“They came up this way, I tell you. We ought to go up and hunt above the Point, for the sheriff’ll ’tend to this part.”
“Are you sure that gun’s loaded, Jack? This is no child’s play, for one of those fellows is armed.”
There were a few more remarks of this kind and then the party came into view, almost in front of the prisoners. The latter were silent and motionless, for they hoped vaguely that somehow they might not be noticed. But, alas! the white flannel was like a torch in moonlight. The searchers stopped short and stared in amazement.
“Good heavens!” exclaimed one, apparently the leader. “Here they are now!”
The surprise that the apparition caused can well be imagined. They counted one, two, three, four—of the very men they were pursuing, tied hand and foot to trees along the roadside. Here was a mystery indeed! This was a strange thing for even lunatics to do, and the crowd of men handled their weapons nervously as they stared.
“I have it!” cried one of them, suddenly. “I know!”
“What is it?” demanded the others.
“The sheriff’s caught and tied ’em here for us.”
That was a likely conjecture, and it took with the puzzled crowd, who were glad for any theory. In vain Bull and his crowd protested, in the words of Poe’s poem, “I am not mad!” That was a likely story, coming from lunatics. And where did they get those clothes? None of the sheriff’s posse chanced to be there; so there was no one to recognize Bull as the original giver of the information. And as for his own protests and cries, they were of course insane ravings, to be listened to with gaping mouths and some pity.
There was nothing for the captors to do but march the yearlings down to jail. This they did with no little caution, and considerable display of firearms. There was not a man of them who did not feel relieved when the gates clanged once more upon those desperate creatures.