gap in the bridge,
where boards had been pried away in the preparation, of the ambush.

Helpless for the moment until he got his bearings and his pony gained
solid footing, Sam automatically whipped out his gun, cursing as he saw
Sandy slide from the saddle, clutch at the rim of the gap, drop down to
the bed of the creek, while Pronto, frantic at the loss of his master,
leaped the opening and fled with clatter of hoof and swinging stirrup
into the desert.

Sam, wild with rage at the thought of Sandy shot, scrambling in bloody
sand below him, flung himself from the roan as more bullets whined,
whupping into the planks. One seared his upper arm, another struck the
saddle tree as he vaulted off, slapping the roan on the flanks, yelling
at it as it gathered, leaped the gap and followed Pronto.

"You damned, cowardly, murderin' pack of lousy coyotes!" swore Sam
mechanically, as he knelt on the edge of the gap and tried to pierce the
blackness, listening fearfully for a groan. He had not fired back. There
was nothing to fire at but clumps of blurred growth. The shots had been
too sudden, the shying of the horses too confusing for location.

He kneeled over the rim of the last plank, turned, caught with his
hands, revolver thrust back into its holster, swung, dropped. A hand
closed about his ankle, pulled him down sprawling on the soft sand.

"I'm O. K.," whispered Sandy, and Sam's heart leaped. "Only plugged the
rim of my hat. I faked a fall to fool 'em. Snake erlong down the crick
bed. Here's where we git even." Sam knew that ring in his partner's
voice, low though it was, and his blood tingled. The high crumbly banks
of the creek, gouged out by winter rains and cloud-bursts, were set with
brush. Immediately above the bridge were the stripped trunks of
cottonwoods, stranded in a flood. Peering through the boughs, they saw
stooping figures running along the bank. A man called from the lower
side of the bridge, a shot was fired harmlessly. The hunters in view
raced back.

"Think they saw us," whispered Sandy. "They'll hear from us, right
soon." He led the way back, crossing to the town side beneath the
bridge, keeping half-way up the bank, close under the stringers of the
bridge, crawling between bushes on his belly, Sam with him. Now they
could see no gunmen but occasionally they caught a whisper, the slight
sound of moving brush.

There was only a trickle of water in the bed of the creek. Here and
there were small ba