She frowned. “But how? Why, the other man could——”
“Could, but wouldn’t,” Nash interrupted. “It’s the gun he’s afraid of, not the bullet. And being gun-shy is about the commonest of human traits. As a general rule, you’ll find it is the Eastern man who is most likely to pack around a gun. He considers it a necessary part of his Western equipment—the same as fringed gloves, chaps, knotted bandannas, and jingling spurs.”
She did not answer him immediately, and they rode on in the silence. The twilight still lasted; an awesome hush brooded over the purpling hills. The hard outlines of the slim pines and the gaunt ridges of rock softened in the tender light. The air, sweet with the fragrance of wild flowers, tempered by the banks of snow on the higher ranges, swept to the faces of the riders.
“What is that?” Miss Breen asked abruptly, pointing below, to where a black line wound along the foot of the cliff.
“That is part of our water main,” Nash responded, following the direction of her finger. “It is piped from camp to camp. A half mile on down the line is where——”
He stopped so unexpectedly that the girl bent forward in her saddle and peered into his face. Nash had caught sight of a dark form slipping along the pipe line. The outrage of the previous night was instantly recalled to his mind.
He dropped from his saddle. “You’d better remain right where you are, Miss Breen.”
Luckily they had stopped well within the shadow of a cliff. The man below them came on cautiously, unable to distinguish the two who waited on the trail.
Miss Breen had slipped from her saddle and had joined Nash. Both were crouching behind a jagged point of rock.
Nash’s eager, searching eyes had discovered something that fairly made his pulses race. The advancing man was carrying a long-handled hammer over his shoulder.