The Settling of the Sage

by Hal G. Evarts

There were no prisoners.

"So they wouldn't give up even when they was burnt out," the horse guard commented. "I thought maybe a few would march out and surrender."

"I'd sort of hoped we'd have one or two left over so we could put on a trial," the sheriff said. "There was three come out. But the light was poor and all. Maybe they did aim to surrender. It's hard to say. But if they did—why, some of the Three Bar boys read the signs wrong. Anyway, there won't be any trial."

They rode to the sheltered box canyon where Waddles had left the pack train. A little later Bentley's men rode up and five minutes behind them came Carp with the rest. The bed rolls were spread among the stunted cedars on the floor of the canyon and all hands turned in. At daylight the long return journey to the Three Bar was commenced. The horses were tired and the back trip was slow. They camped for the night twenty miles out from the ranch and before noon of the next day the sheriff and the marshals had split off with their men, leaving the Three Bar crew to ride the short intervening space to the ranch alone.

As she neared the edge of the Crazy Loop valley the girl dreaded the first glimpse of the pillaged ranch. For the first time it occurred to her to wonder at the speed with which Harris had planned and executed the return raid while the Three Bar still burned.

"How did you get word to them all?" she asked. "Did you have it all planned before?"

"It was Carp," he said. "One of Lang's men rode down to inquire for Morrow and told Carp the cows were gathered for the run and held near the Three Bar. They figured Carp was a pal of Morrow's and all right. It was near morning then. Carp sent Bentley fanning for Coldriver to see if the sheriff was back and to bring out the posse if he hadn't turned up. He started out for the Three Bar himself. The run was under way when he came in sight so he cut over and headed the mule teams at the forks and turned them back, then kept on after the boys at Brill's. Sent word to me by Evans to meet them where we did."

She did not hear the latter part of his explanation for they had reached the edge of the valley and she looked down upon the ruins of her ranch.

"Now I'm ready to go," she said. "I'll go and see what Judge Colton wants."

"He wanted you to get away before anything like this occurred," Harris said. "I knew that maybe we'd have tough going for a while at some critical time and wanted you to miss all of that—to come back and find the Three Bar booming along without having been through all the grief. So I wrote him to urge you to come."