The axles and springs of the springboard wagon were making noise enough to keep their voices from reaching the ears of any human being more than a dozen feet away.
Bad Pete was still about two hundred and fifty feet ahead, nor did he, as yet, give any sign whatever of having noted the vehicle.
Instead, he was leaning against a boulder at the turn in the road.

In his left hand he held a hand-rolled cigarette from which he took an occasional reflective puff as he looked straight ahead of him as though he were enjoying the scenery.

The road---trail---ran close along the edge of a sloping precipice.

Fully nine hundred feet below ran a thin line of silver, or so it appeared.

In reality it was what was left of the Snake River now, in July, nearly dried out.
Over beyond the gulch, for a mile or more, extended a rather flat, rock-strewn valley.