Meanwhile the hours passed. As the sun climbed the clear, steely
lights vanished, the blue hazes deepened, and slowly the glistening
surfaces of lava turned redder. Ladd was concerned to discover that
Yaqui was missing from his outlook upon the high point. Jim Lash
came out of the shady crevice, and stood up to buckle on his
cartridge belt. His narrow, gray glance slowly roved from the
height of lava down along the slope, paused in doubt, and then
swept on to resurvey the whole vast eastern dip of the plateau.
"I reckon my eyes are pore," he said. "Mebbe it's this damn red
glare. Anyway, what's them creepin' spots up there?"
"Shore I seen them. Mountain sheep," replied Ladd.
"Guess again, Laddy. Dick, I reckon you'd better flash the glass
up the slope."
Gale adjusted the field glass and began to search the lava,
beginning close at hand and working away from him. Presently
the glass became stationary.
"I see half a dozen small animals, brown in color. They look like
sheep. But I couldn't distinguish mountain sheep from antelope."
"Shore they're bighorn," said Laddy.
"I reckon if you'll pull around to the east an' search under that
long wall of lava--there--you'll see what I see," added Jim.
The glass climbed and circled, wavered an instant, then fixed
steady as a rock. There was a breathless silence.
"Fourteen horses--two packed--some mounted--others without
riders, and lame," said Gale, slowly.
Yaqui appeared far up the trail, coming swiftly.
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