Read The Collected Short Stories of Louis L'Amour, Volume 1 for Free Online

argument was ensuing. One canteen, one horse, thirty pounds of gold, and two men.
    Coolly, Speke rolled a smoke. He could have written the story of what was to happen now. Harassed beyond limit, their nerves on edge from constant attack, from sleepless nights, and from uncertainty as to their enemies, the two were now facing each other. In the mind of each was the thought that success and escape could belong to one man, and one only.
    Floren was saddling the horse. Then he picked up the gold and tied it behind the saddle. He seemed to be having trouble. Ross dropped his hand to his gun—he failed to calculate on the shadow, and Floren turned and fired.
    Ross staggered, took a step back, then yelled something wild and incoherent. He went down to his hands and knees and Floren swung into the saddle and rode away.
    Ross remained on his hands and knees. Speke drew deep on his cigarette and watched Floren go. He was heading northwest. Speke smiled and got up, then went back for his own horses. When he had them he walked down to Ross. The man had fallen, and he was breathing hoarsely.
    Working with swift sureness, Speke carried the smaller man into the shade of a cedar and, ripping open his shirt, examined the wound. Ross had been struck on the top of the hipbone, knocking him down and temporarily shocking him into a state of partial paralysis. The bullet had torn a hole in his side, a flesh wound, from which blood was flowing.
    Heating water, he bathed the wound. Then, making a decoction from the leaves of a creosote bush, he used it as an antiseptic on the wound. Then he bandaged it crudely but effectively. Ross revived while he worked, and stared at him. “You … is it?”
    â€œUh-huh.”
    â€œFigured we’d lost you.”
    â€œAin’t likely.”
    â€œWhy you helpin’ me?”
    Speke sat back on his heels. He nodded at the horse he had stolen. “I’m leavin’ you that horse and a canteen. You head out of here. If I ever see you again, I’ll kill you.”
    He got to his feet and started for the horses. Ross stared after him, then tried to lift himself to an elbow, managed it. “You leavin’ me a gun?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œThen I’m a sittin’ duck for Injuns.”
    Speke smiled a rare smile. “Maybe you’ll be lucky.”
    He walked his horse away on Floren’s trail. He was in no hurry. Before them lay the breaks of the Colorado. Soon Floren would be stopped by the canyon itself. Speke had been long in the desert, and the desert teaches patience. There was no escape for Floren.
    For days Speke had directed his smoke columns and his actions to cause the two outlaws to pull farther and farther north, until now Floren was in a cul-de-sac from which there was no way out except back the way he had come. But Floren would not know this. He would waste time looking.
    It was a hot still day when the search ended. A day of a high sun and the reflecting heat from the face of vast plateaus of rock and the cedar-clad hillsides. Lizards panted even in the shade, their mouths held open, their sides pumping at the hot, thin air.
    Floren was hollow-eyed and frightened. Whichever way he went he faced awesome canyons, and the only water was far, far below. Only a few drops slopped lonesomely in his canteen, and the horse he rode was gaunt and beaten. He swung down, and his heels hit hard, and he stared over the brink into the vast canyon below.
    Trapped … Seven times he had found new routes, and each had ended in a cliff. Seven times he tried and seven times he failed. And now he knew there was no way to turn but back. He turned toward the horse, and as if expecting him, the animal went to its knees, then rolled over on its side. Fiercely, Floren swore. He kicked the horse. It would not rise, it could not rise. Better yet without the horse he could take the gold and find a way down the cliffs. Then a raft … feverishly, he