Page:Edward Ellis--Alden the Pony Express Rider.djvu/315

 him down to a walk. Then he moved off in the shadows, the rider still silent.

Alden looked after him in the gloom. Man and brute had disappeared but the light twinkled and dipped as before.

“That is a little ahead of anything I ever saw before!” was the exclamation of the puzzled Alden; “we have plenty of mutes in the east but I never met any on the plains, and I don’t believe he is one. I should set him down as a fool or one gone crazy.”

By and by the soft hoof beats died out, ever on the same deliberate walk. The pony would have gone faster had his master permitted, and why he did not was altogether beyond the understanding of the mystified lad.

But the questions could not be answered by standing in the midst of the plain and guessing and staring. The soggy pouches about his shoulders would not allow Alden to forget his duty. Besides, the soaked leather with its contents was growing heavy, and the brisk gait he had maintained for the last half hour or more was telling on him. He was weary and would have been glad of a rest.

“They must have known long ago at the station that something has happened to Dick