“A dead horse! Freshly killed, he appears? What does that prove?”
“That the mowstanger hes killed him.”
“It frightened the others off, you think, and they followed no further?”
“They follered no further; but it wa’n’t adzackly thet as scared ’em off. Thur’s the thing as kep them from follerin’. Ole Hickory, what a jump!”
The speaker pointed to the arroyo, on the edge of which both riders had now arrived.
“You don’t suppose they leaped it?” said Calhoun. “Impossible.”
“Leaped it clur as the crack o’ a rifle. Don’t ye see thur toe-marks, both on this side an the t’other? An’ Miss Peintdexter fust, too! By the jumpin’ Geehosofat, what a gurl she air sure enuf! They must both a jumped afore the stellyun war shot; else they kedn’t a got at it. Thur’s no other place whar a hoss ked go over. Geeroozalem! wa’n’t it cunnin’ o’ the mowstanger to throw the stud in his tracks, jest in the very gap?”
“You think that he and my cousin crossed here together?”
“Not adzackly thegither,” explained Zeb, without suspecting the motive of the interrogatory. “As I’ve sayed, Spotty went fust. You see the critter’s tracks yonner on t’other side?”
“I do.”