He rose and worked cautiously down the eastern slope, searching for Dex in the valley.  In the gray gloom he saw the outline of his horse grazing alone.  He stepped down to him.  The big horse raised its head.  Waring spoke.  Reassured, Dex plodded to his master, who turned and tracked back to the pocket in the rocks.  “I think your cayuse has drifted south,” he told Ramon.

The young Mexican showed no surprise.  He seemed resigned to the situation.  “I knew when the senor said to turn my horse loose that he would seek the horses of his kind.  He has gone back to the horses of those who follow us.”

“You said it” said Waring.  “And that’s going to bother them.  It tells me that the rurales are not far behind.  They’ll figure that I put you out of business to get rid of you.  They’ll look for a dead Mexican, and a live gringo riding north, alone.  But they’re too wise to ride up here.  They’ll trail up afoot and out of sight.  That’s your one chance.”

“My chance, senor?”

“Yes.  Here’s some grub.  You’ve got your gun.  Drift down the slope, get back of the next ridge, and strike south.  Locate their horses and wait till they leave them to come up here.  Get a horse.  Pick a good one.  I’ll keep them busy till you get back.”

Ramon rose and climbed to the edge of the pocket.  “I go,” he said sadly.  “And I shall never see the senor again.”

“Don’t bet all you’ve got on that,” said Waring.

When Ramon had disappeared, Waring led Dex back from the pocket, and, saddling him, left him concealed in the brush.  Then the gunman crept back to the rim and lay waiting, a handful of rifle shells loose on a flat rock in front of him.  He munched some dried meat and drank from the canteen.

The red dawn faded quickly to a keen white light.  Heat waves ran over the rocks and danced down the hillside.  Waring lighted a match and blackened the front sight of his carbine.  The sun rolled up and struck at him, burning into the pocket of rock where he lay motionless gazing down the slope.  Sweat beaded his forehead and trickled down his nose.  Scattered boulders seemed to move gently.  He closed his eyes for an instant.  When he opened them he thought he saw a movement in the brush below.  The heat burned into his back, and he shrugged his shoulders.  A tiny bird flitted past and perched on the dry, dead stalk of a yucca.  Again Waring thought he saw a movement in the brush.

Then, as if by magic, the figure of a rural stood clear and straight against the distant background of brownish-green.  Waring smiled.  He knew that if he were to fire, the rurales would rush him.  They suspected some kind of a trap.  Waring’s one chance was to wait until they had given up every ruse to draw his fire.  They were not certain of his whereabouts, but were suspicious of that natural fortress of rock.  There was not a rural in Old Mexico who did not know him either personally or by reputation.  The fact that one of them had offered himself as a possible target proved that they knew they had to deal with a man as crafty as themselves.