With a heart that pounded queerly Arthur watched his friend cross the valley and work his way to the ridge beyond. Even after Jack had disappeared, he waited, nerves jumpy, for the crack of a rifle to carry news of death in the mesquite.
No tidings of tragedy came. The minutes fulfilled the hour. The many small sounds of the desert were shattered by no report. At last, drowsing in the warmth of the sunlit land, the Ranger's eyes closed, opened, and shut again. He nodded, fell asleep.
When he awakened it was with a shock of dread. His heart died. Four men were watching him. Two of them had him covered with revolvers. A third was just removing noiselessly his rifle and six-shooter from reach of his hand.
He jumped to his feet. The consternation in his eyes showed how completely he had been caught napping.
One of the men--a long, lank, cross-eyed fellow--laughed mockingly, and the sound of his mirth was evil.
"Whatta you doin' here?" demanded one whom he recognized as Pete Dinsmore.
For a moment the Ranger's mind was a blank. He could not make it serve his needs. Words were out of reach of his tongue. Then, "I'm lost," he stammered.
"Are you alone?"
"Yes." Out of his confusion one idea stood up imperatively. He must not betray Jack.
"Where's yore hawss?"
"It--it got away from me."
"When?"
"Last night." It seemed to him that he could keep just one jump ahead of this dominant man's menacing questions.
"Howcome that?"
"I shot a prairie-hen, and when I got down to get it--I don't know--my horse got frightened and jerked away. I tried to catch it. The brute wouldn't let me. Then night came."
"What were you doin' so far from town?" cut in one of the two who were covering him. He was a short, heavy-set man.
"That's right, Dave. Looks funny to me." Gurley seemed fairly to ooze malice. "Just happened to drift here to this herd, I reckon. It sure was yore unlucky day."
Arthur looked from one to another despairingly. He found no hope anywhere, not even in the expressionless face of Homer Dinsmore, who as yet had not spoken a word. There came over the boy what he afterward described as a "gone" feeling. It was the sensation, intensified many times, felt when an elevator drops from under one in swift descent.
"I--don't know what you mean," he faltered.
"You will," said Gurley brutally.
"Been across the valley to the herd yet?" asked Overstreet, elaborately careless.
Here was one question Ridley could answer with the truth. He spoke swiftly, eagerly. "No."