hat I must
follow. He leads the way over rising ground, riding toward a snow-clad
peak that gleams like silver in the far distance, pausing occasionally
while his peons drive a stake into the ground where directed by him.
They proceed thus until they find themselves facing a bare rocky slope
so steep that scarcely might a llama climb it; and here they pause for a
time while the _Ingles_ looks about him. Then they move off to the
left, skirting the precipice until they come to a great wood growing on
a steep spur of the mountain. They enter this wood and penetrate it for
a considerable distance, the ground ever rising more steeply and
becoming looser and more difficult as they go. Here the horse finds it
so hard to keep his feet, and is in such constant danger of falling,
that at length the rider dismounts and, leaving the horse standing,
presses forward as though anxious to get to the other side of the wood,
his peons following and whispering eagerly together. They are
encumbered with the various articles which they carry, and consequently
cannot travel over that steep, loose ground so rapidly as the
Englishman, who carries nothing but his riding whip and one of the poles
with a flag on it, which he uses to help him over the rough ground, and
he turns upon them from time to time with angry words, urging them to
greater exertion. At first they answer nothing; but at length the
strictures of the _Ingles_ goad them to retort, humbly in the beginning,
but soon with such heat that he lifts his whip and strikes one of them
savagely with it across the face. And at that, as though the blow were
a signal, every peon flings from him his burden, and the whole of them
hurl themselves upon the white man and bear him to the ground, the one
who was struck raising his machete as though to split the skull of his
enemy."

CHAPTER SIX.

FOUND!

At this point Mama Cachama became greatly agitated, and struggled
violently in an endeavour to wrench her hands out of Escombe's grasp,
crying that they were going to murder the Englishman, and that she would
not remain to see it. But the vision which she had thus far described
was of so extraordinary a character, and impressed the young man so
strongly with a sense of its reality and truth, that he was determined
to follow up the clue as far as possible; he therefore resolutely
retained his grip upon the old woman's hands, under the impression that,
if he released them, the vision