“A bronc that ought to have a rider and ain’t,” Milk River pronounced it.
Farther along, we passed a bullet-riddled Mexican sombrero, and then the sun sparkled on a handful of empty brass cartridges.
One of the ranch buildings was a charred black pile. Nearby another one of the men I had disarmed in Bardell’s lay dead on his back.
A bandaged head poked around a building-corner, and its owner stepped out, his right arm in a sling, a revolver in his left. Behind him trotted the one-eyed Chinese cook, swinging a cleaver.
Milk River recognized the bandaged man.
“Howdy, Red! Been quarreling?”
“Some. We took all th’ advantage we could of th’ warnin’ you sent out, an’ when Big ’Nacio an’ his herd showed up just ’fore daylight, we Injuned them all over the county. I stopped a couple o’ slugs, so I stayed to home whilst th’ rest o’ th’ boys followed ’em south. ’F you listen sharp, you can hear a pop now an’ then.”
“Do we follow ’em, or head ’em?” Milk River asked me.
“Can we head ’em?”
“Might. If Big ’Nacio’s running, he’ll circle back to his rancho along about dark. If we cut into the canyon and slide along down, maybe we can be there first. He won’t make much speed having to fight off Peery and the boys as he goes.”
“We’ll try it.”
Milk River leading, we went past the ranch buildings, and on down the draw, going into the canyon at the point where I had entered it the