deepened. The boisterous song of the creek be{48}came a sullen growl. The mountain walls seemed to close in. The stars above the peaks and ridges were lonely and far away. The camp fire, so tiny in the gloom, burned low.
{48}
The sleeping man groaned and stirred uneasily as if in pain, and a fox that had crept too close slipped away in startled flight. The man cried out in his sleep, and a coyote that was following the scent of the camp up the wind turned aside to slink into the thicket of mesquite. The man awoke and springing to his feet stood as if at bay, and a buck that was feeding not far away lifted his antlered head to listen with wary alertness. From somewhere on the heights came the cry of a mountain lion, and at the sound the night was suddenly as still as death. The man shuddered and quickly threw more wood on the dying fire. Again he lay down to cower in his blankets—to sleep restlessly—and to dream his troubled dreams.
In the first faint light of the morning, a dark form might have been seen moving stealthily down the mountain above the stranger’s camp. The buck, with a snort of fear, leaped away, crashing through the brush. The prowling coyote fled down the cañon. On every side the wild creatures of the night slunk into the dense covers of manzanita and buckthorn and cat-claw.
Silently, as the gray shadows through which he crept, Natachee the Indian drew near the place where the white man lay. From behind a near-by bush the Indian observed every detail of the camp.{49} When the form wrapped in the blanket did not stir, the Indian stole from his sheltering screen and with soft-footed, noiseless movements, inspected the stranger’s outfit. He even bent over the sleeping man to see his face. The man moved—tossing an arm and muttering. Swift as a fox the Indian slipped away; silent as a ghost he disappeared among the bushes.
{49}
The gray of the morning sky changed to saffron and rose and flaming red. The shadowy trees and bushes assumed definite shapes. The detail of the rocks emerged from the gloom. The man awoke.
He had just finished breakfast when he heard the sound of horse’s hoofs on the road. With a startled cry he leaped to his feet. The Lizard was riding toward him.
Like a hunted creature the man drew back, half crouching, as if to escape. But it was too late. Pale and trembling he stood waiting as the horseman drew up beside the road, on the bank above the
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