"No good my grieving over it now. Regrets won't get her back. There
may be another opportunity yet. If I live there shall be, though it
cost me all my life to bring it about."
Another pause spent reflecting what he ought to do next. He has still
some fear of being followed by Sime Woodley. Endeavouring to dismiss
it, he mutters:--
"'Tisn't at all likely they'd find the way up here. They appeared to be
afoot. I saw no horses. They might have them for all that. But they
can't tell which way I took through the timber, and anyhow couldn't
track me till after daylight. Before then Borlasse will certainly be
along. Just possible he may come across Woodley and his lot. They'll
be sure to make for the Mission, and take the road up t'other side. A
good chance of our fellows encountering them, unless that begging fool,
Bosley, has let all out. Maybe they killed him on the spot? I didn't
hear the end of it, and hope they have."
With this barbarous reflection he discontinues his soliloquy, bethinking
himself, how he may best pass the time till his comrades come on. At
first he designs alighting, and lying down: for he has been many hours
in the saddle, and feels fatigued. But just as he is about to dismount,
it occurs to him the place is not a proper one. Around the summit of
the pass, the plain is without a stick of timber, not even a bush to
give shade or concealment, and of this last he now begins to recognise
the need. For, all at once, he recalls a conversation with Borlasse, in
which mention was made of Sime Woodley; the robber telling of his having
been in Texas before, and out upon the San Saba--the very place where
now seen! Therefore, the backwoodsman will be acquainted with the
locality, and may strike for the trail he has himself taken. He
remembers Sime's reputation as a tracker; he no longer feels safe. In
the confusion of his senses, his fancy exaggerates his fears, and he
almost dreads to look back across the bottom-land.
Thus apprehensive, he turns his eyes towards the plain, in search of a
better place for his temporary bivouac, or at all events a safer one.
He sees it. To the right, and some two or three hundred yards off is a
_motte_ of timber, standing solitary on the otherwise treeless expanse.
It is the grove of black-jacks, where Hawkins and Tucker halted that
same afternoon.
"The very place!" says Richard Darke to himself, after scrutinising it.
"There I'll be safe every way; can see without being seen. It commands
a view of the pass, and, if the moon keep clear, I'll be able to tell
who comes up, whether friends or foes."
Saying this, he makes for the _motte_.
Reaching it, he dismounts, and, drawing the rein over his horse's head,
leads the animal in among the trees.
At a short distance from the grove's edge is a glade. In this he makes
stop, and secures the horse, by looping the bridle around a branch.
He has a tin canteen hanging over the horn of his saddle, which he lifts
off. It is a large one,--capable of holding a half-gallon. It is three
parts full, not of water, but of whisky. The fourth part he has drunk
during the day, and earlier hours of the night, to give him courage for
the part he had to play. He now drinks to drown his chagrin at having
played it so badly. Cursing his crooked luck, as he calls it, he takes
a swig of the whisky, and then steps back to the place where he entered
among the black-jacks. There taking stand, he awaits the coming of his
confederates.
He keeps his eyes upon the summit of the pass. They cannot come up
without his seeing them, much less go on over the plain.
They must arrive soon, else he will not be able to see them. For he has
brought the canteen along, and, raising it repeatedly to his lips, his
sight is becoming obscured, the equilibrium of his body endangered.
As the vessel grows lighter, so does his head; while his limbs refuse to
support the weight of his body, which oscillates from side to side.
At length, with an indistinct perception of inability to sustain himself
erect, and a belief he would feel better in a recumbent attitude, he
gropes his way back to the glade, where, staggering about for a while,
he at length settles down, dead drunk. In ten seconds he is asleep, in
slumber so profound, that a cannon shot--even the voice of Simeon
Woodley--would scarce awake him.