Nagger
could never head that stallion. Slone meant to go on and on, always pushing
Wildfire, keeping him tired, wearied, and worrying him, till a section of the
country was reached where he could drive Wildfire into some kind of a natural
trap. The pursuit seemed endless. Wildfire kept to open country where he could
not be surprised.
There came a morning when Slone climbed to a cedared plateau that rose for a
whole day's travel, and then split into a labyrinthine maze of canyons. There
were trees, grass, water. It was a high country, cool and wild, like the
uplands he had left. For days he camped on Wildfire's trail, always
relentlessly driving him, always watching for the trap he hoped to find. And
the red stallion spent much of this time of flight in looking backward.
Whenever Slone came in sight of him he had his head over his shoulder,
watching. And on the soft ground of these canyons he had begun to recover from
his lameness. But this did not worry Slone. Sooner or later Wildfire would go
down into a high-walled wash, from which there would be no outlet; or he would
wander into a box-canyon; or he would climb out on a mesa with no place to
descend, unless he passed Slone; or he would get cornered on a soft, steep
slope where his hoofs would sink deep and make him slow.
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