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Here at last they rested, though the buckskin mare kept anxious vigil for the first sign of any one pursuing them. The mothers began grazing slowly while their young, moving with them, strove to get the milk they felt belonged to them. As soon as the colts had had all the milk there was for them they went leisurely in search of tender grasses and soon all were grazing as if nothing had ever happened.

But the buckskin mare was still worried. She walked to the two wires that barred her way and with her head above the upper wire she gazed to the north. A quarter of a mile away, the coulee ended. Its floor curved upward like the bottom of a ship. Where it ended and the prairie floor began there was a cluster of sagebrush. The evening was rapidly turning the sage into a silhouette against the bright background of the sky. Fear of pursuit came back with the coming of the night and the old mare roused herself. With a sudden impulse she backed away from the wires and dropped to her knees. Pushing her head under the lower wire she moved cautiously forward, an inch at a time. Slowly she felt the wire move backward over her body and each time the barb dug through her skin she stopped and tried to crouch lower. With a sharp scratch it rolled over her withers and stuck painfully into her back. She tried again to crouch down lower, but failing to rid herself of the barb, she rested a moment.