Kerb Perrin was dead.
In the instant that Kerb Perrin’s gun came up too late, Ducrow wheeled and ran into the house.
Kiefer, seeing his leader fall, grabbed for his own gun and was killed by a shot from Voyle Ragan’s rifle, hurriedly grabbed from its place beside the door.
The others broke and ran for their horses, and Mike got off one quick shot as they fled. He had lifted his gun for a final shot when he heard the scream.
Ducrow had come to the ranch for women, and it was a woman he intended to have. Dashing through the house while all eyes were on the shooting, he was just in time to see Juliana, horrified at the killing, run for her bedroom. The bedroom window was open and Ducrow grabbed her and threw her bodily from the window. Before she could rise he was through the window and had caught her up from the ground. Swiftly, he threw her across the saddle of a horse and with the few swift turns of the experienced hand she was bound hand and foot. Her scream was partly stifled by a backhanded blow across the mouth, then Ducrow leaped to the saddle of Perrin’s mount, which was better than his own. Catching up the bridle of her horse he went out of the yard at a dead run.
Mike had wheeled, running for the house, believing the scream had come from inside. By the time he glimpsed them they were disappearing into the pines. He saw two horses, one rider and- “Where’s Juliana?” he shouted.
He had already glimpsed Drusilla standing on the porch. Voyle Ragan ran around the house.
“He’s got juke!” he yelled. “I’ll get a horse!” “You stay here! Take care of the women and the ranch! I’ll go after Julianal” He walked to his horse, thumbing shells into his gun. Dru Ragan started toward another horse.
“You go back to the house!” he ordered.
“She’s my sister!” Dru flared. “When we do find her she may need a woman’s care!” “Come on then, but you’ll have to do some riding!” He wheeled the big bay and was off in a jump. The horse Dru mounted was one of Ben Curry’s big horses, bred not only for speed but for staying power.
Mike’s mind leaped ahead. Would Ducrow try to return to Toadstool? Or would he join Monson and Clatti” If he did, then Mike was in trouble. He worried about no one of them-but all three?
He held down the bay’s pace. He had taken a swift glance at the hoof tracks of the two horses he was trailing.
Mike Bastian went over the situation, trying to view it from Ducrow’s standpoint. Ducrow could not know that Juliana was Ben Curry’s daughter, but at this stage he probably would not care. Yet he would realize Ben was back in the saddle again, so a return to Toadstool was out of the question. Also, Ducrow would want to keep the girl for himself. That he would kill her had to be understood, for any attack upon a decent woman was sure to end in hanging if he was caught.
Long ago Roundy had taught him that there were more ways to trailing a man than merely following tracks. One must follow the devious trails in a man’s mind as well. He tried to think as Ducrow would be thinking. The fleeing outlaw could not have much, if any, food.
On previous forays, however, he must have learned where there was water. Also there were ranch hangouts that he would know. Some of these would be inhabited, others would not. Owing to the maps Ben Curry had him study, Mike knew the locations of all such places.
The trail veered suddenly, turning into the deeper stands of brush, and Mike followed. Drusilla had not spoken since they started, but glancing back he saw her face was dusty and tear streaked, yet he noted with a thrill of satisfaction she had brought her rifle. She was Ben Curry’s daughter, after all, a fit companion for any man. He turned his attention to the trail. Ducrow must know he was followed or would be followed, and he would want to leave no trail. Nor was he inexperienced. In his many outlaw raids as one of Ben Curry’s men and before he would have had much experience with such things. And now it had happened. Despite the small lead he had, Ducrow had vanished!
Turning into the thicker desert growth he had dipped down into a sandy wash. There, because of the deep sand and the tracks of cattle and other horses it needed several precious minutes to decide whether he had gone up or down the wash. He searched, trying not to disturb the sand until he had worked it out.
Then he saw a recognizable hoofprint following the winding of the wash as it led up-country.
Ducrow would not stay in the wash long, as it was tiring for the horses to walk in the deep sand, and he would wish to save his horses’ strength.
From there on it was a nightmare. Ducrow rode straight away, then turned at right angles, using every bit of cover he could find and mingling his tracks with others wherever found. At places he had even stopped to brush out tracks, but Roundy’s years of training had not been wasted, and Mike clung to the trail like a bloodhound.
Following him, Dru saw him pick up sign where she could see nothing. Once a barely visible track left by the edge of a horseshoe, again a broken twig on a bush they had passed. Hours passed and the sun began to slide down the western sky. Dru, realizing night would come before they found her sister, was cold with fear for her.
Mike glanced back at her. “You wanted to come,” he said, “and I am not stopping because of darkness.” “How can you trail them in the dark?” “I can’t, but I believe I know where they are going and we will have to take a chance.” Darkness closed down upon them. Mike’s shirt had stuck to his body with sweat, and now he felt the chill of the night wind, but grimly he rode on.
One advantage he had. He had never ridden with the gang, so Ducrow might not suspect he knew of all the hideouts. Ducrow could not know of the hours he had spent with Ben Curry and Roundy going over the trails and checking the hideouts and what he could expect at each one. The big bay horse seemed unwearied by the miles of travel, yet at times Dru heard Mike speak encouragingly to the big horse. At the edge of a clearing he suddenly drew up, so suddenly she almost rode into him. “Dru,” he whispered, “there’s a small ranch ahead. There might be one or more men there, and Ducrow is almost surely there with your sister. I am going to find out. his “I’ll come, too.” “Stay herel When I whistle, come and bring the horses. I have skill at this sort of thing, and I have to get close without making a sound.” Removing his boots he slipped on the moccasins he always carried in his saddlebags. He was there a moment, and then he vanished into the darkness, and she heard no sound, nothing. Suddenly a light appeared in a window . . . too soon for him to have reached the cabin.
Moving like a ghost, Mike reached the corral.
There were horses there, but it was too dark to make them out. One stood near the bars, and putting a hand out he touched the horse’s flank. It was damp with sweat.
Without so much as a whisper of sound, Mike was at the window, his head carefully to one side but peering in.
He saw a square-faced man with a pistol in his hand, and as Mike watched, the man placed the pistol on the table with a towel over it. Soundless in his moccasins, Mike walked around the house and stepped into the room.
Obviously the man within had been expecting the sound of horse’s hoofs or even a jingle of spurs and a sound of boots. Mike’s sudden appearance startled him, and he made an almost inadvertent move toward the pistol under the towel.
Bastian closed the door behind him, and the man stared at him. This black-haired young man in buckskins did not look like the law, and he was puzzled but wary.
“You’re Walt Sutton. Get your hands away from that table before you get blown wide open! Move!” Sutton backed off hurriedly, and Mike swept the towel off the gun. “If you had tried that I’d have killed you.” “Who are you? What d’you want here?” “You know damn” well what I wantl I am Mike Bastian, Ben Curry’s foster son.
He owns this ranch. He set you up here, gave you stock to start with! Now you double cross him. Where’s Ducrow?” Sutton shook his head. “I ain’t seen him,” he protested.