Boots scraped on stone at his right and another voice raised out of the dark. "If he didn't, there'd be some cussed rapid shootin' about now!"
"Course I got him!" snorted Purdy.
Johnny cautiously backed out of the thicket while the men behind him crashed through the brush and swore at the density of the growth.
The man at the end of the clearing stopped and stood quietly regarding the vague boots, his rifle at the ready. Somehow he did not feel that everything was as it should be. The boots appeared to be in the same position as when he had espied them a moment before. He must have made a lucky brain or heart shot, or—. He raised his hand swiftly and backed into the oak brush again, where Mexican locust in the high grass stabbed him mercilessly. Again his rifle spoke. The boots did not move.
"You got him th' first time," laughed Fleming, walking rapidly toward the tent; but he was not confident enough in his claim to put up his Colt.
"Shore," endorsed Holbrook. "It was good judgment, an' good luck."
Fleming, Colt ready, leaned swiftly over, grasped a boot and gave a strong pull—and went down on his back, the Colt exploding and flying one way while the boot, showering pebbles and small bits of rock, soared aloft and went the other way.
"D—n him!" swore Purdy, diving back into the brush and giving no thought to the thorns. "Cover, fellers! Quick!" he cried.
His warning was hardly needed, for Holbrook had dived headfirst into a matted thicket and landed on some locust with but little more that passing knowledge of its presence. Fleming bounded to his feet, scooped up his Colt on the run and jumped into another thicket, unmindful at first of the peculiar odor which assailed his nostrils. He had no time, then, to think about skunks, or whether or not they were hydrophobic.