“Can’t start pushing on our reins any too quick to suit me,” Cole assented.
“That’s the only thing to do,” agreed McCoy. “Sam, you and Brad had better get back to your homes, where you’ve been sleeping all night if any one asks you. Falkner, you go back with us to the ranch. We’ll fix up a story about how you joined us there and bunked with Jack and Larry.”
“What about these?” Rogers indicated with his hand the sprawling bodies of the sheepmen. His voice was a whisper.
“We can’t do anything for them,” answered Rowan. “We’ve got to think of ourselves. If we talk, if we make any mistakes, we’re going to pay the price of what we’ve done. We can’t explain we didn’t intend to kill any one. We’re all in this. The only thing to do is to stand together and keep our mouths shut.”
Everybody was in a sudden hurry to be gone. They tramped back to the pine grove, and hurriedly mounted, eager to put as many miles as possible between them and what was lying at the foot of Bald Knob.
A light snow was already falling. They welcomed it for the protection it offered.
“We’ve bumped into good luck to start with,” said Larry to Cole. “The snow will blot out our tracks. They can’t trail us now.”
Cole nodded. “Yep. That’s so.”
But the thing that had been done chilled their spirits, and the dread as to what was to come of it rested like a weight upon their hearts. Mile after mile they rode, swiftly and silently. More than once Larry glanced over his shoulder with a shudder. He could see the snow sifting into the sightless eyes that stared up at the breaking dawn. Always he had laughed at the superstitions which rode ignorant people, but now he was careful not to bring up the rear of the little procession.
Once an elk crashed out of some brush fifty feet from them. The sudden clamour shook their nerves with dread.