They have just arrived at their present halting-place, their first camp since leaving the estancia; from which they parted a little before mid-day: soon as the sad, funeral rites were over, and the body of the murdered man laid in its grave. This done at an early hour of the morning, for the hot climate of the Chaco calls for quick interment.
The sorrowing wife did nought to forbid their departure. She had her sorrows as a mother, too; and, instead of trying to restrain, she but urged them to take immediate action in searching for her lost child.
That Francesca is still living they all believe, and so long as there seemed a hope—even the slightest—of recovering her, the bereaved mother was willing to be left alone. Her faithful Guanos would be with her.
It needed no persuasive argument to send the searchers off. In their own minds they have enough motive for haste; and, though in each it might be different in kind, as in degree, with all it is sufficiently strong. Not one of them but is willing to risk his life in the pursuit they have entered upon; and at least one would lay it down rather than fail in finding Francesca, and restoring her to her mother.
They have followed thus far on the track of the abductors, but without any fixed or definite plan as to continuing. Indeed, there has been no time to think of one, or anything else; all hitherto acting under that impulse of anxiety for the girl’s fate which they so keenly feel. But now that the first hurried step has been taken, and they can go no further till another sun lights up the trail, calmer reflection comes, admonishing them to greater caution in their movements. For they who have so ruthlessly killed one man would as readily take other lives—their own. What they have undertaken is no mere question of skill in taking up a trail, but an enterprise full of peril; and they have need to be cautious how they proceed upon it.
They are so acting now. Their camp-fire is but a small one, just sufficient to boil a kettle of water for making the maté, and the spot where they have placed it is in a hollow, so that it may not be seen from afar. Besides, a clump of palms screens it on the western side, the direction in which the trail leads, and therefore the likeliest for them to apprehend danger.
Soon as coming to a stop, and before kindling the fire Gaspar has gone all around, and made a thorough survey of the situation. Then, satisfied it is a safe one, he undertakes the picketing of their horses, directing the others to set light to the faggots; which they have done, and seated themselves beside.