Twenty-four hours had the command been in saddle, except for the required halts and a long two hours during the dead of night, when leading their wearied steeds or crouching beside them at rest, while Barclay and his scouts explored the overhanging heights and listened eagerly for sound of coming troopers from the eastward. But for the waning moon there would have been hours of total darkness. Ninety miles, all told, had they travelled, and now, wearied though they were, nine out of ten of the men were chafing with wrath that the wily gang had managed to escape them. Whither were they gone, and where on earth was the paymaster, were the questions. Certainly not through the Pass, for there were no fresh hoof-prints. Could it be that, balked in their plan to overwhelm the escort by this coming of at least an equal force, the gang had turned back angered and thrown themselves on Cramer's crippled party with the view of getting away with the horses, arms, and equipments? Certainly none of Cramer's people had made their way by the game trails over the range to join them, but there was reason for that: Lawrence had never succeeded in reaching Cramer.
Sad, wearied, and depressed, Major Brooks seated himself on a saddle-blanket to take counsel with his officers, now reduced to three,—Barclay, Winn, and the doctor. He missed Mullane, stanch old fighter that he was, for Mullane knew most of the country thoroughly, and had been posted for months at the Rio San Saba, now only some twenty miles to the east. He sorely missed Lawrence, for on him he had often leaned. He was beginning to take vast comfort in Barclay, to be sure, but now Barclay, Winn, the doctor, men and horses, the entire command, in fact, had come to a stand-still. There was no use in going farther east; there the country was comparatively open and rolling, and the gang would hardly dare attack forty troopers on the wide prairie. Besides, the nearest water in that direction was twenty miles away; the little rivulet rising in the heart of the hills was ten miles behind them, and already horses were thirsting and men emptying their canteens. Blankly the major stared up into Barclay's drawn and almost haggard face. "Can you think of anything we ought to do?" he asked, and, in asking, Brooks was a far better soldier than the man who, having exhausted his own resources, thought it infra dig. to invite suggestions from his juniors.
"Just one, sir. Sergeant McHugh tells me he once came out here hunting with Captain Mullane, and that they took a light spring wagon right over the range southeast of Crockett's, the way Cramer went. It is a much longer way round, but a more open way. The trail must lie some eight or ten miles off here to the south, or west of south. Could it be that the gang only started from the place of Cramer's ambuscade as though to go to the Pass and then veered around again and covered that trail, and for some reason have been expecting the paymaster that way after all?"
Worn and weary as he was, Brooks staggered to his feet at once, his face going paler still. "By heaven, Barclay, if that's possible, they've had uninterrupted hours in which to deal with Pennywise already! It is possible," he added, with misery in the emphasis of his tone. "I remember having heard of that trail, but never thought it practicable for an ambulance. Then there is work before us yet. Call Sergeant McHugh," he cried. The word was passed among the wearied groups, where, squatting or lying, the men had thrown themselves upon the ground, and presently, rubbing his red eyes, a stocky little Irish sergeant came trudging up to his commander and silently touched the visor of his worn old cap.
"Can you guide us by the shortest route from here to the trail you spoke of to Captain Barclay?" asked the major.
Mac turned and gazed away southwestward along the line of the San Saba hills.
"I don't think we could miss it, sir, if we followed the foot-hills."
"Then we must try it," said Brooks, decidedly, half turning to the silent officers as he spoke. "Let the horses graze ten minutes more and get all the dew and grass they can, then we'll push for it."
And so, just before five, hungry, weary, and weak,—some of the men at least,—the little squadron clambered into saddle and once more moved away. No need to leave any one to say which way they'd gone; the trail showed all that. Silently they headed for the broad valley of the Bravo, miles away to the invisible west. Once across a little rise in the falda, Brooks struck the slow trot he had learned long years before from the beloved major of his old regiment, and doggedly the column took it up and followed. Not a mile had they gone when the sun came peering up over the heights far in their wake; for a few minutes the dew flashed and sparkled on the turf before it died beneath that fiery breath, and still no man spoke. Sound sleep by night, a cold plunge at dawn, and the hot tin of soldier coffee send the morning tongues of a column en route "wagging like sheep's tails," say the troopers, but it takes a forced all-night march, following an all-day ride, followed by a morning start without either cold plunge or hot coffee, to stamp a column with the silence of a Quaker meeting. Let no man think, however, the fight is out of its heart, unless he is suffering for a scrimmage on any terms. Men wake up with a snap at sound of the first shot; dull eyes flash in answer to the bugle challenge, and worn and wearied troopers "take a brace" that means mischief to the foe at the first note that tells of trouble ahead. Just two miles out there came the test to Brooks's men, and there was none so poor as to be found wanting.
Two miles out, and the column woke up at the cry, "Yon comes a courier!" and coming he was, "hell to split," said Sergeant McHugh, from afar off over the rolling prairie to the southwest. Five minutes brought him within hail,—a corporal from the camp on the Rio San Saba, on foaming horse, who came tugging at both reins, sputtering and plunging, up to the head of column, and blurted out his news. "I thought you was the escort, sir,—the paymaster's escort. They left camp at nine last night, and at two this morning Corporal Murphy got back, shot, and said they were corralled in the hills on the old trail. The captain is coming along with twenty men, and sent me ahead. They must be ten miles from here yet, sir."