"The Señor Correspoñsal thinks we might be pursued."
"I doubt it, Don Juan. Xuarez will be too busy checking the excesses of his soldiers. Besides, Señor, as we escaped in the confusion, it may be that we will not be missed for some hours."
Peter, unaccustomed to riding, began to feel sore with this incessant galloping, and raised his voice in protest.
"I hope we will be able to rest at Centeotl. When do we reach it?"
"Before midnight, probably. Then we will rest till dawn, get fresh horses, and push on to Tlatonac."
"Hope we'll get there," muttered Jack, shaking his reins. "But if the Indians——"
"Deuce take the Indians," retorted Philip, irritably. "Come on Jack, and don't worry so much."
Their horses were fortunately quite fresh, having been mewed up in Janjalla without exercise for some weeks. Stretching their necks, they clattered along at a breakneck speed. The road was as hard as flint, and their iron-shod hoofs struck out sparks from the loose stones. The riders, with their heads bent against the wind whizzing past their ears, let the reins hang loosely, and pressed on with blind trust along the highway leading to Centeotl.
Here and there they passed a flat-roofed house, deserted by its occupants, and standing up lonely, a white splotch amid the vague gloom of its flat acreage. Clumps of trees loomed suddenly against the clear sky, at times a ragged aloe sprang spectral-like from the reddish soil, thorny thickets lay densely in the hollows, tall spear-grass waved on the tops of undulating drifts of sand, and at intervals an oasis of rank herbage would frame an oval pool thickly fringed with reeds.
The road wound onward, turning now to right, now to left, dipping into hollows, curving over eminences, stretching white and dusty towards the horizon like a crooked winding river. On either side they could mark the moving forms of animals, flying from the clatter of their horses' hoofs, cattle, vicuñas, llamas, and flocks of sheep. The white peak of Xicotencatl arose suddenly like a ghost from the shadows of forests lying heavily along the verge of earth between plain and sky. A thin vapour lay white over the plain, and gathered thickly along the banks of the river. The horses stretched their necks and neighed loudly. They smelt the water of the stream.