Chub dropped his eyes to the road and scanned it as he jogged along. The marks left by the pneumatic tires of the motor-cycles could be clearly seen; and on either side of them was a heavier mark.
"Put me wise to it, Matt. Has a wagon been along here since we got to the Bluebell?" gasped Chub.
"A broad-tired freight-wagon from some of the mines," added Matt. "There were four horses hitched to it and it was going to Phœnix."
"Oh, slush!" exclaimed Chub admiringly. "You've hit it off straight as a die, Matt. Why, thick-headed as I am, I can count the hoof-tracks of the horses and see which way they were headed, now that you've given me the tip. But what has the freight-wagon got to do with the machines?"
"The wagon stopped close to the house on the Bluebell," went on Matt. "I could tell that by the way the hoof-tracks were all cluttered up. And then, too, around the place where the wagon stopped there were boot-marks. It's a cinch the freighter took our machines."
"It can't be that freighter is graftin' on his own hook, Matt, an' yet I'm a Navajo if I can see how Hawley ever put it up to have him run off with the wheels. I don't believe the gambler is keepin' track of us as close as all that."
"The freighter has the two machines," averred Matt. "Why he took 'em needn't bother us very much just now; we know they're in his wagon, and that's the principal thing. It's up to us to get the motor-cycles back. A four-horse freight-wagon, even when it's empty, can't travel very fast. About all we've got to do is to outrun the gait of a walking horse. The faster we beat it, the quicker we reach the wagon."
"It looks good to me," said Chub. "Say, I would have been up in the air, wouldn't I, if you hadn't been along? But for this mix-up in the hills, you'd have been starting for Denver."
"I was going to start for Denver to-morrow," returned Matt, "but I'm not particular about a thing like that, Chub, when my friends need me."
"True to your friends always, eh?" said Chub, his blue eyes glistening. "No wonder Motor Matt makes a hit with everybody."