Shrieks of surprise and fear rolled from a hundred throats. The group about the first fire scattered; the horse kicked the embers in the faces of the gentiles. Down the line of fires the caballero rode like a madman, hurling Indians right and left, while behind the chiefs, realising what he was doing, yelled orders to take him, screamed for horsemen to go in pursuit, called for weapons. Pistols exploded, bullets whistled past him as he rode. Unscathed he reached the darkness and dashed down the valley, while the hoofs of hard-ridden ponies pounded in pursuit. He fired his pistol in the face of an Indian sentinel who would have sprung at the horse’s head--and then he rode madly, blindly, trusting to the sure-footedness of the steed he bestrode. The animal took the backward track, half maddened with fear and gunning like the wind. The caballero bent low over the beast’s neck and let reins fall free. He did not fear being overtaken, but he did not know what was ahead. Soldiers sought him--dead or alive. Indians would slay him without hesitation now, fearful he would use treachery against them. El Camino Real was watched. Rancho owners were on the alert for him. He was an outlaw in truth, and in a strange country. Mile after mile he rode, until his horse began to stagger in its stride, and then, emerging from the mouth of a cañon he saw lights in the distance and stopped to reconnoitre. The wash of the sea came to his ears. The horse had circled the valley--and the lights ahead were in the presidio. “Now I _am_ cut off,” quoth the caballero, “from the society of all persons, both reputable and disreputable! Riding alone, however, I shall not be hindered by the opinions of followers. And--by all the saints!--I have much work to do!” CHAPTER XI AT THE PRESIDIO Not a light showed in the Indian huts of tide and straw that clustered near the presidio. From behind the walls came no whisperings of conspiracy, no cries of children in their dreams, no mumblings of women. Since nightfall they had been slipping away down the coast and back into the hills--the men to hurry to their camps, women and children to seek refuge in the wilderness until the war should be over--exactly as they had done in every uprising since the coming of Serra and his coadjutors. Even the mangy curs that generally infested the road were gone, and so there was none to bark and snap at the heels of the caballero as he made his way slowly toward the presidio, walking silently, holding the scabbard of his sword so it would not strike against boot or spur, stopping every few yards to peer into the night, to listen for some sound above the wash of the sea that would apprise him of the nearness of danger.