CHAPTER VII
OUTLAND JUSTICE
The noon sun sweltered down through the rank vegetation of the narrow defile. The heat was almost too burdensome to endure. It was moist; it was dank with the reek of decaying matter. The way was a seemingly endless battle against odds. But the travelers were buoyed with the knowledge that it was a short cut, calculated to save them many hours and many miles.
Bud Tristram had pointed the way. Furthermore, he had urged Jeff to accept and endure the tortures and shortcomings which he knew they must face in the heart of this remote gulch.
Nor were his warnings unneeded, for Nature had set up no inconsiderable defenses. Here were swarms of over-grown mosquitoes of a peculiarly vicious type, which covered their horses' flanks in a gray horde, almost obliterating their original colors; and a bleeding mass resulted every time either man raised a hand to the back of his own neck to soothe the fierce irritation of the vicious attacks. Then the way itself. It was a narrow gorge almost completely occupied by the muddy bed and boggy shores of a drying mountain creek.
It was, in Jeff's own words, a "fierce journey." The heat left them drenched in perspiration, and wiltering. The two packhorses fought for their very lives, often hock deep in a sucking mire. While the beasts, who bore the burden of their exacting masters, were driven to battle every inch of the way against a fiercely obstinate rampart of dense grown bush.
Mercifully the gorge was less than three miles in length. A greater distance must have left the nervous equine mind staggered, and helpless, and beaten. As it was nearly three hours of incessant struggle only served to pass the final barrier.
"Phew!"
Jeff Masters drew off his hat as they emerged upon the wide opening of a great valley. Then he flung himself out of the saddle and began to sweep the blood-inflated mosquitoes from his horse's flanks. Bud, with less haste, proceeded to do the same. Finally, both men walked round the weary beasts and examined the security of the packs on the led horses.
Bud pointed down the valley with one outstretched arm.