"Four leagues at the most. What is that distance in the desert, when it can be crossed so easily in a straight line?"
"Then your advice is?" the hacendero asked.
"Weigh well my words, Don Sylva; above all, do not give them an interpretation differing from mine. By a prodigy almost unexampled in the Del Norte, we have now been crossing the desert for nearly three weeks, and nothing has happened to trouble our security: for a week we have been, moreover, seeking a trail which it is impossible to come on again."
"Quite true."
"I have, therefore, worked out this conclusion, which I believe to be correct, and which you will approve, I am convinced. The French only accidentally formed the resolution of entering the desert: they only did it to pursue the Apaches. Is not that your view?"
"It is."
"Very good. Consequently, they crossed it in a straight line. The weather which has favoured us favoured them too: their interest, the object they wished to attain, everything, in a word, demanded that they should display the utmost speed in their march. A pursuit, you know as well as I, is a chase in which each tries to arrive first."
"Then you suppose—?" Don Sylva interrupted him.
"I am certain that the French left the desert long ago, and are now coursing over the plains of Apacheria: that fire we noticed is a convincing proof to me."
"How so?"