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We dropped into a low, broad watercourse, ascended its bed to big cottonwoods and flowing water, followed it into box canons between rim-rock carved fantastically and painted like a Moorish facade, until at last in a widening below a rounded hill, we came upon an adobe house, a fruit tree, and a round corral. This was the Double R. Charley and Windy Bill welcomed us with soda biscuits.
And that the boys would be mighty glad to see him again; concluding with an explanation of his own presence there that he had been over to the T-Bar-T to see Houck about some of his stock that had strayed through some "down-fence" "She's all fenced now," he explained and had run into a bunch of wild turkeys, chased them to a rim-rock and had managed to shoot one, but had had to climb down a cañon to recover the bird, which had set him back considerably on his home journey.
Of course, if you're going to make a perfect lady get off and walk " Blue snuffed at the ledge with his neck craned. The rim-rock had crumbled and sunk low into the bluff, like a too rich pie-crust when the oven is not quite hot enough. From a ten- or fifteen-foot wall it shrunk here to a three-foot ledge.
He might have gone straight down the bluff afoot, through a rift in the rim-rock where it was possible to climb down into the fissure and squeeze out through a narrow opening to the bowlder-piled bluff.
He waved his hand at the steep shoulder of the hill, where the canyon had cut through the rim-rock; and as Denver looked at the formation of the ground a gleam came into his eyes. The claim took in the silted edge of the rim, where the strata had been laid bare, and along through the middle of the varicolored layers there ran a broad streak of iron-red.
Half an hour's climbing brought Slone to where he could see that he was entering a vast valley, sloping up and narrowing to a notch in the dark cliffs, above which towered the great red wall and about that the slopes of cedar and the yellow rim-rock. And scarcely a mile distant, bright in the westering sunlight, shone the red stallion, moving slowly. Slone pressed on steadily.
They rode down from the rim-rock, bearing to the right, as far away from the river as possible. The Utes in the blackberry fringe caught sight of them and concentrated their fire on the galloping horsemen. Presently the riders dipped for a minute behind a swell of ground. "A heap more comfortable ridin' here," Dud said, easing his horse for a few moments to a slower pace.
To the casual glance the rim-rock was impassable. The men were discouraged and the officer nonplussed. A hundred rifles might be covering the rock fort for all they knew. On closer examination a cutting was found in the face of the rock which was a rude attempt at steps, doubtless made long ago by the Indians.
The rest of us hurried to the head of Dude Canyon. Copple and I were to go down to the first promontories under the rim. The others were to await developments and go where Haught thought best to send them. Copple and I started down over and around the crags, going carefully until we reached the open slope under the rim-rock.
He glanced often up at the rim-rock as he rode slowly to the Point o' Rocks, and when he was halfway to the turn he thought he saw something moving up there. He pulled up to make sure, and a little blue ball puffed out like a child's balloon, burst, and dissipated itself in a thin, trailing ribbon, which the wind caught and swept to nothing.
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