Shortly after dusk on the same night Silverthorn, Dale, and Maison were sitting at a table in Maison's private office in the bank building. They, too, were playing cards.
But their thoughts were not on the cards. Elation filled their hearts.
Dale was dealing, but it was plain that he took no interest in the game. At last, with a gesture of disgust, he threw the cards face up on the table and smiled at the others.
"What's the use?" he said. "I keep thinking of what happened at Devil's Hole. We ought to have been sure that we finished the job, an' we would have been sure if we hadn't known that that damned Colfax sheriff was hanging around somewhere.
"He took two hundred head from Sanderson—when he ought to have taken the whole damn herd—which he'd orders to do. And then, instead of driving them direct to Lester's he made camp just on the other side of Devil's Hole—three or four miles, Morley said. I don't know what for, except that maybe he's decided to give Sanderson the steers he'd taken from him—the damned fool! You've got to break him, Maison, for disobeying orders!"
"I'll attend to him," said Maison.
"That's the reason we didn't go through Devil's Hole to see what had become of Sanderson," resumed Dale. "We was afraid of running into the sheriff, and him, being the kind of a fool he is, would likely have wanted to know what had happened. I thought it better to sneak off without letting him see us than to do any explaining."
Silverthorn looked at his watch. "Morley and the others ought to be here pretty soon," he said.
"They're late as it is," grumbled Dale. "I ought to have gone myself."
They resumed their card-playing. An hour or so later there came a knock on the door of the bank—a back door—and Dale opened it to admit Morley—the big man who had drawn a pistol on Sanderson when he had tried to take Barney Owen out of the City Hotel barroom.