If he was around here he must have heard my gun--an' sloped." He smiled and urged his pony about.

"I reckon we'll go look around that gully a little, Mustard," he said.
Half an hour later he rode down into the gully.

After going some little distance he came across a dead cow, lying close to an overhanging rock rim.

A bullet hole in the cow's forehead told eloquently of the manner of her death.
Ferguson dismounted and laid a hand on her side.

The body was still warm.