They did not search long before they found plenty of evidence that Jerry had been there at the time of the trouble.  They found Manuel lying on his back, with his beard clotted and stained red, and his black eyes staring dully at the sky.  Farther along they came upon Carlos, lying upon his face, with a blood-stained trail behind him in the grass to show how far he had crawled before death overtook him.  But they did not find Jerry, look where they would.

In the cabin, where they finally went to search systematically for clews, they found places where the logs had been splintered near the loopholes with bullets from without.  A siege it had been, then.

Jack, more familiar with the interior than either of the others because of his frequent visits there with Teresita, missed certain articles; the frying pan, an iron pot, a few dishes, and the bedding, to be exact.

So, finally, they decided that Jerry, having had the worst befall him, had buried his dead, packed a few necessary things upon one of the mules, mounted the other, and had gone—­where?  There was no telling where, in that big land.  Somewhere into the wilderness, they guessed, where he could be alone with the deadly hurt Fate and his enemies had given him.

The oxen, when they went outside, came shambling up the slope to the oak tree where they were wont to spend the night near the prairie schooner that had been their homing place for many a month.  But without a doubt the mules were gone; otherwise, Jack insisted, they would be near the oxen, as was their gregarious habit.

“Jerry’s gone—­pulled out,” Jack asserted for the third or fourth time.  “And the mules, and—­the pup.  Where’s Chico?  I haven’t seen or heard anything of him; have you?”

They had not; and they immediately began calling and looking for Chico, who was at that stage of puppyhood that insists upon getting in front of one and then falling down and lying, paws in the air, waiting to be picked up and petted.  But Chico did not come lumbering up like an animated black muff, and they could not find his little, dead body.

It occurred to Dade that he might be buried with Tige; and, once the idea was presented to Jack, he could not content himself to leave the place until he knew to a certainty.  He would never have admitted it, but there were certain sweet memories which made that particular pup not at all like other black pups.  He got the shovel, and he dug in the little grave until he was certain that Tige lay there, and that he was alone.

“Well, he’s taken the pup along, then; and that proves to me that Jerry wasn’t crazy, or anything like that.  He’s just pulled out, because he couldn’t stand it around here any longer—­and I don’t blame him.  But I wish I knew where; we’d take him up to the mine with us; huh?”

“Yes—­but we’re about fourteen hours too late to find out where he went.  If I’m any judge, these bodies have been dead that long.  And if we found him, the chances are he wouldn’t go.  If I’m any good at guessing poor Jerry’s state of mind, right now, he don’t want to see or speak to any human being on earth.”