He saw that his path was converging with theirs, so he spurred Kidnapper 
forward at a hand-gallop, hoping to reach the intersection of the roads before 
it was clogged by this column of refugees. Kidnapper outdistanced them easily, 
but to no avail; when he reached the intersection, he found it
had been seized by the column's vanguard, which had established a roadblock 
there and would not let him pass.