She saw him then, kneeling behind his insufficient shelter, a
trapped man making his last stand.
>From where she stood the girl distinguished him very clearly,
and under the field-glasses that she turned on him the details
leaped to life. Tall, strong, slender, with the lean, clean build
of a greyhound, he seemed as wary and alert as a panther. The
broad, soft hat, the scarlet handkerchief loosely knotted about
his throat, the gray shirt, spurs and overalls, proclaimed him a
stockman, just as his dead horse at the entrance to the coulee
told of an accidental meeting in the desert and a hurried run for
cover.
That he had no chance was quite plain, but no plainer than the
cool vigilance with which he proposed to make them pay. Even in
the matter of defense he was worse off than they were, but he
knew how to make the most of what he had; knew how to avail
himself of every inch of sagebrush that helped to render him
indistinct to their eyes.
One of the attackers, eager for a clearer shot, exposed himself a
trifle too far in taking aim. Without any loss of time in
sighting, swift as a lightning-flash, the rifle behind the forked
pine spoke. That the bullet reached its mark she saw with a gasp
of dismay.
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