If only the night had been dark, if the gelding had had a fair start;
but the moon was bright, and in the thin mountain air it made a radiance
almost as keen as day and just sufficiently treacherous to delude a
horse, which had been sent unexpectedly out among rocks by a cruel pair
of spurs. At the end of the first leap the gelding stumbled to his knees
with a crash and snort among the stones. The shock hurled Andrew
forward, but he clung with spurs and hand, and as he twisted back into
the saddle the gelding rose valiantly and lurched ahead again.
Yet that double sound might have roused an army, and for the keen-eared
watchers around the clearing it was more than an ample warning. There
was a crash of musketry so instant and so close together that it was
like a volley delivered by a line of soldiers at command. Bullets sang
shrill and small around Andrew, but that first discharge had been a
burst of snap-shooting, and by moonlight it takes a rare man indeed to
make an accurate snapshot. The first discharge left both Andrew and the
horse untouched, and for the moment the wild hope of unexpected success
was raised in his heart. And he had noted one all-important fact--the
flashes, widely scattered as they were, did not extend across the exact
course of his flight toward the trees. Therefore, none of the posse
would have a point-blank shot at him. For those in the rear and on the
sides the weaving course of the gelding, running like a deer and
swerving agilely among the rocks, as if to make up for his first
blunder, offered the most difficult of all targets.
All this in only the space of a breath, yet the ground was already
crossed and the trees were before him when Andrew saw a ray of
moonlight flash on the long barrel of rifle to his right, and he knew
that one man at least was taking a deliberate aim. He had his revolver
on the fellow in the instant, and yet he held his fire. God willing, he
would come back to Anne Withero with no more stains on his hands!
And that noble, boyish impulse killed the chestnut, for a moment later a
stream of fire spouted out, long and thin, from the muzzle of the rifle,
and the gelding struck at the end of a stride, like a ship going down in
the sea; his limbs seemed to turn to tallow under him, and he crumpled
on the ground.
The fall flung Andrew clean out of the saddle; he landed on his knees
and leaped for the woods, but now there was a steady roar of guns behind
him. He was struck heavily behind the left shoulder, staggered.
Something gashed his neck like the edge of a red-hot knife, his whole
left side was numb.
And then the merciful dark of the trees closed around him.
For fifty yards he raced through an opening in the trees, while a
yelling like wild Indians rose behind him; then he leaped into cover and
waited. One thing favored him still. They had not brought horses, or at
least they had left their mounts at some distance, for fear of the
chance noises they might make when the cabin was stalked. And now,
looking down the lane among the trees, he saw men surge into it.
All his left side was covered with a hot bath, but, balancing his
revolver in his right hand, he felt a queer touch of joy and pride at
finding his nerve still unshaken. He raised the weapon, covered their
bodies, and then something like an invisible hand forced down the muzzle
of his gun. He could not shoot to kill!
He did what was perhaps better; he fired at that mass of legs, and even
a child could not have failed to strike the target. Once, twice, and
again; then the crowd melted to either side of the path, and there was a
shrieking and forms twisting and writhing on the ground.
Some one was shouting orders from the side; he was ordering them to the
right and left to surround the fugitive; he was calling out that Lanning
was hit. At least, they would go with caution down his trail after that
first check. He left his sheltering tree and ran again down the ravine.
By this time the first shock of the wounds and the numbness were leaving
him, but the pain was terrible. Yet he knew that he was not fatally
injured if he could stop that mortal drain of his wounds.
He heard the pursuit in the distance more and more. Every now and then
there was a spasmodic outburst of shooting, and Andrew grinned in spite
of his pain. They were closing around the place where they thought he
was making his last stand, shooting at shadows which might be the man
they wanted.
Then he stopped, tore off his shirt, and ripped it with his right hand
and his teeth into strips. He tied one around his neck, knotting it
until he could only draw his breath with difficulty. Several more strips
he tied together, and then wound the long bandage around his shoulder
and pulled. The pain brought him close to a swoon, but when his senses
cleared he found that the flow from his wounds had eased.
But not entirely. There was still some of that deadly trickling down his
side, and, with the chill of the night biting into him, he knew that it
was life or death to him if he could reach some friendly house within
the next two miles. There was only one dwelling straight before him, and
that was the house of the owner of the bay mare. They would doubtless
turn him over to the posse instantly. But there was one chance in a
hundred that they would not break the immemorial rule of mountain
hospitality. For Andrew there was no hope except that tenuous one.
The rest of that walk became a nightmare. He was not sure whether he
heard the yell of rage and disappointment behind him as the posse
discovered that the bird had flown or whether the sound existed only in
his own ringing head. But one thing was certain--they would not trail
Andrew Lanning recklessly in the night, not even with the moon to
help them.
So he plodded steadily on. If it had not been for that ceaseless drip he
would have taken the long chance and broken for the mountains above him,
trying through many a long day ahead to cure the wounds and in some
manner sustain his life. But the drain continued. It was hardly more
than drop by drop, but all the time a telltale weakness was growing in
his legs. In spite of the agony he was sleepy, and he would have liked
to drop on the first mat of leaves that he found.
That crazy temptation he brushed away, and went on until surely, like a
star of hope, he saw the light winking feebly through the trees, and
then came out on the cabin.
He remembered afterward that even in his dazed condition he was
disappointed because of the neat, crisp, appearance of the house. There
must be women there, and women meant screams, horror, betrayal.
But there was no other hope for him now. Twice, as he crossed the
clearing before he reached the door of the cabin, his foot struck a rock
and he pitched weakly forward, with only the crumbling strength of his
right arm to keep him from striking on his face. Then there was a
furious clamor and a huge dog rushed at him.
He heeded it only with a glance from the corner of his eye. And then,
his dull brain clearing, he realized that the dog no longer howled at
him or showed his teeth, but was walking beside him, licking his hand
and whining with sympathy. He dropped again, and this time he could
never have regained his feet had not his right arm flopped helplessly
across the back of the big dog, and the beast cowered and growled, but
it did not attempt to slide from under his weight.
He managed to get erect again, but when he reached the low flight of
steps to the front door he was reeling drunkenly from side to side. He
fumbled for the knob, and it turned with a grating sound.
"Hold on! Keep out!" shrilled a voice inside. "We got guns here. Keep
out, you dirty bum!"
The door fell open, and he found himself confronted by what seemed to
him a dazzling torrent of light and a host of human faces. He drew
himself up beside the doorway.
"Gentlemen," said Andrew, "I am not a bum. I am worth five thousand
dollars to the man who turns me over, dead or alive, to the sheriff. My
name is Andrew Lanning."
At that the faces became a terrible rushing and circling flare, and the
lights went out with equal suddenness. He was left in total darkness,
falling through space; but, at his last moment of consciousness, he felt
arms going about him, arms through which his bulk kept slipping down,
and below him was a black abyss.