Powers sneered.
“If you value this girl’s life, don’t move from your tracks,” he said, with a brutal oath, holding a knife up to Mason’s horrified eyes. “I’ll kill her with this knife if you don’t leave your guns here. Go back down the gorge and give me thirty minutes’ start and you can save her life. I am going to the coast with her and we’ll get married.”
“Powers, you’re crazy,” Mason answered to gain time. “If you harm that girl, I’ll hound you to your grave.”
Josephine had given a cry of delight when Mason first had borne down on Powers. Now, she had ceased struggling and was watching Mason with imploring eyes.
Powers showed signs of uneasiness. He was in fear his other pursuers would show up any minute.
“Come, give me thirty minutes’ start or the girl dies!” he threatened.
Great beads of sweat started on Mason’s forehead. He had about made up his mind to obey the fiend’s demand and take a chance of rescuing the girl later, when the sharp crack of a rifle broke the awful stillness, followed by a yell from above them.
Powers clapped his hand to his side and pitched forward on his face. Mason looked up to see where the yell and shot had come from, and saw Scotty standing on a huge boulder holding a smoking rifle in his hands and waving his hat at them. The girl stood looking down at Powers as though in a daze.
Mason leaped quickly to her side.
“Oh, Jack,” Josephine cried, her eyes swimming with tears, and collapsed in his arms.