n his territory. He, too, wanted the outlaw, and he praised Brown
for his reward offer.

Judson Brown himself led the posse of thirty men which took the east
trail up the foothills. It was an hour past midnight. The moon had
risen and was flooding the tumbled landscape with its cold, white
light. From different vantage points on ridges high above, two men
looked grimly down and saw the moving shadows of the man hunters as
they took the trail.

CHAPTER V

A CAPTURE

Three hours after the posses scattered on their search for The Coyote,
spurred by thoughts of the reward of a thousand dollars offered by San
Jacinto county, and Judson Brown's declaration that the reward would
be increased by the thousands more which Arizona had laid upon the
fugitive's head, Rathburn smiled at the rosy dawn in supreme
satisfaction.

He had not lost his man's trail during the early morning hours. Time
and again he had outwitted the man ahead when the latter had waited to
scan the back trail for signs of pursuit; more than once he had gained
ground when screened by timber growth close to the trail; every
stretch of dust-filled trail had been taken advantage of, while the
soft going underfoot had deadened the sound of his horse's flying
hoofs.

The bandit had traveled fast and he had kept steadily to the eastward.
This last was what caused Rathburn to smile with satisfaction. The man
for whose crime Rathburn was suspected was heading straight for
Rathburn's own stamping ground--the far-distant desert range, which he
knew from the low horizon in the south to the white-capped peaks in
the north. To catch up with him would be but a matter of a few hours,
Rathburn reflected contentedly.

Nor had the posse gained upon the two men ahead. Brown's men, perhaps,
did not have as excellent specimens of horseflesh as Rathburn and his
quarry rode. Nor did they possess the trail knowledge, the tricks
which Rathburn knew, and which the latter, more or less to his
surprise, found that the man ahead knew. Whatever it was that caused
that curling, sneering smile of contempt to play upon Rathburn's lips
at intervals, it was not scorn of the riding ability of the man he was
pursuing.

Moreover, both men ahead were saving their horses' strength against a
probable spurt by the posse at daylight. It would not be a hard matter
to follow their trail by the bright light of broad day. So far as he
could determine, Rathburn did not believe the man ahe