Telling the others to remain by the camp fire, Brinklow took Bull Bracker and McNab a few paces down the road. Some fifty feet away from the fire there was a natural opening into the grass. They entered it. The dog followed close at McNab’s heels, always giving Bull Bracker a wide berth.
“On the night of the murder were your horses hobbled?” asked Brinklow.
Bull Bracker now studied every answer before he spoke. “Only the bay gelding,” he said. “The other horses wouldn’t stray unless he led them off. But he had learnt to walk almost as good with the hobbles as without them.”
“They do,” said Brinklow. “When you heard him wandering off which way was he heading?”
Bull pointed vaguely into the woods on the farther side of the grass. “In there,” he said.
“Retrace your steps that night.”
“H
