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Then, still only half conscious he rode, reeling in the saddle, toward a light that he saw in the distance, which, he dimly felt, must come from the Flying W ranchhouse. Randerson did not leave the scene of the fight immediately. He stood for a long time, after buckling on his belt and pistols, looking meditatively toward the break in the canyon beyond which was Catherson's shack.
The man whose soul held no love of the poetic sat for two or three hours on the threshold of the bunkhouse door, his gaze on the ranchhouse. He was considering his "reputation," and he had reached the conclusion that Barbara Morgan had reason to fear him if rumor's tongues had related to her all of the crimes that had been attributed to him.
"I was thinking we might make a run for it if Miss Barbara was here; but as she's not we must wait for those who went out after her." Mr. Harding summoned the two Mexicans while Bridge ran to the cookhouse and ordered the Chinaman to the ranchhouse. Then the erstwhile bookkeeper ransacked the bunkhouse for arms and ammunition.
What was odd about the incident was that Morgan should attempt to cross to Pardo to have his gold assayed at just about the time Harlan had decided to begin his trip to the Rancho Seco. Harlan smiled as his gaze rested on the ranchhouse. He was glad he had met Lane Morgan; he was glad he had headed straight for Lamo after leaving Morgan.
As they rode away from the dilapidated hut of the Indian the old man stood silhouetted against the rectangle of dim light which marked the open doorway, and shook his fist at the back of the departing ranch foreman. "El cochino!" he cackled, and turned back into his hut. At El Orobo Rancho Barbara walked to and fro outside the ranchhouse.
Masten at the ranchhouse?" He hesitated. Then he spoke slowly. "I didn't see him there, ma'am." She evidently wondered why it had not been Masten that had come for her. They were near the house when she spoke again: "Did you have an accident today, Randerson?"
Twice she lost her way and rode miles before she recovered her sense of direction, and when she finally pulled the beast to a halt at the edge of the Diamond K ranchhouse gallery, midnight was not far away. The ranchhouse was dark. She smothered a gasp of disappointment as she crossed the gallery floor.
Ferguson did not visit Miss Radford the next morning he had seen Leviatt and Tucson depart from the ranchhouse, had observed the direction they took, and had followed them. For twenty miles he had kept them in sight, watching them with a stern patience that had brought its reward.
Then he walked over to the bench where he had been sitting when Rogers had warned him of the plan to kill him; ordered several of the men to take Latimer's body away, and then resumed his place on the bench, where he rolled a cigarette. Later, when the men who had gone with Latimer's body returned to the vicinity of the ranchhouse, Harlan was still sitting on the bench.
He bowed again over the pony's mane and urged the animal around the corner of the cabin, striking the trail that led through the flat toward the Two Diamond ranchhouse. Ferguson heard loud talking and laughter in the bunkhouse when he passed there an hour after his departure from the Radford cabin in Bear Flat. It was near sundown and the boys were eating supper.
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