of the door ... going away....

14

Three good strides one way, four another to measure the cell. Morning sun,
gone by noon, daylight outside the window becoming dusk in turn. They fed
him army rations, delivered under guard. And the guard never spoke. There
was no use asking questions, and Drew had none left to ask, anyway.
Except, by the morning of the second day after Rennie's visit, his wonder
grew. Why was Bayliss delaying a formal charge against him? This wait
could mean that the captain was not finding it so easy to prove he really
did have a "renegade horse thief" in custody. But Drew knew he must pin no
hopes on a thread that fine.

What had happened to Anse? And Shannon--gone to Mexico? He must have ridden
back with the _Coronel_. Drew could expect nothing more from Rennie, or
Topham. The Trinfans? Spath had marched them back, too, along with his
prisoner, but the lieutenant had not had them under arrest. The mustangers
were well known in this district and could prove their reason for being
where they were found. And Kitchell had raided one of their corrals last
season, so they had no possible tie with the elusive outlaw. Probably by
now the Trinfans had returned to their hunt for the Pinto.

No, there was no use thinking that anyone was going to get him out of
this--no one but himself, and he had bungled badly so far. Drew, his body
tired with pacing the small cell, flung himself down on the bunk and
listened to the sounds of the camp. He had pretty well worked out the
routine by those sounds. The camp itself was a makeshift affair. Its core,
of which this cell was a part, was an old ranch building. There were tents
and a few lean-tos, on a plateau bounded on the east by a ravine, on the
west by a creek bottom. Huts of stone, rawhide, and planks served as
officers' quarters. In fact it was no more a fort than the bivouacs he had
known during the war. Unfortunately this room was the most substantial
part.

If he could only get out, and pick up his horses, then perhaps he could
head for Mexico. There was a war on down there; a soldier could find an
anonymous refuge in a foreign army. Shelby's whole Confederate command had
crossed the Rio Grande to do just that. That part was easy. To get out of
here--that was what he could not accomplish.

Two men always came together when they fed him, and they didn't open the
cell door, but just pushed the plate through. A sentry was on duty
outside. Drew coul