishing. Water we can secure somewhere among the mountain trails, since never a drop would we be apt to find on the open desert.”
“Huh! I’m leavin’ it all to you, Big Boss,” Perk told him, again lost in wonder and near awe as he realized how Jack seemed to have thought of everything—what a mind the boy had for grasping details, and weaving them into the net with which they expected to enmesh the slippery one.
Now Jack slowed down their speed more or less, although of course it was not possible to soften the clamor accompanying their flight through space. But Perk noticed that, so far as he could tell, the night wind was coming from ahead, and this assured him it would not be apt to carry those telltale sounds toward the range lying in the east, and so warn the enemy of their coming.