Confident that someone would be found at that point who could give him the important news he was seeking, Avon rode thither on a dead run. He saw no one stirring as he galloped up. The cook, who had charge of the wagon, was asleep, and the men off duty were slumbering soundly, while the chance was theirs.
But young Burnet had scarcely checked his mustang, when the sound of someone riding his horse equally fast reached his ear, and the next instant Oscar Gleeson dashed beside him.
"Howdy, Baby, is that you?" he asked, peering at the young man dimly seen in the scant yellow rays of the lantern.
"Yes, Ballyhoo," was the reply; "I'm in trouble."
The Texan shook in his saddle with laughter.
"That's me, too; the first thing I knowed they was gone. I yelled for you, but you couldn't have heard me, and, after cantering round awhile, I struck for the wagon in quest of news."
Avon drew a sigh of relief, and with a smile:
"I'm glad you lost them, for the boys won't laugh at you, while they would at me."
"I don't think there's anyone in that crowd that will laugh, for they all had the same experience. I know Old Bronze and Short Stop have lost a herd more than once."
"It won't do to stay here," remarked Avon, "for you know there is another herd only a mile off, and if the two become mixed, it will be a big job to cut out ours to-morrow."
"I shouldn't wonder," replied Gleeson, "if the cattle have gone back to the bed-ground; at any rate we'll look for them there."
The return to the wagon enabled the couple to obtain their bearings, and they knew the proper course to reach the spot, but the possibility of the theory being wrong caused them to separate, so as to proceed thither by routes which, while substantially parallel, were so far apart that they were out of each other's sight and hearing, the latter being chiefly due to the direction of the wind.
Avon spurred Thunderbolt into an easy canter, the soft grass making the travel easy, though there was always the risk of his animal sinking one or more of his hoofs into a hole, with the prospect of a broken leg for the horse and a dislocated neck for his rider.
When it seemed to the latter that he had passed the intervening distance, he drew his mustang to a walk, listening and peering through the gloom with all the power at his command. There was no lighting of the darkness, the wind still blew keenly, and the fine drizzling rain continued.