He meant to leave Helen and Mrs. Hallard at the casa, but they refused to listen to such a plan. Helen sprang into the buckboard, and as the last horseman swept out at the gate the sweating team was in pursuit.
Four of the men rode out upon the plain. Two, of whom Manuel was one, kept to the road, and after these Sandy lashed his horses. He came up with them a mile beyond the gate. Manuel was off his bronco, studying some tracks that just here turned abruptly from the way.
“They must have turned off here,” Sandy said, springing out and straining his eyes to make out the hoof-prints in the baffling gloom. “Gard’s got a poor horse. They headed him off.”
“Oh!” Helen cried, wringing her hands. “Why didn’t he ride back to the rancho?”
“Gard wouldn’t do that, with you alone there,” answered Sandy. “But oh, Lord! Why didn’t some of us turn up sooner?”
Sago Irish, who had ridden out upon the plain, while Manuel studied the hoof-prints, now came back.
“Did you pick up the trail?” the foreman demanded, sharply.
The cowboy shook his head.
“Sand’s too hard,” he said, sorrowfully, “an’ it’s gettin’ too dark.”
Sandy’s eyes searched the dusky landscape. He was breathing hard.