The voice, and the clenched hand that struck the blow, belonged to Jake, the herdsman, who thrust his head in at the door and nodded to his employer, as if to say: “I know all about it!” CHAPTER XVI CAUGHT AT LAST! “Let’s hold up a little, boys. We mustn’t tire our horses out at the start, you know. We are safe now, for even if those ranchemen should come in pursuit of us, they’d never think of looking for us here.” The fugitives were five miles from the rancho, and they had not consumed a great deal of time in accomplishing the distance, either. They had scarcely exchanged a dozen words since they began their flight, for George led the way at a pace so rapid that conversation was impossible. Ned and Gus had never travelled so fast on horseback before, and the former was obliged to confess to himself that he was by no means so fine a rider as he thought he was. It was comparatively easy to keep a firm and upright seat while his nag was ambling leisurely along a smooth trail, but it was not so easy when the horse was running at the top of his speed, over rough ground. His feet were out of the stirrups more than half the time, while Gus was jolted up and down and from side to side with such violence that it was a wonder he kept in his saddle at all. Fortunately, Ned’s departure from home had been so hurried that he had forgotten to take with him the ornaments he usually wore when he went riding. If he had had his spurs on while his heels were digging into his horse’s sides, he might not have kept his seat as well as he did. Both he and Gus were glad when George checked his horse and allowed him to settle down to a walk. “Texas isn’t so dull a place to live in after all, is it?” said George, who knew he must say something to keep up the spirits of his companions. “One can get all the excitement he wants, without half trying, can’t he?” “I never would have been in this scrape if it hadn’t been for Gus,” declared Ned, who, mean-spirited fellow that he was, always tried to shift the responsibility for any wrongdoing upon the shoulders of somebody else. “I wish I had never brought him here!” “So do I,” replied Gus, who might, with just as much show of reason, have accused Ned of being the author of all his misfortunes. If Ned had not written him those letters and offered to pay his travelling expenses, he never would have been in Texas. “I don’t see how you can blame me for anything that has happened. Did I have a hand in stealing that horse?” “You had just as much to do with it as I did. What I mean is, that if you had been at home, where I wish you were this very minute, those cattle never would have been shot.” “That’s a pretty way for you to talk!” exclaimed Gus, angrily. “I hadn’t been in your house an hour before you told me that you intended to do that very thing, just to get up a breeze and show the neighbors that you had some pluck.”