III.


Shortly after sunset on this same hot evening the sergeant in charge
of the little signal-party at the Picacho came strolling forth from
his tent puffing at a battered brier-root pipe. Southward and a few
hundred feet below his perch the Yuma road came twisting through the
pass, and then disappeared in the gathering darkness across the desert
plain that stretched between them and the distant Santa Maria. Over to
the east the loftiest crags of the Christobal were still faintly
tinged by the last touch of departed day. Southward still, beyond the
narrow and tortuous pass, the range rose high and precipitous, covered
and fringed with black masses of cedar, stunted pine, and juniper.
North of west, on the line of the now invisible road, and far out
towards the Gila, a faint light was just twinkling. There lay
Ceralvo's, and nowhere else, save where the embers of the cook fire
still glowed in a deep crevice among the rocks, was there light of any
kind to be seen. A lonely spot was this in which to spend one's days,
yet the soldier in charge seemed in no wise oppressed with sense of
isolation. It was his comrade, sitting moodily on a convenient rock,
elbows on knees and chin deep buried in his brown and hairy hands, who
seemed brooding over the desolation of his surroundings.

Watching him in silence a moment, a quiet smile of amusement on his
lips, Sergeant Wing sauntered over and placed a friendly hand on the
broad blue shoulder.