"It's yore say-so; I'll string along, ready to chip."
CHAPTER XXI
SCOUTING AS A FINE ART
Quigley, favoring his injured arm, led the way toward Twin Buttes to relieve the men on guard, Purdy close behind him; and he did not stick to the trail, but cut straight for his objective along a way well known to both. He was not in good shape for hard work or hard fighting, but he felt that his place was on the scene of action, as befitted a chief; and he had stubbornly battered down all the reasons advanced by his companions at the ranch by which they sought to dissuade him. It had to be either him or the cook, for he was not as seriously wounded as Gates.
The chief was the best man for leader that the outfit contained, and if he had erred in being slack and over-confident it was only because they never had been molested seriously since they had taken to the Twin Buttes country, and, with the exception of Ackerman, he secretly felt less security than any of the others. Thanks to his earlier activities and clever distortion of facts as to why he had crossed the Deepwater to live in the Buttes, the outfit had not been bothered; and the Twin Buttes section had become taboo, in recent years, to everyone, no man caring to risk his life in penetrating that locality until Johnny Nelson appeared. And although Ackerman had preached disaster, he had preached it so long and so much that he was regarded as a calamity howler.
There were two comparatively safe ways to reach the Buttes, when once the last high, intervening ridge was attained. One led to the far side of the northern Twin and was hidden by it from the sight of anyone on the other butte; the second course swept to the south, running through arroyos and draws, and sheltered by the dense growths of pine; and it not only was a shorter and easier course, but allowed an occasional glimpse of the way Johnny had scaled the great southern wall.
Reaching the ridge, Quigley paused to rest, and weighed the merits of the two approaches. He could be as clever and cautious as the next man when he felt that the occasion demanded it; and the events of the last few days told him that such an occasion had arrived. Easing the bandages, he chose the southern course and led the way again.
"There's his smoke," grunted Purdy, trudging along in the rear. "Wonder how much grub that ki-yote's got?"
"Don't know; an' don't care much," replied Quigley. "It don't make no difference. Th' time will come when he's got to come down, an' bein' there when he does is our job. If I was plumb shore he was workin' on his own hook my worries would simmer down a whole lot; an' until I am shore, I ain't overlookin' nothin'."