McShannon heard the bellow from the open window and, expecting a bullet to follow closely on its heels, vaulted recklessly over the rail into space. As he went over, the shot came, brushing carelessly through his hair and telling him that he had been within a fraction of an inch of death. In such a way did one have to pay for visiting the girl of one’s dreams.
He landed so hard that he thought that he must have at least broken an ankle. He rolled and came up on his feet and found to his astonishment that he was still whole. At once he set off running, glancing back to see the dim bulk of Markham on the gallery. Even as he looked he heard the second report and saw the muzzleflash of the gun. This time the bullet went a foot wide, but that wasn’t far enough for McShannon’s comfort. He was tempted to stop and snap off a shot at the old fool, but he knew that might endanger Alvina. So he just kept on going.
Markham was bawling for his men to turn out and hunt down the intruder. Behind that sound, McShannon could hear Alvina screaming. He would have thought that the sweet and gentle girl would have had such a strident sound stored up in her.
He ran on.
A man shouted in the front yard.
McShannon blessed the fact that he wasn’t wearing boots. Like this he could outrun an Indian. He stretched his stride to a long untiring pace and prayed that the men left at the ranch were still horseless. He quickly left the house behind him and within a short while reached his horse. He paused for a moment to regain his breath, tightened the girth and stepped into the saddle. Turning the horse, he set off south. He laughed as he went. He could have wished that Markham could have waited five minutes longer before suspecting that there was a man in his daughter’s room, so that true manhood could have been proven, but he didn’t really have any grumbles. He knew now that Alvina looked on him kindly and that he only had to find the ways and means and she was his. He’d made a damn fool out of Markham, any road. He looked forward to the meeting at Indian Rock.
He took a devious trail back into the hills in case any of Markham’s riders had been sent to follow him, watched his back-trail as carefully as he could, and reached camp the following morning about two hours after dawn. Jack Owen and Sarie were working horses and hardly seemed to have time to spare him a word. He ate some stew that he found on the pot by the fire, rolled up in his blankets and fell into a deep sleep during which he dreamed of the fair Alvina.
When he woke an hour after noon, he found himself alone in camp with Sarie.
“Where’s Jack?” he asked, sitting up in his blankets.
Sarie pulled a face.
“He said McAllister went a-courtin’, you been a-courtin9, now it’s time he done some. I don’t know what’s gotten into you men.”
“Jack gone courtin’?” he said, amazed. That could only mean the meakest and mildest of the three partners had gone into the hornets’ nest to find Lucy. He’d be lucky if he didn’t get himself killed. He washed his face in the creek, wondering what he ought to do. There was Sarie and the horses here and Jack Owen somewhere down there on the plain making a fool of himself and McShannon didn’t know which he ought to be with. Then ‘to hell with Owen’, he thought. If he couldn’t look after himself he shouldn’t go courting a Markham. Somebody had to stay with Sarie and the horses and that meant him.
When he went back to the fire, Sarie had a cup of coffee ready for him. He squatted on his heels and drank the scalding bitter liquid.
“You ridin’ in the race?” Sarie asked.
He’d clean forgotten about the race.
“Sure,” he said carelessly. Where there was a race, McShannon would ride in it as a matter of course.
“Which horse’re you ridin’?”
“My sorrel, of course. We don’t have anything to match my black.”
Sarie snorted. She rode every horse she could get her leg over and she had firm opinions on the merits of the animals. McShannon gave her a look.
“You think we got something better’n the sorrel?”
“I don’t know we got any thin’ better than the sorrel. Not just like that.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“We got a horse that could beat the sorrel with me up.”
“You? You ain’t ridin’ in no race.”
“I am so.”
“I ain’t allowin’ it.”
“You can go chase yourself. Jack says I can ride the red stallion.”
“He’d kill you.”
“I ride him every day. He’s real gentle. Ill win the race on him.”
“What in hell does Jack think he’s doin’ lettin’ you ride a horse like that in the race?”
“I’m light. The red can win with me on him.”
When McShannon had finished the coffee he and the girl went to look at the horses. The sorrel was in fine fettle. McShannon threw a hull on him and stepped astride. He watched Sarie put a kind of a surcingle on a lively bay and get lightly aboard. He saw that she had been right and the usually fiery animal was gentle with her. It obeyed the child with no more than the surcingle and a hackamore on. They rode down a nearby valley together and they let the horses go. The sorrel at once forced the pace as by habit, but the bay with its light load up, slowly overtook it. They ran a mile together and then pulled the horses in.
Grudgingly, McShannon said: “Kid, you can sure make that horse step it out”
She grinned at him maddeningly and said: “We’re goin’ to win that race. Nobody’ll catch me on the stallion.”
He had to laugh.
“That would sure make Markham mad - being beaten by a kid. I’d like to see that.”
They turned their animals and trotted back to camp.