So it is nothing to the discredit of the boy ranchers that they and their friends were distanced in the first wild rush following the discovery and alarm.

"Come on!" cried Bud. "Come on!" and he and d.i.c.k for the moment were in the lead, the canyon being wide enough, here, for several to ride abreast. "We've got to get 'em!"

"And we won't stop until we do!" added his cousin.

But they reckoned not with the roughness of the way, the start the rustlers had, their fresher horses and the fact that Del Pinzo and his crowd were more familiar with the trail than were the boy ranchers. So though our heroes rode on as fast as they could go with comparative safety, they did not, for some time at least, again come within sight of the enemy.

"Wait there! Hold on a little!" finally called Slim to Bud, d.i.c.k and Nort, who, in their youthful and natural eagerness, had forged to the front in a bunch. "Pull up! This isn't a hundred yard dash! It's going to be a long race!"

Bud was beginning to believe this, and some of his first exuberance was disappearing. He was getting more cool-headed.

"Let's take it a bit easy," he said to Nort and d.i.c.k. "I guess we've got a long trail to follow."

"But we've got to get 'em!" declared d.i.c.k.

"You got rid of something that time!" commented his brother, meaningly, if slangily. "We're going to make 'em give back our cattle!"

"Say!" suddenly cried Bud. "That's the queer part of it! Where are the steers?"

And for the first time it occurred to the minds of the boy ranchers that of that quarry they had come most in search of they had had not a glimpse. Not a steer was in sight!

Something of the amazement they felt must have been depicted on their faces, for when Slim rode up to where the boy ranchers had halted he asked:

"What's the matter?"

"Where are the cattle?" asked Bud, shouting almost as loudly as Yellin' Kid would have done. "Did you notice they didn't have a one with them, Slim?"

"Yes. Are you just waking up to that, Bud?"

"I reckon I am. But what does it mean?"

"It means that there's a deeper game being played than we have any idea of, son. We've got to go some to get to the bottom!"

CHAPTER XXII

BUD'S DISCOVERY

Once it became evident that catching the rustlers was likely to be the work of a long chase on the trail, the whole party of pursuers came to a halt beside the boy ranchers. And after some rapid talk of what might lay beyond their stopping place, in a lonely, wild and desolate section of the defile, the conversation switched to what had surprised Bud and his cousins--the absence of the cattle.

"I s'posed they were driving the steers ahead of 'em all along,"

admitted North "They drove the animals off our ranch, and I didn't think but what they were hazing 'em along to some place where they could change or blur the brands, and then sell 'em."

"That's what I thought, too," acknowledged d.i.c.k.

"Well, I must say I didn't think much about it," confessed Bud.

"When I saw Del Pinzo and his gang in there all I wanted to do was to come to hand-grips with 'em. I forgot all about the cattle. But after we'd chased along a bit I did begin to wonder where my animals were--_our_ animals, I should say," he corrected himself with a glance at his cousins. However, they understood.

"They must have gotten the cattle over to Double Z, or wherever it is they dispose of 'em," suggested d.i.c.k.

"They couldn't--not in this short time," declared Slim. "We followed 'em too close. Besides, there isn't a sign of any cattle having been here, nor in that place where we surprised th' head Greaser and his gang. Not a sign of cattle!"

He looked up and down the gorge, as did the other cowboys. But not even the sharpest eye could detect the faintest "sign" of the steers having been driven along the pa.s.sage.

"They must have them hidden somewhere," said d.i.c.k. "We'd better go back to the place where the sign petered out. There must be some opening there out of the main canyon."

"If there is it's so well hid that it takes sharper eyes than I've got to find it," declared Snake, and he was noted for his far-seeing and clear vision.

"Go _back_!" exclaimed North impulsively. "We aren't going back, are we, until we get Del Pinzo and his gang?"

"Shoot 'em up--that's what I advise!" cried Yellin' Kid. There was a moment's pause, and Bud spoke.

"We're got two things to do," said the boy rancher. "One is to get our cattle back, and the other is to nab the rustlers. But it's more important to get the cattle, I think.

"If we don't do that our ranch experiment will be a failure," he went on. "But, of course, for the sake of other ranchers, it would be a mighty good thing if we could put Del Pinzo and his rustler crowd out of business."

"Can't we do both?" asked Nort.

"That's what I was coming to," his cousin continued. "If we can get on the trail of the hidden steers--for hidden they are, I'm sure--we can haze them back to the valley. Then we can keep on after this crowd," and he nodded toward the winding trail that led down the narrow defile.

"Then you think we'd better go back!" asked d.i.c.k.

"Let's see what Slim says" answered Bud. Naturally he would turn to his father's foreman for advice.

"Oh, you're leavin' it t' me, are you?" asked Slim, as he finished rolling his cigarette, a feat he could accomplish with one hand. Then he lighted it, took a satisfying puff and went on: "If you ask my advice I'd say to go back an' see if you can't locate the cattle. As Bud remarks, they're dollars an' cents. Th'

rustlers aren't, though it would be a mighty good stunt t' wipe 'em off th' face of this cow country. But maybe we can attend to _them_ later."

"Turn back she is!" exclaimed Bud, accepting, as did the others, the advice of Slim as being final. "We'll see if we can find the cattle, and then haze them to a safe place. After that we'll nab Del Pinzo and his bunch--if we can," he added, as a saving clause.

"Suits me!" remarked Yellin' Kid, taking off his hat and looking at the two bullet holes. "That nabbin' part is what I want t'

play at," and his grin suggested that when he and the Greaser met there would be some interesting happenings.

It having been thus decided that the pursuit would be abandoned for the time being, a sort of council of war was held to settle on the next course.

"I say grub!" exclaimed Bud, knowing that the suggestion would come with better grace from him than from some of the men who were working for him and his father. "Let's eat!"

There was no debate on this question and when the ponies had been turned loose to graze on what scanty gra.s.s they could find, a fire was made and preparations started for feeding the hungry posse. For they were that--both hungry and a posse, bent on the capture of the lawless rustlers. Though, for the time, righteous revenge was given over to the more practical side of the question--getting back the cattle.

Probably you do not need to be told that little time was wasted over the meal, simple as it was. Cowboys, on the trail, or otherwise engaged in their work of the ranch or range, do not spend much time over the pleasures of the appet.i.te. There is a time for feasting, and a time for chasing cattle rustlers, and there was no sense in combining the two. That, evidently, was the thought in the minds of Bud and his friends, for they hurried through their eating, and, having rested the horses, were soon in saddles again.

"Now," remarked Bud, talking the matter over with Slim, "what is the best plan?"

"To get back, as fast as we can, t' th' place where we saw th'

last signs of th' cattle," was the foreman's answer. "The unravelin' of th' skein of mystery, t' use a poetical expression, Bud, is there!"

They all agreed with this view of it, and after a short ride down the defile, to see, if by chance, any of the Del Pinzo crowd might be in evidence, or returning, the back trail was taken.