Consequently, he thought only of his purpose to throw the cowboy off his track.
With that end in view, he rode low over his horse, dropping to one side or the other, Indian fashion, when a rise in the plains might expose his form to the eyes he knew were strained for a glimpse of him, at the same time swerving his course to the North that he might cross the trail made by the steers he had lifted and swing into the swamp from a direction almost opposite that where his pursuers would expect.
Thus deprived of any guidance as to the position of his quarry, Deadshot was forced to rely on his powers of deduction.
That the stolen cattle had been driven to the swamp he knew. And he was also convinced that the man who had burned Hawks’ buildings was the lifter who had deceived the entire Double Cross outfit with his spectral trick. With these two premises, it was not difficult for him to reach the conclusion that the fugitive would seek the shelter of the bottom lands. And accordingly he decided to strike the shortest route to the Sangammon swamps in the hope that he might outride the man he was pursuing, because of the greater freshness of his own mount, and arrive in time to intercept the raider.
Having evolved his method of procedure, therefore, Deadshot settled down grimly to his long night ride.
But that his plan was to come to naught, the reader already knows.
As they trailed in his wake, however, Ki Yi and the other avengers were mystified by the lack of shooting. To them, the silence seemed to indicate that some mishap had overtaken the cowboy, and great was their anxiety on that account.
Once or twice, Bowser suggested the advisability of making a search for him, but each time he was overruled.
“If Deadshot did lose his pony, like Ki Yi, he would know enough to go back to what’s left of my home ranch,” finally declared Hawks. “And if he’d been wounded, he would either have ridden for us or to the ranch. So it’s all the same. It’s my opinion, though, that he has set out to follow the fiend alone. You know you gave him a pretty severe call down for not hitting the man when he dashed from the shadow of the bunkhouse out onto the plains.”
This mention of the spectral appearance presented by the Midnight Raider turned their minds to the manner in which he worked his trick.