Then came a spasm of vitality.  She writhed in a torture of reviving strength, and in her convulsions she almost tore from Ventner’s grasp.  Slowly she relaxed and sank partly back.  The ungloved hand sought the wound, and pressed so hard that her wrist half buried itself in her bosom.  Blood trickled between her spread fingers.  And she looked at Venters with eyes that saw him.

He cursed himself and the unerring aim of which he had been so proud.  He had seen that look in the eyes of a crippled antelope which he was about to finish with his knife.  But in her it had infinitely more—­a revelation of mortal spirit.  The instinctive bringing to life was there, and the divining helplessness and the terrible accusation of the stricken.

“Forgive me!  I didn’t know!” burst out Venters.

“You shot me—­you’ve killed me!” she whispered, in panting gasps.  Upon her lips appeared a fluttering, bloody froth.  By that Venters knew the air in her lungs was mixing with blood.  “Oh, I knew—­it would—­come—­some day!...Oh, the burn!...Hold me—­I’m sinking—­it’s all dark....Ah, God!...Mercy—­”

Her rigidity loosened in one long quiver and she lay back limp, still, white as snow, with closed eyes.

Venters thought then that she died.  But the faint pulsation of her breast assured him that life yet lingered.  Death seemed only a matter of moments, for the bullet had gone clear through her.  Nevertheless, he tore sageleaves from a bush, and, pressing them tightly over her wounds, he bound the black scarf round her shoulder, tying it securely under her arm.  Then he closed the blouse, hiding from his sight that blood-stained, accusing breast.

“What—­now?” he questioned, with flying mind.  “I must get out of here.  She’s dying—­but I can’t leave her.”

He rapidly surveyed the sage to the north and made out no animate object.  Then he picked up the girl’s sombrero and the mask.  This time the mask gave him as great a shock as when he first removed it from her face.  For in the woman he had forgotten the rustler, and this black strip of felt-cloth established the identity of Oldring’s Masked Rider.  Venters had solved the mystery.  He slipped his rifle under her, and, lifting her carefully upon it, he began to retrace his steps.  The dog trailed in his shadow.  And the horse, that had stood drooping by, followed without a call.  Venters chose the deepest tufts of grass and clumps of sage on his return.  From time to time he glanced over his shoulder.  He did not rest.  His concern was to avoid jarring the girl and to hide his trail.  Gaining the narrow canyon, he turned and held close to the wall till he reached his hiding-place.  When he entered the dense thicket of oaks he was hard put to it to force a way through.  But he held his burden almost upright, and by slipping side wise and bending the saplings he got in.  Through sage and grass he hurried to the grove of silver spruces.