CHAPTER VII
WATERING SHEEP
The deputy glanced quietly round, nodded here and there at sight of thefamiliar face of an acquaintance, and spoke to the driver.
"Let's hear you say your little piece again, Jose."
The Mexican now had it by heart, and he pattered off the thing frombeginning to end without a pause. Melissy, behind the counter, leaned herelbows on it and fastened her eyes on the boyish face of the officer. Inher heart she was troubled. How much did he know? What could he discoverfrom the evidence she had left? He had the reputation of being the besttrailer and the most fearless officer in Arizona. But surely she hadcovered her tracks safely.
From Jose the ranger turned to Alan. "We'll hear your account of it now,seh," he said gently.
While Alan talked, Jack's gaze drifted through the window to the flock ofsheep that were being driven up from the ditch by Lee and Norris. Thatlittle pastoral scene had its significance for him. He had arrived at thelocality of the hold-up a few minutes after they had left, and his keenintelligence had taken in some of the points they had observed. A rapidcircuit of the spot at the distance of thirty yards had shown him notracks leading from the place except those which ran up the lateral oneither side of it. It was possible that these belonged to the horses ofthe robbers, but if so the fellows were singularly careless of detection.Moreover, the booty must be accounted for. They had not carried it withthem, since no empty box remained to show that they had poured the goldinto sacks, and it would have been impossible to take the box as it was ona horse. Nor had they buried it, unless at the bottom of the irrigatingditch, for some signs of their work must have remained.
Balancing probabilities, it had seemed to Flatray that these might be thetracks of ranchmen who had arrived after the hold-up and were followingthe escaping bandits up the lateral. For unless these were the robber's,there was no way of escape except either up or down the bottom of theditch. His search had eliminated the possibility of any other but theroad, and this was travelled too frequently to admit of even a chance ofescape by it without detection. Jack filed away one or two questions inhis brain for future reference. The most important of these was todiscover whether there had been any water in the ditch at the time of thehold-up.
He had decided to follow the tracks leading up the ditch and found nodifficulty in doing so at a fast walk. Without any hesitation theyparalleled the edge of the lateral. Nor had the deputy travelled a quarterof a mile before he made a discovery. The rider on the right hand side ofthe stream had been chewing tobacco, and he had a habit of splashing hismark on boulders he passed in the form of tobacco juice. Half a dozentimes before he reached the Lee ranch the ranger saw this signature ofidentity writ large on smooth rocks shining in the sun. The last place hesaw it was at the point where the two riders deflected from the lateraltoward the ranch house, following tracks which led up from the bottom ofthe ditch.
An instant later Flatray had dodged back into the chaparral, for somebodywas driving a flock of sheep down to the ditch. He made out that therewere two riders behind them, and that they had no dog. For the present hiscuriosity was satisfied. He thought he knew why they were watering sheepin this odd fashion. Swiftly he had made a circuit, drawn rein in front ofthe store, and dropped in just in time to hear his name. Now, as with oneear he listened to Alan's account of the hold-up, with his subconsciousmind he was with the sheep-herders who were driving the flock back intothe pasture.
"Looks like our friend the bad man was onto his job all right," was thedeputy's only comment when Alan had finished.
"I'll bet he's making his getaway into the hills mighty immediate,"chuckled Baker. "He can't find a bank in the mountainside to deposit thatgold any too soon to suit him."
"Sho! I'll bet he ain't worried a mite. He's got his arrangements allmade, and likely they'll dovetail to suit him. He's put his brand on thatgold to stay," answered Farnum confidently.
Jack's mild blue eyes rested on him amiably. "Think so, Bob?"
"I ain't knockin' you any, Jack. You're all right. But that's how I figureit out, and, by Gad! I'm hopin' it too," Farnum made answer recklessly.
Flatray laughed and strolled from the crowded room to the big piazza. Aman had just cantered up and flung himself from his saddle. The ranger,looking at him, thought he had never seen another so strikingly handsomean Apollo. Black eyes looked into his from a sun-tanned face perfectlymodelled. The pose of the head and figure would have delighted asculptor.
There was a vigor, an unspoken hostility, in the gaze of both men.
"Mo'nin", Mr. Deputy Sheriff, one said; and the other, "Same to you, Mr.Norris."
"You're on the job quick," sneered the cattle detective.
"The quicker the sooner, I expect."
"And by night you'll have Mr. Hold-up roped and hog-tied?"
"Not so you could notice it. Are you a sheep-herder these days, Mr.Norris?"
The gentle irony of this was not lost on its object, for in the West aherder of sheep is the next remove from a dumb animal.
"No, I'm riding for the Quarter Circle K Bar outfit. This is the firsttime I ever took the dust of a sheep in my life. I did it to oblige Mr.Lee."
"Oh! To oblige Mr. Lee?"
"He wanted to water them, and his herder wasn't here."
"Must 'a' been wanting water mighty bad, I reckon," commented Jackamiably.
"You bet! Lee feels better satisfied now he's watered them."
"I don't doubt it."
Norris changed the subject. "You must have burnt the wind getting here. Ididn't expect to see you for some hours."
"I happened to be down at Yeager's ranch, and one of the boys got me onthe line from Mesa."
"Picked up any clues yet?" asked the other carelessly, yet always withthat hint of a sneer; and innocently Flatray answered, "They seem to beright seldom."
"Didn't know but you'd happened on the fellow's trail."
"I guess I'm as much at sea as you are," was the equivocal answer.
Lee came over from the stable, still wearing spurs and gauntlets.
"Howdy, Jack!" he nodded, not quite so much at his ease as usual. "Gothyer on the jump, didn't you?"
"I kept movin'."
"This shorely beats hell, don't it?" Lee glanced around, selected a smoothboulder, and fired his discharge of tobacco juice at it true to the inch."Reminds me of the old days. You boys ain't old enough to recall them, butstage hold-ups were right numerous then."
Blandly the deputy looked from one to the other. "I don't suppose eitherof you gentlemen happen to have been down and looked over the ground wherethe hold-up was? The tracks were right cut up before I got there."
This center shot silenced Lee for an instant, but Norris was on the spotwith smiling ease.
"No, Mr. Lee and I have been hunting strays on the mesa. We didn't hearabout it till a few minutes ago. We're at your service, though, Mr.Sheriff, to join any posses you want to send out."
"Much obliged. I'm going to send one out toward the Galiuros in a fewminutes now. I'll be right glad to have you take charge of it, Mr.Norris."
The derisive humor in the newly appointed deputy's eyes did not quitereach the surface.
"Sure. Whenever you want me."
"I'm going to send Alan McKinstra along to guide you. He knows thatcountry like a book. You want to head for the lower pass, swing up Diablecanyon, and work up in the headquarters of the Three Forks."
Within a quarter of an hour the posse was in motion. Flatray watched itdisappear in the dust of the road without a smile. He had sent them outmerely to distract the attention of the public and to get rid of as manyas possible of the crowd. For he was quite as well aware as the leader ofthe posse that this search in the Galiuros was a wild-goose chase.Somewhere within three hundred yards of the place he stood both the robberand his booty were in all probability to be found.
Flatray was quite right in his surmise, since Melissy Lee, who had comeout to see the posse off, was standing at the end o
f the porch with herdusky eyes fastened on him, the while he stood beside the house with onefoot resting negligently on the oilcloth cover of the wash-stand.
She had cast him out of her friendship because of his unworthiness, butthere was a tumult in her heart at sight of him. No matter how herjudgment condemned him as a villain, some instinct in her denied thepossibility of it. She was torn in conflict between her liking for him andher conviction that he deserved only contempt. Somehow it hurt her toothat he accepted without protest her verdict, appeared so willing to be astranger to her.
Now that the actual physical danger of her adventure was past, Melissy wasaware too of a chill dread lurking at her heart. She was no longer buoyedup by the swiftness of action which had called for her utmost nerve. Therewas nothing she could do now but wait, and waiting was of all things theone most foreign to her impulsive temperament. She acknowledged too somefear of this quiet, soft-spoken frontiersman. All Arizona knew not onlythe daredevil spirit that fired his gentleness, but the competence withwhich he set about any task he assigned himself. She did not see how he_could_ unravel this mystery. She had left no clues behind her, she feltsure of that, and yet was troubled lest he guessed at her secret behindthat mask of innocence he wore. He did not even remotely guess it as yet,but he was far closer to the truth than he pretended. The girl knew sheshould leave him and go about her work. Her role was to appear asinconspicuous as possible, but she could not resist the fascination oftrying to probe his thoughts.
"I suppose your posse will come back with the hold-ups in a few hours.Will it be worth while to wait for them?" she asked with amiablederision.
The ranger had been absorbed in thought, his chin in his hand, but hebrought his gaze back from the distance to meet hers. What emotion laybehind those cold eyes she could not guess.
"You're more hopeful than I am, Miss Lee."
"What are you sending them out for, then?"
"Oh, well, the boys need to work off some of their energy, and there'salways a show they might happen onto the robbers."
"Do you think some of the Roaring Fork gang did it?"
"Can't say."
"I suppose you are staying here in the hope that they will drop in anddeliver themselves to you."
He looked at her out of an expressionless face. "That's about it, Ireckon. But what I tell the public is that I'm staying so as to be withintelephone connection. You see, Sheriff Burke is moving up to cut them offfrom the Catalinas, Jackson is riding out from Mammoth to haid them offthat way, these anxious lads that have just pulled out from here aretaking care of the Galiuros. I'm supposed to be sitting with my fingers onthe keys as a sort of posse dispatcher."
"Well, I hope you won't catch them," she told him bluntly.
"That seems to be a prevailing sentiment round here. You say it righthearty too; couldn't be more certain of your feelings if it had been yourown father."
He said it carelessly, yet with his keen blue eyes fixed on her.Nevertheless, he was totally unprepared for the effect of his words. Thecolor washed from her bronzed cheeks, and she stood staring at him withbig, fear-filled eyes.
"What--what do you mean?" she gasped. "How dare you say that?"
"I ain't said anything so terrible. You don't need to take it to heartlike that." He gave her a faint smile for an instant. "I'm not reallyexpecting to arrest Mr. Lee for holding up that stage."
The color beat back slowly into her face. She knew she had made a falsemove in taking so seriously his remark.
"I don't think you ought to joke about a thing like that," she saidstiffly.
"All right. I'll not say it next time till I'm in earnest," he promised ashe walked away.
"I wonder if he really meant anything," the girl was thinking in terror,and he, "she knows something; now, I would like to know what."
Melissy attended to her duties in the postoffice after the arrival of thestage, and looked after the dining-room as usual, but she was all the timeuneasily aware that Jack Flatray had quietly disappeared. Where had hegone? And why? She found no answer to that question, but the rangerdropped in on his bronco in time for supper, imperturbable andself-contained as ever.
"Think I'll stay all night if you have a room for me," he told her afterhe had eaten.
"We have a room," she said. "What more have you heard about the stagerobbery?"
"Nothing, Miss Lee."
"Oh, I thought maybe you had," she murmured tremulously, for his blueeyes were unwaveringly upon her and she could not know how much or howlittle he might mean.
Later she saw him sitting on the fence, holding genial converse with JimBudd. The waiter was flashing a double row of white teeth in deep laughterat something the deputy had told him. Evidently they were already friends.When she looked again, a few minutes later, she knew Jack had reached thepoint where he was pumping Jim and the latter was disseminatingmisinformation. That the negro was stanch enough, she knew, but she was onthe anxious seat lest his sharp-witted inquisitor get what he wanted inspite of him. After he had finished with Budd the ranger drifted around tothe kitchen in time to intercept Hop Ling casually as he came out afterfinishing his evening's work. The girl was satisfied Flatray could nothave any suspicion of the truth. Nevertheless, she wished he would let thehelp alone. He might accidentally stumble on something that would set himon the right track.
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