"Quite a hike yit, down to Goldite."
"I suppose it is," said Beth in her interesting way. "How far is it, really, from here?"
"'Bout twenty miles of straight ahead, and two miles of straight up, and three of straight down—if a feller could go straight," said Gettysburg gravely, "but he can't."
Beth looked very much concerned. She had hoped they were almost there, and no more hills to climb or descend. She felt convinced they had ridden over twenty miles already, and the horseman had assured her it was thirty at the most, from the station so far behind the mountains.
"But—Mr. Van can't walk so far as that," she said. "I'm sure I don't see what——"
She was interrupted by the reappearance of Van himself.
"Isn't there a horse on the place?" he asked his partners collectively. "What have you done with the sorrel?"
Gettysburg arose. "Loaned him to A. C., yistiddy," said he. "But the outlaw's on the job."
"Not Vesuvius?" Van replied incredulously. "You don't mean to say he's turned up again unslaughtered?"
"Cayuse here roped him, up to Cedar flat," imparted Gettysburg. "Cornered him there in natural corral and fetched him home fer fun."