As luck would have it Hare happened to be well screened by a thick cedar;
and since there was a possibility that he might remain unseen he chose to
take it. Silvermane and Wolf stood still in their tracks. Hare felt
Mescal's hands tighten on his coat and he pressed them to reassure her.
Peeping out from his covert he saw a man in his shirt-sleeves leading the
horses--a slender, clean-faced, dark-haired man--Dene! The blood beat
hotly in Hare's temples and he gripped the handle of his Colt. It seemed
a fatal chance that sent the outlaw to that trail. He was whistling; he
had two halters in one hand and with the other he led his bay horse by
the mane. Then Hare saw that he wore no belt; he was unarmed; on the
horses were only the halters and clinking hobbles. Hare dropped his Colt
back into its holster.
Dene sauntered on, whistling "Dixie." When he reached the trail, instead
of crossing it, as Hare had hoped, he turned into it and came down.
Hare swung the switch he had broken from an aspen and struck Silvermane a
stinging blow on the flanks. The gray leaped forward. The crash of
brush and rattle of hoofs stampeded Dene's horses in a twinkling.
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