"No, not now," he replied decisively. "They've had too much time now. And it's safe to bet that they rode at full speed just as soon as they got out of my sight. They knew Bill would tell me. They're miles away by this time. But don't you worry, Sis--they won't get him. Five curs never lived that could catch a timber wolf in his own country--and if they do catch him, they will wish they hadn't. And I almost hope they win the chase, for they'll lose their fool lives. It will be a lesson to the rest of the bullies of the Cross Bar-8--and small loss to the community at large, eh, Charley?"

"Yore sh.o.r.e right, Jim," replied Charley, smiling at Miss Ritchie.

"Did you ever hear tell of the dog that retrieved a lighted dynamite cartridge?" he asked her. "No? Well, the dog left for parts unknown."

"That's good, Charley," Shields responded with a laugh. "The dog just wouldn't mind, and he was only a snarling, no-account cur at that, wasn't he?" Then he looked at the coach, and his heart softened to the hunted man. "I can see it all, now," he said slowly. "Those punchers must have forced him out of the Backbone, and he was getting away when he saw the plight you were in. By G.o.d!" he cried in appreciation of the act. "It wasn't no one man's work, five Apaches! One man stopping five of those devils--it was no work for a murderer, not much! It was clean-cut nerve, and if I ever see him I'll tell him so, too! I'll let him know that he's got some friends in this country. They can say what they please, but there's more manhood in him to the square inch than there is in all the people who cry him down; and who are in a great way responsible for his being an outlaw. I'm ready to swear that he never wantonly shot a man down; no, sir, he didn't. And I reckon he never had much show, from what I know of him."

"Helen was real kind to him," remarked the spinster. "She bathed his wound and bandaged it. Spoiled her very best skirt, too."

"You're a good girl, Sis," Shields said, looking fondly at the beautiful girl at his side. His arm went around her shoulder and he affectionately patted her cheek. "I'm proud of you, and we'll have to see if we can't get another 'very best skirt,' too." Then he laughed: "But I'll bet he blesses the warrior who fired that shot--he's not used to having pretty girls fuss about him."

Mary looked quickly at her sister. "Why, Helen! You've lost your gold pin!

Where do you suppose it has gone? I'll look in the stage for it before we forget about it. Dear me, dear me," she cried as she entered the vehicle, "this has indeed been a terrible day!"

Bill grinned and turned toward his team. "I reckon she'll find it some day," he said in a low aside as he pa.s.sed the sheriff. "I'll just bet she does. It'll be in at the finish of a whole lot of things, and people, too, you bet," he added enigmatically.

Shields looked quickly at the driver, his face brightened and he smiled knowingly at the words. "I reckon it will; fool punchers, for instance?"

Bill turned his head and one eye closed in an emphatic wink. "Keno," he replied.

Mary bustled out again, very much agitated. "I can't find it. Where do you suppose you lost it, dear? I've looked everywhere in the stage."

"Probably back where we stopped before," Helen replied quietly. "We were so agitated that we would never have noticed it if it slipped down."

"Well--" began Mary.

"No use going back for it, Miss Shields," promptly interrupted Bill from his high seat. "We just couldn't find it in all that trampled sand, not if we hunted all week for it with a comb."

"You're right, Bill," gravely responded the sheriff. "We never could."

As they entered the defile of the Backbone the sheriff suddenly remembered what Bill had told him and he stopped and dismounted.

"You keep right on, Bill," he said. "I'm going up to hunt that fool puncher. Lord, but it's a joke! This game is getting better every day--I'm getting so I sort of like to have The Orphan around. He's sh.o.r.e original, all right."

"He's better than a marked deck in a darkened room," laughed the driver.

"He sh.o.r.e ought to be framed, or something like that."

"You better go with them, Charley," the sheriff said as his friend made a move at dismounting. "There ain't no danger, but we won't take no chances this time; we've got a precious coachful."

"All right," replied Charley as he wheeled toward the disappearing stage.

"So long, Sheriff."

The sheriff looked the wall over and then picked out a comparatively easy place and climbed to the top. As he drew himself over the edge he espied a pair of boots which showed from under a pile of debris, and he laughed heartily. At the laugh the feet began to kick vigorously, so affecting the sheriff that he had to stop a minute, for it was the most ludicrous sight he had ever looked upon.

Shields grabbed the boots and pulled, walking backward, and soon an enraged and trussed cow-puncher came into view. Slowly and carefully unrolling the rope from the unfortunate man, he coiled it methodically and slung it over his shoulder, and then a.s.sisted in loosening the gag.

The puncher was too stiff to rise and his liberator helped him to his feet and slapped and rubbed and chuckled and rubbed to start the blood in circulation. The gag had so affected the muscles of the puncher's jaw that his mouth would not close without a.s.sistance and effort, and his words were not at all clear for that reason. His first word was a curse.

"'Ell!" he cried as he stamped and swung his arms. "'Ell! I'm asleep all o'er! ----! 'Ait till I get 'im! ----! 'Ait till I get 'im!"

"Sort of continuing the little nap you was taking when he roped you, eh?"

asked Shields, holding his sides.

"Nap nothing! Nap nothing!" yelled the other in profane denial. "I wasn't asleep, I tell yu! I was wide awake! He got th' drop on me, and then that cussed rope of his'n was everywhere! Th' air was plumb full of rope and guns! I didn't have no show! Not a bit of a show! Oh, just wait till I get him! Why, I heard my pardners talking as they hunted for me, and there I was not twenty feet away from them all the time, helpless! They're fine lookers, they are! Wait till I sees them, too! I'll tell 'em a few things, all right!"

"Well, I reckon you may see one or two of them, if they're lucky--and you can't beat a fool for luck," replied the sheriff. "They want to be angels; they're on his trail now."

"Hope they get him!" yelled the puncher, dancing with rage. "Hope they burn him at th' stake! Hope they scalp him, an' hash him, an' saw his arms off, an' cave his roof in! Hope they make him eat his fingers and toes!

Hope----"

"You're some hopeful to-day," responded the sheriff. "If you like them, you better hope they don't get him. That's hoping real hope."

"Wait till I get him!" the puncher repeated, grabbing for his Colt, being too enraged to notice its absence. "I'll show him if he can tie a man up an' leave him to choke to death, an' starve an' roast! I'll show him if he can run this country like he owns it, shooting and abusing everybody he wants to!"

"All right, Sonny," Shields laughed. "I'll sh.o.r.e wait till you gets him, if I live long enough. But for your sake I sh.o.r.e hope you never finds him.

He wouldn't get any more reputation if he killed you, and your friends would miss you."

"Don't yu let that worry yu!" retorted the enraged man. "I can take care of myself in a mix-up, all right! An' I'm going to chase after my friends an' take a hand in th' game, too, by G.o.d! He ain't going to leave me high an' dry an' live to boast about it! But I suppose you reckon yu'll stop me, hey?"

Shields raised both hands high in the air in denial. "I wouldn't think of such a thing, not for the world," he cried, laughter shaking his big frame. "You can go any place you please, only _I'd_ take a gun if I was going after _him_," he added, eyeing the empty holster. "You know, you _might_ need it," he was very grave in his use of the subjunctive.

The puncher slapped his hand to his thigh and then jumped high into the air: "----! ----!" he shouted. "Stole my gun! Stole my gun!" Then he paused suddenly and his face cleared. "But I've got something better'n a Colt on my cayuse!" he cried as he leaped toward the edge of the canon.

"An' I'll give him all it holds, too!" he threatened as he b.u.mped and slid to the bottom. The sheriff took more care and time in descending and had just reached the trail when he heard a heart-rending yell, followed by a sizzling stream of throbbing profanity.

"Where's my cayuse?" yelled the puncher as he rounded the corner of the canon wall on a peculiar lope and hop. "Where's my cayuse, yu law-coyote?" he shouted, temporarily out of his senses from rage.

"Where's my cayuse!" dancing up to the sheriff and shaking both fists under the laughter-convulsed face.

When the sheriff could speak, he leaned against the canon wall for support and broke the news.

"Why, Bill Howland said as how The Orphan was riding a Cross Bar-8 cayuse--dirty brown, with a white stocking on his near front foot. It had a big scar on its neck, too."

"Th' d----d hoss thief!" began the puncher, but Shields kept right on talking.

"There was a dandy Cheyenne saddle," he said, counting on his fingers, "a good gun, a pair of hobbles and a big coil of rawhide rope on the cayuse.

Was they yours?"

"Was they mine! Was they mine!" his companion screamed. "My new saddle gone, my gun gone and my fine rope gone! Oh, h--l! How'll I hunt him now?

How'll I get home? How'll I get back to th' ranch?" Words failed him, and he could only wave his arms and yell.

"Well, it wouldn't hardly be worth while chasing him on foot without a gun, that's sh.o.r.e," the sheriff said, grave once more. "But you can get home all right; that's easy."

"How can I?" asked the puncher, eyeing the sheriff's horse and waiting for the invitation to ride double on it.

"Why, walk," was the reply. "It's only about twenty miles as the crow flies--say twenty-five on the trail."

"Walk! Walk!" cried his companion, savagely kicking at a lizard which looked out from a crevice in the rock wall. "I never walked five miles all at once in my life!"

"Well, it'll be a new experience, and you can't begin any younger,"

replied Shields as he swung into his saddle. "It'll do you good, too--increase your appet.i.te."