I came to the summit without overtaking them

Too Long; Didn't Read

I came to the summit without overtaking them, but I could tell from the trail that they were not far ahead of me. The canyon trail is very winding and there is a great deal of brush, so that oftentimes a horseman a score of yards ahead of you is out of sight and the noise of your own mount’s passage drowns that of the others. For this reason I did not know, as long as I was in the canyon, how close I might be to them; but when I reached the summit it was different. Then I could see farther in all directions. The murderers were not in sight upon the great highway of the ancients, and I rode swiftly to where the trail drops down upon the north side of the mountains to the great valley that I had seen the day before. There are fewer trees and lower brush upon this side, and below me I could see the trail at intervals as it wound downward and as I looked, I saw the first of a party of horsemen come into sight around the shoulder of a hill as they made their way down into the canyon.