“You’re a wonder,” said Ajax.  “How you divined that the thief would travel this trail beats me.”

“Wal,” said old man Dumble, “it’s this way.  There’s a big dealer comes three times a year to Bakersfield; he pays good money for good stuff—­ an’ he asks no questions.  I happened to hear he was a-comin’ down only las’ Sunday.”

Something in his voice, some sly gleam in his eye, aroused my suspicions.  As soon as we happened to be alone, I whispered to my brother:  “I say, what if the old man is playing hare and hound with us?”

“Pooh!” said Ajax.  “He’s keen as mustard to collar this thief—­the keener, possibly, since he discovered that the fellow is a tenderfoot.  I’ve sized him up about right.  He wants to establish a record.  It’s like this teetotal business of his.  The people here refuse to believe evil of a man who drinks water, goes to church, and catches horse-thieves.  I’ll add one word more.  To give the old fraud his due, he really holds in abhorrence any crime that might land him in the State penitentiary.  Hullo!  There’s a faint reek out yonder.  I’ll take a squint through my glasses.”

We called a halt.  We were now on the alkaline plains beyond the San Emigdio mountains.  Riding all through the night, we had changed horses at a ranch where we were known.  Ajax stared through his binoculars.

“What we’re after,” said he quietly, “is in sight.”

He handed his glasses to me.  I could barely make out a horseman, herding along two animals.  The plains were blazing with heat.  In the distance a soft blue haze obscured the horizon; faintly outlined against this were three spirals of what seemed to be white smoke:  three moving pillars of alkaline dust.

“He can’t git away from us,” said old man Dumble.

Looking at him, my suspicions took flight.  He was, as Ajax said, keener than we to arrest the thief.  His small eyes sparkled with excitement; his right index-finger was crooked, as if itching for the trigger; his lips moved.  In fancy he was rehearsing the “Stand and deliver” of an officer of the law!

“We kin ride him down,” he muttered.

“Yes,” said Ajax.

We looked to our girths and our pistols.  It was unlikely that the thief would show fight, but—­he might.  Then we mounted, and galloped ahead.

“Forrard—­for-r-rard!” shouted Ajax.

Within a few minutes, a quarter of an hour at most, the man we were hunting would see us; then the chase would really begin.  He would abandon the footsore colts, and make for the hills.  And so it came to pass.  Presently, we saw the horseman turn off at right angles; the jaded colts hesitated, trotted a few yards, and stood still.  A faint neigh floated down wind.

“Doggone it!” exclaimed old man Dumble, “his horse is fresh.  He’s got friends in the hills.”

We had left the trail, and were pounding over the sage-brush desert.  I could smell the sage, strongly pungent, and the alkaline dust began to irritate my throat; the sun, if one stood still, was strong enough to blister the skin of the hands.