Page:Clarence Mulford - Man from Bar-20.djvu/266

 The Man from Bar-20 but, failing to draw a shot, he gave it up and crawled back to a safer and more comfortable place where he lay down to get some sleep.

Johnny, full of wrath, worked along the edge of the butte in a vain endeavor to catch sight of his enemy, and he took plenty of time in his efforts to be cautious. Any man who could hit a shirt plumb center and nearly every time, at that distance, shooting across a deceptive canyon and against the sky, was no one to get careless with. After waiting a while without hearing any more from his humorous enemy, he looked down each trail and then went to the other end of the butte.

Not far from him a slender column of smoke arose from a box-like depression which lay beyond a high ridge and was well protected from his rifle. Peering cautiously over the rim of the butte, his head hidden in a tuft of grass, he critically examined the canyon, bowlder by bowlder, ridge by ridge. A puff of smoke spurted from a pile of rocks and a malignant whine passed over his head. Wriggling back, he hurried to another point fifty yards to his right, where he again crept to the edge and looked down. Another puff of smoke and a bloody furrow across his cheek told him that the marksman had good eyes and knew how to shoot. Johnny drove a Sharp's Special into the middle of the smoke and heard an angry curse follow it. 254