"What will you do?" he asked; and Ballard came alive with a start and shook his head.
"I don't know: if we could manage to overtake that auto.... But it's too late now to do anything, Bigelow. I've made my complaint and sworn out the warrants. Beckwith will serve them—he's obliged to serve them."
"Of course," said Bigelow; and together they waited for the sheriff's posse to close up.
XIII
THE LAW AND THE LADY
It touched a little spring of wonderment in the Forestry man when Ballard made the waiting halt merely an excuse for a word of leave-taking with Sheriff Beckwith; a brittle exchange of formalities in which no mention was made of the incident of the brush barrier and the type-written note.
"You have your warrants, and you know your way around in the valley; you won't need me," was the manner in which the young engineer drew out of the impending unpleasantness. "When you have taken your prisoners to the county seat, the company's attorneys will do the rest."
Beckwith, being an ex-cattleman, was grimly sarcastic.
"This is my job, and I'll do it up man-size and b'ligerent, Mr. Ballard. But between us three and the gate-post, you ain't goin' to make anything by it—barrin' a lot o' bad blood. The old colonel 'll give a bond and bail his men, and there you are again, right where you started from."