The Morgan Trail by W.C. Tuttle

The shadows from the mesquite clumps were growing long on the mesa below the mouth of Coyote Cañon. Farther to the south was the blue haze over the flat land toward Cañonville. Blue quail were calling to one another from the brushy slopes, their plaintive, _ca cuckoo_, _ca cuckoo_, being the only sound to break the silence.

A lean coyote, like a gray shadow, came limping along past a mesquite, where he stopped in the shade, his ears cocked toward the sound of feeding quail. A brush rabbit rustled in the mesquite, and the coyote shifted his head quickly. Suddenly he lifted his nose. Down the wind came a scent which he quickly associated with men who carried gun and lariat ropes. More like a shadow than before, the coyote seemed to fade out of sight through a convenient cover, while from a spot upwind came the soft crackling of brush.