Free Trail Hand by R. W. Stone Page B

spook at every tumbleweed and step in every hole. I suppose that’s why it’s called horse sense—either a cayuse has it or doesn’t.
    With a trail-wise horse, life can be downright pleasant. A good pony is sure-footed, agile, and alert. It will walk when it’s supposed to, stand if you want it to, and run like blazes when it has to. And that’s the way that Morgan bay of mine was. He was as sound as any horse I’ve ever had.
    I’d ridden several hours without any signs of trouble, Indian, outlaw, or otherwise, and figured my current position to be about three days northwest of where the herd was camped. The Morgan could have gone on, but, since he was sweating heavily, I paused alongside the rim of a long gully that sloped off from my right, and down about forty feet.
    The area was so hot, dry, and dusty it was a sure bet even the bay was daydreaming about the last creek we’d crossed. I know I was. We’d been searching for signs of water without much luck until finally I noticed the horse flaring his nostrils, as if he were taking a sudden interest in something. Up ahead was a small shallow depression that had formed underneath a smooth rock face overhang. From the way it looked, it promised to be a small collecting basin.
    I was concentrating on that overhang when the Morgan suddenly pricked up his ears. The years had given me enough trust in that stallion toknow something was wrong. His head turned quickly to the left and almost simultaneously I caught a glint of light reflecting off something metal on a ridge about 100 yards off.
    Everything happened so fast I’m still not sure which came first. There was a puff in the dirt near me, and a sharp crack , a sound that could have only come from a rifle shot.
    I turned in the saddle, drew my Colt, and fired. It was a long ways off to hit anything with a handgun, but mine was purely a reflex action. Turning suddenly like that must have saved me, but the only thing I really remember before everything went black was flinching in pain and grabbing for my head.
       
    I came to, sprawled, face down, at the bottom of the gully, tortured by a loud buzzing sound that seemed louder inside my head than it did from its source, a nearby swarm of bees. Even dazed as I was, I knew it wouldn’t be smart just to sit up and start moving around. Whoever had shot me might still be around, and I had no way of knowing how long I’d been out.
    The dust caked into my mouth and nose as I laid there playing ’possum. It seemed like a good half hour before even I dared open my eyes. After hearing nothing but those bees, I finally felt safe enough to roll over slowly and check myself. Putting a hand to my head, I found the whole right side covered with dried blood. There was no way to tell how much I’d lost, but at least the bones felt intact. Once again I was grateful for the hard head my ma always accused me of having.
    Getting up was a chore, but somehow I managed. After taking stock, I realized my pistol was missing from its holster, and began anxiously searching around until I finally found it half buried in the dirt in front of me. The fall must have covered it over with dust.
    I probably wouldn’t be alive now were it not for my angle of fall. Had my pistol been visible, it would surely have attracted too much attention to ignore. It stood to reason that whoever had bushwhacked me hadn’t bothered to enter the gully to make sure I was dead. There was plenty of my blood in the sand, but no boot marks other than my own were present, which confirmed my suspicion.
    Head wounds tend to bleed more than other kinds, and many times appear worse than they actually are. That must have been the reason I was mistakenly left for dead. Regardless of how I looked, my head was pounding so bad I had a hard time convincing myself I wasn’t still going to end up dead, anyway. I felt downright critical.
    Whether barely alive or not, I had lost a lot of blood and had no way of knowing if I was