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Published by Henry Holt & Company, New York
Copyright 1967, Fourth Printing October 1968
Library of Congress Catalog Card 67-18990
There is less than a month's grass left on the drought stricken Argentine estancia and the 250 Arabian horses face starvation if something isn't done. Thirteen year old Martin has been training all his life to be the Segundo, the man who helps break horses and now, because of the drought, there is no glory in his first domo. The horses will die anyhow. His uncle Epifanio, the great domodor, tells of a pass over the Andes to abundant grass, impassable since an earthquake years ago. Martin and his two friends decide to take the horses over this pass if they can. They plot and plan. In a moment of utter desperation the men agree to let the boys and Uncle Epifanio try the impossible.
So three boys and an old gaucho begin the historic horse drive that tests every bit of Epifanio's experience and skill as well as the strength, intelligence, and instincts of the horsewise Martin and his friends. They are hardly a day out of the estancia when a puma starts stalking them, picking off a stray colt during a storm when the horses stampede and they lose Uncle Epifanio and Martin's horse for a day and a night. They must poultice many scraped horses and the puma still stalks, tantalized by the smell of wounded horses. On a second try, Martin finally kills the puma. Then Epifanio must fight like a gaucho with his knife to gain them beds and desperately needed fodder and and water at the Condor Inn, last stop before'the unexplored high pass they may or may not be able to find a way to cross with 250 horses. Each of the three boys is changed and formed by the trip and by his relationship with the gaucho Epifanio.
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