Reason for keeping on slipped from VB's mind. He needed air, so his reflexes carried him through the doorway again, out of the place where he had left the stallion, out of the place where his trust had been betrayed. He stumbled, recovered his balance, plunged on out into the moonlight, into the brush, sobbing heavily. His knees failed. He crashed down, face plowing into cool soil.
"Captain"! he moaned. "Oh, boy—I didn't think—you would—fail— No wonder—I couldn't keep—going—"
He did not hear the running feet, did not know they rolled him over, Rhues with his gun upraised.
"I got him, th' ——" he muttered.
"Then let's get out—pronto!"
Twenty minutes later a man with a lantern stepped out of the shack in which the Captain had stood. Two others were with him.
"Yes, he left his horse there, all right," the man with the light muttered. "He got to him an' got away. Nobody else could lead that horse off. He couldn't 'a' been hard hit or he couldn't 'a' got up."