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Updated: June 6, 2025
From the rim-rock above the ranch, Good Indian had heard the shooting, though the trees hid from his sight what was taking place, and he had given over his search for Saunders and made haste to reach home.
Deep Cañon had been conquered; but it was yet to be seen whether the victory had not been won at a disastrous cost. The sheriff and his nine men sank down on the grassy slope, gasping, outspent. Ashton collapsed in their midst. He was more than outspent; he was utterly exhausted. The instant he had seen Blake lifted over the rim-rock, he had given way to the strain of his frightful exertions.
It was a knife-blade stringer, a mere seam of rotten quartz running along the side of a canyon; and yet not without its elements of promise, for it was located near another big fault. In geological days the rim-rock had been rent here as it had at Queen Creek Canyon and this stringer of quartz might lead to a golden treasure that would far surpass Bunker's silver.
There, for the time being, he was safe. Unless the shooter upon the rim-rock was mounted, he must travel swiftly indeed to reach again a point within range of the grade road before Good Indian would pass out of sight again. For the trail wound in and out, looping back upon itself where the hill was oversleep, hidden part of the time from the receding wall of rock by huge bowlders and giant sage.
"'N' if you don't wanta loose that there red mop uh yourn ye better keep yer eyes open, now I'm tellin' yuh!" He refilled his rifle magazine and took up his station beside Lite Avery where he could watch the Frying-pan through the bushes without exposing himself to a treacherous shot from the rim-rock.
On they pressed, their blood now quickened by excitement, crawling up the steep, while volley on volley poured over them. Within nine feet of the pits was a rim-rock ledge over which the Indian bullets swept, and here the charge was stopped. It now became a duel. Every time a head showed on either side, it drew fire like a flue-hole.
She would have welcomed a heavy downpour out of a black night. The rim-rock was close above. She edged along it till she came to a scar where the sandstone had broken off and scorched a path down the slope. Into the hollow formed by two boulders resting against each other she crawled. For hours she heard Jake moving about, first among the aspens and later on the sage hill.
His eyes searched involuntarily the rim-rock with a certain incredulity, as if he could not bring himself to believe in that bullet, after all. "But two of the jumpers are gone," said Wally. "I reckon we stirred 'em up some yesterday, and they're trying to get back at us." "They've picked a dandy place," Good Indian observed. "I think maybe it would be a good idea to hold that fort ourselves.
The boss'll shore have t' look into it when he gits here. Lucky we made up our minds t' hold yuh a murderer, like as not." He filled his pipe with deliberation, while Casey, his jaw sagging, stared from one to the other. Casey had meant to accuse them to their faces of shooting Barney and the burros from the rim-rock.
Yuh musta sprung the trap 'fore yuh got inside, 'cause they shore aimed t' occupy this nest uh rocks theirselves, with you fellers down there in the Fryin'-pan where they could git at yuh. "Thar's one of 'em up on the rim-rock see 'im? standin' thar, by granny, like he was darin' somebody t' cut loose! Here, Lite, you spill some lead up thar. We'll learn 'im t' act up smart " "Hey, hold on!"
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