"Pretty ridin’," remarked Andy, spitting appreciatively over the wheel.
The men inside the stage clambered out with grunts at their stiffened limbs, and leaned against the wheels watching. The man in the doorway stepped out, and thrust his hands into his pockets, and looked calmly while the horse placed its four feet together and humped its back with a momentum which sent the rider high in the air.
When he came down, he settled himself in the saddle, drew up on the reins, and dug his spurs into the horse’s flank. The animal, his nostrils distended and the foam flying from his mouth, without any warning rose on his hind legs, and threw himself backward. The rider freed one foot from the stirrup; but the other caught, and horse and rider went down in a heap. There was a deep groan from both, and then silence. If the men had seemed indifferent before, they made up in activity now. With a flying leap Andy was down from his high seat. The stage-camp man rushed forward, and threw himself on the horse’s head, while the others pulled the unconscious rider from beneath the animal’s body.
"Leg’s done for," Ross heard Steele say as they carried the wounded man into the dugout.
Ross clambered awkwardly down from his seat, and followed. He nearly fell over an empty chicken-coop and into the one little room of the dugout.
"Put ’im here," directed the stage-camp man, whom the others called Hank. He pointed to the blankets in the corner from which he had crawled ten minutes before.
"Here, boy," Steele said with pale-faced absorption, "smooth the blankets up."
Ross, half dazed by his strange and unexpected surroundings, slowly and clumsily did as he was directed, and they laid the unconscious stranger down carefully, his left leg hanging limply from a point half-way between knee and hip. Then the men straightened up, and looked at one another.
"A bad job," muttered Hank.
"Take ’im back to Cody?" asked Steele.