"El Capitan may have taken them all captives, or butchered them in cold blood."
"There is nothing to show that violence has been done them. The huts are simply deserted, just as if the owners had been called suddenly away for a brief absence."
"True, Sergeant Rand. Shall we stop here a while or push on toward the next place?"
"We have no time to waste at this stage of action," replied the energetic young American. "Let's move on into the country of the insurgents. We can learn nothing by keeping away from them. The day will soon be breaking."
"_Si_, sergeant; I am at your command. We will climb the hill back of us, and then turn to the right. At the top of the hill I think a call will bring our comrades."
"The safer call is to go to them. I will wait on the hill while you are gone."
From the vantage he had gained where he waited for his companions to rejoin him, Ronie obtained a wide sweep of the surrounding country, a view he knew was likely to prove of great value to him in his future actions. He could not follow, even in the pale light of the western moon, which was beginning to lose its glory before the coming of the new light on the eastern horizon, the trend of the mountain ranges as he had not been able to do before. He was really in the region of a distinct offshoot of mountains from those that lead away from the greatest mountain chain on the globe, the mighty Andes. The mountain system which crosses Venezuela in this district is an offset from the eastern Cordillera, and runs down to the Caribbean Sea in irregular conformity with the eastern shore of the Lake of Maracaibo. From this chain the Venezuelan system of two ranges, running almost side by side, extends toward the east, the most northerly branch, which follows quite closely to the seashore culminating in the Island of Trinidad. As he looked down upon it in the still morning atmosphere, the whole panorama of country appeared like a solid mass of forest, uneven, it is true, but unbroken by the hand of man. The intense silence which had hung over deserted Caro was intensified here, so that it became oppressive. Ronie could not fully throw off this spirit of utter loneliness which weighed down his very soul, so that he exclaimed involuntarily, in an undertone: