He stretched himself under the shelter of a low bush, and, strangely enough, recognized it as the one he had lain under on that memorable first night. This realization brought him a grim foreboding; he knew what he expected, he knew what was coming. And his foreboding was fulfilled within a few seconds of taking up his position.
Suddenly he heard a door close, and the voices ceased speaking. He waited almost breathlessly for the next move. It came. The crackling of pine cones under shod hoofs sounded sharply to his straining ears. It was a repetition of what had happened before. Two horsemen were approaching from the direction of the house. It was inevitable that his hand should go to his gun, and, as he realized his own action, he understood how surely the prairie instincts had claimed him. But he withdrew it quickly and waited, for he had no intention of taking action. It might be Red Mask. It probably was. But he had no intention of upsetting his present plans by any blind, precipitate attack upon the desperado. Besides, if Red Mask and Jake were one, then the shooting of him, in cold blood, in the vicinity of the ranch, would, in the eyes of the police, be murder. No story of his would convince a jury that the foreman of Mosquito Bend was a cattle-rustler.
A moment later the horses dimly outlined themselves. There were two of them, as before. But he could not see well, the woods seemed darker than before; and, besides, they did not pass so near to him. They went on like ghostly, silent shadows, only the scrunch of the cones underfoot told of their solidity.
He waited until the sound died out, then he rose quietly and pursued his way. But what he had just witnessed plunged his thoughts into a moody channel. The night-riders were abroad again, riding unchecked upon their desperate way, over the trail of murder and robbery they cut for themselves wherever they went. He wondered with dread who was to be victim to-night. He remembered Manson Orr and shuddered. He had a bitter feeling that he had acted wrongly in letting them pass unchallenged in spite of what reason and a cool judgment told him. His duty had been to investigate, but he also thought of a sad-faced girl, friendless and alone, weeping her heart out in the midst of her own home. And somehow his duty faded out before the second picture. And, as though to further encourage him, the memory of Joe Nelson’s words came to him suddenly, and continued to haunt him persistently.
“You’ll jest round that gal up into your own corrals, an’ set your own brand on her quick, eh?”
CHAPTER XII
THE RISING OF A SUMMER STORM
When the horsemen had passed out of hearing, Tresler still exerted the utmost caution. He had yet to pass the blind man’s room, and he knew that that individual’s hearing was something bordering on the marvelous, and, he argued, he must still be up, or, at least, awake. So he moved on with the lightest tread, with every sense alert; watchful alike for every unusual sound or movement. At the stable he paused and gently tried the door. It was fast. He put his ear to it and listened, and was forced to be content with the rattle of the collar chains, and the sound of the heavy-breathing animals within. He would have liked to investigate further, for the noise of the shutting door, he knew, had come from the stable, but it behooved him to refrain. It would be worse than useless to rouse the man, Anton, who slept over the stable. And there was no other means of ascertaining what had been going on.