The three were agreed, however, to follow up to the mouth of the Gap itself and did follow. Finding no trace of de Spain’s movements in this quest, they rode separately in wide circles to the north and south, but without picking up a hoof-print that led anywhere or gave them any clew to the whereabouts of the missing man.
“There is one consolation,” muttered Lefever, as they held to what each felt to be an almost 149 hopeless search. “As long as Henry can stick to a saddle he can shoot––and the Morgans after yesterday afternoon will think twice before they close in on him, if they find him.”
Scott shook his head: “That brings us up against another proposition, John. De Spain hasn’t got any cartridges.”
Lefever turned sharply: “What do you mean?”
“His belt is in the barn at Calabasas, hanging up with his coat.”
“Why didn’t you tell me that before,” demanded Lefever indignantly.
“I’ve been hoping all the time we’d find Henry and I wouldn’t have to tell you.”
In spite of the hope advanced by Lefever that de Spain might by some chance have cartridges in his pocket, Scott’s information was disquieting. However, it meant for de Spain, they knew, only the greater need of succor, and when the news of his plight was made known later in the day to Jeffries, efforts to locate him were redoubled.
For a week the search continued day and night, but each day, even each succeeding hour, reduced the expectation of ever seeing the hunted man alive. Spies working at Calabasas, others sent in by Jeffries to Music Mountain among the Morgans, and men from Medicine Bend haunting Sleepy Cat could get no word of de Spain. Fairly 150 accurate reports accounted for Gale Morgan, nursing a wound at home, and for Sassoon, badly wounded and under cover somewhere in the Gap. Beyond this, information halted.
Toward the end of the week a Mexican sheep-herder brought word in to Lefever that he had seen in Duke Morgan’s stable, Sassoon’s horse––the one on which de Spain had escaped. He averred he had seen the blood-stained Santa Fe saddle that had been taken off the horse when the horse was found at daybreak of the day following the fight, waiting at Sassoon’s corral to be cared for. There could be, it was fairly well ascertained, no mistake about the horse: the man knew the animal; but his information threw no light on the fate of its missing rider.