"Low as the sun is in the afternoon sky, it bites my crown like acid."
"And famine bites at me like acid," Francis confessed. "Is the valley inhabited?"
"I should know, Senor," Torres replied. "There is the narrative of Mendoza, in which he reported that Da Vasco and his party were left there "to perish miserably. "This I do know: they were never seen again of men."
"Looks as though plenty of food could be grown in a place like this," Francis began, but broke off at sight of Leoncia. picking berries from a bush. "Here! Stop that, Leoncia! We've got enough troubles without having a very charming but very much poisoned young woman on our hands."
"They're all right, she said, calmly eating. "You can see where the birds have been pecking and eating them."
"In which case I apologize and join you," Francis cried, filling his mouth with the luscious fruit. "And if I could catch the birds that did the pecking, I'd eat them too."
By the time they had eased the sharpest of their hungerpangs, the sun was so low that Torres removed the helmet of Da Vasco.
"We might as well stop here for the night," he said. "I left my shoes in the cave with the mummies, and lost Da Vasco's old boots during the swimming. My feet are cut to ribbons, and there's plenty of seasoned grass here out of which I can plait a pair of sandals."
While occupied with this task, Francis built a fire and gathered a supply of wood, for, despite the low latitude, the high altitude made fire a necessity for a night's lodging. Ere he had completed the supply, Leoncia, curled up on her side, her head in the hollow of her arm, was sound asleep. Against the side of her away from the fire, Francis thoughtfully packed a mound of dry leaves and dry forest mould.