"Don't you see, you doddering imbecile? If Foy had really killed d.i.c.k Marr he might have gone to any other place in the world--but he wouldn't have come here."

"Aha! So Foy did come here, hey?" croaked the sheriff, triumphant in his turn. "Thanks, Major, for the information, though I was sure before, humanly speaking, that he came this way."

"Which is another way of saying that you don't think Foy did the killing--that you don't even suspect him of it," said Anastacio. as the Major subsided, crestfallen. "Matt Lisner, I know that you hate Foy. I know that you welcome this chance to get rid of him. Make no mistake, Breslin. I was not wanted here. I wasn't asked and none of my people were brought along. I tagged along, though--to wait. It's one of the best little things I do--waiting. And I came to protect Foy, not to capture him. I came to keep right at his side, in case he surrendered without a fight--for fear he might be killed ... escaping ... on the way back. It's a way that we have in Las Uvas!"

Lisner threw a look of hate at his deputy.

"You don't mean to tell me there's any danger of anything like that?"

said Breslin, staggered and aghast.

"Every danger. That's an old gag--the _ley fuga_."

"You lie!" bawled Creagan. His six-shooter covered Anastacio.

"That'll keep. Put up your gun, Bennie," said Anastacio with great composure. "Supper's most ready. Besides, the Barelas won't like it if you shoot me this way. There's a lot of the Barelas, Ben. I'll tell you what I'll do, though--I'll slip the idea to my crowd, and any time you want to kill me on an even break, no Barela or Ascarate will take it up. Put it right in your little holster--put it up, I say! That's right. You see, Breslin? Don't let Foy out of your sight if he should be taken."

"But he'll never let himself be taken alive," said Vorhis. "Even if anyone wants to take him--alive. Pa.s.s the word to your friends, Breslin, unless you want them to take part in a deliberate, foreplanned murder."

"d.a.m.n you, what do you mean?" shouted the sheriff.

"By G.o.d, sir, I mean just what I say!"

"Why, girls!" said Pringle. "You shock me! This is most unladylike.

This is scandalous talk. Be nice! Please--pretty please! See, here comes some more p.u.s.s.y-foot posse--three, six, eleven hungry men. Have they got Foy? No; they have not got Foy. Is he up? He is up. Look who's here too! Good old Applegate and Brother Espalin. I wonder now if they're goin' to give me the cut direct, like Creagan did? You notice, Mr. Breslin."

The hors.e.m.e.n rode into the corral.

"No; don't go, Sheriff," said Anastacio.

"I'm anxious to see if those two will recognize Ananias the Amateur.

They'll be here directly. You, either, Creagan. Else I'll shoot you both in the back, accidentally, cleaning my gun."

From without was the sound of spurred feet in haste; three men appeared at the open door.

"Why, if it ain't George! Good old George!" cried Pringle, rising with outstretched arms. "And my dear friend Espalin! What a charming reunion!"

Applegate's eyes threw a startled question at his chief and at Creagan; Espalin slipped swiftly back through the door.

"I don't know you, sir," said Applegate.

"George! You're never going to disown me! Joe's gone, too. n.o.body loves me!"

The third man, a grizzled and bristly old warrior with a limp, broke in with a roar.

"What in h.e.l.l's going on here?" he stormed.

"You are, for one thing, if you don't moderate your voice," said Anastacio. "Nueces, you bellow like the bulls of Bashan. Mr.

Applegate, meet Mr. Pringle."

"What does he mean, then, by such monkeyshines?" demanded the other--old Nueces River, chief of police, ex-ranger, and, for this occasion, deputy sheriff. "I got no time for foolishness. And you can't run no whizzer on me, Barela. Don't you try it!"

"Oh, they're just joking, Nueces," said the Major. "Tell us how about it. Here, I'll light the lamp; it's getting dark. Find any sign of Foy?"

Nueces leveled a belligerent finger at the Major.

"You've been joking, too! I've heard about you. Lisner, I'm ashamed of you! Let Vorhis pull the wool over your eyes, while you sit here and jaw all afternoon, doing nothing!"

"Why, what did you find out?"

"A-plenty. Them stiffs you sent out found Foy's horse, to begin with."

"Sure it was Foy's horse?" queried Lisner eagerly.

"Sure! I know the horse--that big calico horse of his."

"Why didn't you follow him up?"

"Follow h.e.l.l! Oh, some of the silly fools are milling round out there--going over to the San Andres to-night to take a big hunt manana. Not me. That horse was a blind. They pottered round tryin' to find some trace of Foy--blind fools!--till I met up with 'em. I'd done gathered in that mizzable red-headed Joe Cowan on a give-out horse, claim-in' he'd been chousin' after broom-tails. He'd planted Foy's horse, I reckon. But it can't be proved, so I let him go. He'll have to walk in; that's one good thing."

"But Foy--where do you figure Foy's gone?"

"Maybe he simply was not," suggested Pringle, "like Enoch when he was translated into all European languages, including the Scandinavian."

"Pringle, if you say another word I'll have you gagged!" said the exasperated sheriff. "Don't you reckon, Nueces, that Cowan brought Foy a barefooted horse? He can't have gone on afoot or you'd have seen his tracks."

"Sheriff, you certainly are an easy mark!" returned Nueces, in great disgust. "Foy didn't go on afoot or horseback, because he was never there. I've told you twice: Cowan left that calico horse on purpose for us to find. Vorhis is Foy's friend. Can't you see, if Foy had tried to get away by hard riding he would have had a fresh horse, not the one he rode from Las Uvas, and you wouldn't have found a penful of fresh horses to chase him with? Not in a thousand years! That was to make it nice and easy for you to ride on--a six-year-old kid could see through it! It's a wonder you didn't all fall for it and chase away.

No, sir! Foy either stopped down on the river and sent his horse on to fool us--or, more likely, he's up in the b.u.t.tes. Did you look there?"

"I sent the boys round to out sign. I didn't feel justified in hunting out the rough places till we had more men. Too much cover for him."

"And none for you, I s'pose? Mamma! but you're a fine sheriff! Look now: After we started back here we sighted a dust comin' 'way up north. We went over, and 'twas Hargis, the Major's buckaroo, throwin'

in a bunch from the round-up. He didn't know nothin' and was not right sure of that--till I mentioned your reward. Soon as ever I mentioned twenty-five hundred, he loosened up right smart."

"Well? Did he know where Foy was?"

"No; but he knew of the place where I judge Foy is, this very yet.

Gosh!" said Nueces River in deep disgust, "it beats h.e.l.l what men will do for a little dirty money! Seems there's a cave near the top of the least of them two b.u.t.tes--the roughest one--a cave with two mouths, one right on the big top. n.o.body much knows where it is, only the V H outfit."

Pringle had edged across the room. He now plucked at Bell Applegate's sleeve.

"Say, is that right about that reward--twenty-five hundred?" he whispered. His eyes glistened.

"Forty-five," said Bell behind his hand. "The Masons, they put up a thousand, and d.i.c.k's old uncle--that would have let d.i.c.k starve or work--he tacked on a thousand more. Dead or alive!" He looked down at Pringle's face, at Pringle's working fingers, opening and shutting avariciously; he sneered. "Don't you wish you may get it? S-sh! Hear what the old man's saying."

During the whispered colloquy the old ranger had kept on:

"There's where he is, a twenty-to-one shot! He'll lay quiet, likely, thinkin' we'll miss him. Brush growin' over both the cave mouths, Hargis says, so you might pa.s.s right by if you didn't know where to look. These short nights he couldn't never get clear on foot. Thirty mile to the next water--we'd find his tracks and catch him. But he might make a break to get away, at that. Never can tell about a he-man like that. We can't take no chances. We'll pick a bite of supper and then we surround that hill, quiet as mice, and close up on him. He can't see us to shoot if we're fool enough to make any noise. Come daylight, we'll have him cornered, every man behind a bowlder. If he shows up he's our meat; if he don't we'll starve him out."

"And suppose he isn't there?" said Creagan. "What would we look like, watching an empty cave two or three days?"