“He’s had a bad shaking up, and he’s as sore as a boil and will be for some days,” declared the physician. “But nothing is broken, and I think there will prove to be no internal injuries. He’s badly bruised and he’ll have to stay in bed for three or four days. Now where’s the other chap?”
But that was a question that could not be answered; at least off-hand. For when they went to Munson’s room, whither he had limped on his arrival at the ranch with the startling news, he was gone. Some bloody bandages on a chair seemed to indicate that he had dressed his wound again and gone. But where?
The cook solved the mystery by reporting that, just before the arrival of the doctor, Munson had been seen riding away in the direction taken by the pursuing cowboys.
“Well, he’s got grit, that’s what I say!” exclaimed the foreman.
Jerry was made as comfortable as possible, and then they could only await the return of the cowboys from the chase to see how Munson fared. And when he came riding in with the others, showing little traces on his face of any pain or suffering, and heard the edict that the doctor was to come to him, or he to go to the doctor, he exclaimed:
“Not much! It isn’t the first time I’ve been shot, and it may not be the last. I know how to doctor myself and I’m all right. I’ll be a little lame and stiff for a while and I’ll have to lie around the bunk, but that’ll be about all. No doctor for me!” and they could not persuade him otherwise.
Then the talk turned to the results of the pursuit.
“They got clean away!” declared Gimp, in disappointed tones. “Couldn’t find hide nor hair of ’em.”
“Where was the last trace?” asked the foreman.
“Same place as the others, near Horse Tail Gulch.” This, it appeared, was the name of the ravine near which the boys had made some observations. “We traced ’em to there,” explained the Parson, “and that was all we could do.”