By the time the driver had finished they had tramped into the dawn. About them the land loomed gray and bleak, and full of up-shouldering masses of rock.
At the same time they gained a hope of being near homesteads, for the main trail was now broken by many branching tracks.
It was while they bent over one of these junctions that the next manifestation of Mr. Neuburg’s criminal efficiency developed.
A spurt of earth kicked up almost in their faces. And then another. They heard the snap of a pistol, and the “whit-whit” of bullets about them.
The driver sprang erect with an oath, but Clement caught him and flung him to the ground.
“Down on your tummy!” he snapped. “Crawl to cover under those rocks. There’s a man on that outcrop ahead, and he’s shooting to kill.”
V
As the three of them huddled to the earth under cover, there came a sparkle of light from the mound of rock ahead, and a bullet droned above them. At the flash, the driver darted his hand upward, fired every chamber of the five-shot revolver he carried. At once above his head the protecting rock splintered, and on a rock behind a bullet starred.
“Better not do that again,” said Clement, hugging cover.