"That will take me a good while, but when I do find it, the trail will be so much larger and plainer that there will be no trouble about following it, but it will take me several days to do it, and it is going to be hard work.

I need all the time possible, so I guess it will be best to keep going all night." There was not so much amusement in this as he fancied, but he kept it up bravely for some two or three hours, during which he made good headway.
The walking was comparatively easy in the ravine, which was one of those openings encountered at intervals among the mountains in the West, and which are known under the name of passes.

In many places it would be utterly out of the question for parties to force their way through the chains but for these avenues, which nature has kindly furnished.
The moonlight was just sufficient to make the boy feel uneasy.

He could discern objects, although indistinctly, nearly a hundred yards away, and where the character of the gorge was continually shifting to a certain extent there was abundant play for the imagination.
He had been walking but a short time when he abruptly halted, under the impression that he had seen an Indian run across the gorge directly in front of him.

This caused a wilder throbbing of his heart, and another examination of his gun, which was loaded, as he had assured himself some time before, and ready at any time to do him one good turn, if no more.
"He wouldn't have skipped over in that style if he had known I was so near," was the reflection of the boy, as he sheltered himself in the shadow of the rocks and looked and listened.