Gunsight Pass by Raine William MacLeod

Author:Raine, William MacLeod [MacLeod, Raine, William]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Published: 2005-01-03T05:00:00+00:00

The prospector took the sandy bed of the dry canal as his path. He chose it for two reasons. There was less brush to obstruct his progress, and he could reach the ears of both his auditors better as he burbled his comments on affairs in general and the wisdom of Mr. Thomas in particular.

The ditch was climbing into the hills, zigzagging up draws in order to find the most even grade. The three men traveled slowly, for Sanders and Crawford had to read sign on every foot of the way.

"Chances are they didn't leave the ditch till they heard the water comin'," the cattleman said. "These fellows knew their business, and they were playin' safe."

Dave pulled up. He went down on his knees and studied the ground, then jumped down into the ditch and examined the bank.

"Here's where they got out," he announced.

Thomas pressed forward. With one outstretched hand the young man held him back.

"Just a minute. I want Mr. Crawford to see this before it's touched."

The old cattleman examined the side of the canal. The clay showed where a sharp hoof had reached for a footing, missed, and pawed down the bank. Higher up was the faint mark of a shoe on the loose rubble at the edge.

"Looks like," he assented.

Study of the ground above showed the trail of two horses striking off at a right angle from the ditch toward the mouth of a box cañon about a mile distant. The horses were both larger than broncos. One of them was shod. One of the front shoes, badly worn, was broken and part of it gone on the left side. The riders were taking no pains apparently to hide their course. No doubt they relied on the full ditch to blot out pursuit.

The trail led through the cañon, over a divide beyond, and down into a small grassy valley.

At the summit Crawford gave strict orders. "No talkin', Mr. Thomas. This is serious business now. We're in enemy country and have got to soft-foot it."

The foothills were bristling with chaparral. Behind any scrub oak or cedar, under cover of an aspen thicket or even of a clump of gray sage, an enemy with murder in his heart might be lurking. Here an ambush was much more likely than in the sun-scorched plain they had left.

The three men left the footpath where it dipped down into the park and followed the rim to the left, passing through a heavy growth of manzanita to a bare hill dotted with scrubby sage, at the other side of which was a small gulch of aspens straggling down into the valley. Back of these a log cabin squatted on the slope. One had to be almost upon it before it could be seen. Its back door looked down upon the entrance to a cañon. This was fenced across to make a corral.

The cattleman and the cowpuncher looked at each other without verbal comment. A message better not put into words flashed from one to the other.

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