I'll take the burden of it."
"You'll take a halter for it, that's what you'll take. The whole
range'll rise for this. You're marked already. Everywhere you've gone
you've made an enemy. They'll be out to get you--Nash--Boardman--the
whole gang."
"Let 'em come. I'd do this all over again."
"Born gunman, eh? Bard, you ain't got a week to live."
It was fierceness; it was a reproach rather than sorrow.
"Then let me go my own way. Why do you follow, Sally?"
"D'you know these mountains?"
"No, but----"
"Then they'd run you down in twelve hours. Where'll you head for?"
He said, as the first thought entered his mind: "I'll go for the old
house that Drew has on the other side of the range."
"That ain't bad. Know the short cut?"
"What cut?"
"You can make it in five hours over one trail. But of course you don't
know. Nobody but old Dan and me ever knowed it. Let go my bridle and
ride like hell."
She jerked the reins away from him and galloped off at full speed. He
followed.
"Sally!" he called.
But she kept straight ahead, and he followed, shouting, imploring her to
go back.
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