repeatedly expressed her doubts as to the road, and Coronado had as often
asserted that they would soon see the train. At last the ravine became a
gully, winding up a breast of shadowy mountain cumbered with loose rocks,
and impassable to horses.

"We are lost," confessed Coronado, and then proceeded to console her. The
train could not be far off; their friends would undoubtedly seek them; at
all events, would not go on without them. They must bivouac there as well
as might be, and in the morning rejoin the caravan.

He had been forethoughted enough to bring two blankets on his saddle, and
he now spread them out for her, insisting that she should try to sleep.
Clara cried frankly and heartily, and begged him to lead her back through
the cañon. No; it could not be traversed by night, he asserted; they would
certainly break their necks among the bowlders. At last the girl suffered
herself to be wrapped in the blankets, and made an endeavor to forget her
wretchedness and vexation in slumber.

Meantime, a few hundred yards down the ravine, a tragedy was on the verge
of action. Thurstane, missing Coronado and Clara, and learning what
direction they had taken, started with two of his soldiers to find them,
and was now picking his way on foot along the cañon. Behind a detached
rock at the base of one of the sandstone walls Texas Smith lay in ambush,
aiming his rifle first at one and then at another of this stumbling trio,
and cursing the starlight because it was so dim that he could not
positively distinguish which was the officer.