It wasn't over yet, though. Their horses were hobbled out that way. If the riders came up close to them, they could see the hobbles, or if they got close enough to spook the horses, they would figure it out. Then the fight would start, and John, Tom, and Sisson would be on the wrong side of the ridge, exposed to the south and east, where the riders would now be. John pushed himself back down into the ridge and waited, as he had done when he was a child, playing. He closed his good eye tight and waited for the shot.

But the shot did not come. Finally, John opened his eye and involuntarily moved his leg, dislodging some detritus. It clattered down the face of the ridge, and he pulled his leg up hard, dislodging even more. Sisson reached out and held John's leg, signaling that he should not move anymore. He could see the riders stop and turn around in their saddles. The riders were about three rods away, close enough to see them but far enough that they would be more shape than form. If the posse glassed the ridges, they could see them. Sisson turned his face toward the rock so his sweat would not cause his face to gleam in the sunlight, and John did the same. It was the childhood feeling again, the helpless waiting for what you could not foresee or control. And the tingling started at the back of his neck, the feeling that he was being watched, maybe through a rifle sight.

Sisson tapped him on the boot heel. John slowly turned his face toward the south to see the riders moving south, away from them.

“That was pretty close,” Tom said. “How'd they get that close?”

“They just did,” John said.

“They just did because you wasn't paying attention.”

“No,” Sisson said. “We ain't got no way to run. It's either going to be hide or fight for a while. You can't be glassing the distance every second. He was paying attention, and so was I. We saw them when we saw them. There wouldn't have been nothing to do if we'd seen them five minutes earlier.”

“Shit. We're just out here in the open.”

“We knew that when we chose the spot,” Sisson said. “And it's as good as we're going to get until we reach the mountains.”

“You chose the spot,” Tom said. “Trying to think like an Apache, and you ain't no Apache.”

“We all chose the spot. I made the suggestion, and it worked out all right. It worked out all right. They was within ten rod of us and went right on by. I'd say that worked out just about right.”

“It worked, but it was a hell of a hard thing.”

Sisson cast a baleful glance at Tom and snorted. Everything was hard. Sisson understood that. Tom was still learning it.