They camped at a point where one enormous rock--a monster carried by ice and stranded here thousands of years ago--stood isolated in the middle of the way. Manuel Balda pitched Dyke’s tent and made the sleeping-place behind this rock, out of sight of the camp-fire and the men, very neatly and snugly. More silent than was his wont, but as efficient as ever, he carried out his customary duties, boiled their tea, gave them their supper.
The moon had risen high and was shedding its gentle radiance far and near, as Emmie and Dyke came round the broken angles of the big rock, and standing side by side, looked down at their little camp. All was peaceful; the familiar aspect of the nightly assemblage gave one a sense of comfort and security. The men lay huddled on the ground with saddles for pillows; the mules, some with shining moonlit coats, some dark and shadowy, were ranged behind their deposited burdens. In the profound silence one could hear the slightest movement, and a note of the bell as the madrina raised her head startled one by the sharpness of the sound. Beyond this one spot of animated existence the moonlight showed them the valley stretching away tenantless through its stone walls, like an unused passage in a dead world. There was no need to post sentries on guard; there were no living foes that could attack the camp. Dyke and Emmie went back behind their rock, and they too lay down to sleep.
Dyke woke at dawn, and mechanically groped for the revolver that from habit he kept within reach of his hand while sleeping. His hand did not encounter it. No doubt it lay buried in the blankets and the rugs. He crept from the tent, got upon his feet, stretched himself, and went yawning round the rock. Then he uttered a roar of anger.
The place was empty. The camp had vanished. Not a sign of man or beast was anywhere visible. Like Pedro del Sarto, he had been abandoned by his cowardly followers. As far as the eye could reach--and that was for many miles--the valley lay grey and void. Those scoundrels already had made good their escape from it; their resented intrusion no longer troubled its blackened heights and barren flats; it had swept them away with the deadly impalpable force that it contained. They were gone again, by the path on which they had dared to come; and Fear triumphant laughed in the sunlight above the deserted valley and lay down to rest in its shadowed depths.