Chapter Fifty Four.
The man-hunters had not long to wait. They had anticipated this. There was a moon which they had also expected. It was a bright moon at intervals, and then obscured—for minutes at a time—by the passage of dark clouds over the canopy.
There was no wind, however, and the air was perfectly still. The slightest noise could have been heard for a long distance in the atmosphere of that elevated region—so pure and light that it vibrated afar with the slightest concussion.
Sounds were heard, but they were not made by either the dogs or horses of the hunters—well-trained to silence—nor by the hunters themselves. Both lay stretched in silence; or if they spoke, it was only in whispers and low mutterings.
The sounds were those of nature—such as it exists in that wild region. The “snort” of the grizzly bear from the rocky ledge—the howling bark of the coyote—the “hoo-hoop” of the burrowing owl, and the shrill periodical cries of the bull-bat and goatsucker. For a while these were the only sounds that fell upon the ears of the ambushed hunters.
Half-an-hour elapsed, and during all that time never permitted their eyes or ears to rest for a moment. They gazed up the ravine, and at intervals glanced outwards upon the plain. There was a probability that their victim might be abroad—even in the day—and with such men no probability was allowed to pass without examination. Should it prove to be so, and he were to return at that time, it would frustrate the plan they had arranged. But for such a contingency the mulatto had conceived another—that was, to steal during the night as near the cave as possible—within rifle-shot if he could—wait until the güero should make his appearance in the morning, and wing him with a bullet from his rifle—in the use of which weapon the yellow hunter was well skilled. To shoot the horse was another design. The horse once killed or crippled, the cibolero would be captured to a certainty; and both had made up their minds, in case a good opportunity offered, to despatch the noble animal.
These men knew a certain plan by which their victim could be killed or captured—that is, supposing they had been certain he was in the cave—a plan which could scarce have failed. But yet, for reasons of their own, they would not adopt it.
It would have been simple enough to have conducted a party of dragoons to the head of the pass, and there have stationed them, while another party entered the cañon from below. As the sides of the ravine were impassable precipices, the retreat of the cibolero would have been thus cut off at both ends. True, to have reached the upper plain, without going through the ravine itself—and that, as we have seen would have defeated such a plan—would have cost a journey to the troop to be stationed above. But neither Vizcarra nor Roblado would have grudged either the time or the men to have rendered success thus sure. The mulatto and his dusky camarado knew all this perfectly, but to have caused such a plan to be put in execution was the last thought in their minds. Such a course would have been attended with but little peril to them, but it would have brought as little pay, for every trooper in the whole band would have claimed equal share in the promised reward. That would not be satisfactory to the hunters, whose heads and knowledge had furnished the means and the ways.
Neither entertained any idea of following such a course. Both were confident in their ability to effect their object without aid from any quarter.
From the time they had taken their station on the rock, half-an-hour was all they had to wait. At the end of that period the quick ears of both caught the sound of some one coming from the direction of the ravine. They heard a horse’s hoof striking upon loose shingle, and the rattling of the displaced pebbles. A débris of broken fragments filled the bottom of the ravine, brought there during rain-torrents. Over this ran the path. A horseman was coming down it.