He landed, catlike,
on hands and feet, unhurt.
It had been a long shot, a lucky hit even for a marksman of the sheriff's
caliber, and now the six horsemen streamed over a distant hilltop and swept
into the valley to take their quarry dead, or half dead, from his fall.
However, that approaching danger was nothing in the eye of Barry. He ran to
the fallen mare and caught her head in his arms. She ceased her struggles
to rise as soon as he touched her and whinneyed softly. The left foreleg
lay twisted horribly beneath her, broken. Grey Molly had run her last race,
and as Barry kneeled, holding the brave head close to him, he groaned, and
looked away from her eyes. It was only an instant of weakness, and when he
turned to her again he was drawing his gun from its holster.
The beating hoofs of the posse as they raced towards him made a growing
murmur through the clear air. Barry glanced towards them with a consummate
loathing. They had killed a horse to stop a man, and to him it was more
than murder. What harm had she done them except to carry her rider bravely
and well? The tears of rage and sorrow which a child sheds welled into the
eyes of Dan Barry.
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