“He would, with you looking after him, Madam,” Scot answered gallantly.
“It’s a God’s mercy he stuck on all those miles, wounded the way he was. I don’t see how he ever did,” Mrs. Jessup said.
“I reckon he clamped his teeth on the job. Hugh’s right obstinate when he gets set,” the older brother said with affectionate pride.
“Runs in the family,” Hugh cut back, grinning.
“Maybe so. Well, tell me all about it, boy. Where did you jump the Piutes? And how did you make your getaway?”
“Not much to tell,” the younger brother replied, and gave a skeleton outline of the story.
They started on their journey next morning, made a short day of it on account of Hugh’s wound, and put up at Carson for the night.
On what had been known as Eagle Ranch, in the valley of the same name, the town of Carson had been built. During the previous decade both Eagle and Carson valleys had served as a refuge for those who ran off stolen stock from San Francisco and other California points. In these hidden parks the outlaws had been accustomed to rest and feed the herds before making the desert trip by obscure routes to Salt Lake. But those days were past. Carson now had two thousand inhabitants, a boom in town lots, and a civic consciousness. It had become respectable, though guns still flashed frequently. Already it was laying political wires to become the capital of Nevada, the “battle-born” state.
Through Carson supplies came by way of Mormon Station for the diggings at Virginia, along a road which wound around the base of the hills. As Scot drove in, the air was musical with chimes. Some of these came soft and mellow from a great distance. Each mule of the freight outfits had a circlet of bells suspended in a steel bow above its collar. They made music as they moved.
At the hay corral into which McClintock drove, scores of outfits were gathered, most of them freighters to or from the diggings. A dozen others could be heard jingling in, from one direction or the other. The winter had been a severe one, and hundreds of cattle in the adjacent valleys had died for lack of feed. Hay was scarce. There was a very strong demand for it to feed the freight outfits. Just now the price was three hundred dollars a ton. Ranchers found it far more profitable to let their cattle rustle on bunch grass and take a chance of roughing through than to feed hay worth such a price. Wherefore all the native hay went to the stock hauling supplies.