The Andre Norton Megapack - 15 Classic Novels and Short Stories

his old caution to win out for an instant over his blood lust? The red head with the dangling white forelock tossed, and then the wild horse whirled and ran. Shiloh, teeth bared, ready and willing to come to battle, followed.…
    Drew was on his feet. Then he was pulled backward by a jerk out of nowhere, and he fell under a brown, mostly bare body which pinned him firmly to the ground.
    CHAPTER 17
    Drew struggled wildly but he could not break the grip which held him down. He was looking up into the face of Greyfeather, and none of his writhing made any impression on the Pima’s hold. There was a sprinkle of shots; then a whirl of the wind brought sand up over them, blinding eyes, filling mouth and nose. Even the Indian flinched from that and Drew managed to tear loose. He rolled down the grade, bringing up against a small tree with a jolt which drove most of the air from his laboring lungs.
    He pulled his arm up across his face, trying to shield his eyes from the blast which thickened steadily, gasping for air to breathe. And the wind voiced a howl which arose as alarmingly as the stallions’ screaming.
    Stallions! Drew clawed his way up to his knees. But there was no seeing through that murk to where Shiloh had been. Then he was on his feet, stumbling along…the big gray must be hidden somewhere.…
    “Drew!” A figure blundered into him from behind, almost sending him to the ground again. “Get down, you fool!” Hands clutched at his body, trying to pull him earthward.
    “Let me go! Shiloh—”
    “Get down!” Anse’s whole weight struck him, and he fell, the Texan sprawling with him. It was only then that he heard the spatterof rifle fire and understood that they were in the middle of an exchange of lead slugs.
    “Keep down!” Anse, his voice ragged with anger, snapped the command in Drew’s ear. “What in thunder you tryin’ to do? You gone completely loco, amigo ? Walkin’ right out to git yourself shot like them bullets was nothin’ but pecans or somethin’ like!”
    For the first time Drew realized what he had done—blown Rennie’s carefully planned trap sky-high. His shot at the Pinto must have been warning enough for the fugitives. But why were they trying to make a fight of it now, when to cut and run would have been the smartest move? Unless, having seen only one man, they believed he was alone. He tried to rub the dust from his eyes and think coherently. But all that was in the forefront of his mind was that last sight of Shiloh following the Pinto to battle.
    “All right.” Drew shifted in Anse’s hold. “It’s all right.”
    Not that it was, but at least that was the best way he could express his return to reason. And the Texan appeared to understand, for his grip loosened.
    The dust which had blown up an opaque curtain dropped as quickly. They lay together on the far side of the ridge, but the space below was empty. They saw no men, no battling horses—nothing.
    “They’ve hightailed it,” someone called from the crest of the ridge.
    “I tell you…I got one of ’em.… He’s over between those two bushes. He’d pulled up to take up th’ fella runnin’ an’ went out of th’ saddle. Other man got his hoss an’ lit out.”
    Drew stood up.
    “Where you goin’ now?” Anse demanded.
    “Where d’ you think?” the Kentuckianasked dully. “After Shiloh.”
    He went on foot, down the slope, across the open where the gray had unseated his rider and turned to take up the Pinto’s challenge. Since the horses were no longer in sight, there was only one way they could have gone—to the east.
    Drew was in the open when another of those wild sand and dust flurries caught him. Buffeted here and there, staggering, his arm up over his face, he was driven by its force until he brought up against a rock wall. With that as a guide he kept on stubbornly, because once more he had heard the scream of the Pinto. In triumph? Drew shivered under a thrust of fear which left him sick. He was sure that that murderous red-and-white devil had finished off Shiloh.
    Along the wall…keep going.… The dust was thinning again. Drew’s hand was on the Colt Topham had supplied. The Spencer lay back on the ridge. But if any kind of fortune favored him now, he was going to shoot the Pinto—if it was the last thing he ever did.
    There was a clear space ahead once more. The sullen gray sky gave only dulled light, but enough to see by.
    Drew had heard many stories of the fury of the stallion