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They don't mix much with Arguilla's men." "She's a lovely lay-out," said Pete. "But I'm with you." Circling the ranch, Brevoort and Pete rode far out into the desert, until the camp-fire was hidden by the ranch-buildings. Then they angled in cautiously, edging past the 'dobe outbuildings and the corrals toward the hacienda. "Don't see anybody around.
Such a war-party descended into the Santa Cruz valley one afternoon and found Billy Rhodes's partner alone at the ranch. When they got through with him there was little left in the semblance of a man, but they took good care to postpone burning the ranch-buildings, contenting themselves with promiscuous looting.
"We'll ride over to the house," said he. Pete estimated that they had covered three or four miles before the ranch-buildings came in sight a dim huddle of angles against the starlit sky.
Silently he rode away, the empty kyacks clattering as the pack-horses trotted unwillingly behind him. Too busy with the unaccustomed lead-rope to roll cigarettes, he whistled, and, in turn, recited verse to keep up his spirits. About midnight he discerned the outline of the low ranch-buildings and urged his horse to a faster gait. As he passed a clump of cottonwoods, his horse snorted and shied.
"I'll sure make Andy sit up!" he declared as the Concho buildings loomed beneath the cool, dark-green outline of the trees. He dismounted to open and close a gate. A half-mile farther he again dismounted to open and close another gate. From there on was a straightaway road to the ranch-buildings.
Five miles away a thin column of smoke could be seen rising up into the air. Every mile made it clearer to Cameron that the smoke rising from behind the round-topped hill before him was from his ranch-buildings, and every mile intensified his anxiety. His wife was alone on the ranch at the mercy of that fiend.
He determined to make the best appearance possible. The myriad Arizona stars burned with darting radiance, in thin, unwavering shafts of splintered fire. The moon, coldly brilliant, sharp-edged and flat like a disk of silver paper, touched the twinkling aspens with a pallid glow and stamped a distorted silhouette of the low-roofed ranch-buildings on the hard-packed earth.
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