The crackling of a twig brought her around as a sudden tight rein does a
high-strung horse. The man had emerged from the prickly pears and was
close upon her. His steps dragged. The sag of his shoulders indicated
extreme fatigue. The dark hollows beneath the eyes told of days of
torment.
The girl stood before him slender and straight. She was pale to the lips.
Her breath came fast and ragged as if she had been running.
Abruptly she shot her challenge at him. "Who are you?"
"Water," he gasped.
One swift, searching look the girl gave him, then "Wait!" she ordered, and
was off into the mesquit on the run. Three minutes later the tenderfoot
heard her galloping through the brush. With a quick, tight rein she drew
up, swung from the saddle expertly as a vaquero, and began to untie a
canteen held by buckskin thongs to the side of the saddle.
He drank long, draining the vessel to the last drop.
From her saddle bags she brought two sandwiches wrapped in oiled paper.
"You're hungry, too, I expect," she said, her eyes shining with tender
pity.
She observed that he did not wolf his food, voracious though he was. While
he ate she returned to the fire with the running iron and heaped live
coals around the end of it.
"You've had a pretty tough time of it," she called across to him gently.
"It hasn't been exactly a picnic, but I'm all right now."
The girl liked the way he said it. Whatever else he was--and already faint
doubts were beginning to stir in her--he was not a quitter.
"You were about all in," she said, watching him.
"Just about one little kick left in me," he smiled.
"That's what I thought."
She busied herself over the fire inspecting the iron. The man watched her
curiously. What could it mean? A cow killed wantonly, a calf bawling with
pain and fear, and this girl responsible for it. The tenderfoot could not
down the suspicion stirring in his mind. He knew little of the cattle
country. But he had read books and had spent a week in Mesa not entirely
in vain. The dead cow with the little stain of red down its nose pointed
surely to one thing. He was near enough to see a hole in the forehead just
above the eyes. Instinctively his gaze passed to the rifle lying in the
sand close to his hand. Her back was still turned to him. He leaned over,
drew the gun to him, and threw out an empty shell from the barrel.