CHAPTER XXXIV

A MAN GETS A SQUARE DEAL

Dale did not miss Ben Nyland by more than a few hundred yards as he
passed through the neck of the basin. But the men could not see each
other in the black shadows cast by the somber mountains that guarded
the entrance to the basin, and so they sped on, one headed away from
Okar and one toward it, each man nursing his bitter thoughts; one
intent on killing and the other riding to escape the death that, he
felt, was imminent.

Dale reached the Bar D and pulled the saddle and bridle from his horse.
He caught up a fresh animal, threw saddle and bridle on him, and then
ran into the house to get some things that he thought might be valuable
to him.

He came out again, and nervously paused on the threshold of the door to
listen.

A sound reached his ears--the heavy drumming of a horse's hoofs on the
hard sand in the vicinity of the ranchhouse; and Dale gulped down his
fear as he ran to his horse, threw himself into the saddle and raced
around a corner of the house.

He had hardly vanished into the gloom of the night when another rider
burst into view.