"Yes, the ship will not wait, Don Abrahan will wonder at our delay. What was that?"
Simon started, listening, hand lifted to impose silence.
"Coyotes, very likely," Henderson replied, unconcerned. "They come around here at night."
"It sounded like a horse." Simon rose, leaning into the dark, listening hard, "If mine has got loose!"
He walked away a little distance, going softly, almost immediately disappearing in the dark, which was deeper for the wooded side of the canyon forming the background of the camp. Henderson heard him swearing presently around the corner of the hut, disturbing the bushes softly as if he sought a passage through.
"A bird in the bushes, I think," Simon said, turning back. "Do you leave your fire uncovered these dry days?"
"I drown it," Henderson said.
"Go ahead, then; we must get down out of this dark place. Don Abrahan will think I'm slower than seven doctors."
Henderson took up the pail to pour what water it contained over the dying fire. He was standing with it poised, held in both hands, when something came toward him from Simon's direction with the swishing sound of a bird's wing. Quick as the leaping of his intuitive warning that treachery was afoot behind him, Henderson stooped and sprang aside.
But Simon, with all the vaquero's cunning in casting the lariat, had planned his part too carefully, and risked too much, to fail. The rope fell true to calculation, tightening with Simon's vicious jerk, binding Henderson's arms to his body, one impotent hand within a few inches of his pistol. Simon threw all his sinewy strength into the struggle that followed, cutting Henderson's resistance short by dragging him to the ground. In a moment additional coils of rope webbed the over-trustful sailor as a spider binds a bug.