"Sure, it's none of my butt-in how you handle the durn polecat, but if I had my way I'd swing Ranlett up to a cottonwood if I got my mazuma fer doin' it. Them were the finest Shorthorns in the world and if Nick-the-time-feeder was back——"
Nicholas Fairfax had been notoriously prompt to discharge a man who slacked on the job, but O'Neil had not intended to let the bunk-house name for the late owner of the Double O slip out. He looked furtively at Courtlandt but he, consciously or unconsciously, ignored the lapse.
"We'll find them, O'Neil. We must. Get a move on, boys. Ride in pairs and ride like——"
Their whoop of enthusiasm drowned his last words. Steve remained motionless until the last one had taken the fence at a jump. His face was white, his eyes strained and tired. He rode toward Peg and Benson who had with difficulty restrained their horses from following the riders.
"That was the nearest approach to the wild-west cowboy of the eighties that you will ever see, Peg-o'-my-heart. Did you notice that Marks and Schoeffleur were missing, Tommy? Why didn't Jerry come with you, Peg?"
"She said that she had work to do, that she would ride after luncheon."
"She understood that she was not to go out of sight of the ranch-house?"
The girl's salaam was as profound as the neck of her horse would permit.
"Your slave heard and obeys, oh Abdul the Great."
A laugh erased the tired lines about Courtlandt's mouth.