Chapter Eighty.
A Doorway Well Watched.
It was some time before Zeb Stump sallied forth from the covert where he had been witness to the “horse swop.” Not till both the bargainers had ridden entirely out of sight. Then he went not after either; but stayed upon the spot, as if undecided which he should follow.
It was not exactly this that kept him to the place; but the necessity of taking what he was in the habit of calling a “good think.”
His thoughts were about the exchange of the horses: for he had heard the whole dialogue relating thereto, and the proposal coming from Calhoun. It was this that puzzled, or rather gave him reason for reflection. What could be the motive?
Zeb knew to be true what the Mexican had said: that the States horse was, in market value, worth far more than the mustang. He knew, moreover, that Cassius Calhoun was the last man to be “coped” in a horse trade. Why, then, had he done the “deal?”
The old hunter pulled off his felt hat; gave his hand a twist or two through his unkempt hair; transferred the caress to the grizzled beard upon his chin—all the while gazing upon the ground, as if the answer to his mental interrogatory was to spring out of the grass.
“Thur air but one explication o’t,” he at length muttered: “the grey’s the faster critter o’ the two—ne’er a doubt ’beout thet; an Mister Cash wants him for his fastness: else why the durnation shed he a gin a hoss thet ’ud sell for four o’ his sort in any part o’ Texas, an twicet thet number in Mexiko? I reck’n he’s bargained for the heels. Why? Durn me, ef I don’t suspect why. He wants—he—heigh—I hev it—somethin’ as kin kum up wi’ the Headless!
“Thet’s the very thing he’s arter—sure as my name’s Zeb’lon Stump. He’s tried the States hoss an foun’ him slow. Thet much I knowd myself. Now he thinks, wi’ the mowstang, he may hev a chance to overhaul the tother, ef he kin only find him agin; an for sartin he’ll go in sarch o’ him.