As soon as they were clear of the trees Donald headed directly southwest, for that was the direction taken by the stampeded herd. Looking down he could easily discover where their hoofs had torn up the soil of the prairie; and as long as the friendly light from above held out, the ranch boy believed that he could follow that plain trail, even though they heard no sound from ahead to give them pointers as to where the cattle had gone.
He and Adrian rode side by side, so that from time to time they could exchange sentences. Billie on the other hand was quite willing to bring up the rear. He was accustomed to “taking other people’s dust,” as he himself frankly admitted, and did not object seriously to such a thing.
So far as he could discover Jupiter was feeling all right again after his rest, and offered no objection
to keeping up the swift pace set by the others.
“Of course after we begin to haul up on them,” said Donald, presently, “we’ll cut down the pace more or less, so they won’t get wind of our being around.”
“I wonder what sort of luck we’ll have,” Adrian was saying, showing that he had been trying to figure things out in his mind. “Of course I take it for granted that we’ll come up with the rustlers; but it’s another thing to get them off their guard, so we can make them prisoners, and take the cattle away with us.”
“Yes, that’s so,” assented Donald, “but you never know what you can do till you make a try; and we’ve carried out a few jobs on our own hook, you and me, Adrian, if you stop to think.”
“As big as this one seems to be, for a fact, Donald,” agreed the other, brightening up under the inspiring remarks of his chum, just as Donald supposed would be the case.
“Of course, Ad, we can’t lay any plans till we see how the ground lies,” the other went on to say; “after they’ve got the cattle quieted down I reckon those rustler fellows will take things easy. They’ve run matters with such a free hand up around here so long now, that they just can’t imagine anybody daring to interfere with their business.”
“Yes,” added Adrian, “and perhaps if they were held up and asked to give an account of the cattle