A Vast and Desolate Land by Robert Peecher

Author:Robert Peecher
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 1792160003
Publisher: Mooncalf Press
Published: 2018-12-21T06:00:00+00:00

-14-

Kuwatee pressed his palm against the coals of the abandoned fire.

"Still a little warmth," he said, looking up at Sinclair.

"What do you think?" Rab asked.

"He was here," Kuwatee said. "This fire is from this morning. He is not so far off now."

O'Toole kneeled close to the ground and looked at the tracks.

"I don't see how you can tell one from the other," he said.

"I know these hawsses," Kuwatee said. "I can recognize their tracks by their strides. This is the stride of the hawss Cossatot Jim stole from our remuda."

"What about all these others?" O'Toole asked.

"I do not know these hawsses," Kuwatee said. "Most of them had no riders and bore no packs. The prints do not sink into the sand deep enough if they were burdened."

O'Toole shook his head. "I can see that some of them are deeper than others. But I don't know how you can be certain of what you're seeing."

"I am certain," Kuwatee said. "I have studied tracks many times."

Rab stood beside the blue roan, idly patting its neck.

"I'm pretty sure he's right," Rab said. "See how this track presses deep into the sand? This is a hawss that's carrying an extry hundred and sixty pounds on its back. That's why the track presses so deep into the sand. But these others, they're not deep. Less weight because there's no rider. Also, you see how these others all ride in almost perfect single file? These are tied hawsses being led. You don't lead a hawss like that if it's toting a rider."

O'Toole shrugged. "Now that I can understand."

"It's a big gamble if we're misreading the tracks," Vazquez said.

Having ridden so many times with posses, Vazquez knew that trackers sometimes made mistakes — even trackers who were sure of what they saw. And a mistake — like misreading a track — could prove disastrous for a posse. It could set them on the wrong path and put them hours or days behind a fugitive. And that might be all the time the fugitive needed to get clear.

"It ain't likely that Kuwatee would misread the tracks of a hawss he knows," Rab said.

"So who are these others?" O'Toole said. "What do you reckon?"

"Hawss thieves," Vazquez said. "I'd bet a month's wages on it. Who else would be leading hawsses out across the Staked Plains?"

Vazquez had spent too long as a deputy sheriff to miss the signs of a criminal, and he was often quick to assume the worst about others. That he was usually correct in his assumptions proved out how good he was as a lawman.

"Likely so," Rab agreed.

"He didn't plan to meet hawss thieves out here," Vazquez said. "He came across a gang of outlaws and fell in with them. Turned him back east."

"Warned them about us, and the Comanche," Kuwatee said. "And they cut south to avoid us."

"That's how I'd figure it," Vazquez agreed.

O'Toole stiffened and craned his neck to the east. "I don't see them."

"They are there," Kuwatee said.

While the others looked east, Sinclair's eyes were fixed to the north.

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