He opened one of the saddlebags. He usually carried a curry comb and brush with him so that he could use them in odd moments. The implements were still there, but it was hard to tell if they had been used. Whatever the thief had used, Ticktock had obviously been groomed only a short time before. The pony didn’t look tired either, but acted quite fresh and frisky.
Noticing that the other saddlebag bulged suspiciously, Jim opened it. There, folded neatly, was the missing bridle.
“Now why would anyone fold up a bridle and put it in the saddlebag?” asked Jim.
Ticktock didn’t answer but just nuzzled his master contentedly.
“If someone wasn’t going to ride you for a while,” said Jim musingly to his pony, “he would take off your saddle as well as your bridle. If he was going to ride you in a few minutes, he either wouldn’t take off the bridle at all or at most hang it on a tree limb or the saddle horn. But that bridle was carefully put away in the saddlebag. There’s something fishy here. I don’t believe that thief is so far from here.”
The more Jim thought about the matter, the more puzzled he became. But no matter what the solution, he was very angry with whoever had stolen his horse. According to all the books he had read and movies he had seen, a horse thief was considered three degrees lower than a murderer. Jim agreed with the Western idea. Turning over such thoughts in his mind, he finally came to a decision. He saddled Ticktock, put on the bridle and then went into the house. He opened the closet to his father’s room and carefully got out a twenty-two rifle. He had been forbidden to touch his father’s firearms, but he felt this case was different. There was a heavy deer gun in the closet too, but that looked too forbidding. He found five twenty-two long shells in his father’s bureau, which he carefully stuck in his pocket. It was a single shot rifle, and he knew how to load it.
Going back downstairs, he found a pencil and paper and wrote a short note that he left lying on the kitchen table.
Dear Dad and Mom:
Ticktock came back and is all right. I have gone to look for that low-down horse thief. If I catch him alive, I hope they hang him.
Jim
Very grim-faced, Jim mounted and rode off in the direction from which Ticktock had come. He had no idea where he was going to hunt for the thief, but to hunt anywhere was a form of action. He jogged along, so overjoyed to be back on his horse once more that he paid little attention to where the pony was heading. Suddenly he realized that he was entering Briggs Wood. At the proper point Ticktock turned off the road toward the hideaway.
“Well, we might as well go there as anywhere else,” said Jim cheerfully. He really didn’t have much hope of locating the thief anyhow.