He started back, with his game swung up on his back, and the shadows rapidly deepening about him.
As he neared his old destroyed home he stopped suddenly, for across the cañon a light flashed before his gaze.
"It is a firelight as sure as I live," he muttered.
"What does it, what can it, mean?"
He stood like one dazed by the sight for some time, and then slowly fell from his lips the words:
"It can mean but one thing—that some one has come into the cañon."
After a moment more of silent thought he said almost cheerily:
"Ah! it is Lucas."
But again his voice changed as he added:
"No, he dreads the spot where he was so nearly buried alive and will not go there. Whoever it is, he is a stranger. I must know, for if they have come here to remain, if they are our foes we will be forewarned and hence forearmed.