maraud; their objective point the towns on the Horcasitas.
Just now, however, as they sight the Cerro, another question occupies them: whether it be prudent or possible to continue on to it without halting for the night. Some say Yes, but most No. It is still good twenty miles off, though appearing scarce ten. In the diaphanous atmosphere of the Sonora tableland distances are deceptive, as Pedro Vicente has said. But the native inhabitants, above all the aborigines, are aware of this, and reckon accordingly. Besides, the Coyoteros, like the gambusino, have been over the ground before, and are familiar with every foot of it. So distance has nought to do with their discussion, save as it affects the capability of their horses. Since morning they have made fifty miles, and are fagged; twenty more would be killing work for them. And the twenty to Nauchampa-tepetl will be a nice distance to their next day’s noon halt.
The question of continuing on is at length decided in the negative, by him of the grotesque heraldry dropping down from his horse, and proceeding to picket the animal on the grass. As his example has the force of a command, all the others follow it, and camp is quickly formed. A simple affair this; only the tethering out of their steeds, and stripping them of such caparison as they carry. Then follows a search for dry faggots, and the kindling of a fire; not for warmth, but cooking. There is a bit of butchering to precede; these redskinned rovers having their commissariat on the hoof – this in the shape of some spare horses driven along en caballada. A knife drawn across the throat of one lets his blood out in a torrent, and he drops down dead, – to be skinned and cut up in a trice, the pieces impaled upon sticks and held over the blaze of the fire.
But the hippophagists avail themselves of other comestibles of a vegetable kind; seeds from the cones of the piñon, or edible pine, and beans of the algarobia– trees of both sorts growing near. Enough of both are collected and roasted, to form an accompaniment to the horseflesh.
Fruit they find too on several species of cactus; the best of them on the pitahaya, whose tall rigid stems, with limbs like the branches of a candelabrum, tower up around their camp. So, in the desert – for it is such – they are enabled to end their dinner with dessert. To provide something for breakfast besides, a viand rare and strange, but familiar to them, a branch of their tribe – the “Mezcaleros” – making it their staple food, even to deriving their tribal appellation from it. For it is the mezcal plant, one of the wild species of magueys (Agave Mexicana). The central core, from which radiate the stiff spinous blades, is the part eaten, and the mode of preparing it is now made manifest in the Coyotero camp. Several plants are torn out by the roots, their leaves hacked off, and the skin of the core itself cut away – leaving an egg-shaped mass of white vegetable substance, large as a man’s head, or a monster mangold-wurzel. Meanwhile, a hole has been “crowed” in the ground, pit-shaped, its sides fended by flat stones, with a like pavement at the bottom. Into this red coals are flung, nigh enough to fill it; an interval allowed for these to smoulder into ashes, and the stones become burning hot. The mezcals, already wrapped up in the horse’s skin late stripped off, red side inward, along with some loose pieces of the flesh, and the bundle is lowered down into the improvised oven, then all covered over with a coat of turf. Thus buried it is left to bake all night, and in the morning will afford them a meal Lucullus need not have disdained to partake of.
The Coyoteros, well sure of this, go to sleep contentedly and without care; each rolled-up in his own wrap, his couch the naked earth, canopied by a star-bespangled sky.
In that uninhabited and pathless wilderness, or with paths only known to themselves, they have little fear of encountering an enemy; and as little dream they that within less than two hours’ gallop of their camping-ground is another camp occupied by the foes of their race, too few to resist their attack. Knew they but this, there would be a quick uprising among them, a hasty springing to horse, and hurried ride towards Nauchampa-tepetl.
Chapter Three.
A Rush for Water
Meanwhile, with many a crack of whip and cry of “Anda!” “Mula maldita!” the miners have been toiling on towards the Lost Mountain. At slow pace, a crawl; for their animals, jaded and distressed by the long-endured thirst, have barely strength enough left to drag the wagons after them. Even the pack-mules totter under their loaded alparejas.
Viewing the eminence from the place where they had pulled up, the mine labourers, like the Englishman, had been inclined to doubt the guide’s allegation as to the distance. Men whose lives are for the most part spent underground, are as sailors ashore when above it, oddly ignorant of things on the surface, save what may be learnt inside a liquor saloon. Hence their unbelief in Vicente’s statement was altogether natural. But the mule and cattle-drivers knew better, and that the gambusino was not deceiving them.
All come to this conclusion ere long, a single hour sufficing to convince them of their mistake; at the end of which, though moving continuously on, and making the best speed in their power, the mountain seems far off as ever. And when a second hour has elapsed, the diminution of distance is barely perceptible.
The sun is low down – almost touching the horizon – as they get near enough to the Cerro to note its peculiar features; for peculiar these are. Of oblong form it is; and, viewed sideways, bears resemblance to a gigantic catafalque or coffin, its top level as the lid. Not smooth, however, the horizontal line being broken by trees and bushes that stand in shaggy silhouette against the blue background of sky. At all points it presents a façade grim and precipitous, here and there enamelled by spots and streaks of verdure, wherever ledge or crevice gives plants of the scandent kind an opportunity to strike root. It is about a mile in length, trending nearly north and south, having a breadth of about half this; and in height some five hundred feet. Not much for a mountain, but enough to make it a conspicuous object, visible at a great distance off over that smooth expanse of plain. All the more from its standing solitary and alone; no other eminence within view of it, neither sierra nor spur; so looking as if strayed and lost– hence the quaint appellation it bears.
“At which end is the lake, Señor Vicente?” asks the elder Tresillian, as they are wending their way towards it; he, with Don Estevan and the guide, as before, being in advance of the wagon train.
“The southern and nearer one, your worship. And luckily for us it is so. If it were at the other end, we’d still have a traverse of a league at least before reaching it.”
“How’s that? I’ve heard that the Cerro is only a mile in length.”
“True, señor, that’s all. But there are rocks strewn over the llano below, for hundreds of yards out, and so thick we couldn’t take the wagons through them. I suppose they must have fallen from the cliffs, but how they got scattered so far, that puzzles me, though rocks have been the study of my life.”
“So they have, Pedro,” put in Don Estevan. “And you’ve studied them to some purpose. But let us not enter into a geological discussion now. I feel more concerned about something else.”
“About what, your worship?”
“Some memory tells me that Indians are accustomed to visit the Cerro Perdido. Though I can see no sign of human being about it, who knows but there might be?”
This is said after examination of the plain all along the base of the mountain through a field-glass, which Don Estevan habitually carries on his person.
“Therefore,” he continues, “I think it advisable that some five or six ride ahead – those who are best mounted – and make sure that the coast is clear. In case of redskins being there in any formidable numbers, the knowledge of it in time will enable us to form corral, and so better defend ourselves should we be attacked.”
Before becoming a master miner, Don Estevan
