Venters warmed to greater admiration of the sorrel;
and, giving him a loose bridle, he stepped down foot by foot.
Oftentimes the stones and shale started by Wrangle buried Venters
to his knees; again he was hard put to it to dodge a rolling
boulder, there were times when he could not see Wrangle for dust,
and once he and the horse rode a sliding shelf of yellow,
weathered cliff. It was a trail on which there could be no stops,
and, therefore, if perilous, it was at least one that did not
take long in the descent.
Venters breathed lighter when that was over, and felt a sudden
assurance in the success of his enterprise. For at first it had
been a reckless determination to achieve something at any cost,
and now it resolved itself into an adventure worthy of all his
reason and cunning, and keenness of eye and ear.
Pinyon pines clustered in little clumps along the level floor of
the pass. Twilight had gathered under the walls. Venters rode
into the trail and up the canyon. Gradually the trees and caves
and objects low down turned black, and this blackness moved up
the walls till night enfolded the pass, while day still lingered
above. The sky darkened; and stars began to show, at first pale
and then bright. Sharp notches of the rim-wall, biting like teeth
into the blue, were landmarks by which Venters knew where his
camping site lay. He had to feel his way through a thicket of
slender oaks to a spring where he watered Wrangle and drank
himself.
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