"Pretty work!"

"What?"

"I said I thought it was pretty work. We did a clean job;--got all we went out for."

"Like the devil we did!" shot out Jim.

"Why!--what did we forget, grouchy?"

"Everything! They're too blamed wise for us, that bunch, and they're too many."

Phil stopped pulling off a sock and looked over at Jim.

"Aw, come off!" cried the other. "Let in the daylight, man! What did we get anyway?"

"We got the thieves, didn't we?"

"Not by a jugfull! Half a dozen half-breed teamsters,--that's all!"

"Armed and driving stolen goods!"

"Yes! I grant that, but what good is that going to do?"

"Well, Jim,--you've discovered the plan they have been operating for doing away with the stuff. That is something."

"Sure!--that too, and it will end the wholesale thieving for a bit, till they find another way. It will give poor old Morrison a chance to recoup."

"Then I guess you always expect too much, Jim. You're never contented."

"Why should I be;--with Brenchfield's foreman and head-boss rotter Red McGregor, and that sneaky little devil St.i.tchy Summers not among the casualties."

"But Palmer will get them, won't he?"

"Not on your life!"

"Why not? We stopped each of them making for the gang to warn them off."

"How are we to prove that? They might have been going anywhere. Why man!--that pair could pretty nearly nail us for unprovoked a.s.sault."

Phil laughed.

"And they were the men who were conducting the entire steal when I fell in among them in the cellar;--but I can't prove it."

"You're sure they were, Jim?"

"Of course I'm sure. Red hit me on the head with the b.u.t.t-end of his quirt. I'll get him one for it too, before I'm done."

"And they engineered the whole affair, set the teamsters on their journey, then beat it ahead for Redmans?"

"'Oh n.o.ble judge! O excellent young man,'" Jim quoted sarcastically.

Phil felt the thrust. He went over to the bed, tilted up Jim's chin with his forefinger and looked straight into his mischievous eyes.

"Seeing you know so much, Jim Langford,--tell me more. What side is Brenchfield on in this affair?"

Jim grew serious all of a sudden.

"Now you're talking!" he exclaimed, his eyes snapping angrily and his voice throwing fire. "I've had no darned use for that son-of-a-gun for some considerable time. He has his nose in everything. He pretty nearly bosses the whole Valley. He's political boss, Mayor, rancher, and G.o.d knows what else. If he isn't crooked, why does he have his biggest ranch right in the thick of that Indian settlement? He has the whole of the breeds on the reservation under his thumb. He's a party heeler, a grafter from away back, and everybody falls for him. And yet,--good Land!--if you did so much as open your mouth against him, you'd get run out of town."

"Go on! Go on!" applauded Phil. "I like to hear you."

"Yes!--and _you've_ got the biggest grudge against him of any for something or other, or I'm not Wayward Langford. But you're so darned tight about it."

Phil's applause ended abruptly.

"Thought that would stop you!" grinned Jim. "But that man, and the blindness of the so-called wise men of this wee burg make me positively sick in the stomach.

"Who's at the back of the whole feed steal?--Brenchfield! Half-breeds didn't make that tunnel. It is a white man's job all through. It was all nicely done. Oh, ay! A tunnel to the three warehouses, Brenchfield's included! Thieving right and left and Brenchfield always losing a bit--to himself--every time; just to keep up appearances; and getting richer and richer every theft until he owns about as much land and gear as Royce Pederstone does!"

"Well then, Jim;--why can't that fertile brain of yours devise something to land him on this?"

"Weel ye may ask!" answered Jim, breaking into the Doric, "and I canna answer ye.

"We can't prove a thing on him. He would plead absolute ignorance of the entire affair; that he had been away for weeks and only got in yesterday with Royce Pederstone, and was at the dance when it happened. Everybody would believe him and sympathise with him too because of an apparent endeavour to blacken the character of a public man, a prominent citizen and a local benefactor--one who himself had lost so much by the thefts--for, mark you, Brenchfield has made much of it in his conversations."

"Can't Chief Palmer make the half-breeds talk? They will surely be pretty sore over the raw deal that has been handed out to them."

"Palmer be jiggered! He is another of Brenchfield's cronies, and is feathering his nest like the rest of them. I'll be very much surprised if the innocent Howden isn't fired by this time for his share in this morning's work. I'm half sorry I dragged him into it."

"Couldn't a good lawyer wriggle something out of the Indians at the trial?"

"He might,--but the Indians will be darned well paid to keep their mouths shut. Believe me!--it'll fizzle out. You watch and see!"

Jim sat quiet for a bit, then he began again.

"And that kind of animal has the nerve to want to marry little Eilie Pederstone. Oh, h.e.l.l!--I'd better stop or I'll burst a blood-vessel or something.

"Say!"

"Speak on!"

"Are you going to work after breakfast?"

"Of course!" answered Phil. "Aren't you?"

"No!"

"Are you going to bed?"