“Let us hear it!”
“It is this. Some of those peons regularly visit the fellow in his lair. I feel certain of it. Of course they have been followed, but only in daylight, and then they are found to be on their ordinary business. But there is one of them who goes abroad at night; and all attempts at following him have proved abortive. He loses himself in the chapparal paths in spite of the spies. That is why I am certain he visits the cibolero.”
“It seems highly probable.”
“Now if we can find one who could either follow this fellow or track him—but there’s the difficulty. We are badly off for a good tracker. There is not one in the whole troop.”
“There are other ciboleros and hunters in the valley. Why not procure one of them?”
“True, we might—there are none of them over well disposed to the outlaw—so it is said. But I fear there is none of them fit, that is, none who combines both the skill and the courage necessary for this purpose—for both are necessary. They hate the fellow enough, but they fear him as well. There is one whom I have heard of,—in fact know something of him,—who would be the very man for us. He not only would not fear an encounter with the cibolero, but would hardly shun one with the devil; and, as for his skill in all sorts of Indian craft, his reputation among his kind is even greater than that of Carlos himself.”
“Who is he?”
“I should say there are two of them, for the two always go together; one is a mulatto, who has formerly been a slave among the Americanos. He is now a runaway, and therefore hates everything that reminds him of his former masters. Among other souvenirs, as I am told, he hates our cibolero with a good stout hatred. This springs partly from the feeling already mentioned, and partly from the rivalry of hunter-fame. So much in our favour. The alter ego of the mulatto is a man of somewhat kindred race, a zambo from the coast near Matamoras or Tampico How he strayed this way no one knows, but it is a good while ago, and the mulatto and he have for long been shadows of each other; live together, hunt together, and fight for one another. Both are powerful men, and cunning as strong; but the mulatto is the zambo’s master in everything, villainy not excepted. Neither is troubled with scruples. They would be the very men for our purpose.”
“And why not get them at once?”
“Therein lies the difficulty—unfortunately they are not here at present. They are off upon a hunt. They are hangers-on of the mission, occasionally employed by the padrés in procuring venison and other game.