"All right, Mason," and Grant came into view on a rangy sorrel. "Get your men back into saddle; we'll move on."
"Think he went this way?" asked the blacksmith carelessly.
"How the hell do I know!" savagely. "He must have started this way, but likely he took the north road. We'll get the chap before night, unless he runs into Delavan's fellows out yonder. See here, Farrell," holding in his horse, "we'll be back here about dark, and will want something to eat."
"You impudent rebel, you see that you are here when we come. I know you, you night raider, and will bring you to book yet. Forward men--trot! Close up the rank there, sergeant; we'll take the road to the left."
I watched them go past, the dust-covered green uniforms slipping by the crack of the door, as the men urged their horses faster. Farrell never moved, the blue tobacco smoke curling above his head, and I stole across the littered storeroom to a cobwebbed window, from which I could watch the little column of riders go down the hill. They finally disappeared in the edge of a grove, and I turned around to find the blacksmith leaning against his anvil waiting for me.
"Genial young fellow, Grant," he said. "Always promising to hang me, but never quite ready to tackle the job. Afraid I shall have to disappoint him again, to-night."
"Hardly. You heard what he said about Delavan? That was the very news I wanted to learn. Now I think both those lads will meet me much sooner than they expect."
He stepped forward into the open doorway, and blew three shrill blasts on a silver whistle. The echo had scarcely died away, when, out from a thick clump of trees perhaps half a mile distant, a horse shot forth, racing toward us. As the reckless rider drew up suddenly, I saw him to be a barefooted, freckle-faced boy of perhaps sixteen, his eyes bright with excitement.
"So it's you on duty, Ben," said Farrell quietly, glancing from the boy to his horse. "Well, you're in for a ride. Have the men at Lone Tree by sundown; all of them. See Duval first, an' tell him for me this is a big thing. Now off with you!"
The boy, grinning happily, swung his horse around, and, jabbing his sides with bare heels, rode madly away directly south across the vacant land. Within five minutes he had vanished down a sharp incline. Farrell was still staring after him, when I asked: