He approached warily, riding slowly around the base of the butte as Sergeant Cassara had done. Dismounting, he threw the reins over his horse’s head and went forward alone, silently, foot by foot, fearing a stumble over a stone might attract the attention of some Indian sentinel and cause an alarm. He reached the edge of the precipice and looked down. Scores of fires were burning; scores of Indian warriors were dancing; the groups of teepees told how the savages had gathered, gentile and neophyte, for this attempt to drive white men from the coast country and reclaim the territory for their own. For several minutes the caballero watched the scene below, noting especially where a group of chiefs had gathered before a large wigwam as if for a conference. Then, fully determined, he slipped over the edge of the precipice and started down to the floor of the cañon, a perilous descent made more perilous by the fact that escape would be difficult if his presence were discovered. He reached the bottom, and for a time rested behind a clump of bushes, where the light from the fires did not penetrate, breathing heavily because of his exertion, listening to the chatter of a band of neophytes near--neophytes who already quarrelled regarding the division of certain goods in the mission storehouse. Forward again, toward the wigwam, keeping out of the light from the fires, going step by step and cautiously, now backing into the brush when he came across a slumbering hostile, now daring a nearer approach to the fires when the country made it necessary. He reached a jumble of rocks directly behind the wigwam, and stopped to rest again. He heard Indians shrieking in the distance, heard the sound of galloping hoofs, and saw riding down the line of fires the man he had warned the _comandante_ to watch. “Then I was right, after all,” the caballero said, and gripped his pistol for use in case of discovery. The chiefs were standing now, awaiting the approach of their white leader with evident courtesy, and one of them stepped forward and grasped the reins of the horse as he dismounted. An Indian took the horse away; the chiefs and their white leader sat down before the fire. “You have satisfaction, Señor Rocha?” one of the chiefs asked. “Things appear to be as I had wished,” was the reply. “We will attack to-morrow night, as we have planned. The men have all arrived?” “Except perhaps half a hundred who will be here by morning,” said a chief. “A scout came in some time ago, with the report that they are preparing for defence at the mission.” “Hah! Small good it will do them, except to cause us more annoyance.” “A soldier warned them, _señor_, it is said--a big soldier who belongs not to the presidio here, but at Santa Barbara.” “I know him; I expected as much. Do some of you remember this certain soldier when we attack, and take account of him. There has been nothing seen of the man who tricked you?”