. All the days and the miles and the
toil and the endurance and the hopelessness and the hunger were paid
for in that moment. His heart seemed too large for his breast.

"I tracked--you!" he cried, savagely. "I stayed--with you! ... An' I
got a rope--on you! An'--I'll ride you--you red devil!"

The passion of the man was intense. That endless, racking pursuit had
brought out all the hardness the desert had engendered in him. Almost
hate, instead of love, spoke in Slone's words. He hauled on the lasso,
pulling the stallion's head down and down. The action was the lust of
capture as well as the rider's instinctive motive to make the horse
fear him. Life was unquenchably wild and strong in that stallion; it
showed in the terror which made him hideous. And man and beast somehow
resembled each other in that moment which was inimical to noble life.

The avalanche slipped with little jerks, as if treacherously loosing
its hold for a long plunge. The line of fire below ate at the bleached
grass and the long column of smoke curled away on the wind.

Slone held the taut lasso with his left hand, and with the right he
swung the other rope, catching the noose round Wildfire's nose. Then
letting go of the first rope he hauled on the other, pulling the head
of the stallion far down. Hand over hand Slone closed in on the horse.
He leaped on Wildfire's head, pressed it down, and, holding it down on
the sand with his knees, with swift fingers he tied the noose in a
hackamore--an improvised halter. Then, just as swiftly, he bound his
scarf tight round Wildfire's head, blindfolding him.

"All so easy!" exclaimed Slone, under his breath. "Lord! who would
believe it! ... Is it a dream?"

He rose and let the stallion have a free head.

"Wildfire, I got a rope on you--an' a hackamore--an' a blinder," said
Slone. "An' if I had a bridle I'd put that on you.... Who'd ever
believe you'd catch yourself, draggin' in the sand?"

Slone, finding himself failing on the sand, grew alive to the augmented
movement of the avalanche. It had begun to slide, to heave and bulge
and crack. Dust rose in clouds from all around. The sand appeared to
open and let him sink to his knees. The rattle of gravel was drowned in
a soft roar. Then he shot down swiftly, holding the lassoes, keeping
himself erect, and riding as if in a boat. He felt the successive steps
of the slope, and then the long incline below, and then the checking
and rising and spreading of th