CHAPTER X
A CHANGE OF BASE
Johnny, upon leaving Hastings, struck south from it and spent the night west of the Circle S after a journey of twenty miles on foot. Pepper was again a pack horse, and the diamond hitch which held the bulging tarpaulin in place would have dispelled any doubt as to Johnny's abilities to cut loose from civilization and thrive in the lonely places. And he had cut loose when he placed a note under a rock behind a certain tree near the ford; for when "Hen" Crosby, riding for the mail, saw the agreed-upon sign on the tree, it would not be long before Logan had the note.
Following the line of least resistance, the second day found him bearing westerly, and the next three days found him crowding the pack on Pepper's back and riding due north through a country broken, wild, and without a trail. The way was not as difficult as it might have been because the valleys joined one another, and through them all flowed creeks, which made a trail that left no tracks. To an experienced man who had plenty of time the difficulties were more often avoided than conquered.
At noon of the fifth day he drove Pepper slantingly up the wall of a crumbling butte, and, reaching the top, looked around for his bearings. They were easily found, for Twin Buttes looked too much alike, even from the rear, to be easily mistaken; and they loomed too high to be overlooked. Almost on a direct line with the Twins lay Quigley's cabins, a matter of fifteen miles from him; which he decided was too far. That distance covered twice daily would take up too much time. Returning to the valley he built a fire, had dinner, and, hanging the edible supplies on tree limbs for safety, whistled Pepper to him and departed toward the Twins.
Two hours later he left the horse in a deep draw and crawled up the eastern bank. Crossing a bowlder-strewn plateau he not long afterward wriggled to the edge of Quigley's valley and looked down into it.
The size of the enclosed range amazed him, for it was fully thirteen miles long, eight miles across at its widest, the northern end, and three miles wide at the middle, where massive cliffs jutted far out from each side.
The more he saw of it the better he liked it. The grass was better and thicker than even that in the prized and fought-for valley of the old Bar-20. He judged it to contain about eighty square miles and believed that it could feed two hundred cows to the mile. The main stream, which he named Rustler Creek, flowed through a deep ravine and was fed, in the valley alone, by six smaller creeks. There was a sizable swamp and six lakes, one of them nearly a mile long. It was singularly free from bowlders and rocks except at a place near the upper wall, where a great collection of them extended out from a broken cliff.
Except at three places the canyons which cut into the cliffs were blind alleys and he could see that two of them had narrow waterfalls at their upper ends. The three open canyons were the only places where cattle could leave the great "sink," as Johnny called it; and they were strongly fenced. The first was the entrance canyon, near the houses; the second was a deep, steep walled defile at the northwest corner of the range, and it led into another, but smaller valley, also heavily grassed. Through it ran a small stream which joined Rustler Creek at the swamp. The third canyon, at the northeast corner of the valley, was wide enough to let Rustler Creek flow through it and leave room for the passing of cattle; and judging by the gates in the heavy fence which crossed it, Johnny knew this to be the exit through which the drive herds went. Where that drive trail led to he did not know, but he believed it to pass well to the west of Hope.