"Which way did he ride?" asked Houck, indicating the footprint.
The old herder shook his head. "Quien sabe?" he grunted, shrugging his shoulders.
"Who knows, eh? Well, you know—for one. And you're goin' to say—or there'll be a heap big bonfire right here where your shack is."
Meanwhile one of the men, who had pushed out into the desert and was riding in a circle, hallooed and waved his arm.
"He headed this way," he called. "Some one dragged a blanket over his trail."
The cowboy who was afoot strode up to the herder. "We'll learn you to play hoss with this outfit!" He swung his quirt and struck the Indian across the face. The old Indian stepped back and stiffened. His sunken eyes blazed with hatred, but he made no sound or sign. He knew that if he as much as lifted his hand the men would kill him. To him they were the law, searching for a fugitive. The welt across his face burned like the sear of fire—the cowardly brand of hatred on the impassive face of primitive fortitude! This because he had fed a hungry man and delayed his pursuers.
Long after the posse had disappeared down the far reaches of the desert, the old Indian stood gazing toward the east, vaguely wondering what would have happened to him had he struck a white man across the face with a quirt. He would have been shot down—and his slayer would have gone unpunished. He shook his head, unable to understand the white man's law. His primitive soul knew a better law, "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth," a law that knew no caste and was as old as the sun-swept spaces of his native land. He was glad that his daughter had not been there. The white men might have threatened and insulted her. If they had … The old herder padded to his shack and squatted down, to finish soldering the tiny rings on the buttons for his daughter's jacket.