ant forest that edged the mesa, and once he thought
he saw a horse's head behind a bush, but it turned out to be the stub
of a fallen tree. The brush hid the cabin as he worked toward the
timber. Presently he discovered Blue Smoke's tracks and followed them
down into a shallow hollow where the brush was thick. He wound in and
out, keeping the tracks in sight and casually noting where the horse
had stopped to graze. Near the bottom of the hollow he heard voices.
He had been so intent on tracking the horse that he had forgotten Gary
and Cotton. The tracks led toward the voices. Pete instinctively
paused and listened, then shrugged his shoulders and stepped forward.
A thick partition of brush separated him from the unseen speaker. Pete
stopped midway in his stride.

"If you squat down here you can see the winder, right under this bush.
The moon was shinin'. It was a plumb easy shot. And it sure stopped
homesteadin' in this end of the country."

Gary was speaking. Pete drew a step nearer.

"You ain't sayin' who fired that shot,"--and Cotton laughed
obsequiously.

Pete stepped from behind the bush. Gary was facing toward the cabin.
Cotton was squatting near by smoking a cigarette.

"Tell him," said Pete. "I want to know myself."

"What's it to you?" snarled Gary, and he stepped back. Gary's very
attitude was a challenge. Pete knew that he could not drop his rope
and pull his own gun quick enough to save himself. He saw Gary's hand
move almost imperceptibly toward his holster.

"I reckon I made a mistake," said Pete slowly--and he let the rope slip
from his hand as though utterly unnerved. "I--I talked kind o' quick,"
he stammered.

"Well, you won't make no more mistakes," sneered Gary, and he dropped
his hand to his gun. "You want to know who plugged that old
hoss-thief, Annersley, eh? Well, what you goin' to say when I tell you
it was me?"

Pete saw that Gary was working himself up to the pitch when he would
kill. And Pete knew that he had but one chance in a thousand of
breaking even with the killer. He would not have time to draw--but
Montoya had taught him the trick of shooting through the open
holster . . . Cotton heard Pete's hand strike the butt of his gun as
the holster tilted up. Pete fired twice. Staring as though
hypnotized, Gary clutched at his shirt over his chest with his free
hand. He gave at the knees and his body wilted and settled down--even
as he threw a desperate shot a