Until then he had never done Betty's horsemanship justice. He saw her bring her mount down from a flying gallop to a sliding standstill, he saw her throw herself from the saddle, he saw the released animal plunge on again under a blow from the quirt which Betty had snatched from the horn, the whole act taking so little time that it hardly seemed that the horse had stopped for a second's time. Kendric duplicated her act and ran toward the spot where she had disappeared. In another moment his hand had closed about hers, was greeted by a little welcoming squeeze, and he and Betty slipped side by side into the thicker dark at the mouth of a friendly cañon.
CHAPTER XVIII
OF FLIGHT, PURSUIT, AND A LAIR IN THE CLIFFS
Straightway Jim Kendric began to understand the real Betty. He broke a way through the bushes for her, confident that the noise of their progress was lost in the increasing beat of hoofs and rattle of loose stones. They stumbled into a rocky trail in the bottom of the cañon and made what haste they could, climbing higher into the mountain solitudes. The pursuit had swept by them; they could hear occasional shouts and twice gunshots. They came to a pile of tumbled boulders across their path and crawled up. There was a flattish place at the top in which stunted plants were growing. Here they sat for a little while, hiding and resting and listening. Hardly had they settled themselves here when they heard again the clear tones of Zoraida's whistle. Not more than fifty yards away they made out the form of Zoraida's white horse.
There was a little sound from where Betty sat, and Jim thought that she was sobbing. "Poor little kid," he had it on his lips to mutter when the sound repeated itself and, amazed, he recognized it for a giggle of pure delight. This from Betty, sitting on a rock in the mountains with a crowd of outlaws riding up and down seeking her!
"You're about as logical an individual as I ever knew," was what he said. And with a grunt, at that.
"I never claimed to be logical," retorted Betty. "I'm just a girl."
Even then, while they whispered and fell silent and watched and listened, he began to understand the girl whom he was to come to know very well before many days. She did not pretend at high fearlessness; when she was afraid she was very much afraid, and had no thought to hide the fact. Tonight her fright had come as near killing as fright can. But then she was alone and there was no one but herself to make the fight for her. Now it was different. Since Jim had come she had allowed her own responsibility to shift to his shoulders. It was instinctive in her to turn to some man, to have some man to trust and to depend upon. Jim was looking out for her and right now, while Zoraida and her men searched up and down, Betty clasped her arms about her gathered-up knees and sat cozily at the side of the man whose sole duty, as she saw it, was to guard her with his life. So Betty, close enough to touch the rifle across Jim's arm, could giggle as she pictured Zoraida rushing by the very spot where they hid.
"You're not afraid, then?" asked Jim.
"Not now," whispered Betty.