"How many? Jeerupiter! Thirty or forty fer all I know, they've been rustlin' 'em for a year back."

"Why didn't you report before?"

"Why we thought we'd git 'em ourselves, and if we had we wouldn't 'a troubled yuh--and I guess they wouldn't 'a troubled us much longer. But they are so slick--so blank slick!"

"Mr. Cadwaller, we don't allow any profanity in this court room," said the Commissioner in a quiet voice.

"Eh? Who's givin' yuh profanity? I don't mean no profanity. I'm talkin'

about them blank blank--"

"Stop, Mr. Cadwaller!" said the Commissioner. "We must end this interview if you cannot make your statements without profanity. This is Her Majesty's court of Justice and we cannot tolerate any unbecoming language.

"Waal, I'll be--!"

"Pardon me, Mr. Commissioner," said Mr. Hiram S. Sligh, interrupting his friend and client. "Perhaps I may make a statement. We've lost some twenty or thirty horses."

"Thirty-one" interjected Mr. Raimes quietly.

"Thirty-one!" burst in Mr. Cadwaller indignantly. "That's only one little bunch."

"And," continued Mr. Sligh, "we have traced them right up to the Blood reserve. More than that, Mr. Raimes has seen the horses in the possession of the Indians and we want your a.s.sistance in recovering our property."

"Yes, by gum!" exclaimed Mr. Cadwaller. "And we want them--eh--eh--consarned redskin thieves strung up."

"You say you have seen the stolen horses on the Blood reserve, Mr.

Raimes?" enquired the Commissioner.

Mr. Raimes, who was industriously chewing a quid of tobacco, ejected, with a fine sense of propriety and with great skill and accuracy, a stream of tobacco juice out of the door before he answered.

"I seen 'em."

"When did you lose your horses?"

Mr. Raimes considered the matter for some moments, chewing energetically the while, then, having delivered himself with the same delicacy and skill as before of his surplus tobacco juice, made laconic reply:

"Seventeen, no, eighteen days ago."

"Did you follow the trail immediately yourselves?"

"No, Jim Eberts."

"Jim Eberts?"

"Foreman," said Mr. Raimes, who seemed to regard conversation in the light of an interference with the more important business in which he was industriously engaged.

"But you saw the horses yourself on the Blood reserve?"

"Followed up and seen 'em."

"How long since you saw them there, Mr. Raimes?"

"Two days."

"You are quite sure about the horses?"

"Sure."

"Call Inspector d.i.c.kson!" ordered the Commissioner.

Inspector d.i.c.kson appeared and saluted.

"We have information that a party of Blood Indians have stolen a band of horses from these gentlemen from Montana and that these horses are now on the Blood reserve. Take a couple of men and investigate, and if you find the horses bring them back."

"Couple of men!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Mr. Cadwaller breathlessly. "A couple of hundred, you mean, General!"

"What for?"

"Why, to sur--raound them--there--Indians." The regulations of the court room considerably hampered Mr. Cadwaller's fluency of speech.

"It is not necessary at all, Mr. Cadwaller. Besides, we have only some eighty men all told at this post. Our whole force in the territories is less than five hundred men."

"Five hundred men! You mean for this State, General--Alberta?"

"No, Sir. For all Western Canada. All west of Manitoba."

"How much territory do you cover?" enquired the astonished Mr.

Cadwaller.

"We regularly patrol some three hundred thousand square miles, besides taking an occasional expedition into the far north."

"And how many Indians?"

"About the same number as you have, I imagine, in Montana and Dakota. In Alberta, about nine thousand."

"And less than five hundred police! Say, General, I take off my hat.

Ten thousand Indians! By the holy poker! And five hundred police! How in Cain do you keep down the devils?"

"We don't try to keep them down. We try to take care of them."

"Guess you've hit it," said Mr. Raimes, dexterously squirting out of the door.

"Jeerupiter! Say, General, some day they'll ma.s.sacree yuh sure!" said Mr. Cadwaller, a note of anxiety in his voice.

"Oh, no, they are a very good lot on the whole."

"Good! We've got a lot of good Indians too, but they're all under graound. Five hundred men! Jeerupiter! Say, Sligh, how many soldiers does Uncle Sam have on this job?"

"Well, I can't say altogether, but in Montana and Dakota I happen to know we have about four thousand regulars."