"That jigger can shore handle a gun," remarked Loudon. "If this ain't one lovely fix for a Christian! Winchester no good, only a six-shooter, an' a fully-organized miracle-worker a-layin' for my hide. I'm a-goin' somewhere, an' I'm goin' right now." He dropped the broken lever and rubbed his numbed fingers till sensation returned. Then he put on his hat and hurried down to his horse. He jammed the rifle into the scabbard, mounted, and rode swiftly southward, taking great pains to keep to the low ground. A mile farther on he forded the creek and gained the shelter of an outflung shoulder of Box Hill. Near the top Loudon tied Lemons to a tree and went forward on foot. Cautiously as an Indian, Loudon traversed the flat top of the hill and squatted down in a bunch of tall grass between two pines. From this vantage-point his field of view was wide. The rock ledge and the mud-hole were in plain sight. So was the rock from which he had been fired upon. It was a long mile distant, and it lay near the crest of a low hog's-back close to the creek. "He's got his hoss down behind the swell," muttered Loudon. "Wish this hill was higher." Loudon pondered the advisability of climbing a tree. He wished very much to obtain a view of the depression behind the hog's-back. He finally decided to remain where he was. It was just possible that the hostile stranger might be provided with field glasses. In which case tree-climbing would invite more bullets, and the shooting of the enemy was too nearly accurate for comfort. Loudon settled himself comfortably in his bunch of grass and watched intently. Fifteen or twenty minutes later what was apparently a part of the rock detached itself and disappeared behind the crest of the hog's-back. Soon the tiny figure of a mounted man came into view on the flat beyond. Horse and rider moved rapidly across the level ground and vanished behind a knoll. When the rider reappeared he was not more than nine hundred yards distant and galloping hard on a course paralleling the base of the hill. "Good eye," chuckled Loudon. "Goin' to surround me. I'd admire to hear what he says when he finds out I ain't behind that swell." The stranger splashed across the creek and raced toward some high ground in the rear of Loudon's old position. Now that the enemy had headed westward there was nothing to be gained by further delay. Loudon had plenty of courage, but one requires more than bravery and a six-shooter with which to pursue and successfully combat a gentleman armed with a Winchester. Hastily retreating to his horse, Loudon scrambled into the saddle, galloped across the hilltop and rode down the eastern slope at a speed exceedingly perilous to his horse's legs. But the yellow horse somehow contrived to keep his footing and reached the bottom with no damage other than skinned hocks.