It was Bud who voiced the thought of both partners immediately after a close interrogation of the injured man.
"Looks like some low-bred son-of-a-hobo owes you a reckonin' he's yearnin' to git quit of, Jeff," he said, the moment they were alone. "They're workin' this way all the time. They ain't so much as smelt around the old 'T.T.' territory in days. D'you make it that way?"
Jeff nodded.
"Sure."
But he made no attempt to throw enlightenment.
"Guess you signed the reward."
Bud watched the shadowed serious face of his friend.
"Maybe it's that." There was something like indifference in the younger man's manner.
Perhaps it was this manner which stirred Bud's impatience and drove him to resentment.
"Say," he cried, in fiercely vibrant tones, "d'you know what it is I got in my head? It's the 'hands' on our range. Sure. Ther's some lousy guy on the Obar working in with the gang. Cowpunchers are a mongrel lot anyway. Ther' ain't one but 'ud souse the sacrament wine ef the passon wa'an't lookin' on. I guess we'll need to chase up the penitentiary re-cord of every blamed thief on our pay-roll. Maybe the cinch we're lookin' fer lies that way."