Dale frowned. Then he got up, went to a drawer in the desk before which Silverthorn sat, and drew out a letter—the letter young Bransford had written to his father about a year before.
"We've still got a chance," he told Silverthorn. And then he told the latter of his suspicions about Sanderson.
Silverthorn's eyes gleamed. "That's possible," he said, "but how are you going to prove it?"
"There's a way," returned Dale. He went to the door, and shouted the names of two men, standing in the doorway until they came—the two men who had accompanied him that morning. He spoke to them, briefly:
"You're ridin' straight to Tucson as fast as your cayuses can take you. You ought to make it in a week. I'll give you that long. Find Gary Miller. Tell him I sent you, an' find out what he knows about young Bill Bransford. Then hit the breeze back. If it takes you more than two weeks I'll knock your damned heads off!"
CHAPTER IX
THE LITTLE MAN TALKS
Mary Bransford spent the first day of Sanderson's absence in the isolation of the parlor, with the shades drawn, crying. Her brother had bitterly disappointed her.
He had sent word by one of the men that he was going to Las Vegas to look up the title to the property. She thought he might at least have brought her the message personally.