The enemy are hovering around the "pathfinders" entrenched on the hills; they will try to frighten them into return, and drive them out of the regions of Alta California. Some sly Californian may even contrive an Indian attack to obliterate them.
Valois fears not the ultimate fate of the friends he has been torn away from. The adventurous boy knows he will be missed at daybreak. The camp will be on the alert to meet the enemy. Their keen-eyed scouts can read the story of his being lassoed and carried away from the traces of the deed.
The young rover concludes he is to be taken before some superior officer, some soldier charged with defending Upper California. This view is confirmed. Down into the valley of the San Joaquin the feet of the agile mustangs bear the jaded travellers.
They cross the San Joaquin on a raft, swimming their horses. Valois sees nothing yet to hint his impending fate. Far away the rich green billows of spring grass wave in the warm sun. Thousands of elk wander in antlered armies over the meadows. Gay dancing yellow antelope bound over the elastic turf. Clouds of wild fowl, from the stately swan to the little flighty snipe, crowd the tule marshes of this silent river. It is the hunter's paradise. Wild cattle, in sleek condition, toss their heads and point their long, polished horns. Mustangs, fleet as the winds, bound along, disdaining their meaner brethren, bowing under man's yoke. At the occasional mud-walled ranches, vast flocks of fat sheep whiten the hills.
Maxime mentally maps the route he travels. Alas! no chance of escape exists. At the first open attempt a rifle-ball, or a blow from a razor-edged machete, would end his earthly wanderings. Despised, shunned by even the wretched women at the squalid ranchos, he feels utterly alone. The half-naked children timidly flee from him. The wicked eyes of his guards never leave him. He knows a feeling animates the squad, that he would be well off their hands by a use of the first handy limb and a knotted lariat. The taciturn chief watches over him. He guards an ominous silence.
The cavalcade, after seven days, are in sight of the purpled outlines of the sculptured Sierras. They rise heavenward to the sparkling crested pinnacles where Bret Harte's poet fancy sees in long years after the "minarets of snow." Valley oaks give way to the stately pines. Olive masses of enormous redwoods wrap the rising foot-hills. Groves of laurel, acorn oak, and madrona shelter the clinging panther and the grim warden of the Sierras, the ferocious grizzly bear.
Over flashing, bounding mountain brooks, cut up with great ledges of blue bed rock, they splash. Here the silvery salmon and patrician trout leap out from the ripples to glide into the great hollowed pools, yet the weary cavalcade presses on. Will they never stop?
Maxime Valois' haggard face looks back at him from the mirrored waters of the Cottonwood, the Merced, and the Mariposa. The prisoner sees there only the worn features of his strangely altered self. He catches no gleam of the unreaped golden harvest lying under the feet of the wild mustangs. These are the treasure channels of the golden West.
The mountain gnomes of this mystic wilderness are already in terror lest some fortunate fool may utter the one magic word, "Gold." It will call greedy thousands from the uttermost parts of the earth to break the seals of ages, and burrow far below these mountain bases. Through stubborn granite wall, tough porphyry, ringing quartz, and bedded gnarled gneiss, men will grope for the feathery, fairy veins of the yellow metal.
A feverish quest for gold alone can wake the dreamy "dolce far niente" of the Pacific. God's fairest realm invites the foot of man in vain. Here the yellow grains will be harvested, which buy the smiles of beauty, blunt the sword of justice, and tempt the wavering conscience of young and old. It will bring the human herd to one grovelling level—human swine rooting after the concrete token of power. Here, in later years, the wicked arm of power will be given golden hammers to beat down all before it. Here will that generation arise wherein the golden helmet can dignify the idle and empty pate.