“I reckon not—not uh human one anyway. Go on and finish yore remarks about hair.”
“I tell yuh I heard somebody yell!” declared Sig. “It was jist over that ridge, and I’m goin’ to see who it was.”
He spurred his horse into a gallop and Ren followed at his heels. They crossed the ridge and swung down into an open timbered swale, interspersed with clumps of willows and jack-pines.
There they saw her. She was tied to a tree and seemed to be exerting every muscle to get loose. She was dressed in a faded calico dress and her dark-brown hair tumbled in confusion about her half-bare shoulders.
The sight of her was a shock to the punchers and they threw their broncos back on their haunches at the sight. The girl didn’t see them, and after the first gasp of surprise they sat there and stared at her.
Suddenly she shrank back against the tree and screamed—
“That’s not Oscar!”
Like a flash of yellow light a scared cougar had bounded out of the willow thicket near her and crouched low.
Ren acted first. While he hadn’t the uncanny skill on the draw attributed to the Western gunman, he was deadly when he did “get his ol’ smoke-wagon unhitched.” The cougar had barely touched his belly to the ground when Ren’s .45 started to spout death and destruction.