Part 105 (1/2)

The backwoodsman's brain having become the recipient of new thoughts, required a fresh exercise of its ingenuity.

If there was reason before for taking the trail of the Headless Horseman, it was redoubled now.

With but short time spent in consideration, so Zeb concluded; and commenced making preparations for a stalk after Ca.s.sius Calhoun.

These consisted in taking hold of the bridle, and giving the old mare a kick; that caused her to start instantaneously to her feet.

Zeb stood by her side, intending to climb into the saddle and ride out into the open plain--as soon as Calhoun should be out of sight.

He had no thoughts of keeping the latter in view. He needed no such guidance. The two fresh trails would be sufficient for him; and he felt as sure of finding the direction in which both would lead, as if he had ridden alongside the horseman without a head, or him without a heart.

With this confidence he cleared out from among the acacias, and took the path just trodden by Calhoun.

For once in his life, Zeb Stump had made a mistake. On rounding the mezquite grove, behind which both had made disappearance, he discovered he had done so.

Beyond, extended a tract of chalk prairie; over which one of the hors.e.m.e.n appeared to have pa.s.sed--him without the head.

Zeb guessed so, by seeing the other, at some distance before him, riding to and fro, in transverse stretches, like a pointer quartering the stubble in search of a partridge.

He too had lost the trail, and was endeavouring to recover it.

Crouching under cover of the mezquites, the hunter remained a silent spectator of his movements.

The attempt terminated in a failure. The chalk surface defied interpretation--at least by skill such as that of Ca.s.sius Calhoun.

After repeated quarterings he appeared to surrender his design; and, angrily plying the spur, galloped off in the direction of the Leona.

As soon as he was out of sight, Zeb also made an effort to take up the lost trail. But despite his superior attainments in the tracking craft, he was compelled to relinquish it.

A fervid sun was glaring down upon the chalk; and only the eye of a salamander could have withstood the reflection of its rays.

Dazed almost to blindness, the backwoodsman determined upon turning late back; and once more devoting his attention to the trail from which he had been for a time seduced.

He had learnt enough to know that this last promised a rich reward for its exploration.

It took him but a short time to regain it.

Nor did he lose any in following it up. He was too keenly impressed with its value; and with this idea urging him, he strode rapidly on, the mare following as before.

Once only did he make pause; at a point where the tracks of two horses converged with that he was following.

From this point the three coincided--at times parting and running parallel, for a score of yards or so, but again coming together and overlapping one another.

The horses were all shod--like that which carried the broken shoe--and the hunter only stopped to see what he could make out of the hoof marks.

One was a ”States horse;” the other a mustang--though a stallion of great size, and with a hoof almost as large as that of the American.

Zeb had his conjectures about both.