He rode out from the yard, and making a broad circuit, quickly struck the trail. There could be no mistaking this, for it lay plainly imprinted upon the dew-moistened ground. Dismounting, he closely examined each of the four hoof-prints, registering them indelibly upon his memory.
“I’ll not forget,” he muttered, swinging himself once more into the saddle. “Large hoofs, shod in front; a triangular chip broken from the inside edge of the off hind foot. Now it only remains to follow the trail to its end. Sooner or later we must meet, and then, Mark Haley—if that be your name—beware! As God hears me, I will kill you without mercy! And if—if harm has come to my poor child, I’ll torture you so that the most devilish red-skin would blush for shame at his ignorance!”
Bending low in the saddle, Hawksley rode on at a rapid gallop, his keen eye, sharpened by a knowledge of his child’s peril, picking up the trail unerringly. Straight as the flight of a crow, for miles, led the trace.
Hawksley’s brow darkened as he noted this. The abductor seemed striking for the broad, unsettled prairie. Could it be that he was one of those fiendish renegades who found a refuge among the Kiowas? He could think of no other solution for the abductor taking such a course.
“Never mind—’twill only be the easier to trail him, if he keeps away from the settled track. Ha! what is that?”
Checking his horse he bent down and picked up a circular patch of cloth, covered with some sticky substance. A groan broke from his lips as he divined the use it had been put to. One mystery was cleared up: that why Fannie had not given the alarm while being taken from her home.
“Curse him!” hissed Hawksley, hurling the bit of plaster away. “Curse my blindness in not seeing through his mask. Poor Fred’s fate should have taught me more caution. But never mind—my time will come.”
The settler, with flashing eyes and close-set teeth, continued his course, picking up the trail with tolerable ease for one so little versed in the art as he was. He knew, by the position of the hoof-prints—they being planted one in a place, from eight to ten feet apart—that at this point Mark Haley had been advancing rapidly, at a gallop. In trotting, there would be two hoof-prints close together, one almost obliterated by the other, or, just the same as made while in a walk, save of larger stride.
Hawksley, by this fact, could guess pretty closely at the speed maintained by the abductor, and though he knew that his own progress was much slower, still he did not despair of overtaking the man. Doubly loaded, the fugitive must pause soon, if only to rest his horse.
The sun was two hours high, when a sight met the father’s eye that caused a cold thrill to pervade his veins. For a moment he reeled in his saddle, and almost fell to the ground, but then, with pale face and starting eyeballs, he plunged spurs deep into his horse’s flanks, and dashed madly forward.