The distant gobbling of turkeys was a sound that awakened no suspicions, the more so as it grew fainter and fainter, receding in the direction of the higher crests and peaks.

Neither were the numerous crows a source of uneasiness to him.

On every clearing these birds gravely promenaded by half-dozens together, and his cautious gliding across such exposed places did not in the least discommode the dusky company.

As soon as Topanashka came in sight of the trail again he kept near it, but to its left, gliding from tree to tree or creeping across clear expanses from shrub to shrub.

He therefore moved more slowly than the Tehua whom he was pursuing.
In this manner he had advanced for quite a while, always keeping an eye on the trail to his right, when he caught sight of a suspicious object lying directly in the path, where the latter was barely more than a faint streak across the thin grass that grows sometimes on the plateaus in bunches.