The two young men ran down the back stairs, passed through the kitchen where a Chinese cook was getting breakfast, and out into the bright sunlight. Before they cut across to the corral their eyes searched for enemies. Nobody was in sight except the negro janitor of a saloon busy putting empty bottles into a barrel.
“Won’t do to be in any hurry. The play is we’re gentlemen of leisure, just out for an amble to get the mo’ning air,” Curly cautioned.
While they fed, watered, and saddled they swapped gossip with the wrangler. It would not do to leave the boy with a story of two riders in such a hurry to hit the trail that they could not wait to feed their bronchos. So they stuck it out while the animals ate, though they were about as contented as a two-pound rainbow trout on a hook. One of them was at the door all the time to make sure the way was still clear. At that they shaved it fine, for as they rode away two men were coming down the street.
“Kite Bonfils,” Curly called to his partner.
No explanation was needed. Bonfils was the foreman of the Bar Double M. He let out a shout as he caught sight of them and began to run forward. Simultaneously his gun seemed to jump from its holster.
Mac’s quirt sang and his pony leaped to a canter in two strides. A bullet zipped between them. Another struck the dust at their heels. Faintly there came to the fugitives the sound of the foreman’s impotent curses. They had escaped for the time.
Presently they passed the last barb wire fence and open country lay before them. It did not greatly matter which direction they followed, so long as they headed into the desert.
“What we’re looking for is a country filled with absentees,” Curly explained with a grin.
Neither of them had ever been in serious trouble before and both regretted the folly that had turned their drunken spree into a crime. Once or twice they came to the edge of a quarrel, for Mac was ready to lay the blame on his companion. Moreover, he had reasons why the thing he had done loomed up as a heinous offense.
His reasons came out before the camp fire on Dry Sandy that evening. They were stretched in front of it trying to make a smoke serve instead of supper. Mac broke a gloomy silence to grunt out jerkily a situation he could no longer keep to himself.