For many a minute she waited by that camp-fire, but there was never a sign of the builder of it, though she centered all her will in making her eyes and ears sharper to pierce through the darkness and to gather from the thousand obscure whispers of the forest any sounds of human origin.

So she grew bold at length to take off the pack and the saddles; the camp was hers, built for her coming by the invisible power which surrounded her, which read her mind, it seemed, and chose beforehand the certain route which she must follow.
She resigned herself to that force without question, and the worry of her search disappeared.

It seemed certain that this omnipotence, whatever it might be, was reading her wishes and acting with all its power to fulfill them, so that in the end it was merely a question of time before she should accomplish her mission--before she should meet Pierre le Rouge face to face.
That night her sleep was deep, indeed, and she only wakened when the slant light of the sun struck across her eyes.

It was a bright day, crisp and chill, and through the clear air the mountains seemed leaning directly above her, and chief of all two peaks, almost exactly similar, black monsters which ruled the range.

Toward the gorge between them the valley of the Old Crow aimed its course, and straight up that diminishing canyon she rode all day.
The broad, sandy bottom changed and contracted until the channel was scarcely wide enough for the meager stream of water, and beside it she picked her way along a narrow path with banks on either side, which became with every mile more like cliffs, walling her in and dooming her to a single destination.
It was evening before she came to the headwaters of the Old Crow, and rode out into the gorge between the two mountains.