A voice spoke low to Taisie’s ear—a voice she knew.
“The little trunk—is it in your tent?” The hateful question, itself an accusation for the asker, was repeated.
“No!” she got strength to say, clutched by her fears, her anger, her sudden hatred.
“All right! But watch out for it! They’re after it!”
They were after it! Who were “_they_”? And who was this? Under which flag, all along, has been Dan McMasters, sheriff, captain?
She did not hear his voice again. Suddenly, as though he sensed her indecision, she felt herself swept to his body as she stood, her own strong body helpless under strength of his. No hand was on her mouth, but she could not cry out. She felt his cheek laid against her cheek—for one half instant; heard a sigh, a gasp, felt at her temple then a kiss as light and gentle as the embrace had been ruthless and savage. Then she was free.
She stood alone. He was gone. Yes, he went that way, in the direction the flame of the two shots had lined out. He went lightly, swiftly.
And in the morning, when first they sought why the great buzzards were hopping, they found a man, a dead man, with his hands crossed on his breast and his hat drawn down over his face. It was not Dan McMasters. None of them knew who it was. But Taisie Lockhart knew that Dan McMasters had killed this man. Why?
It was Sanchez, first back from the run, who first saw this dead man in the daylight, and he knew him.
Sanchez crossed himself. He knew the man’s feet, his boots, his spurs. Not so long ago he had tied those feet under a horse’s belly.
Sanchez coursed like a questing hound for the sign. Many tracks of horses. A loose horse without the Fishhook brand. All of which made mystery enough.
“Miss Taisie,” demanded Milly, “You’se all a-trimble, chile! Who dat man? Who him were standin’ thah?”
She caught the hand Taisie had against her bosom, the hand that covered her temple.
“No! I don’t know!” she heard her mistress say.
But Jim Nabours was harder to satisfy when he came in soon after sunup, his face lined as though he had lost pounds in the night ride. He cursed openly as he snatched loose his cinches and turned off his trembling and sweat-stained night horse. Then he turned to Taisie, who had come over to the men’s camp.