That was prompted by the fighting, the killing instinct in him.

In that moment it had almost superhuman power. If he must die,
that was the way for him to die. What else could be expected of

Buck Duane? He got to his knees and drew his gun. With his
swollen and almost useless hand he held what spare ammunition

he had left. He ought to creep out noiselessly to the edge of
the willows, suddenly face his pursuers, then, while there was

a beat left in his heart, kill, kill, kill. These men all had
rifles. The fight would be short. But the marksmen did not live

on earth who could make such a fight go wholly against him.
Confronting them suddenly he could kill a man for every shot in

his gun.
Thus Duane reasoned. So he hoped to accept his fate--to meet

this end. But when he tried to step forward something checked
him. He forced himself; yet he could not go. The obstruction

that opposed his will was as insurmountable as it had been
physically impossible for him to climb the bluff.

Slowly he fell back, crouched low, and then lay flat. The grim
and ghastlydignity that had been his a moment before fell away

from him. He lay there stripped of his last shred of
self-respect. He wondered was he afraid; had he, the last of

the Duanes--had he come to feel fear? No! Never in all his wild
life had he so longed to go out and meet men face to face. It

was not fear that held him back. He hated this hiding, this
eternal vigilance, this hopeless life. The damnable paradox of

the situation was that if he went out to meet these men there
was absolutely no doubt of his doom. If he clung to his covert

there was a chance, a merest chance, for his life. These
pursuers, dogged and unflagging as they had been, were mortally

afraid of him. It was his fame that made them cowards. Duane's
keenness told him that at the very darkest and most perilous

moment there was still a chance for him. And the blood in him,
the temper of his father, the years of his outlawry, the pride

of his unsought and hated career, the nameless, inexplicable
something in him made him accept that slim chance.

Waiting then became a physical and mental agony. He lay under
the burning sun, parched by thirst, laboring to breathe,

sweating and bleeding. His uncared-for wound was like a red-hot
prong in his flesh. Blotched and swollen from the never-ending

attack of flies and mosquitoes his face seemed twice its
natural size, and it ached and stung.

On one side, then, was this physicaltorture; on the other the
old hell, terribly augmented at this crisis, in his mind. It

seemed that thought and imagination had never been so swift. If
death found him presently, how would it come? Would he get

decent burial or be left for the peccaries and the coyotes?
Would his people ever know where he had fallen? How wretched,

how miserable his state! It was cowardly, it was monstrous for
him to cling longer to this doomed life. Then the hate in his

heart, the hellish hate of these men on his trail--that was
like a scourge. He felt no longer human. He had degenerated

into an animal that could think. His heart pounded, his pulse
beat, his breast heaved; and this internalstrife seemed to

thunder into his ears. He was now enacting the tragedy of all
crippled, starved, hunted wolves at bay in their dens. Only his

tragedy was infinitely more terrible because he had mind enough
to see his plight, his resemblance to a lonely wolf,

bloody-fanged, dripping, snarling, fire-eyed in a last
instinctive defiance.

Mounted upon the horror of Duane's thought was a watching,
listening intensity so supreme that it registered impressions

which were creations of his imagination. He heard stealthy
steps that were not there; he saw shadowy moving figures that

were only leaves. A hundred times when he was about to pull
trigger he discovered his error. Yet voices came from a

distance, and steps and crackings in the willows, and other
sounds real enough. But Duane could not distinguish the real

from the false. There were times when the wind which had arisen
sent a hot, pattering breath down the willow aisles, and Duane

heard it as an approaching army.
This straining of Duane's faculties brought on a reaction which

in itself was a respite. He saw the sun darkened by thick slow
spreading clouds. A storm appeared to be coming. How slowly it

moved! The air was like steam. If there broke one of those
dark, violent storms common though rare to the country, Duane

believed he might slip away in the fury of wind and rain. Hope,
that seemed unquenchable in him, resurged again. He hailed it

with a bitterness that was sickening.
Then at a rustling step he froze into the old strained

attention. He heard a slow patter of soft feet. A tawny shape
crossed a little opening in the thicket. It was that of a dog.

The moment while that beast came into full view was an age. The
dog was not a bloodhound, and if he had a trail or a scent he

seemed to be at fault on it. Duane waited for the inevitable
discovery. Any kind of a hunting-dog could have found him in

that thicket. Voices from outside could be heard urging on the
dog. Rover they called him. Duane sat up at the moment the dog

entered the little shaded covert. Duane expected a yelping, a
baying, or at least a bark that would tell of his hiding-place.

A strange reliefswiftly swayed over Duane. The end was near
now. He had no further choice. Let them come--a quick fierce

exchange of shots--and then this torture past! He waited for
the dog to give the alarm.

But the dog looked at him and trotted by into the thicket
without a yelp. Duane could not believe the evidence of his

senses. He thought he had suddenly gone deaf. He saw the dog
disappear, heard him running to and fro among the willows,

getting farther and farther away, till all sound from him
ceased.

"Thar's Rover," called a voice from the bluff-side. "He's been
through thet black patch."

"Nary a rabbit in there," replied another.
"Bah! Thet pup's no good," scornfully growled another man. "Put

a hound at thet clump of willows."
"Fire's the game. Burn the brake before the rain comes."

The voices droned off as their owners evidently walked up the
ridge.

Then upon Duane fell the crushing burden of the old waiting,
watching, listening spell. After all, it was not to end just

now. His chance still persisted--looked a little brighter--led
him on, perhaps, to forlorn hope.

All at once twilight settled quickly down upon the willow
brake, or else Duane noted it suddenly. He imagined it to be

caused by the approaching storm. But there was little movement
of air or cloud, and thunder still muttered and rumbled at a

distance. The fact was the sun had set, and at this time of
overcast sky night was at hand.

Duane realized it with the awakening of all his old force. He
would yet elude his pursuers. That was the moment when he

seized the significance of all these fortunate circumstances
which had aided him. Without haste and without sound he began

to crawl in the direction of the river. It was not far, and he
reached the bank before darkness set in. There were men up on

the bluff carrying wood to build a bonfire. For a moment he
half yielded to a temptation to try to slip along the

river-shore, close in under the willows. But when he raised
himself to peer out he saw that an attempt of this kind would

be liable to failure. At the same moment he saw a rough-hewn
plank lying beneath him, lodged against some willows. The end

of the plank extended in almost to a point beneath him. Quick
as a flash he saw where a desperate chance invited him. Then he