scattered along its length and breadth.
Tyree took off his hat and wiped sweat from the band with his gloved fingers, the blazing sun hammering at him mercilessly. He was about to replace his hat but stopped in midmotion, frozen in place by a sudden, angry rattle.
He turned slowly. Ten feet away a huge side-winder that had been basking on a rock raised its head, tongue flickering, warning him to keep his distance.
Tyree took a step backward, then another, his hand dropping to the gun on his hip. But the snake, its point made, slithered into a cluster of boulders shot through with bunchgrass and disappeared.
Swallowing hard, Tyree settled his hat back on his head and began to climb again.
The slot canyon itself was a deep gash in the sandstone rock, sculpted over millions of years into fantastic twists and turns by raging floodwaters. Judging by the closeness of the walls in some places, parts of it were so narrow a wide-shouldered man would have been forced to turn sideways to get through.
When Tyree stood on the rim and looked down into the canyon’s depths, he could see twenty or thirty feet of wall bathed in a dim amber light, and below that only darkness.
There was no telling if there were actually cows down there, but if there were, the God apples would hopefully get them moving.
One by one Tyree tossed his rocks into the canyon and listened to them bounce off the walls. A few moments later there was a thud of hooves as spooked cattle ran in panic along the sandy bottom.
Tyree grinned, let out a wild whoop and tossed down a few more rocks. Luke had been right—it was actually working.
But after four hours and as many slot canyons, Boyd and Fowler had counted only a handful of cows, and the Hereford bull was not among them.
After throwing the last of his rocks, Tyree decided this fourth canyon, carved into the side of a high, flat- topped butte, was his last. He was scraped and bruised all over from climbing, and his knees and elbows were bleeding from cactus spines. He was yet to regain all of his strength, and he felt hot, irritable and completely worn-out. Making his way through scattered boulders, Tyree reached the meager shade of a stunted juniper and built a cigarette, the smoke tasting hot, dry and acrid on his tongue.
Tyree finished his cigarette and ground out the butt under his heel. He walked back toward the run-off and had just begun his hazardous descent when a brownish-yellow smudge in the sky far to the north stopped him in his tracks.
He used his hat to shade his eyes against the glare of the sun, scanning the hazy distance. But there was no mistaking what he’d seen, a dust cloud hanging in the still air, thick enough to have been kicked up by several riders.
Tyree studied the dust, wondering at its meaning. Fowler had told him there was a settlement to the north called Moab, a farming and ranching community run by Mormons. It could be the dust was being raised by punchers from there, though it was a fair piece off their home range.
But Tyree immediately dismissed the thought. Dust to the north coupled with Boyd’s missing bull was too much of a coincidence—or at least enough of a coincidence to justify an investigation.
He came off the butte in a hurry, sliding on his rump most of the way. When he reached the bottom he jumped to his feet and yelled, waving his hat to Boyd and Fowler, who were some distance off by the creek.
The two men loped toward Tyree, Boyd leading the steeldust.
“What’s all the fuss, boy?” the old rancher asked, reining up beside the younger man. “You seen my bull?”
Tyree shook his head at him. “There’s dust to the north, Luke: three, maybe four riders. It could be that your bull is with them.”
A frown gathering between his eyes, the rancher sat his saddle for a few moments, thinking it through. He glanced at the sun, as though seeking the answer to a question he’d just asked himself.
“How far?” he asked finally.
“Four, five miles.”
Again Boyd sat lost in thought. Then he said, “That bull wouldn’t have wandered far from the cows. We’ve searched high and low for him and he ain’t here, so he’s someplace else.” He glanced at the sun again. “We still have a couple of hours of daylight left, time enough to catch up with the rustlers if that’s what they are.” He tossed the reins of the steeldust to Tyree. “Mount up, boy. Slip the thong off your Colt, and let’s go talk to those gents and see what they’re about.”
It did not occur to Tyree, for even an instant, to refuse. He had enjoyed Boyd’s hospitality and he was therefore expected to ride for the brand if the need arose. Among Western men, to do otherwise would have marked him as a man of low character and, even worse, a coward.
The three men rode north, working their way through narrow, sandy canyons and wider draws, a few of them with grass and water. Whenever possible they kept to the grass or rode through stands of cedar to settle their own dust.
After an hour, at the mouth of a canyon between high, heavily corroded bluffs, Tyree cut sign. The tracks of three horses led into the gulch and among them what could only be the wide, split-toed prints of Luke Boyd’s bull.
“I reckon they’re planning to head all the way north to Salt Lake City,” the rancher said, his face grim. “They’ll sell my bull cheap, but even so, the money will keep them in whiskey and women for a long time.”
“Could be Salt Lake, Luke,” Fowler allowed. “Unless they make a turn east and head for Colorado.”
Boyd shook his head in irritation. “North, east, it don’t matter a damn. I’m going after them.” He turned in the saddle and looked at Fowler. “Owen, you’re not a gunfighting man. I wouldn’t think any less of you if’n you was to ride back to the cabin.”
Fowler shook his head. “I reckon I’ll stick.”
Boyd’s smile was slight but genuine. “Good man. Then let’s get it done.”
The advancing dusk was starting to crowd out the light as the three riders entered the canyon and followed its twists and turns for several miles. Some places were so narrow their stirrups scraped along the walls. At other points the canyon widened around shallow, water-filled basins surrounded by willow and cottonwoods, the gound muddied by the tracks of deer, elk and cattle.
In the falling darkness, Boyd led Tyree and Fowler out of the canyon and then up a steep, hogback rise formed by the slanting talus slopes of a pair of dome-topped mesas, the way made treacherous by loose rock and gravel. The air smelled stale and old, the dusty odor of sandstone not yet cooled from the blazing heat of the day.
Before they reached the crest of the rise, Tyree told Boyd to hold up. “The way I see it, those boys will soon camp for the night,” he said. “Judging by their tracks, I’d say they’re not hustling any, so they don’t know they’re being followed and they won’t want to run too much beef off that bull.”
“What’s on your mind, son?” Boyd asked.
“I suggest you and Owen stay here. I’m going on ahead to scout for the camp. When I find it, I’ll come back and get you.” Tyree shrugged. “Less chance of being seen if we know exactly where those rustlers are holed up. Last thing we want to do is go wandering around in the dark.”
Boyd thought that through, then turned to Fowler. “How does Chance’s notion set with you, Owen?”
“Makes sense,” Fowler answered. “We go stumbling around hunting for their camp they could hear us coming and kill all three of us quicker’n scat.”
Boyd turned back to Tyree. “All right, go do it, boy, but when you find the camp come hightailing it back here, mind. There’s too many of them for one man to handle.”
His face revealing nothing, Tyree touched the brim of his hat then swung the steeldust toward the top of the hogback. He crested the rise and rode down the other side, dropping four hundred feet, his horse sliding most of the way on its haunches. He crossed an area of sandy, open ground, dotted here and there with patches of prickly pear cactus and mesquite, and rode into a shallow arroyo.
The moon came up, silvering the night, and out among the canyons the coyotes were talking.
Tyree thought he smelled smoke, but with no wind to carry the scent the odor was faint and fleeting. He reined up the tired steeldust, stood in the stirrups, and lifted his nose, testing the air.
There it was again, just a fragile whiff of burning cedar that seemed to come from right ahead of him. And
