CHAPTER IV
DOWNHILL AND UP
The lash of the quirt fell with a swish on the flank of the girl'spony. He did not wait for a second hint, but started down the steepslope "on the jump." Before Ashton realized what was happening, hisown horse was following at the same breakneck pace.
Down plunged the two ponies--down, down, down the sharply pitchedmountain side, leaping logs and stones, crashing through brush,scrambling or slithering stiff-legged down rock slides. It was a wildrace, a race that would have been utterly foolhardy with any otherhorses than these mountain bred cow ponies. A single misstep wouldhave sent horse and rider rolling for yards, unless sooner brought upagainst tree or rock.
Most of the color had left Ashton's cheeks, but his full lips were setin resolute lines. His gaze alertly took in the ground before hishorse and at the same time the girl's graceful, swaying figure.Fortunately he knew enough to let his horse pick his own way. But sucha way as it was! Had not the two animals been as surefooted as goatsand as quick as cats, both must have pitched head over heels, notonce, but a score of times.
They had leaped down over numbers of rocks and logs and ledges, andthe girl had not cast back a single glance to see if Ashton wasfollowing. But as they plunged down an open slope she suddenly twistedabout and flung up a warning hand.
"Here's a jump!" she cried--as though they had not been jumping everyfew yards since the beginning of that mad descent.
Hardly had she faced about again when her pony leaped and dropped withher clear out of sight. Ashton gasped and started to draw rein. He wastoo late. Three strides brought his horse to a ledge fully six feethigh. The beast leaped over the edge without making the slightesteffort to check himself.
Ashton uttered a startled cry, but poised himself for the shock withthe cleverness of a skillful rider. His pony landed squarely, and atonce started on again as if nothing unusual had happened.
The girl was already racing down the lower slope, which was moremoderate, or rather, less immoderate than that above the ledge. Shelooked around and waved her hand gayly when she saw that Ashton hadkept his seat.
The salute so fired him that he gave his pony the spur and dashedrecklessly down to overtake her. At last he raced alongside and alittle past her. She looked at his overridden pony and drew rein.
"Hold on," she said. "Better pull up a bit. You don't want to blowyour hawss. 'Tisn't everyone can take that jump as neatly as he did."
"But the others?" he panted--"they'll beat us!"
"They cut down to the right. It's nothing to worry about if they dohead us. They've got the best hawsses. We'll jog the rest of theway."
"Of course," he hastened to agree, "if you prefer."
"I'd prefer to lope uphill and down, but--" she nodded towards hispony's heaving flanks--"no use riding a willing hawss to death."
"No danger of that with this old nag. He's tough as a mule," Ashtonassured her, though he followed her example by pulling his mount in toa walk.
"A mule knows enough to balk when he's got enough," she informed him.
He did not reply. With the lessening of his excitement habit sent hishand to his open packet of cigarettes. He had not smoked since beforeshooting the calf. As they came down into the shallow valley betweenthe foot of the mesa and a parallel line of low rocky hills he couldwait no longer. His lighter was already half raised to the gilt-tippedcigarette when it was checked by etiquette. He bowed to the girl as amatter of form.
"Ah, pardon me--if you have no objections," he said.
"I have," was her unexpected reply.
"Er--what?" he asked, his finger on the spring of the lighter.
"You inquired if I have any objections," she answered. "I told you thetruth. I dislike cigarettes most intensely."
"But--but--" he stammered, completely taken aback, "don't your cowboysall smoke?"
"Not cigarettes--where I ever see them," she said.
"And cigars or pipes?" he queried.
"One has to concede something to masculine weakness," she sighed.
"Unfortunately I have no cigars with me, not even at my camp, and apipe is so slow," he complained.
"Oh, pray, do not deprive yourself on my account," she said. "You'llfind the cut between those two hills about as short a way to your campas this one, if you prefer your cigarettes to my company."
"Crool maid!" he reproached, not altogether jestingly. He even lookedacross at the gap through the hills to which she was pointing. Then hesaw the disdain in her blue eyes. He took the cigarette from his lips,eyed it regretfully, and flung it away with a petulant fillip.
"There!" he said. Meeting her amused smile, he added in the injuredtone of a spoiled child. "You don't realize what a compliment thatis."
"What?--abstaining for a half hour or so? If I asked you to break offentirely, and you did it, I would consider that a real compliment."
"I should say so!"
"But I am by no means sure that I would care to ask you," shebantered.
"You're not? Why, may I inquire?"
"I do not like to make useless requests."
"Useless!" he exclaimed, his self-esteem stung by her raillery. "Doyou think I cannot quit smoking them?"
"I think you do not care to try."
Impulsively he snatched out a package of his expensive cigarettes andtossed it over his shoulder. Another and another and still othersfollowed in rapid succession, until he had exhausted his supply.
"How's that?" he demanded her approval.
"Well, it's not so bad for a start-off," she answered with an absenceof enthusiasm that dashed him from his pose of self-abnegation.
"You don't realize what that means," he complained.
"It means, jilt Miss Nicotine in haste, and repent at leisure."
"You're ragging me! You ought to be particularly nice to me. I did itfor you."
"Thanks awfully. But I didn't ask you to do it, you know."
"Oh, now, that's hardly--when I did it because of what you said."
"Well, then, I promise to be nice to you until events do us part. Thatwill be in about five minutes. Over there is Dry Fork Gulch. Thewaterhole is just down around this hill."
Ashton took his ardent gaze off the girl's face long enough to glanceto his left. He recognized the tremendous gorge in the face of themountain side that he had tried to ascend the previous day. It ran inwith a moderately inclined bottom for nearly a mile, and then scaledup to the top of High Mesa in steep slopes and sheer ledges.
His eyes followed the dry gravelly creek bed around to the right, andhe nodded: "Yes, my camp is just over the corner of those crags. Butsurely, Miss Knowles, you will not end our acquaintance there."
She met his appealing look with a level glance. "Seriously, Mr.Ashton, don't you think you had better move camp to another section?It seems to me you have done quite enough unseasonable deer hunting."
Without waiting for him to reply, she urged her horse into a lope. Hisown mount was too jaded for a quick start. When he overtook the girlshe had rounded the craggy hill on their right and was in sight of ascattered grove of boxelders below a dike of dark colored trap rockthat outcropped across the bed of the creek.
Above the natural dam made by this dike the valley was bedded up withsand and large gravel washed down by the torrential rush of springfreshets. Below it the same wild floods, leaping down in a twenty-footfall, had gouged out a pothole so wide and deep that it was neverempty of water even in the driest seasons.