"Just nicked me," he said calmly, his hand holding back the blood that seeped through his coarse-woven shirt.
Orth found it hard to believe that these fallen men were actually but pseudo-men, robots. Their laboratory-given life blood was as red and sticky as a true man's, and their dying struggles were as realistic as his own might have been.
The bartender came sidling up to Orth. He was but one of a score of muttering, staring onlookers.
"Better clear outta town," he advised. "Krepp's brother is sheriff. And if he don't hang you Krepp's mob will do you up."
"Thanks," Orth said. There were a dozen horses, saddled and bridled, drooping at a nearby hitchrail, and toward these he moved.
"Come on," he told Horgan and Ayna. "We're riding out of here."
Horgan shrugged. "Might as well get neckties for rustling a horse as for killing Krepp," he conceded, reloading his two spring guns.
They climbed into the saddles, Orth snapping a warning burst of explosive slugs into the road and Horgan menacing the glowering knot of townspeople and riders, and went riding eastward out of the village street.
Once they were free of the town and climbing a long easy grade into the low tree-clad hills the men of Hardpan City organized their pursuit. Orth saw horses, light waggons, and high-wheeled vehicles resembling bicycles come streaming up the highway after them.
Drums began to boom all along the cleared valley they had left and in the hills ahead.