Dunc Lester slept fitfully that night beneath his roof of stone, and awoke the next morning stiff and sore and still bewildered in his mind. He swore at himself for showing himself to Sarah Sue Tanis. His position was much more dangerous now, for members of the gang would be out looking for him.
After a brief breakfast of more parched corn, he un-hobbled the bay and got the animal saddled. Where he would go now, he was not sure. He felt empty and defeated.
The small sound of a distant rifle punctured the quiet of the morning. Dunc came erect in the saddle, listening hard. Had some of the gang spotted him? Were they shooting at him?
This prospect did not seem likely, considering the distance separating him and the rifleman. Possibly it was a hunter after small game, but it was pretty early in the day for that. After a moment Dunc reined the bay around and headed cautiously in the general direction of the sound, and after a few minutes he heard a second shot and this time was able to pin-point the direction as due north, somewhere in a heavily wooded draw between his hill and the neighboring one.
Cautiously Dunc dismounted near the bottom of the slope, studying the woods about him. Now he saw that he was close to what had been the second outpost when the gang had occupied Ulster's Cave. He thought about this for a moment. Could it mean that the gang had moved back to this neighborhood?
Now he heard the sound of hoofs and falling rocks as another horse made its way down the side of the opposing hill. Dunc led his bay deeper into a stand of timber and tied it there. Unbooting the shotgun, he moved forward to some high ground where he could lie on his stomach and look down on the draw.
He could see nothing, but he could still hear the horse coming through the woods. Suddenly the sound of a coyote lay on the still morning air, and Dunc flattened a little harder against the ground as the voice echoed and reechoed between the hills.
For a moment there was complete silence. Then a voice called out, “I seen you, goddamn it! There's no use tryin' to hide!”
Although Dunc could not see him, he knew that the voice belonged to Wes Longstreet, the young Arkansas hellion that had belonged to the gang since its beginning. Dunc peered hard into the green umbrella of leaves and branches that spread out below, trying to see who Wes was after. He could see nothing, and the forest was quiet.
Then there Was the sound of a second horse, and a second voice called, “You got her spotted, Wes?”
Dunc heard his breath whistle between his teeth. That voice belonged to Cal Brunner! Wes called back something that Dunc couldn't understand, and then there was silence again and Dunc guessed that the two men had met and were planning what to do next.
Now he heard the two horses moving aimlessly and knew that Wes and Gal had dismounted to make the hunt on foot. But who were they hunting? As far as Dunc knew, he was the only one the gang had it in for. Maybe, he hoped, one of the other members had found out how the Brunners were using the gang for their own ends and had made a break for it.
But he doubted this, knowing how stubborn a pack of hill boys could be when they got their heads set on something. Right now they were set on the idea that Ike and Cal were their friends, and it would take a Jot more than guesswork to jar them loose from that.
He could hear the two men thrashing around in the brush at the bottom of the deep draw. “See anything yet?” Cal shouted.
“Not yet,” Wes called.
“Goddamn it!” Cal swore, and this time Dunc heard the rough edge of anxiety in the younger brother's voice. “Ike'll be fit to kill if he finds out we let her get away!”
Her? This was the first time Dunc had noticed that they were referring to the hunted person as a woman. He pondered on this, a certain tenseness straining at his nerves, a vague new worry appearing in the lines of his hard, young face. On his belly, he slipped over the top of the ridge and began crawling forward.
At last Wes Longstreet called wearily, “Hell, we'll never find her in all this brush.”
“We've got to find her!” Cal shouted angrily.
“I don't understand this. Why's Ike so het up about Mort Stringer's girl, anyway?”
“None of your goddamn business!” Cal snarled.
The two took up their search again, cursing and thrashing among the tall, tough saplings and thick weeds. Dunc Lester lay flat on the cool ground, the chill of winter spreading through him.
He told himself that it couldn't be Leah Stringer that they were looking for. Leah was back at the ex-marshal's place, where he had left her; she
But all the time he knew that she wasn't. She was down there in that draw somewhere, hiding in the weeds like a frightened rabbit. How she got there, Dunc didn't know. But he could feel her presence now in the singing of his nerves.
Damn it to hell! he thought angrily. I'm not goin' to take any more chances on account of that fool girl. She gets herself into these messes; let her get herself out!
And even as he thought it he began crawling forward again, dragging the clumsy shotgun along at his side. At the bottom of the draw he rolled quietly into a deep gully and lay there for a moment, listening. The gully, which had recently carried the runoff of spring rains down to the mouth of the Canadian, was still muddy and soft at the bottom, and Dunc took a moment to clean the sticky clay from his shotgun and revolver.
His common sense told him to stay right where he was and let the girl shift for herself, but he could no more do it than he could stop breathing. Because of him, Leah Stringer was still alive, and some stubborn streak in his Lester nature would not let him lie still and see all his effort go for nothing.
So he continued his crawling, this time to the north, along the sides of the boggy wash, cursing himself and the girl every inch of the way.
He could hear the two men clearly now, their swearing and tramping in the tangle of underbrush. Sooner or later, if they kept it up, they would flush Leah, no matter what kind of hiding place she had. Dunc thought of this and knew that the chances were a hundred to one against his being able to help her.
