“Once,” Tresler replied. Then he told the officer of his runaway ride.
Fyles listened with interest. At the conclusion he said, “Pity you didn’t tell me of this before. However, you missed the chief interest. Look away down there in the shelter of the cliff. See—about a mile down. Corrals enough to shepherd ten thousand head. And they are cunningly disposed.”
Tresler now became aware of a scattered array of corrals, stretching away out into the distance, but so arranged at the foot of the towering walls of the valley that they needed looking for closely.
Then he looked up at the ledge which had been the scene of the disaster, and the ladder of hewn steps above, and he pointed at them.
“I wonder what’s on the other side?”
“That’s an easy one,” replied his companion promptly. “Half-breeds.”
“A settlement?”
“That’s about it. You remember the Breeds cleared away from their old settlement lately. We’ve never found them. Once they take to the hills, it’s like a needle in a haystack. Maybe friend Anton is in hiding there.”
“I doubt it. ‘Tough’ McCulloch didn’t belong to them, as I told you. He comes from over the border. No; he’s getting away as fast as his horse can carry him. And Arizona isn’t far off his trail, if I’m any judge.”
Fyles’s great round face was turned contemplatively on his companion.