He complained: "I ain't never heard before of a man leavin' his hoss behind him! It ain't right and it ain't policy." His leader, however, paid no attention to this grumbling.

He skirted back behind the barns, walking with a speed which extended even the long legs of Haw-Haw Langley.

Most of the stock was turned out in the corrals.

Now and then a horse stamped, or a bull snorted from the fenced enclosures, but from the barns they heard not a sound.

Now Mac Strann paused.