CHAPTER XXI
WORD FROM HEADQUARTERS
Two horses ambled complacently, side by side, down the village trail. Each was ridden by the man it knew best, and was most willing to serve. Peter’s affection for Stanley Fyles was probably little less than his master’s affection for him. The same thing applied to Sergeant McBain, whose hard face suggested little enough of the tenderer emotions. But both men belonged to the prairie, and the long prairie trail inspires a wonderful sympathy between man and beast.
The men were talking earnestly in low voices, but their outward seeming had no suggestion of anything beyond ordinary interest.
“He’s surely leaving a trail all over the valley,” said Sergeant McBain, after listening to his superior’s talk for some moments. “It’s a clear trail, too—but it don’t ever seem to lead anywhere—definite. You’ve made nothing of that corral place, sir?”
Fyles’s eyes roamed over the scene about him in the quick, uneasy fashion of a groping mind.
“I don’t know yet,” he said slowly, “I’ve got to windward of that haying business. The fellow’s haying all right. He’s got a permit for cutting, and he generally puts up fifty tons. Maybe he keeps that wagon out there all the time for convenience. I can’t say. But even if he doesn’t I can’t see where it points.”
“We can watch the place,” said McBain quickly.
“That’s better than speculation, but—it’s clumsy.”