His gaze met that of Norris before he answered, 89 and there was in it some hint of a great fear. “Beats me, ’Lissy.”
He had told the simple truth, but not the whole truth. The men had waited at the entrance to the Box Cañon for nearly two hours without the arrival of the stage. Deciding that something must have happened, they started back, and presently met a Mexican who stopped to tell them the news. To say that they were dazed is to put it mildly. To expect them to believe that somebody else had heard of the secret shipment and had held up the stage two miles from the place they had chosen, was to ask a credulity too simple. Yet this was the fact that confronted them.
Arrived at the scene of the robbery both men had dismounted and had examined the ground thoroughly. What they saw tended still more to bewilder them. Neither of them was a tenderfoot, and the little table at the summit of the long hill told a very tangled tale to those who had eyes to read. Obvious tracks took them at once to the spot where the bandit had stood in the bushes, but there was something about them that struck both men as suspicious.
“Looks like these are worked out on purpose,” commented Lee. “The guy’s leaving too easy a trail to follow, and it quits right abrupt in the bushes. Must ’a’ took an airship from here, I ’low.”
“Does look funny. Hello! What’s this?” 90
Norris had picked up a piece of black cloth and was holding it out. A startled oath slipped from the lips of the Southerner. He caught the rag from the hands of his companion and studied it with a face of growing astonishment.
“What’s up?”
Lee dived into his pocket and drew forth the mask he had been wearing. Silently he fitted it to the other. The pieces matched exactly, both in length and in the figure of the pattern.
When the Southerner looked up his hands were shaking and his face ashen.
“For God’s sake, Phil, what does this mean?” he cried hoarsely.