CHAPTER VI.
THE AVENGERS ARE DELAYED.
After an hour’s hard riding, the avengers came upon the body of a steer lying in the trail.
The sight of the beast’s carcass seemed to madden the owner of the Double Cross ranch.
“Look at that steer!” he yelled. “Never was a better beef grazed the plains! And here it lies, dead from being driven to death! Curse the fiends!I’ll make them suffer for raiding my cattle and then running them to death!After them, boys, don’t dally to examine, the steer!”
“Easy, Sam, easy,” returned Sandy. “We’ll get ’em, don’t worry. But it won’t do any harm to look at the crittur. A few minutes won’t make any difference, and we can tell from the heat of the body about how far the lifters are ahead of us.”
Scarce a moment after the foreman had voiced this suggestion was it before Deadshot was on the ground.
Still smarting under the sarcasm of his boss over his failure to pick out the horse tracks when they struck the trail, the cowboy had no sooner gained the side of the prostrate steer than he was upon the mesquite. And, even as Sandy spoke, with skilled hands, he was running over the hide.
Eagerly the others awaited his verdict as to the time the animal had been lying there.
But Deadshot spoke never a word.
“Well?” snapped his master, unable to restrain his impatience when several minutes had passed and the cowboy had not voiced his opinion.
“The body’s cold, Sam. But it ain’t stone cold.”
“Which means we’ve got some tall riding to do if we expect to overhaul the ornery cusses before they lose themselves in the swamp,” commented Pinky.
“That shows how muchyouknow,” retorted the ranchman. “We’re a good twenty mile from the home corral, which is about half way to the bottoms, according to Deadshot, and the steer is cold. Consequently, the rest of the bunch must have passed here a good six hours ago. No man, unless he had wings, could overtake the cowlifters before they reached Sangammon, eh, Sandy?”
“Reckon you’ve got it about right, Sam,” returned his foreman. “The raiders had all of six hours start, and judging from the condition of this steer, here, they’re running the critturs to the limit. If that animal ain’t thirty pound poorer than when he left the corral, I don’t know anything about cattle.”
“Then you think we haven’t gained on them?” demanded Bowser, anxiously.
“None to speak of.”
“And, what’s more, we won’t be able to cut down enough of their lead to make it worth while to kill our ponies trying to,” interposed Deadshot. “Sandy’s telling it straight when he says the devils are running the steers for all they can. If we don’t come across more than half of them before we get to the swamps, I’ll miss my guess.”
A moment the ranchman pondered over these opinions.
“That being the case, then, there’s no use of keeping to the trail,” he finally exclaimed.
“Why not?” demanded the others, surprised at the words as they remembered their boss’s vow.
“Because we’ve got to go over to Henry Hawks’ and get him to send some of his men to guard Sarah and what’s left of my cattle in the corral.”
“And if you’ll take my advice, you’ll get old Hen to join us with a couple or so of his boys,” asserted Deadshot. “Rounding up these lifters ain’t going to be any child’s play—especially when they’re hiding in the swamps!”
“Righto,” rejoined Bowser. “The more of us, the better. Come on, every jump we take along this trail now is leading us farther from the Star and Moon. By striking for it now, we ought to reach Hen’s in time for dinner.”
Accordingly, the avengers abandoned for the time being the trail made by the cattle thieves, and, turning their ponies straight for the South, set out to obtain protection for the lone woman left on the Double Cross home ranch and reinforcements to their own numbers,that they might the more quickly run the miscreants to cover.
The tax upon their ponies incurred by galloping through the tall grass and sagebrush was greater than in following the cattle track and, in consequence, their speed was less. Notwithstanding that handicap, however, they made fairly good time, and the sun was directly overhead when they cantered into the yard of the Star and Moon home ranch.
At the sound of the rapid hoofbeats, Mrs. Hawks came to the door.
“Well, Sam Bowser, if I’m not glad to see you,” she exclaimed, cordially, as soon as she made out the identity of the riders. “Put your ponies in the corral and come right in. You’re just in time for dinner. I guess I’ve got enough, if I haven’t, I can mighty soon get it. I’m——”
Believing that the woman’s volubility would soon wear itself out, Bowser had waited for her to pause of her own accord. But when, after extending her hearty invitation for the riders to come in and eat, she started on a fresh tack, the ranchman decided to interrupt.
“Isn’t Hen home?” he asked, the failure of the man to appear suggesting the far from welcome idea.
“No. He and the boys have been gone three days driving in the cattle for shipping. I expect him back this afternoon, though. He said it wouldn’t be more than three days at the longest.” Then, noting the look of disappointment that her words brought to her neighbor’s face, she asked hastily: “There isn’t anything wrong, is there? Nothing’s happened to Sarah?”
“Sarah’s all right; at least, she was when we left at daybreak. But some ornery cowlifters got into my home corral last night and made off with fifty head.” And briefly he told Mrs. Hawks the uncanny circumstances of the raid.
With eyes growing bigger at each word, the good woman listened to the account of the mysterious spectre.
“Sakes alive! and you’ve left Sarah alone with that thing liable to drop in on her any minute?” she exclaimed, in consternation. “If I were she, I wouldn’t stay there by myself a minute. No, sir, not a single minute. It isn’t fair of you to make her, Sam. I’d just like to see Henry Hawks leave me alone under such conditions.”
This vigorous scolding for failure to afford protection to his wife shamed the owner of the Double Cross, and hot flushes glowed beneath his weather-tanned face as he strove to excuse himself.
“That’s just what I came over here for,” he stammered. “I wanted Hen to let me have a couple of his boys so’s I could use mine to trail the raiders.”
“It makes no difference what you intended to do,” declared Mrs. Hawks. “You men are all alike. You seem to think that we women can take care of ourselves, no matter what happens. And, as though it weren’t enough to make us live way out in the plains, you go and leave us whenever you feel like it. If I were Sarah, I’d let you know what I thought of such treatment, especially with a spook hanging about.”
“Well, thank goodness, you’re not Sarah,” muttered Bowser under his breath, though aloud he said: “To tell the truth, Amy, I was so riled up over being tricked the way I was that the only thing I thought of was getting on the lifters’ trail. But, after what you’ve said, I see it wasn’t just right toward Sarah.
“Pinky, cut out one of Hen’s ponies from the corral and ride back to the ranch just as fast as you can travel. Remember, I shall ask how long it took you when I get home,” he added, noting the look of disappointment and anger that spread over his cowboy’s face at the instructions.
But Pinky knew that orders were orders, especially when delivered by the owner of the Double Cross ranch, and, without any ado, wheeled his pony, rode over to the corral, picked out one of the Star and Moon bronchos and without as much as a glance toward his grinning bunkmates, dashed from the yard.
Yet, to himself, the cowboy was telling in no uncertain words or polite language what he thought of “meddling old women.” And, so many were his ideas upon the subject, that he was still intent upon expressing his opinion when he reined into the yard of the Double Cross, some three hours later.