You know them, Pardaloe? asked Lefever. Pardaloe answered that he did. Lefever turned sharply on Philippi. Where were you when this fight was going on?
Down at the stage barn.
Getting your alibi ready. But, of course, you know that wont let you out, Philippi. Your best chance is to tell the truth. There were two others with this pairwhere are Gale Morgan and Sassoon?
Satt Morgan was here with hay to-day. He took them over this evening to Music Mountain.
Where were they hit?
Morgan was hit in the shoulder, as far as I heard. Sassoon was hit in the side, and in the neck.
Where is de Spain?
Dead, I reckon, by this time.
Wheres his body?
I dont know.
Why do you think he is dead?
Sassoon said he was hit in the head.
Yet he got away on horseback!
Im telling you what Sassoon said; I didnt see him.
Lefever and Pardaloe rode back to the stage barn. Certainly looks blue for Henry, muttered Lefever, after he had gone over with Pardaloe and McAlpin all of the scant information that could be gathered. Bob Scott, he added gloomily, may find him somewhere on the Sinks.
At Sleepy Cat, Jeffries, wild with impatience, was on the telephone. Lefever, with McAlpin and Pardaloe standing at his side, reported to the superintendent all he could learn. He rode awaywithout help, of course, explained Lefever to Jeffries in conclusion. What shape he is in, its pretty hard to say, Jeffries. Three more of the bunch, Vance Morgan, Bull Page, and a lame man that works for Bill Morgan, were waiting in the saddle at the head of the draw between the barn and the hotel for him if he should get away from the inn. Somehow, he went the other way and nobody saw hide nor hair of him, so far as I can learn. If he was able to make it, Jeff, he would naturally try for Sleepy Cat. But thats a pretty fair ride for a sound man, let alone a man thats hitand everybody claims he was hit. If he wasnt hit he should have been in Sleepy Cat long before this. You say youve had men out across the river?
Since dark, responded Jeffries. But, John, he asked, could a man hit in the way de Spain was hit, climb into a saddle and make a get-away?
Henry might, answered Lefever laconically.
Scott, with two men who had been helping him, rode in at two oclock after a fruitless search to wait for light. At daybreak they picked up the trail. Studying carefully the room in which the fight had taken place, they followed de Spains jump through the broken sash into the patio. Blood that had been roughly cleaned up marked the spot where he had mounted the horse and dashed through an open corral gate down the south trail toward Music Mountain. There was speculation as to why he should have chosen a route leading directly into the enemys country, but there was no gainsaying the trailoccasional flecks of blood blazed the direction of the fleeing hoofs. These lednot as the trailers hoped they would, in a wide détour across easy-riding country toward the north and the Sleepy Cat stage roadbut farther and farther south and west into extremely rough country, a no mans land, where there was no forage, no water, and no habitation. Not this alone disquieted
his pursuers; the trail as they pursued it showed the unsteady riding of a man badly wounded.
Lefever, walking his horse along the side of a ridge, shook his head as he leaned over the ponys shoulder. Pardaloe and Scott rode abreast of him. It would take some hit, Bob, to bring de Spain to this kind of riding.
Beyond the ridge they found where he had dismounted for the first time. Here Scott picked up five empty shells ejected from de Spains revolver. They saw more than trace enough of how he had tried to stanch the persistent flow from his wounds. He seemed to have worked a long time with these and with some success, for his trail thereafter was less marked by blood. It was, however, increasingly unsteady, and after a time it reached a condition that led Scott to declare de Spain was no longer guiding Sassoons pony; it was wandering at will.
Confirmation, if it were needed, of the declaration could soon be read in the trail by all of them. The horse, unrestrained by its rider, had come almost completely about and headed again for Music Mountain. Within a few miles of the snow-covered peak the hoof-prints ran directly into the road from Calabasas to Morgans Gap and were practically lost in the dust of the wagon road.
Heres a go, muttered Pardaloe at fault, after riding back and forth for a mile in an effort to pick the horse up again.
Remember, interposed Scott mildly, he is riding Sassoons horsethe brute is naturally heading for home.
Follow him home, then, said Lefever unhesitatingly.
Scott looked at his companion in surprise: Near home, you mean, John, he suggested inoffensively. For three of us to ride into the Gap this morning would be some excitement for the Morgans. I dont think the excitement would last longfor us.
The three were agreed, however, to follow up to the mouth of the Gap itself and did follow. Finding no trace of de Spains movements in this quest, they rode separately in wide circles to the north and south, but without picking up a hoof-print that led anywhere or gave them any clew to the whereabouts of the missing man.