about three quarters of its width, so
that it overlapped the big rock beside it, leaving an aperture between
the two of perhaps three or four inches. While Calumet watched a rifle
barrel was stuck into this aperture. Calumet waited until the muzzle
of the rifle became steady and then he took quick aim at the spot and
pulled the trigger of his six-shooter, ducking his head below the edge
of the gully as his weapon crashed.

He heard a laugh, mocking, discordant, followed by a voice--Taggart's
voice.

"Clean miss," it said. "You're nervous."

"Like you was in town today," jeered Calumet.

"Then you know me?" returned Taggart. "I ain't admittin' that I was
any nervous."

"Scared of the dark, then," said Calumet. "You left town a whole lot
punctual."

"Well," sneered Taggart; "mebbe I ain't much on the shoot. I don't
play any man's game but my own."

"You're right," mocked Calumet; "you don't play no man's game. A man's
game--"

He raised his head a trifle and a bullet sang past it, flattened itself
against the rock behind him, cutting short his speech and his humor at
the same instant. The gully was fully fifty feet long and he dropped
on his hands and knees and crawled to the upper end of it, away from
the slope. He saw one of Taggart's feet projecting from behind the
rock and he brought his six-shooter to a poise. The foot moved and
disappeared. Catching a glimpse of the rifle barrel coming into view
around the edge of the rock, Calumet sank back into the gully. Fifteen
minutes later when he again cautiously raised his head above the level
there was no sign of Taggart. He dropped down into the gully again and
scrambled to the other end of it, raising his head again. He saw
Taggart, twenty-five feet behind the rock, backing away toward the wood
where his horse stood, crouching, watchful, endeavoring to keep the
rock between him and Calumet while he retreated. Altogether, he was
fully a hundred and twenty-five feet away at the moment Calumet caught
sight of him, and he was looking toward the end of the gully that
Calumet had just vacated. Calumet stood erect and snapped a shot at
him, though the distance was so great that he had little expectation of
doing any damage.

But Taggart staggered, dropped his rifle and dove headlong toward the
rock. In an instant he had resumed his position behind it, and Calumet
could tell from the rapidity of his movements that he had not been hit.
He saw the rifl