When the permeating softness suddenly yielded to full transparency, spreading from the fanfare of the rising sun come bolt above the range, and the mist rose, she left the road at sight of two ponies and a burro in a group, their heads together in drooping fellowship.  She knew them at once for P.D., Wrath of God, and Jag Ear.  Nearby rose a thin spiral of smoke and back of it was a huddled figure, Firio, preparing the morning meal.  Animals and servant were as motionless as the cactus.  Evidently they did not hear her footsteps.  They formed a picture of nightly oblivion, unconscious that day had come.  Firio’s face was hidden by his big Mexican hat; he did not look up even when she was near.  She noted the two blanket-rolls where the two comrades of the trail had slept.  She saw that both were empty and knew that Jack had already gone.

“Where is Mr. Wingfield?” she demanded, breathlessly.

Firio was not startled.  To be startled was hardly in his Indian nature.  The hat tipped upward and under the brim-edge his black eyes gleamed, as the sandy soil all around him gleamed in the dew.  He shrugged his shoulders when he recognized the lady speaking as the one who had delayed him at the foot of the pass the previous afternoon.  Thanks to her, he had been left alone without his master the whole evening.

“He go to stretch his legs,” answered Firio.

Apparently, Sir Chaps had been disinclined to disturb the routine of camp by telling Firio anything about the duel.

“Where did he go?  In which direction?” Mary persisted.

Firio moved the coffee-pot closer to the fire.  This seemed to require the concentration of all his faculties, including that of speech.  He was a fit servant for one who took duels so casually.

“Where?  Where?” she repeated.

“Where?  Have you no tongue?” snapped Ignacio.

Firio gazed all around as if looking for Jack; then nodded in the direction of rising ground which broke at the edge of a depression about fifty yards away.  Her impatience had made the delay of a minute seem hours, while the brilliance of the light had now become that of broad day.  She forgot all constraint.  She ran, and as she ran she listened for a shot as if it were something inevitable, past due.

And then she uttered a muffled cry of relief, as the scene in a depression which had been the bed of an ancient river flashed before her with theatric completeness.  In the bottom of it were five men, two moving and three stationary.  Jim Galway and Ropey Smith were walking side by side, keeping a measured step as they paced off a certain distance, while Bill Lang and Pete Leddy and Jack stood by.  Leddy and Lang were watching the process inflexibly.  Jack was in the costume which had flushed her curiosity so vividly on the pass and he appeared the same amused, disinterested and wondering traveller who had then come upon strange doings.