"Yes; with him!" breaks out Old Man Wright. "It was neck against neck—me and Wisner. I had him beat; I'd of had him on his knees. And now he's put the greatest disgrace on us any man could of figured out, no matter how hard he tried—his hired man has run away with my daughter! I could of laughed at Wisner once. Can I laugh at him now?"
"That ain't the worst," says I.
"No," says he; "it ain't the worst. The worst is, she's married a low-down cur that's been after her money all this time. All this time, Curly—and I didn't know it. And you let him go thataway—right here; you heard the wheels that took 'em away!"
"Yes, Colonel," says I; "that's true. Now it's a little late, but I'm going to get on this job the best I know how from this time down. That means I've got to go away from town for a little while, Colonel. I want you to set here and leave this thing to me. Please don't say 'No' to that. I may need you after a while—in case I locate them. Since the newspapers has got fooled by this thing we pulled off this morning, maybe the best thing I can do is to go away while things is quiet.
"Stay here, then, Colonel," says I. "Don't drink no more and no less than you been doing. If anybody comes tell them Bonnie Bell is sick. Wait till you hear from me."
XXVI - How I Went Back
I argued that when you look for a man who has done a crime you got to figure on what he said and done last, so as to get a line on what he's going to do next; and when I come to study over that hired man had mostly said to me I remembered it was about Wyoming and ropes and cows—things like that. I knowed he was batty, like so many people is, about Western things—not that Western men is any different from anybody else, though a lot of people think they are.
Now I figured that the place he'd make a break to was, like enough, the range. He'd told me he knowed the Circle Arrow, too, his boss being a whole lot interested in the Circle Arrow.
I put one thing together with another; and, without saying anything to Old Man Wright about it, I bought a ticket for the Yellow Bull country and pulled out for there as fast as I could go.