bone, were quite bare,
though now it was a time of year when the nights at least were very
cool and when freezing weather might come at any time. He was clad
lightly as ever, in torn cotton garb, and carried no bedding save a
narrow strip of native woollen fabric, woven of undyed wool and so
loose of texture that one might thrust a finger through at any point of
its scant extent. He bore no weapon save the huge knife swinging at
his belt. Fastened to the same girdle was a hide bag or pouch, half
full of parched corn, rudely pounded. Expressionless, mute, untiring,
the colossal figure strode along, like some primordial creature in whom
a human soul had not yet found home. Yet, with an intelligence and
confidence which was more than human, he ran without hesitation the
trail of the unshod horse across this wide, hard plain, where even the
eye of the cowboy could rarely discern it. Now and then the print of
the hoof might show in the soft earth of some prairie-dog burrow; then
perhaps for an hour Juan would walk on, his eye fixed apparently upon
some far-off point of the horizon as upon the ground, until finally
they would note the same hoof-print again and know again that the
instinct of the wild guide had not failed.

The Mexican was running the back trail of the horse of Cal Greathouse,
the missing ranchman, and it was very early seen that the horse had not
returned over the route taken by Greathouse when he started out. He
had gone along the valley of the Smoky River, whereas the course of the
loose animal had been along the chord of a wide arc made by the valley
of that stream, a course much shorter and easier to traverse, as it
evaded a part of that rough country known as the breaks of the Smoky, a
series of gullies and "draws" running from the table-land down to the
deep little river bed. All along the stream, at ragged intervals, grew
scattered clumps of cottonwoods and other trees, so that at a long
distance the winding course of the little river could be traced with
ease. The afternoon of the first day brought the travellers well
within, view of this timber line, but the rough country along the
stream was not yet reached when they were forced to quit the trail and
make their rough bivouac for the night.

There was a curious feeling of certainty in Franklin's mind, as they
again took saddle for the journey, that the end of the quest was not
far distant, and that its nature was predetermined. Neither he