When order was restored and Hockling was tenderly feeling his precious trousers, Loudon suggested that Red, the lightest man, take Marvin's fresh pony and ride to the line-camp for food and two horses.
"Yuh'll have yore work cut out," said Red as he mounted, "to ride them ponies bareback. We ain't even got a extra bridle."
"Don't worry none," Loudon said. "We'll make bridles an' Injun surcingles out o' Marvin's rope, an' we'll toss for his saddle."
"How you feel, Tom?" inquired Laguerre, stretched at ease on a cot in the Cross-in-a-box ranch house.
"Whittled to the chin," replied Loudon. "Which that pony's ridgepole could give odds to a knife-blade on bein' sharp. We might 'a' knowed Marvin would win the toss. His own saddle, too."
"Eet ees de las' piece o' luck she weel have for varree long tam."
"I ain't so shore about that. There's no real evidence to show that Marvin's a rustler. 'Ceptin' Rudd, yuh can't connect any of the 88 outfit with the hoss stealin'. I know they done it. I always knowed Sam Blakely was at the bottom of it, an' I can't prove it yet. Here's you an' I rode from hell to breakfast an' back, an' all we've got to show for it is Archer an' the Maxson boys—an' the hosses, o' course. Unless I find out somethin' more soon an' sudden, I've got to take off Marvin's hobbles. My bluff about Bill Archer's blabbin' ain't workin' with Marvin. He's worried, an' he shows it, but he's standin' pat. I spent a solid hour with him to-night, an' all he does is cuss an' beef about what'll happen when Blakely finds out his range-boss has been kidnapped. It makes me sick!"
Laguerre nodded sympathetically.
"Yuh can't tell me," continued Loudon, "that them Marysville sports was the only ones in the hoss-stealin' deal. If they was, then why was Pete O'Leary expectin' Sam Blakely the day I struck the Bend, an' why was Rufe Cutting planted in the cook's job at the Flyin' M? It all points—so far. An' the rustlin' o' the Bar S an' Cross-in-a-box cattle—there's another mystery. Oh, it's a great life, this here detective business!"
"Tell you w'at, Tom," Laguerre suggested, hopefully, "you un me, huh, we weel bushwhack dees Blak'lee feller. W'at you say?"