Always chary of speech, they became almost silence itself as they drew nearer to San Antonio de Bexar.

In the heart of each was a knowledge of the great tragedy, not surmise, but the certainty that acute intelligence deduces from facts.
They rode on until, by a simultaneous impulse, the two reined their horses back into a cypress thicket and waited.

They had seen three horsemen on the sky line, coming, in the main, in their direction.

Their trained eyes noticed at once that the strangers were of varying figure.
The foremost, even at the distance, seemed to be gigantic, the second was very long and thin, and the third was normal.

Smith and Karnes watched them a little while, and then Karnes spoke in words of true conviction.
"It would be hard, Deaf, for even a bad eye to mistake the foremost." "Right you are, Hank.