Three years had passed. The blue-roan was beginning to be a noted character upon the range. He was broad of horn, and the great black Hashknife, outlined against the blue hide, could be seen for a long distance. The sight of a horseman, no matter how far away, was sufficient to send him plunging down the roughest mountainside, into the depths of the cedar brakes, and over rocks and lava flows, where no mounted man could follow. He was too fleet of foot for the older cows, and the roan soon found himself alone in his glory. He then became what is known to the cowboys of the western ranges as an "outlaw," an animal, either horse, bovine, or even human, that, deserted by all its friends, runs alone and has little to do with the rest of his kind; a "cimarron," the Mexicans call them. Such animals are seldom forced into the roundups that take place at regular intervals upon the ranges, and when caught by that dragnet, are very hard to hold in the herd long enough to get them to the stockyards and shipped out of the country. The next spring, when it was time to start on the roundup, the wagon boss told the men to keep a sharp lookout for that blue-roan outlaw, and "get him or bust him," if the opportunity offered. It fell to the lot of the boss and another man to run into the blue-roan a few days later. They were working down a grassy draw in a thick cedar country, when out from the trees on one side of it there burst a great blue animal with a grand spread of horns, and fleet as a deer. In an instant the two men had their ropes down and were after him in full pursuit. "Cut him off from the cedars!" shouted the boss to his partner, who happened to be closest to the cedars, and the boy spurred his pony toward the steer, which now was doing his best to gain the friendly shelter and protection of the trees. It was but a short distance, and the steer had much the best of the race, but the boy had his pony alongside the animal before he could get his rope into shape for a throw. The steer, with the keen instinct of the hunted, crowded the pony over toward the trees and, just as the rider was ready to drop his rope over the animal's wide-spread horns, an overhanging branch caught the loop, jerking it from his grip. In a vain attempt to turn the steer from the trees into the open, he crowded his pony close up onto the huge bulk of the outlaw. The man's right knee was fairly touching the animal's shoulder, while he rapidly coiled his rope for another throw. Following them came the boss, cursing his rope, a new "Maguey" which had fouled in his hands and was a mass of snarls and knots, which in his eager haste he only made worse instead of better. At this instant, the blue-roan turned suddenly. With a quick upward thrust of his head, he drove his nearest horn deep into the side of the pony, which was crowding him so closely, tearing a cruel gash in his side and throwing horse and rider into a confused, struggling heap on the ground.