Wade stood guard while the helpless Sheriff was trussed up and his mouth stopped by Santry, and if the ranch owner felt any compunction at the sight, he had only to think of his own men as he had seen them the night before, lying on the floor of the ranch house.
"Make a good job of it, Bill," was his only comment.
"You bet!" Santry chuckled as he drew the last of the knots tight. "That'll hold him for a spell, I reckon. How you feel, Sheruff, purty comfortable?" The flowing end of the gag so hid the officer's features that he could express himself only with his eyes, which he batted furiously. "Course," Santry went on, in mock solicitude, "if I'd thought I mighta put a bit of sugar on that there gag, to remind you of your mammy like, but it ain't no great matter. You can put a double dose in your cawfee when you git loose."
"Come on, Bill!" Wade commanded.
"So long, Sheruff," Santry chuckled.
There was no time to waste in loitering, for at any moment Bat Lewis might arrive and give an alarm which would summon reënforcements from amongst Moran's following. Hurrying Santry ahead of him, Wade swung open the door and they looked out cautiously. No one was in sight, and a couple of minutes later the two men were mounted and on their way out of town.
"By the great horned toad!" Santry exulted, as they left the lights of Crawling Water behind them. "It sure feels good to be out of that there boardin'-house. It wasn't our fault, Gordon, and say, about this here shootin'...."
"I know all about that, Bill," Wade interposed. "The boys told me. They're waiting for us at the big pine. But your arrest, that's what I want to hear about."
"Well, it was this-a-way," the old man explained. "They sneaked up on the house in the dark and got the drop on us. Right here I rise to remark that never no more will I separate myself from my six-shooter. More'n one good man has got hisself killed just because his gun wasn't where it oughter be when he needed it. Of course, we put up the best scrap we could, but we didn't have no chance, Gordon. The first thing I knew, while I was tusslin' with one feller, somebody fetched me a rap on the head with a pistol-butt, an' I went down for the count. Any of the boys shot up?"
Wade described the appearance of the ranch house on the previous night, and Santry swore right manfully.