Benito observed them with a covert interest. A black-browed man with a
shaggy beard and something leonine about him, seemed the master of the
chief of this godless band. He moved among them, giving orders, and with
two companions finally ascended to the top. Benito, concealing himself
behind a scrub oak, watched them, animatedly conversing, as they
descended and picked their way inland toward the Square. So swift their
movements and so low their tones he could not make out the tenor of
their discourse. He caught the words, "like tow," but that was all.
Musingly, he went on.
Up the broad and muddy path to Market street, thence west again to
Third, he made his way. Now south to Mission and once more west, a
favored route for caballeros. Benito had never traveled it before afoot.
But his horse had succumbed to the rigors of that frantic ride in
pursuit of Alice and McTurpin several months ago. Mounts were a
luxury now.
He skirted the edge of a lagoon that stretched from Sixth to Eighth
streets and on the ascent beyond observed a tiny box-like habitation,
brightly painted, ringed with flowers and crowned with an imposing
flagpole from which floated the Star-Spangled Banner.
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