ase was still out of sight
ahead, yet every moment seemed to bring them closer upon their heels.
At every bend of the tortuous trail the leader's eye was strained to
see the dust-cloud rising ahead. But jutting point and rolling
shoulder of bluff or hill-side ever interposed. Drummond had just
glanced at his watch for perhaps the twentieth time since daybreak and
was replacing it in his pocket when an exclamation from Sergeant
Meinecke startled him.

"Look at Lee!"

The head of column, moving at the moment at a walk to rest the panting
horses, had just turned a rocky knoll and was following the trail into
a broader reach of the canon, which now seemed opening out to the
west. Instead of keeping in the bottom as heretofore, the wagon-track
now followed a gentle ascent and disappeared over a spur four hundred
yards ahead. Here Lee had suddenly flung himself from his horse,
thrown the reins to Patterson, and, crouching behind a bowlder, was
gazing eagerly to the front, while with hat in hand he was signalling
"Slow; keep down." Up went Drummond's gauntlet in the well-known
cavalry signal "Halt." Then, bidding Meinecke dismount the men and
reset blankets and saddles, the young officer gave "Chester" rein and
was soon kneeling by the side of his trusty subordinate.

Lee said no word at all, simply pointed ahead.

And here was a sight to make a soldier's pulses bound. Not a
quarter-mile away the rocky, desolate gorge which they had been
following since dawn opened out into a wide valley, bounded at the
west by a range of rugged heights whose sides were bearded with a dark
growth of stunted pine or cedar. On each side of their path a tall,
precipitous rock stood sentry over the entrance and framed the view of
the valley beyond. For full a mile ahead the trail swept straight
away, descending gently to the valley level, and there, just pushing
forth upon the wide expanse, with dots of horsemen on flank and front
and rear, dimly seen through the hot dust-cloud rising in their wake,
were the three wagons: the foremost, with its white canvas top, was
undoubtedly the new Concord; the second, a dingy mustard-yellow, the
battered old ambulance of the paymaster; the third and last, with no
cover at all, Moreno's buck-board. It was what was left of the
notorious Morales gang, speeding with its plunder to some refuge in
the rocky range across the farther valley.

Somewhere in the few evenings Drummond had spent in the garrisons of