"What are you driving at, Whitey?"

"I'm just discounting the stranger," said Whitey. "I dunno what other talents he's got, but he's sure a fine nacheral liar."

20

It was some time before Riley Sinclair interrupted his pacing and, turning, strode over to the dim outlines of the sleeping girl. She did not speak, and, leaning close above her, he heard her regular breathing.

Waiting until he was satisfied that she slept, he began to move rapidly. First, with long, soft steps he went to his saddle, which was perched on a ridge of rock. This he raised with infinite care, gathering up the stirrups and the cinches so that nothing might drag or strike. With this bundle secured, he once more went close to the figure of the sleeper and this time dropped on one knee beside her. He could see nothing distinctly by the starlight, but her forehead gleamed with one faint highlight, and there was the pale glimmer of one hand above the blankets.

For the moment he almost abandoned the plan on which he had resolved, which was no less than to attempt to ride into Sour Creek and return to the girl before she wakened in the dawn. But suppose that he failed, and that she wakened to find herself alone in the mountain wilderness?

He shuddered at the idea, yet he saw no other issue for her than to attempt the execution of his plan.

He rose hastily and walked off, letting his weight fall on his toes altogether, so that the spurs might not jingle.

Even that brief rest had so far refreshed his mustang that he was greeted with flattened ears and flying heels. These efforts Sinclair met with a smile and terrible whispered curses, whose familiar sound seemed to soothe the horse. He saddled at once, still using care to avoid noise, and swung steeply down the side of the mountain. On the descending trail, he could cut by one half the miles they had traversed winding up the slope.

Recklessly he rode, giving the wise pony its head most of the time, and only seeing that it did not exceed a certain speed, for when a horse pa.s.ses a certain rate of going it becomes as reckless as a drunken man.

Once or twice they floundered onto sheer gravel slides which the broncho took by flinging back on its haunches and going down with stiffly braced forelegs. But on the whole the mustang took care of itself admirably.

In an amazingly short time they struck the more placid footing of the valley, and Sinclair, looking up, could not believe that he had been so short a time ago at the top of the flat-crested mountain.

He gave little time to wondering, however, but cut across the valley floor at a steady lope. From the top of the mountain the lights of Sour Creek were a close-gathered patch, from the level they appeared as a scattering line. Sinclair held straight toward them, keeping away to the left so as to come onto the well-beaten trail which he knew ran in that direction. He found it and let the mustang drop back to a steady dogtrot; for, if the journey to Sour Creek was now a short distance, there would be a hard ride back to the flat-topped mountain if he wished to accomplish his business and return before the full dawn. He must be there by that time, for who could tell what the girl might do when she found herself alone. Therefore he saved the cattle pony as much as possible.

He was fairly close to Sour Creek, the lights fanning out broader and broader as he approached. Suddenly two figures loomed up before him in the night. He came near and made out a barelegged boy, riding without a saddle and driving a cow before him. He was a very angry herdsman, this boy. He kept up a continual monologue directed at the cow and his horse, and so he did not hear the approach of Riley Sinclair until the outlaw was close upon him. Then he hitched himself around, with his hand on the hip of his old horse, swaying violently with the jerk of the gait. He was glad of the company, it seemed.

"Evening, mister. You ain't Hi Corson, are you?"

"Nope, I ain't Hi. Kind of late driving that cow, ain't you?"

The boy swore with shrill fluency.

"We bought old Spot over at the Apwell place, and the darned old fool keeps breaking down fences and running back every time she gets a chance. Ain't nothing so foolish as a cow."

"Why don't your dad sell her for beef?"

"Beef?" The boy laughed. "Say, mister, I'd as soon try to chew leather.

They ain't nothing but bones and skin and meanness to old Spot. But she's a good milker. When she comes in fresh she gives pretty nigh onto four gallons a milking."

"Is that so!"

"Sure is! Hard to milk, though. Kick the hat right off'n your head if you don't watch her. Never see such a fool cow as old Spot! Hey!"

Taking advantage of this diversion in the attention of her guardian, Spot had ambled off to the side of the road. The boy darted his horse after her and sent her trotting down the trail, with clicking hoofs and long, sweeping steps that scuffed up a stifling dust.

"Ain't very good to heat a milker up by running 'em, son," reproved Sinclair.

"I know it ain't. But it wouldn't make me sorry if old Spot just nacherally dropped down dead--she gives me that much trouble. Look at her now, doggone her!"

Spot had turned broadside to them and waited for the boy to catch up before she would take another forward step.

"You just coming in to Sour Creek?"

"Yep, I'm strange to this town."

"Well, you sure couldn't have picked a more fussed-up time."

"How come?"

"Well, you hear about the killing of Quade, I reckon?"

"Not a word."

"You ain't? Where you been these days?"

"Oh, yonder in the hills."

"Chipping rocks, eh? Well, Quade was a gent that lived out the norm trail, and he had a fuss with the schoolteacher over Sally Bent, and the schoolteacher up and murders Quade, and they raise a posse and go out to hang Gaspar, the teacher, and they're kept from it by a stranger called Sinclair; when the sheriff comes to get Gaspar and hang him legal and all, that Sinclair sticks up the sheriff and takes Gaspar away, and now they're both outlawed, I hear tell, and they's a price on their heads."

The lad brought it out in one huge sentence, sputtering over the words in his haste.

"How much of a price?"

"I dunno. It keeps growing. Everybody around Woodville and Sour Creek is chipping in to raise that price. They sure want to get Gaspar and Sinclair bad. Gaspar ain't much. He's a kind of sissy, but Sinclair is a killer--and then some."

Sinclair raised his head to the black, solemn mountains. Then he looked back to his companion.

"Why, has he killed anybody lately?"

"He left one for dead right today!"

"You don't mean it! He sure must be bad."

"Oh, he's bad, right enough. They was a gent named Cartwright come into town today with his head all banged up. He'd met up with Gaspar and Sinclair in the hills, not knowing nothing about them. Got into an argument with Sinclair, and, not being armed, he had it out with fists.

He was beating up Sinclair pretty bad--him being a good deal of a man--when Gaspar sneaks up and whangs him on the back of the head with the b.u.t.t of his Colt. They rode off and left him for dead. But pretty soon he wakes up. He comes on into Sour Creek, rarin' and tearin' and huntin' for revenge. Sure will be a bad mess if he meets up with Sinclair ag'in!"

"Reckon it had ought to be," replied Sinclair. "Like to see this gent that waded into two outlaws with his bare fists."

"He's a man, right enough. Got a room up in the hotel. Must have a pile of money, because he took the big room onto the north end of the hotel, the room that's as big as a house. Nothin' else suited him at all. Dad told me."

"I ain't got nothing particular on hand," murmured Sinclair. "Maybe I can get in on this manhunt--if they ain't started already."

The boy laughed. "Everybody in town has been trying to get in on that manhunt, but it ain't any use. Sheriff Kern has got a handpicked posse--every one a fightin' fool, Dad says. Wish you luck, though. They ain't starting till the morning. Well, here's where I branch off.

S'long! Hey, Spot, you old fool, git along, will you?"