The last that had been seen of him Luck was walking along the plaza toward the hotel, not a hundred and fifty yards from the latter. A dozen men had spoken to him in the distance of a block. But he had not been seen to reach his hotel. He had not called for his room key. Somehow he had vanished, and none could tell how or where.
To Bolt his disappearance was as good as a confession of guilt. He searched Luck’s room at the hotel. Among other things, he found an old envelope with interesting data penciled on it.
Before nightfall the word was whispered all over Saguache that Luck Cullison, pioneer cattleman and former sheriff, was suspected of the W. & S. Express robbery and had fled to save himself from arrest. At first men marveled that one so well known and so popular, one who had been so prominent in affairs, could be suspected of such a crime, but as they listened to the evidence and saw it fall like blocks of a building into place, the conviction grew that he was the masked bandit wanted by the sheriff.
CHAPTER IV
KATE USES HER QUIRT
Red-headed Bob Cullison finished making the diamond hitch and proudly called his cousin Kate to inspect the packhorse.
“You never saw the hitch thrown better, sis,” he bragged, boy-like. “Uncle Luck says I do it well as he can.”
“It’s fine, Bob,” his cousin agreed, with the proper enthusiasm in her dark eyes. “You’ll have to teach me how to do it one of these days.”