"Notice anything interesting about them?"
"Yes," Winthrop answered grimly; "they ride like police troopers."
"That's just how it seemed to me," exclaimed Drakesford. "They're coming from southward, and if they'd left the trunk line soon after the Vancouver train came in they would get here about now. They could have borrowed horses from the rancher near the station."
Winthrop watched them steadily before he spoke.
"They're troopers, sure," he said at length. "The short one looks like Corporal Slaney, who's out after me; and they'll be in before I could catch either of my horses. I turned them out in the soft grass some way back in the coulée."
"You have got to do something," declared Watson, "and do it right now!"
Winthrop glanced out across the great, level plain, and his face grew set.
"They'd sure search the coulée, and, except for that, there isn't cover for a coyote for a league or two. It won't be dark for half an hour yet, and they'd ride me down in three or four minutes in the open."
This was obvious, and silence followed until Winthrop spoke again.
"That's fortunate," said Drakesford. "What do you want a gun for, anyway? Plugging one of the troopers wouldn't help you."
In the meanwhile, the mounted figures were rapidly drawing nearer. The three men stood tensely watching them until Winthrop suddenly swung round toward his companions.
"You can tell them where my tent is, and they'll waste some minutes going there. That's all I want you to do."
Watson looked at him inquiringly, but he made a sign of impatience.
"I'm going back to the cook-shed. You can't help any. Keep out of this trouble."
Moving away from them, he disappeared into the shadowy interior of the shed, and his companions waited until the rest of the men came running up as the police rode in. The latter asked a few questions which Watson answered truthfully, and then they rode off toward Winthrop's tent. Presently one dismounted trooper reappeared, and proceeded to search the other tents, amid ironical banter and a few protests. This took him some time, and darkness was not far off when he reached the iron shack, the door of which was unusually difficult to open, though Watson, who had visited it in the meanwhile, could have explained the cause of it. Then the other trooper came back, and led both horses out upon the prairie. Leaving them there, he joined his comrade, who addressed the men.