.

"I reckon it's a get-away," he said. "I ain't fool enough to go up that
bank while they're there. And by the time we'd get around they'd be a
couple of miles 'most anywheres."

"We've got ourselves to blame," said Casey.

"Well, that first shot burned up this cayuse of mine," McHale grumbled.
"How could I shoot, with him jumpin' around? And that blasted,
yeller-hided buzzard head of yours, he don't know no better'n to whale
into him with both heels. It wouldn't happen again, not in a million
years."

"It doesn't need to," said Casey sourly. "We found our meat, and we
couldn't stop it."

"The laugh is on us," McHale admitted. "For the powder we burned we
sure ought to have a scalp or two to show. Still, moonlight shootin' is
chance shootin', and when a cussed mean cayuse is sashayin' round if a
man hits anything but scenery he's lucky!"

"I thought that old-timer, Dade, was doing the talking."

"Sure he was. And I'll bet it was his _tillikum_, Cross, that took the
first crack at us. Didn't waste no time. He's some soon, that feller. I
s'pose they got a camp, somewheres. No use tryin' to find it. We can't
prove that they used the powder on our dams. Well, what say if we point
out for home? Daylight's breakin' now."

A pale light was spreading in the east, underneath the stars that
rimmed the horizon. Objects became more visible. As they rode
unmolested from the coulee the pale light began to flush faintly. Rosy
shafts shot upward, and the stars vanished. Here and there birds began
to twitter. An old grouse scuttled away, wings a-trail, as if mortally
hurt, to distract attention from her young brood hidden in the short
grass. A huge owl sailed ghostlike on silent wings, homeward bound from
midnight foray. A coyote yipped shrill protest against the day. Away to
the west, where the mountains loomed grandly, bright lights lay on
peaks still white with the remnants of winter snows. Suddenly, driving
the shadows before it, the sun seemed to leap above the rim of the
world.

CHAPTER XX

During the next twelve hours there was much riding from ranch to ranch.
Of all the small dams constructed and maintained by the ranchers for
irrigation purposes but one remained; and that one was Donald McCrae's.

McCrae himself considered this an invidious distinction. He would have
preferred to suffer with his neighbours. He did not know why his
structure had been spared, and he lent men and teams to others,
labouring