Pagina 315 de 439

Acting upon that impulse, he slid from his horse and slipped into

the sagebrush of the hillside. By good fortune he was wearing a

gray shirt of a shade which melted into that of the underbrush.

Night falls swiftly in the mountains, and already dusk was softly

spreading itself over the hills.

Dick went up a draw, where young pines huddled together in the

trough; and from the upper end of this he emerged upon a steep

ridge, eyes and ears alert for the least sign of human presence.

A third shot had rung out while he was in the dense mass of

foliage of the evergreens, but now silence lay heavy all about

him. The gathering darkness blurred detail, so that any one of a

dozen bowlders might be a shield for a crouching man.

Once, nerves at a wire edge from the strain on him, he thought he

saw a moving figure. Throwing up his gun, he fired quickly. But

he must have been mistaken, for, shortly afterward, he heard some

one crashing through dead brush at a distance.