As he pulled in his heaving mount and leaped off, a couple of

ranchers came out of the place, and one of them stepped to a
clean-limbed, fiery bay. He was about to get into his saddle

when he saw Duane, and then he halted, a foot in the stirrup.
Duane strode forward, grasped the bridle of this man's horse.

"Mine's done--but not killed," he panted. "Trade with me."
"Wal, stranger, I'm shore always ready to trade," drawled the

man. "But ain't you a little swift?"
Duane glanced back up the road. His pursuers were entering the

village.
"I'm Duane--Buck Duane," he cried, menacingly. "Will you trade?

Hurry!"
The rancher, turning white, dropped his foot from the stirrup

and fell back.
"I reckon I'll trade," he said.

Bounding up, Duane dug spurs into the bay's flanks. The horse
snorted in fright, plunged into a run. He was fresh, swift,

half wild. Duane flashed by the remaining houses on the street
out into the open. But the road ended at that village or else

led out from some other quarter, for he had ridden straight
into the fields and from them into rough desert. When he

reached the cover of mesquite once more he looked back to find
six horsemen within rifle-shot of him, and more coming behind

them.
His new horse had not had time to get warm before Duane reached

a high sandy bluff below which lay the willow brakes. As far as
he could see extended an immense flat strip of red-tinged

willow. How welcome it was to his eye! He felt like a hunted
wolf that, weary and lame, had reached his hole in the rocks.

Zigzagging down the soft slope, he put the bay to the dense
wall of leaf and branch. But the horse balked.

There was little time to lose. Dismounting, he dragged the
stubborn beast into the thicket. This was harder and slower

work than Duane cared to risk. If he had not been rushed he
might have had better success. So he had to abandon the horse--

a circumstance that only such sore straits could have driven
him to. Then he went slipping swiftly through the narrow

aisles.
He had not gotten under cover any too soon. For he heard his

pursuers piling over the bluff, loud-voiced, confident, brutal.
They crashed into the willows.

"Hi, Sid! Heah's your hoss!" called one, evidently to the man
Duane had forced into a trade.

"Say, if you locoed gents'll hold up a little I'll tell you
somethin'," replied a voice from the bluff.

"Come on, Sid! We got him corralled," said the first speaker.
"Wal, mebbe, an' if you hev it's liable to be damn hot. THET

FELLER WAS BUCK DUANE!"
Absolute silence followed that statement. Presently it was

broken by a rattling of loose gravel and then low voices.
"He can't git across the river, I tell you," came to Duane's

ears. "He's corralled in the brake. I know thet hole."
Then Duane, gliding silently and swiftly through the willows,

heard no more from his pursuers. He headed straight for the
river. Threading a passage through a willow brake was an old

task for him. Many days and nights had gone to the acquiring of
a skill that might have been envied by an Indian.

The Rio Grande and its tributaries for the most of their length
in Texas ran between wide, low, flat lands covered by a dense

growth of willow. Cottonwood, mesquite, prickly pear, and other
growths mingled with the willow, and altogether they made a

matted, tangled copse, a thicket that an inexperienced man
would have considered impenetrable. From above, these wild

brakes looked green and red; from the inside they were gray and
yellow--a striped wall. Trails and glades were scarce. There

were a few deer-runways and sometimes little paths made by
peccaries--the jabali, or wild pigs, of Mexico. The ground was

clay and unusually" target="_blank" title="ad.异常地；非常">unusually dry, sometimes baked so hard that it left no
imprint of a track. Where a growth of cottonwood had held back

the encroachment of the willows there usually was thick grass
and underbrush. The willows were short, slender poles with

stems so close together that they almost touched, and with the
leafy foliage forming a thick covering. The depths of this

brake Duane had penetrated was a silent, dreamy, strange place.
In the middle of the day the light was weird and dim. When a

breeze fluttered the foliage, then slender shafts and spears of
sunshine pierced the green mantle and danced like gold on the

ground.
Duane had always felt the strangeness of this kind of place,

and likewise he had felt a protecting, harboring something
which always seemed to him to be the sympathy of the brake for

a hunted creature. Any unwounded creature, strong and
resourceful, was safe when he had glided under the low,

rustling green roof of this wild covert. It was not hard to
conceal tracks; the springy soil gave forth no sound; and men

could hunt each other for weeks, pass within a few yards of
each other and never know it. The problem of sustaining life

was difficult; but, then, hunted men and animals survived on
very little.

Duane wanted to cross the river if that was possible, and,
keeping in the brake, work his way upstream till he had reached

country more hospitable. Remembering what the man had said in
regard to the river, Duane had his doubts about crossing. But

he would take any chance to put the river between him and his
hunters. He pushed on. His left arm had to be favored, as he

could scarcely move it. Using his right to spread the willows,
he slipped sideways between them and made fast time. There were

narrow aisles and washes and holes low down and paths brushed
by animals, all of which he took advantage of, running,

walking, crawling, stooping any way to get along. To keep in a
straight line was not easy--he did it by marking some bright

sunlit stem or tree ahead, and when he reached it looked
straight on to mark another. His progress necessarily grew

slower, for as he advanced the brake became wilder, denser,
darker. Mosquitoes began to whine about his head. He kept on

without pause. Deepening shadows under the willows told him
that the afternoon was far advanced. He began to fear he had

wandered in a wrong direction. Finally a strip of light ahead
relieved his anxiety, and after a toilsome penetration of still

denser brush he broke through to the bank of the river.
He faced a wide, shallow, muddy stream with brakes on the

opposite bank extending like a green and yellow wall. Duane
perceived at a glance the futility of his trying to cross at

this point. Everywhere the sluggish water raved quicksand bars.
In fact, the bed of the river was all quicksand, and very

likely there was not a foot of water anywhere. He could not
swim; he could not crawl; he could not push a log across. Any

solid thing touching that smooth yellow sand would be grasped
and sucked down. To prove this he seized a long pole and,

reaching down from the high bank, thrust it into the stream.
Right there near shore there apparently was no bottom to the

treacherous quicksand. He abandoned any hope of crossing the
river. Probably for miles up and down it would be just the same

as here. Before leaving the bank he tied his hat upon the pole
and lifted enough water to quench his thirst. Then he worked

his way back to where thinner growth made advancement easier,
and kept on up-stream till the shadows were so deep he could