"I've a bait or two out for Slade," Harris said. "But that way may prove too slow. If Lanky's gone under, I expect I'll have to pick a quarrel with Slade and hurry things along."
"Don't you!" she objected. For all of her confidence in Harris's efficiency in most respects, her implicit belief in his courage, she could not forget the awkward swing of his gun and she had a swift vision of him facing Slade without a chance.
A crash of wagon wheels and the voice of Waddles admonishing the horses interrupted her. The chuck wagon rolled round a bend as the big cook followed the trail of the night run. Every bed had been rolled and loaded to eliminate the necessity of a return. The remuda trailed behind the wagon under the combined supervision of the nighthawk and the wrangler.
"How is Lanky?" was Harris's first query.
Waddles jerked a thumb over his shoulder. Evans, shot once through the arm and a second time through the shoulder, reclined on the triple-thickness bed roll the cook had spread for him on the floor of the wagon.
"Only nicked—clean holes and no bones," Lanky said. "I'll be all right as soon as Waddles will let me out of this chariot and I get to riding comfortable on a horse."
"He'll come round fine in a few days if we can keep him offen a horse and riding comfortable in the wagon," Waddles countered. "I've give him orders to that effect."
Evans groaned.
"He drives over places I wouldn't cross afoot," he complained. "Did you hold the run?"
Reassured on this point he flattened out on his pallet and the wagon held on toward the herd.