It was some time before the overturned stagecoach could be righted. It took longer to provide a team for it. When the bodies of the unfortunate white men had been loaded into the vehicle and the ponies lined out it was late in the afternoon.
Kid Wolf had examined the contents of the express box and found that it contained a small fortune in money. He decided to take charge of it and see that it reached proper hands. Twenty miles west of Lost Springs, he learned, were an express-company station and agent. The Texan planned to guard the money at Lost Springs overnight and then take it on to the express post, located at Mexican Tanks.
The two Robbinses, both father and son, were overcome with gratitude toward the man who had saved them. They at once agreed to stay with Kid Wolf.
The posse members that the Texan had drafted at revolver point were not so willing. Although most of them were honest men, they feared Garvey's gang and the consequences of their act. All of them suspected that Garvey had a hand in the plot to rob the stagecoach. Most of them made excuses and rode away in different directions.
"We beat the Apaches," explained one, "so I reckon I'll go back to the ranch. Adios, and good luck!"
Kid Wolf smiled. He knew that the men were leaving him for other reasons. Perhaps a man with less courage would have avoided Lost Springs, or even abandoned the money. The young Texan, however, was not to be swerved from what he believed to be the right.
"Look out for Garvey, Kid," begged Dave Robbins. "He hates yuh for what yuh done."
"I've heard of him," the elder Robbins added. "If helpin' us has got you into trouble, I'm sorry. He's a man without a heart."
"Then some day," Kid Wolf said softly, "he's liable to find a bullet in the spot wheah his heart ought to be. I don't regret comin' to yo' aid, not fo' a minute. And I guess Blizzahd and I are ready to see this thing through to the end."
Kid Wolf was riding on his white horse alongside the rumbling stage. The only member of the drafted posse who had stayed was driving the vehicle, and beside him on the box rode the two Robbinses, father and son.