he significance of the
animal waiting patiently for its rider. Then, like the flash of a
speeding film, he saw it all--his pony's tracks up the canon--the rider
who had undoubtedly seen him crossing to the water-hole, and who had
waited until daylight to follow the tracks; who had dismounted, and was
probably in ambush watching him. He summoned all his reserve courage.
Turning away, he remarked, distinctly, naturally, casually, "Thought I
heard something. Must have been the water."

He walked slowly back to the notch in the canon walls. Stepping through
it, he continued on up the stream. A few paces beyond the notch, and a
face appeared in the cleft rock, watching him. The watcher seemed in
doubt. Collie's action had been natural enough. Had he seen the horse?
The hidden face grew crafty. The eyes grew cold. The watcher tapped the
side of the cliff with his revolver butt. The noise was slight, but in
that place of sensitive echoes, loud enough to be heard a long way up
the canon. Then it was that Collie made a courageous but terrible
mistake. He heard the sound, and seemed to realize that it was made
intentionally--to attract his attention. Yet he was not sure. He kept
on, ignoring the sound. Had he not suspected some one was in the canon,
to have glanced back would have been the most natural thing in the
world. The watcher realized this. He knew that the other had heard
him--suspected his presence, and was making a daring bluff.

"Got to stop that," muttered the watcher, and he raised his hand.

The imprisoned report rolled and reechoed like mountain thunder. Collie
threw up his arms and lurched forward.

Below in the canon clattered the hoofs of the speeding horse. The rider,
still holding his six-gun, muzzle up, glanced back. "I didn't care
partic'lar about gettin' _him_, but gettin' the kid hits the red-head
between the eyes. I guess I'm about even now." And Silent Saunders
holstered his gun, swung out of the canon, and spurred down the
mountain, not toward the desert town, but toward Gophertown, some thirty
miles to the north. He had found the claim. The desert town folk he had
used to good advantage. They had paid his expenses while he trailed
Overland and Collie. They had even guaranteed him protection from the
law--such as it was on the Mojave. He had every reason to be grateful to
them, but he was just a step or two above them in criminal artistry. He
had been a "killer." Like the lone wolf that calls the pa