“I’ll give you a job helpin’ me on this hay for a few days, and kind of try you out,” Tim agreed at last. “I don’t want to discourage you at the start, but I don’t believe you got the mettle in you to make a flockmaster, if you want to call it that, out of.”
“All right; I’ll help you on the hay. Before I start in though, I’d like to borrow a saddle-horse from you to take a ride down the creek to Swan Carlson’s place. I wouldn’t be long.”
“Carlson’s place? Do you know Swan Carlson?”
Mackenzie told in few words how much he knew of Carlson, and his reason for desiring to visit him. Tim’s wonder was too large to contain at hearing this news. He got up, his eyes staring in plain incredulity, his mouth open a bit between surprise and censure, it seemed. But he said nothing for a little while; only stood and looked Mackenzie over again, with more careful scrutiny than before.
“I’ll go down with you,” he announced, turning abruptly away to get the horses.
It was evident to Mackenzie that Sullivan was bewildered between doubt and suspicion as they rode toward Carlson’s ranch, which the sheepman said was about seven miles away. But he betrayed nothing of his thoughts in words, riding in silence mainly, looking at the ground like a man who had troubles on his mind.
The silence of abandonment was over Carlson’s house as they rode up. A few chickens retreated from the yard to the cover of the barn in the haste of panic, their going being the only sound of life about the place. The door through which Mackenzie had left was shut; he approached it without hesitation––Tim Sullivan lingering back as if in doubt of their reception––and knocked. No answer. Mackenzie tried the door, finding it unlocked; pushed it open, entered.
Sullivan stood outside, one mighty hand on the jamb, his body to one side under protection of the house, his head put cautiously and curiously round to see, leaving a fairway for Swan Carlson should he rise from a dark corner, shake himself like an old grizzly, and charge.
“Is he there?” Tim asked, his voice a strained whisper.