Her reply to this command was to spring to the tail of the mule and shout to him to back. He backed. She twitched both trace cockeyes out of the singletree hooks (she was using the wagon harness that day) tossed the traces over the mule's back and ran round in front to unbuckle the dead mule's reins.
"Halt or I shoot!"
She giggled hysterically. How could she halt when she had not yet started? She freed the second billet, tore the reins through the terrets, and bunched the reins anyhow in her left hand. He was a tall mule, but she swarmed up his shoulder by means of collar and hames, threw herself across his withers and besought him at the top of her lungs to "Go! Go! Go!"
He went. He went as the saying is, like a bat out of hades. Hazel slipped tailward from the withers, settled herself with knees clinging high, and whanged him over the rump with the ends of the reins. He hardly needed any encouragement. Her initial cry had been more than enough.
The man in the brush stopped. He raised his rifle to his shoulder, looked through the sights at the galloping mule, then lowered the firearm and uttered a heartfelt oath. It had at last been borne in upon his darkened soul that he possibly had made a mistake. Instead of shooting the mule, in the first place, he might better have relinquished his plan of ambush and gone his way in peace. There were other places than Golden Bar, plenty of them, where an enterprising young man could get along and bide his time to square accounts with his enemy.
But the killing of the mule had fairly pushed the bridge over. It was, not to put a nice face on it, an attack on a woman. He might just as well have shot Hazel—better, in fact. She had undoubtedly recognized him. Those Waltons both carried field glasses, he had heard.
"I'll get the mule anyhow," he muttered. "That'll put a crimp in her."
He dropped on one knee between two bushes, took a quick sight at the mule's barrel six inches behind the girl's leg and pulled trigger. Over and over rolled the mule, and over and over a short foot in advance of his kicking hoofs rolled Hazel. Luckily she was not stunned and she rolled clear. She scrambled to her feet and set off up the trail as fast as her shaking legs would carry her.
"Damn her!" cursed Jack Murray, notching up his back sight. "I'd oughta drop her! She's askin' for it, the hussy!"
His itching finger trembled on the trigger, but he did not pull. Reluctantly, slowly, he lowered the Winchester and set the hammer on safety. The drink was dying out in him. Against his will he rendered the girl the tribute of unwilling admiration. "Whatsa use? She's got too much nerve; but maybe I can get him still."