He heard the steps
of his reinforcements with their weapons coming close behind him, and
rolled aside on the sloping ledge to let them pass. But he rolled too
far. He felt himself slipping down the mountain-side in the slimy shoot
of the tunnel. He made a desperate attempt to recover himself, but the
treacherous drift of the loose debris rolled with him, as if he were
part of its refuse, and, carrying him down, left him unconscious, but
otherwise uninjured, in the bushes of the second ledge five hundred feet
below.
When he recovered his senses the shouts and outcries above him had
ceased. He knew he was safe. The ledge could only be reached by a
circuitous route three miles away. He knew, too, that if he could only
reach a point of outcrop a hundred yards away he could easily descend to
the stage road, down the gentle slope of the mountain hidden in a growth
of hazel-brush. He bound up his wounded leg, and dragged himself on his
hands and knees laboriously to the outcrop. He did not look up; since
his pick had crashed into Marshall's brain he had but one blind thought
before him--to escape at once! That his revenge and compensation would
come later he never doubted. He limped and crept, rolled and fell, from
bush to bush through the sloping thickets, until he saw the red road a
few feet below him.
If he only had a horse he could put miles between him and any present
pursuit! Why should he not have one? The road was frequented by solitary
horsemen--miners and Mexicans.
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