eyes and ears alert for those who might lie
hidden on the rim rocks or in the cactus. It was grim business. Driven
out of their holes, the rustlers fought savagely. One, trapped in a hill
pocket, stood off a posse till he was shot to death. A second was
wounded, captured, and sent back with two other suspects to Live-Oaks.
At the end of a week Prince had the remnant of the band surrounded in a
mountain park close to Caballero Canon.

The country into which the outlaws had been driven was an ideal terrain
for defense. The brush was thick and tall. Two wooded arroyos gashed the
rim of the valley and ran down into the basin. An attack against
determined men here was bound to prove costly.

Billie knew that three men lay in the chaparral and he believed that one
of them at least was wounded. Old Reb had jumped them up from a fireless
camp, and in their hurry to escape the outlaws had left all their
provisions and two of their horses. They left, too, one of the posse with
a bullet hole in his forehead. The sheriff's plan was to tighten the
lines gradually and starve out the rustlers.

But though Prince would not let his men advance to a general assault, he
made up his mind to find out more as to the condition of the men he had
surrounded. He wanted to make sure they had not slipped past his guards
into Caballero Canon. In the back of his head, too, was the feeling that
if he could get into touch with them, perhaps he might arrange for a
surrender.

He called Goodheart to one side. "As soon as it's dark I'm goin' in to
find out what's doin'. We haven't heard a murmur from these birds for
hours. Perhaps they've flown. Anyhow, I'm goin' to find out."

"How many of us are goin'?"

"Just one of us--Billie Prince."

"If two of us went--"

"It would double the chances of discovery. No, I'm goin' alone. Maybe I
can have a talk with Albeen or Yankie. I don't want to take 'em dead, but
alive."

"They'll probably get you while you're in there, Prince."

"I don't think it. But if I'm not back by mornin' you are in charge of
this hunt. Use yore judgment."

The deputy ventured one more protest, but his chief vetoed it. Billie had
decided what to do and argument did not touch him.

He did not take a rifle. In the thick brush it would be hard to handle
noiselessly and the snapping of a twig might mean the difference between
life and death. The sheriff slipped into the tangle of cat-claw, prickly
pear, and mesquite, vanishing