“Not yet! But we’ve not finished! How’d you make out?�
“We got a clue, boss!� Jim Casey answered. “I spotted a box in the road an’ Bug Eye says it was in the flivver with him. So the thieves must have come this way.�
Roy spurred his horse close to his father’s.
“Another thing, Dad,� the boy remarked in a low voice. “Bug Eye said that one of the hold-up men had on a checkered shirt!�
“You don’t say!� Mr. Manley appeared startled. “But of course we have to remember that there’s probably more than one checkered shirt around here, though I don’t recall ever seein’ one as loud as the one we noticed at Eagles. Roy, that’s right interestin’ news!�
“Do we go on, boss?� Nick Looker asked.
“We sure do!� the ranch owner answered forcibly. “We’ll trail that flivver till we get it, by jinks!�
Once more the riders started off. The night was growing misty now, and the tracks were harder to see, so that the punchers had to proceed more slowly. Once Pop Burns thought he saw the car at one side, but it proved to be only a large boulder.
After riding some five or six miles, Mr. Manley called to his party to halt.
“There’s something fishy about this,� the cattle owner declared. “These tracks don’t seems to get any place! An’ by the way, there’s more than one car in this part of the country, though I can’t think why any one would take this trail unless they wanted to get away in a hurry. Let’s spread out, and cover more ground. Even if we do find the flivver, it won’t help us much. It’s a cinch the thieves aren’t going to hang around it, once it stops; an’ it can’t go on forever. How much gas did it have in the tank, Bug Eye?�