Even now, with the cigar between his teeth, he knew
that if he lighted a match, the match would tremble
between his fingers, and that trembling would betray
him to Dozier. Yet he must not sit there, either,
with the cigar between his teeth, unlighted.
It was a little thing, but the weight of a feather
would turn the balance and loose on him the thunderbolt
of Hal Dozier in action.
But what could he do?
He found a thing in the very deeps of his despair.
He got up from his chair, pushed his hat calmly upon
his head and walked straight to the deputy. He
dropped both hands upon the edge of Hal’s table
and leaned across it.
“Got a light, partner?” he asked.
And standing there over the table, he knew that Dozier
had at length finally and definitely recognized him;
but that the numbed brain of the marshal refused to
permit him to act. He believed and yet he dared
not believe his belief. Andrew saw the glance
of Dozier go to his hip—his hip which the
holster had rubbed until it gleamed. But no matter—the
gun was not there—and stunned again by that
impossible fact Dozier reached back and brought up
his hand bearing a match box. He took out a match.
He lighted it, his brows drawing together and slackening
all the time, and then he looked up, his eyes rising
with the lighted match, and stared full into the eyes
of Andrew.
It was discovery undoubtedly—and how long
would that mental paralysis last?
Andrew looked straight back into those eyes.
His cigar took the fire and sucked in the flame.
A cloud of smoke puffed out and rolled toward Hal
Dozier, and Andrew turned leisurely and walked toward
the door.
He was a yard from it.
“Lanning!” came a voice behind him, terrible,
like a scream of pain.
As he leaped forward a gun spoke heavily in the room.
He heard the bullet crunch into the frame of the door;
the door itself was split by the second shot as Andrew
slammed it shut. Then he raced around the corner
of the restaurant and made for the grove.
There was not a sound behind him for a moment.
Then a roar rose from the village and rushed after
him. It gave him wings. And, looking back,
he saw that Hal Dozier was not among the pursuers.
No, half a dozen men were running, and firing as they
ran, but there was not a rifle in the lot, and it
takes a good man to land a bullet on the run where
he is firing at a dodging target. The pursuers
lost ground; they stopped and yelled for horses.
But that was what Hal Dozier was doing now. He
was jerking a saddle on the back of Gray Peter, and
in sixty seconds he would be tearing out of Los Toros.
In the same space Andrew was in his own saddle with
a flying leap and spurring out of the trees.
By one thing he knew the utter desperation of Hal
Dozier. For the man had fired while Andrew’s
back was turned. The bullet had followed the
warning cry as swiftly as the strike of a snake follows
its rattle. Luck and his sudden leap forward
had unbalanced the nice aim of Dozier, and perhaps
his mental agitation had contributed to it. But,
at any rate, Andrew was troubled as he cleared the
edge of the trees and cantered Sally not too swiftly
along the Little Silver River toward Las Casas mountains,
a little east of south.
