Transcriber's Notes:
Blank pages have been eliminated.
Variations in spelling and hyphenation have been left as in the original.
A few typographical errors have been corrected.
The cover page was created by the transcriber and can be considered public domain.

Ackerman's gun had him covered as soon as his head showed
[Page 153]

The MAN From BAR 20

A Story of the Cow Country

By CLARENCE E. MULFORD

AUTHOR OF

"Bar 20," "Bar 20 Days,"
"Hopalong Cassidy," Etc.

With Frontispiece
By FRANK E. SCHOONOVER

A. L. BURT COMPANY
Publishers New York
Published by arrangement with A. C. McClurg & Company

Copyright
A. C. McClurg & Co.
1918

Published, May, 1918

Copyrighted in Great Britain

Affectionately Dedicated
to
E. V. A.

CONTENTS

The Man From Bar-20

CHAPTER I
A STRANGER COMES TO HASTINGS

A horseman rode slowly out of a draw and up a steep, lava-covered ridge, singing "The Cowboy's Lament," to the disgust of his horse, which suddenly arched its back and stopped the song in the twenty-ninth verse.

"Dearly Beloved," grinned the rider, after he had quelled the trouble, "yore protest is heeded. 'Th' Lament' ceases, instanter; an' while you crop some of that grass, I'll look around and observe th' scenery, which shore is scrambled. Now, them two buttes over there," leaning forward to look around a clump of brush, "if they ain't twins, I'll eat—"

He ducked and dismounted in one swift movement to the vengeful tune of a screaming bullet over his head, slapped the horse and jerked his rifle from its scabbard. As the horse leaped down the slope of the ridge there was no sign of any living thing to be seen on the trail. A bush rustled near the edge of a draw, a peeved voice softly cursed the cacti and Mexican locust; and a few minutes later the shadow of a black lava bowlder grew suddenly fatter on one side. The cause of this sudden shadow growth lay prone under the bulging side of the great rock, peering out intently between two large stones; and flaming curiosity consumed his soul. A stranger in a strange land, who rode innocently along a free trail and minded his own business, merited no such a welcome as this. His promptness of action and the blind luck in that bending forward at the right instant were all that saved his life; and his celerity of movement spoke well for his reflexes, for he had found himself fattening the shadow of the bowlder almost before he had fully realized the pressing need for it.

Minute after minute passed before his searching eyes detected anything concerned with the unpleasant episode, and then he sensed rather than saw a slight movement on the mottled, bowlder-strewn slope of a distant butte. A bush moved gently, and that was all.

To cross the intervening chaos of rocks and brush, pastures and draws would take him an hour if it were done as caution dictated, and by that time the chase would be useless. So he waited until the sun was two hours higher, pleasantly anticipating a stealthy reconnaissance by his unknown enemy to observe the dead. He had dropped into high grass and brush when he left the saddle and there was no way that the marksman could be certain of the results of his shot except by closer examination. But the man in ambush had no curiosity, to his target's regret; and the target, despairing of being honored by a visit, finally gave up the vigil. After a silent interval a soft whistle from a thicket, well back in a draw, caused the grazing horse to lift his head, throw its ears forward and walk sedately toward the sound.

"Dearly Beloved," said a low voice from the thicket, "come closer. That was a two-laigged skunk, an' his eyes are good. Likewise he is one plumb fine shot."

Ever since he had listened to the marriage ceremony which had subjugated his friend Hopalong for the rest of that man's natural life, the phrase "Dearly Beloved" had stuck in his memory; and in his use of it the words took the place of humorous profanity.

Mounting, he rode on again, but kept off all skylines, favored the rough going away from the trail, and passed to the eastward of all the obstructions he met; and his keen eyes darted from point to point unceasingly, not giving up their scrutiny of the surroundings until he saw in the distance a little town, which he knew was Hastings.

In the little cow-town of Hastings the afternoon sun drove the shadows of the few buildings farther afield and pitilessly searched out every defect in the cheap and hastily constructed frame buildings, showed the hair-line cracks in the few adobes, where an occasional frost worked insidious damage to the clay, and drew out sticky, pungent beads of rosin from the sun-bleached and checked pine boards of the two-story front of the one-story building owned and occupied by "Pop" Hayes, proprietor of one of the three saloons in the town. The two-story front of Pop's building displayed two windows painted on the warped boards too close to the upper edge, the panes a faded blue, where gummy pine knots had not stained them yellow; and they were framed by sashes of a hideous red.

Inside the building Pop dozed in his favorite position, his feet crossed on a shaky pine table and his chair tipped back against the wall. Slow hoof-beats, muffled by the sand, sounded outside, followed by the sudden, faint jingling of spurs, the sharp creak of saddle gear and the soft thud of feet on the ground. Pop's eyes opened and he blinked at the bright rectangle of sunny street framed by his doorway, where a man loomed up blackly, and slowly entered the room.

"Howd'y, Logan," grunted Pop, sighing. His feet scraped from the table and thumped solidly on the floor in time with the thud of the chair legs, and he slowly arose, yawning and sighing wearily while he waited to see which side of the room would be favored by the newcomer. Pop disliked being disturbed, for by nature he was one who craved rest, and he could only sleep all night and most of the day. Rubbing the sleep out of his eyes he yawned again and looked more closely at the stranger, a quick look of surprise flashing across his face. Blinking rapidly he looked again and muttered something to himself.

The newcomer turned his back to the bar, took two long steps and peered into the battered showcase on the other side of the room, where a miscellaneous collection of merchandise, fly-specked and dusty, lay piled up in cheerful disorder under the cracked and grimy glass. Staring up at him was a roughly scrawled warning, in faded ink on yellowed paper: "Lean on yourself." The collection showed Mexican holsters, army holsters, holsters with the Lone Star; straps, buckles, bone rings, star-headed tacks, spurs, buttons, needles, thread, knives; two heavy Colt's revolvers, piles of cartridges in boxes, a pair of mother-of-pearl butt plates showing the head of a long-horned steer; pipes, tobacco of both kinds, dice, playing cards, harmonicas, cigars so dried out that they threatened to crumble at a touch; a patented gun-sight with Wild Bill Hickok's picture on the card which held it; oil, corkscrews, loose shot and bullets; empty shells, primers, reloading tools; bar lead, bullet molds—all crowded together as they had been left after many pawings-over. Pop was wont to fretfully damn the case and demand, peevishly, to know why "it" was always the very last thing he could find. Often, upon these occasions, he threatened to "get at it" the very first chance that he had; but his threats were harmless.

The stranger tapped on the glass. "Gimme that box of .45's," he remarked, pointing. "No, no; not that one. This new box. I'm shore particular about little things like that."

Pop reluctantly obeyed. "Why, just th' other day I found a box of ca'tridges I had for eleven years; an' they was better'n them that they sells nowadays. That's one thing that don't spoil." He looked up with shrewdly appraising eyes. "At fust glance I thought you was Logan. You shore looks a heap like him: dead image," he said.

"Yes? Dead image?" responded the stranger, his voice betraying nothing more than a polite, idle curiosity; but his mind flashed back to the trail. "Hum. He must have a lot of friends if he looks like me," he smiled quizzically.

Pop grinned: "Well, he's got some as is; an' some as ain't," he replied knowingly. "An' lemme tell you they both runs true to form. You don't have to copper no bets on either bunch, not a-tall."

"Sheriff, or marshal?" inquired the stranger, turning to the bar. "It's plenty hot an' dusty," he averred. "You have a life-saver with me."

"Might as well, I reckon," said Pop, shuffling across the room with a sudden show of animation, "though my life ain't exactly in danger. Nope; he ain't no sheriff, or marshal. We ain't got none, 'though I ain't sayin' we couldn't keep one tolerable busy while he lived. I've thought some of gettin' th' boys together to elect me sheriff; an' cussed if I wouldn't 'a' done it, too, if it wasn't for th' ridin'."

"Ridin'?" inquired the stranger with polite interest.

"It shakes a man up so; an' I allus feels sorry for th' hoss," explained the proprietor.

The stranger's facial training at the great American game was all that saved him from committing a breach of etiquette. "Huh! Reckon it does shake a man up," he admitted. "An' I never thought about th' cayuse; no, sir; not till this minute. Any ranches in this country?"

"Shore; lots of 'em. You lookin' for work?"

"Yes; I reckon so," answered the stranger.

"Well, if you don't look out sharp you'll shore find some."

"A man's got to eat more or less regular; an' cow-punchers ain't no exception," replied the stranger, his soft drawl in keeping with his slow, graceful movements.

Pop, shrewd reader of men that he was, suspected that neither of those characteristics was a true index to the man's real nature. There was an indefinable something which belied the smile—the eyes, perhaps, steel blue, unwavering, inscrutable; or a latent incisiveness crouching just beyond reach; and there was a sureness and smoothness and minimum of effort in the movements which vaguely reminded Pop of a mountain lion he once had trailed and killed. He was in the presence of a dynamic personality which baffled and disturbed him; and the two plain, heavy Colt's resting in open-top holsters, well down on the stranger's thighs, where his swinging hands brushed the well-worn butts, were signs which even the most stupid frontiersman could hardly overlook. Significant, too, was the fact that the holsters were securely tied by rawhide thongs, at their lower ends, to the leather chaps, this to hold them down when the guns were drawn out. To the initiated the signs proclaimed a gunman, a two-gun man, which was worse; and a red flag would have had no more meaning.

"Well," drawled Pop, smiling amiably, "as to work, I reckon you can find it if you knows it when you sees it; an' don't close yore eyes. I'll deal 'em face up, an' you can take yore choice," he offered, wiping his lips on the edge of the bar towel, both the action and the towel itself being vociferously described by his saddle-sitting friends as affectations, for everybody knew that a sleeve or the back of a hand was the natural thing. "Now, there's th' Circle S; but I dunno as they needs any more men. They could get along with less if them they has would work. Smith, of th' Long T, over in th' southwest, could easy use more men; but he's so close an' all-fired pe-nurious that I dunno as he'd favor th' idear. He's a reg'lar genius for savin' money, Smith is. He once saved a dollar out of three cents, an' borrowed them of me to start with. Then there's th' CL, over east in th' Deepwater Valley. You might get something there; an' Logan's a nice man to work for, for a few days. He allus gives his men at least two hours sleep a night, averagin' it up; but somehow they're real cheerful about it, an' they all swears by him 'stead of at him. Reckon mebby it's th' wages he pays. He's got th' best outfit of th' three. But, lemme tell you, it's a right lively place, th' CL; an' you don't have to copper that, neither. Th' cards is all spread out in front of you—take yore choice an' foller yore nat'ral bend."

"Logan," mused the stranger. "Didn't you say something about him before?" he asked curiously.

"I did," grunted Pop. "You've got a mem'ry near as bad as Ol' Hiram Jones. Hiram, he once—"

"I thought so," interposed the cow-puncher hastily. "What kind of a ranch is th' CL?"

"Well, it was th' fust to locate in these parts, an' had its pick; an', nat'rally, it picked th' valley of th' Deepwater. Funny Logan ain't found no way to make th' river work; it wouldn't have to sleep at all, 'cept once in a while in th' winter, when it freezes over for a spell. It'd be a total loss then; mebby that's why he ain't never tried.

"But takin' a second holt," he continued, frowning with deep thought; "I dunno as I'd work for him, if I was you. You looks too much like him; an' you got a long life of piety an' bad whiskey ahead of you, mebby. An', come to think of it, I dunno as I'd stay very long around these parts, neither; an' for th' same reason. Now you have a drink with me. It shore is th' hottest spring I've seen in fifty year," he remarked, thereby quoting himself for about that period of time. Each succeeding spring and summer was to him hotter than any which had gone before, which had moved Billy Atwood to remark that if Pop only lived long enough he would find hell a cool place, by comparison, when he eventually arrived there.

"Sic 'em, Towser!" shrilled a falsetto voice from somewhere. "I'll eat his black heart!" Then followed whistling, clucking, and a string of expletives classical in its completeness. "Andy wants a drink! Quick!"

A green object dropped past the stranger's face, thumped solidly on the pine bar, hooked a vicious-looking beak on the edge of the counter, and swore luridly as its crafty nip missed the stranger's thumb.

The puncher swiftly bent his sinewy forefinger, touched it with his thumb, and let it snap forward. The parrot got it on an eye and staggered, squawking a protest.

Pop was surprised and disappointed, for most strangers showed some signs of being startled, and often bought the drinks to further prove that the joke was on them. This capable young man carelessly dropped his great sombrero over Andrew Jackson and went right on talking as though nothing unusual had occurred. It appeared that the bird was also surprised and disappointed. The great hat heaved and rocked, bobbed forward, backward, and sideways, and then slid jerkily along the bar, its hidden locomotive force too deeply buried in thought and darkness to utter even a single curse. Reaching the edge of the bar the big hat pushed out over it, teetered a moment and then fell to the floor, where Andrew Jackson, recovering his breath and vocabulary at the same instant, filled the room with shrill and clamorous profanity.

The conversation finished to his satisfaction, the stranger glanced down at his boot, where the ruffled bird was delivering tentative frontal and flank attacks upon the glittering, sharp-toothed spur, whose revolving rowel had the better of the argument. Andrew sensed the movement, side-stepped clumsily and cocked an evil eye upward.

"You should 'a' taught him to swear in th' deaf an' dumb alphabet," commented the puncher, grinning at the bird's gravity. "Does he drink?" he asked.

"Try him, an' see," suggested Pop, chuckling. He reached for a bottle and clucked loudly.

Andrew shook himself energetically, and then proceeded to go up the puncher's chaps by making diligent use of beak and claws. Reaching the low-hung belt, he hooked his claws into it and then looked evilly and suspiciously at the strange, suddenly extended forefinger. Deciding to forego hostilities, he swung himself upon it and was slowly lifted up to the bar.

Pop was disappointed again, for it was the bird's invariable custom to deftly remove a portion of strange forefingers so trustingly offered. He could crack nuts in his crooked beak. Andy shook himself violently, craned his neck and hastened to bend it over the rim of the glass.

The stranger watched him in frank disgust and shrugged his shoulders eloquently. "So all you could teach him was vile cuss words an' to like whiskey, huh?" he muttered. "He's got less sense than I thought he had," he growled, and, turning abruptly, went swiftly out to his horse.

Pop stared after him angrily and slapped the bird savagely. Emptying the liquor upon the floor, he shuffled quickly to the door and shook his fist at the departing horseman.

"Don't you tell Logan that I sent you!" he shouted belligerently.

The stranger turned in his saddle, grinning cheerfully, and favored his late host with a well-known, two-handed nose signal. Then he slapped the black horse and shot down the street without another backward glance.

Pop, arms akimbo, watched him sweep out of sight around a bend.

"Huh!" he snorted. "Wonder what yo're doin' down here? Galivantin' around th' country, insultin' honest, hard-workin' folks, an' wearin' two guns, low down an' tied! I reckon when you learns th' lay of th' country, if you stays long enough, you'll wind up by joinin' that gang up in th' Twin Buttes country. I allus like to see triggers on six-shooters, I do." He had not noticed the triggers, but that was no bar to his healthy imagination. Shuffling back to his seat, he watched the indignant Andy pecking at a wet spot on the floor.

"So you didn't chaw his finger, huh?" he demanded, in open and frank admiration of the bird's astuteness. "Strikes me you got a hull lot of wisdom, my boy. Some folks says a bird ain't got no brains; but lemme tell you that you've got a danged good instinct."

CHAPTER II
A QUESTION OF IDENTITY

Meanwhile the stranger was loping steadily eastward, and he arrived at the corral of the CL ranch before sundown, nodding pleasantly to the man who emerged from it: "Howd'y," he said. "I'm lookin' for Logan."

The CL man casually let his right hand lay loosely near the butt of his Colt: "Howd'y," he nodded. "Yo're lookin' right at him."

"Do you need any more punchers?" asked the stranger.

"H'm," muttered the foreman. "Might use one. If it's you, we'll talk money on pay-day. I'll know more about you then."

A puncher, passing the corral, noticed the two guns, frowned slightly and entered the enclosure, and leaned alertly against the palisade, where a crack between two logs served him as a loophole.

The two-gun man laughed with genuine enjoyment at the foreman's way of hiring men. "That's fair," he replied; "but what's th' high an' low figgers? I like to know th' limit of any game I sets in."

Logan shrugged his shoulders. "Forty is th' lowest I'd offer a white man; an' he wouldn't draw that more'n a month. Any man as ain't worth more is in our way. It's a waste of grub to feed him. Th' sky is th' high limit—but you've got to work like h—l to pass th' clouds."

"I'm some balloon," laughed the stranger. "Where's the grub shack?"

"Hold on, young man! We ain't got that far, yet. Where are you from, an' what have you been doin' with yore sweet young life?"

The stranger's face grew grave and his eyes narrowed a trifle.

"Some folks allow that's a leadin' question. It ain't polite."

"I allow that, too. An' I'm aimin' to make it a leadin' question, 'though I ain't lackin' in politeness, nor tryin' to rile you. You don't have to answer. Th' wide world, full of jobs, is all around you."

The newcomer regarded him calmly for a moment, and suddenly smiled.

"Yore gall is refreshin'," he grinned. "I'm from th' Bar-20, Texas. I'm five feet ten; weigh a hundred an' sixty; blue eyes, brown hair; single an' sober, now an' always. I writes left-handed; eat an' shoot with both; wears pants, smokes tobacco, an' I'm as handy a cow-puncher as ever threw a rope. Oh, yes; modesty is one of my glarin' faults; you might say my only glarin' fault. Some people call me 'Dearly Beloved'; others, other things; but I answer to any old handle at grub pile. My name is Johnny Nelson an' I never had no other, 'cept 'Kid,' to my friends. I'm thirty years old, minus some. An'—oh, yes; I'm from th' Tin Cup, Montanny. I get things twisted at times, an' this shore looks like one of 'em."

"Of course," grunted Logan, his eyes twinkling. "That's easy. Th' two ranches, bein' so close together, would bother a man. Sorta wander off one onto th' other, an' have to stop to think which one yo're workin' for. They should mark th' boundaries plainer—or put up a fence."

Johnny flushed. "I allus say Bar-20 when I speaks off-hand an' have more on my mind than my hair. That man in th' corral divides my attention. He flusters me. You see, I was cussed near born on th' old Bar-20—worked there ever since I was a boy. That crack in th' wall is big enough for two men to use. Thank you, friend: you near scared me to death," he chuckled as the suspicious watcher emerged and started for the bunk-house.

"You look so much like th' boss, I couldn't help watchin' you," grinned the puncher over his shoulder.

Logan grunted something, and then nodded at the stranger.

"Cut it loose," he encouraged. "I don't get a chance like this every day, my observant friend. I allus reckoned I could cover ground purty well, but I'll be hanged if I can spread myself so I can work in Texas an' Montanny at th' same time. You got me beat from soda to hock. Yo're goin' to be a real valuable man, which I can see plain. Comin' down to cases, you ain't really a cow-puncher; yo're a whole cussed outfit, barrin' th' chuck waggin an' th' cook. I have great hopes for you. Tell me about it."

Johnny swung a leg over the pommel and smiled down at the man who was grinning up at him.

"Of course," he replied, "it ain't none of yore business, which we both admits. We just can't do any business on any other understandin'. But I waives that: an' here goes.

"I worked with the Bar-20 till Buck went up to run th' Tin Cup. Cow-thieves kept him so busy that our new foreman went up to help him. He stayed there. Red got lonesome for Hoppy, and shore follered. Skinny was lost without th' pair of 'em, so he up an' follered Red. Lanky, missin' Skinny, got plumb restless an' takes th' trail a month later. Then a railroad crosses our ranch an' begins layin' out two towns, so Pete gets on his hind laigs, licks a section boss, an' chases after Lanky. I'm gettin' lonesomer and lonesomer all th' time, but I manages to stick on th' job by pullin' leather, because I was drawin' down a foreman's pay. That ranch had five foremen in three months; an' they was all good ones, 'cept, mebby, me. But when I saw barbed wire on th' sidin', fence posts along th' right of way, sheep on th' hills, an' plows plumb ruinin' good grass land, I hunts up that same section boss, licks him again in mem'ry of Pete, packed my war bag, an' loped north after Pete. Th' old ranch has gone plumb to h—l!"

Logan, a scowl on his face, rubbed the butt of his Colt and swore softly. "It'll be that way all over th' range, some day. Go on."

"Well, up on th' Tin Cup, Buck got married. Hoppy had been before he left Texas. Tex Ewalt's gettin' th' disease now. He quit drinkin', card playin', an' most everything worth doin'. He ain't fit company for a sheep no more. Not knowing he was framin' up th' play, I loafed along an' didn't propose quick enough. That's once more he saved my life. Th' air's plumb full of matrimony on th' Tin Cup. There was two black-eyed sisters in Twin River—Lanky takes one an' Skinny th' other. They tossed for choice. Pete, who was matrimony galled, raised such a ruction at th' doin's that there just wasn't no livin' with him. His disposition was full of sand cracks, an' he'd ruther fight than eat. We pulled off a couple of hummers, me an' him.

"Every time I'd try to get some of my friends to go to town for a regular, old time, quiet evenin' I found I didn't have no friends left; an' th' wimmin all joined hands an' made me feel like a brand-blotter. I was awful popular, I was! Ever try to argue with a bunch of wimmin? It's like a dicky bird chirpin' in a cyclone; he can't even hear hisself!

"We had a cook once, on th' Bar-20, that would run an' grab a gun if he saw a coyote ten miles away. That's th' way they acted about me, all but Mary, who is Mrs. Hopalong. She had th' idea she could make me all over again; an' I wouldn't a-cared if she hadn't kept tryin' all th' time. At first all my ex-friends would sneak around an' sort of apologize to me for th' way their wives acted; an' then, d—d if they didn't get to sidin' in with th' wives! Whenever I wandered into sight th' wimmin would cluck to their worse halves, an' scold me like I was a chicken hawk. An' I had lots of advice, too. It was just like my shadow, only it worked nights, too. Nobody called me 'Kid' or 'Johnny' no more. Them days was past. I was that Johnny Nelson: know what I mean?

"Red did sneak off to town with me twice—an' drank ginger-ale, an' acted about as free an' happy as a calf with a red-hot old brandin' iron over his flank. He wouldn't play faro because he only had two dollars, an' reckoned he might need it for somethin' before pay-day come around again. That was on pay-day, too! An' that was Red, Red Connors! Great polecats! Why, there was a time when Red—oh, what's th' use!

"Hopalong—you call him that now when his wife's around!—he was something on some board, or something; an' he said he had to set a good example. Wouldn't even play penny ante! Think of it! There was a time when a camel, with all his stummicks, an' a Gatlin' gun on his back, couldn't a follered th' example he set. I was just as happy as a bobcat in a trap—an' about as peaceful. There wasn't nothin' I could do, if I stayed up there, but get married; an' that was like hangin' myself to keep from gettin' shot. Then, one day, Mrs. Hopalong caught me learnin' William, Junior, how to chew tobacco. As if a five-year-old kid hadn't ought to get some manly habits! An', say! You ought to see that kid! If he won't bust his daddy's records for h—l-raisin' I miss my guess; unless they plumb spoils him in th' bringin' up. Well, she caught me learnin' him; but like th' boundin' jack rabbit I'm hard to catch. An' here I am."

Logan's grin threatened his ears. "I'm glad of it," he laughed. "There's something in yore face I like—mebby it's th' tobacco. Thanks; I will; I'm all out of it right now. How did you come to pick us out to land on? Pop recommend us to you?"

"Now don't blame me for that," rejoined Johnny. "Anyhow, he took it back later. As to stoppin' in this country, th' idea suddenly whizzed my way at them twin buttes north of town. I like this range. Things sort of start themselves, an' there's music in th' air. It reminds me of th' Bar-20, in th' old days. A man won't grow lazy down here; he'll keep jumpin'. An' I found a trace of lead at that funny-lookin' ridge east of them freak buttes; but I couldn't find where it come from. If I had, I'd 'a' salted th' mine with a Sharp's Special. You see, I'm ambidextrous—ain't that a snorter of a word?—an' when I ain't punchin' cows with one hand, I'm prospectin' with th' other. Somebody down here is plumb careless with his gun—an' he's got a good gun, too. He's too cussed familiar on short acquaintance. But it's too bad I look like you, 'though that's why I'm offerin' you my valuable services."

"I reckon it's a cross I got to stagger under," replied Logan, the smile gone from his face; "but I'll try to live it down. An' somehow my trusting nature leans toward you, though it shouldn't. Yo're a two-gun man, which acts like yeast in th' suspicious mind. I've seen 'em before; an' you looks most disconcertin' capable. Then you says Bar-20, an' Hopalong, an' Red Connors, an' th' others. You talk like you knew 'em intimate. I've heard of 'em, all of 'em. Like th' moon, you shine in reflected light. I've heard of you, too; I'm surprised you ain't in jail. Now then: If you are that Johnny Nelson, of that outfit, an' you can prove it, I yearns to weep on yore bosom; if you ain't, then I'll weep on yore grave. Th' question of identity is a ticklish one. It makes me that nervous I want to look under th' bed. As a two-gun man, unknown, yo're about as welcome on this ranch, right now, as a hydrophoby skunk; but as Johnny Nelson, of that old Bar-20, yo're worth fifty a month to me, as a starter, with ten dollars extra for each six-gun. But I've just simply got to have proof about who you are, an' where you come from. Let's pause for an inspiration."

Johnny grinned. "I don't blame you; for I've had a sample of something already. An' I've got a tail holt on an inspiration. You hunt up that pen you've had since Adam was a boy; find th' ink that you put away last summer so you'd know where it was when you wanted it in a hurry; an' then, in thirty minutes' hard labor you'll have something like this:

"'Mr. William Cassidy, Senior, Tin Cup, Twin Rivers, Montanny: Dear Sir: A nice lookin' young man wants to take seventy dollars a month away from me, as a starter. His undershirt is red, with th' initials "WC" worked near th' top buttonhole in pretty blue silk thread. He wants Pete to send him that eight dollars that Pete borrowed to buy William, Junior, a .22 rifle to bust windows with. Tell Red his pants wear well. Does William, Junior, chew tobacco? He has been shot at already. What is this young man's name? Did he work on th' old Bar-20 with you? Yours truly, Logan.'

"Exhibit 1: Th' red undershirt. Hoppy has even more of 'em than Buck, 'though Rose is comin' along fast. Mary branded 'em all so she could pick 'em out of th' wash. It helped me pick this one off th' clothes-line, because me an' Hoppy wears th' same size. Exhibit 2: A scab on my off ear. William, Junior, was shootin' at a calf an' I stopped him. He's a spunky little cuss, all right; but they'll spoil him yet. An' Pete never did have any sense, anyhow. Th' poor kid is shootin' blanks now, an' blamin' it on th' gun. An' it was a mean trick, too. That hit about th' tobacco will get under Hoppy's scalp—he'll answer right quick. You might say to tell William, Junior, that I ain't forgot my promise, an' that I'll send him a shotgun just as soon as he gets big enough to tote it around."

"I'll shore send it," laughed Logan, whose imagination was running wild. "But outside of the identity you suits me right down to the ground. If Hopalong Cassidy says yo're all right I'll back you to my last dollar. You mentioned hearin' music in th' air. It was a tunin' up. Will you stay for th' dance?"

"Sweet bells of joy!" exclaimed Johnny, leaving the saddle as though shot out by a spring. "From wimmin', barb wire, sheep an' railroad towns, to this! I can go to town with th' boys once more! I can cuss out loud an' swagger around regardless! An' some mangey gent is careless with his gun! You can lose me just as easy as a cow can lose a tick. I feel right at home."

"All right, then. Strip off yore saddle and turn that fine cayuse loose," replied Logan, chuckling. He hoped that he might be able to coax the new man to swap horses. "Th' cook's callin' his hogs, so let's go feed."

CHAPTER III
THE WISDOM OF THE FROGS

For two weeks Johnny rode range with the outfit and got familiar with the ranch. There was one discovery which puzzled him and seemed to offer an explanation for the shot on the trail: He had found the ruins of a burned homestead on the northern end of the ranch and he guessed that it had been used by "nesters;" and the evicted squatters might have mistaken him for Logan. His thoughts constantly turned to the man who had shot at him, and to the country around Twin Buttes; and often he sat for minutes, stiffly erect in his saddle, staring at the two great buttes, eager to explore the country surrounding them and to pay his debt.

From where he rode, facing westward, he could see the Deepwater, cold at all seasons of the year. Flowing swiftly, it gurgled and swished around bowlders of lava and granite and could be forded in but one place in thirty miles, where it spread out over a rocky, submerged plateau on the trail between the CL and Hastings, and where it grew turbulent and frothy with wrath as it poured over the up-thrust ledges. Along its eastern bank lay the ranch, in the valley of the Deepwater, and beyond it a short distance stood the Barrier, following it mile after mile and curving as it curved.

The Barrier, well named, was a great ledge of limestone, up-flung like a wall, sheer, smooth and only occasionally broken by narrow crevices which ran far back and sloped gradually upward, rock-strewn, damp, cool, and wild. It stretched for miles to Johnny's right and left, a wall between the wild tumble of the buttes and the smooth, gently rolling, fertile plain, which, beginning at the river, swept far to the eastward behind him, where it eventually became lost in the desert wastes. On one side of the rampart lay the scurrying river and the valley of the Deepwater, rolling, sparsely timbered and heavily grassed, placid, peaceful, restful; on the other, seeming to leap against the horizon, lay the grandeur of chaos, wild and forbidding.

Highest above all that jagged western skyline, shouldering up above all other buttes and plateaus, Twin Buttes peremptorily challenged attention. Remarkably alike from all sides, when viewed from the CL ranch-house they seemed to have been cast in the same mold; and the two towering, steep-sided masses with their different colored strata stood high above the Barrier and the chaos behind it like concrete examples of eternity.

Twin Buttes were the lords of their realm, and what a realm it was! Around them for miles great buttes rose solidly upward, naked on their abrupt sides except for an occasional, straggling bush or dwarfed pine or fir which here and there held precarious footholds in cracks and crevices or on the more secure placement of a ledge. Deep draws choked with brush lay between the more rolling hills along the eastern edge of the watershed where the Barrier stood on guard, and rich patches of heavy grass found the needed moisture in them. On the slopes of the hills were great forests of yellow pine, a straggling growth of fir crowning their tops. Farther west, where the massive buttes reared aloft, the deep canyons were of two kinds. The first, wide, with sloping banks of detritus, were covered with pine forests and torn with draws; the second, steep-walled, were great, narrow chasms of wind- and water-swept rock, bare and awe inspiring. They sloped upward to the backbone of the watershed and had humble beginnings in shallow, basin-like arroyos, which gradually became boxes in the rock formation as the level sloped downward.

But the chaos stopped at the Barrier, which marked the breaking of stratum upon stratum of the earth's crust. Ages ago there had been a mighty struggle here between titanic forces. To the west the earth's crust, battered into buttes, canyons, draws, and great plateaus, had held out with a granite stubbornness and strength defying the seething powers below it; but the limestone and the sandstone, weaker brothers, betrayed by the treachery of the shales, had given under the great strain and parted. The western portion had held its own; but the eastern section had dropped down into the heaving turmoil and formed the floor of the valley of the Deepwater. And as if in compensation, the winds of the ages, still battling with the stubborn buttes, had robbed them of soil and deposited it in the valley.

One evening, when Johnny rode in for supper, Logan met him at the corral and held out his hand.

"Shake, Nelson," he smiled. "Crosby went to town today and brought me a letter from th' Tin Cup. After you have fed up, come around to my room an' see me. I want to hold a right lively pow-wow with you."

"Shore enough!" laughed Johnny, an expectant grin on his face. "Bet he laid me out from soda to hock, tail to bit, th' old pirate!"

"Well, you've got a terrible reputation, young man. Go an' feed."

Johnny was the first at the table that night, and the first away from it by a wide margin. Rolling a cigarette, he lit it and hastened to Logan's quarters, where he found the foreman contentedly smoking.

"Come in an' set down," invited the foreman. "We're goin' to do a lot of talkin'; it's due to be a long session. There's th' letter."

Johnny read it:

"Mr. John C. Logan. Dear Sir: I take my pen in hand to answer your letter of recent date. Pete paid Red the 8 dollars to even up for the pants, but nobody paid me for the shirt, ask him why he took the best one. William, Junior, hates tobacco. We was scared hed die. He swears most suspicious like Johnny Nelson. I hid the gun in the storeroom. It cost me $12 damages the first week, besides a calf. Can you use Pete Wilson? I'll pay 1/2 his wages the first 6 months. I'd ruther have boils than him. He's worse since Johnny left. Don't let Johnny come north again, and God have mercy on your soul. He's easy worth $70, if you are in trouble. If you ain't in trouble he'll get you there. Excuse pensil. Yours truly, Wm. Cassidy, Senior. P. S. His old job is waiting for him and he can have the shirt. It must be near wore out anyhow. Tell him it only costs 2 cents to write me a letter, but I bet hell freezes before I get one. William, Junior, raised the devil when he missed Johnny. Yes, he worked on the Bar-20. If he sends the kid a shotgun, I'll come down and bust his neck. Excuse pensil."

Johnny looked steadily out of the door, ashamed to let Logan see his face, for homesickness is no respecter of age. He gulped and felt like a sick calf. Logan smiled at him through the gloom and chuckled, and at the sound the puncher stiffened and turned around with a fine attempt at indifference.

The foreman nodded at the letter. "Keep it if you wants. They must be a purty fine bunch, them fellers. I never knowed any of 'em, but I've heard a lot about 'em. 'Youbet' Somes used to drop in here once in a while, an' he knowed 'em all. I ain't seen Youbet for quite a spell now."

Johnny managed to relax his throat. "Finest outfit that ever wore pants," he blurted. "Youbet's dead. Went out fightin' seven sheep-herders in a saloon, but he got three of 'em. Hoppy met up with two of th' others th' next summer an' had words with 'em. Th' other two are still livin', I reckon." He thought for a moment and growled: "It's th' wimmin that done it. You wouldn't believe how that crowd has changed! D—n it, why can't a man keep his friends?"

The foreman puffed slowly and made no answer beyond a grunt of understanding. Johnny folded the letter carefully and put it in his pocket. "What's th' cow business comin' to, anyhow?" he demanded. "Wimmin, railroads, towns, sheep, wire—" he despaired of words and glared at the inoffensive corral.

"An' rustlers," added Logan.

"They're only an incident," retorted Johnny. "They can be licked, like a disease; but th' others—oh, what's th' use!"

"Yo're right," replied Logan; "but it's the rustlers that have got me worried. I ain't thinkin' about th' others very much, yet."

Johnny turned like a flash. He wanted action, action that would take his thoughts into other channels. The times were out of joint and he wanted something upon which to vent his spleen. He had been waiting for that word to come from Logan, waiting for days. And he had a score of his own to pay, as well.

"Rustlers!" he exulted. "I knowed it! I've knowed it for a week, an' I'm tired of ridin' around like a cussed fool. I know th' job I want! What about 'em?"

Logan closed the door by a push of his foot, refilled and lit his pipe, and for two hours the only light the room knew was the soft glow of the pipe and the firey ends of the puncher's cigarettes, while Logan unfolded his troubles to eager ears. The cook sang in the kitchen as he wrestled his dishes and pans, and then the noise died out. Laughter and words and the thumping of knuckles on a card table came from the bunkroom, and grew silent. A gray coyote slid around the corral, sniffing suspiciously, and at some faint noise faded into the twilight, and from a distant rise howled mournfully at the moon. From a little pond in the corral came the deep-throated warning of the frogs, endless, insistent, untiring: "Go 'round! Go 'round! Knee deep! Knee deep! Go 'round! Go 'round! Go 'round!"

The soft murmur of voices in the foreman's room suddenly ceased, and a chair scraped over the sandy floor. The door creaked a protest as it swung slowly inward and a gray shape suddenly took form against the darkness of the room, paused on the threshold and then Logan stepped out into the moonlight and knocked his pipe against his boot heel. A second figure emerged and joined him, tossing away a cigarette.

The foreman yawned and shook his head. "I didn't know how to get 'em, Nelson," he said again. "I wasn't satisfied to stop th' rustlin'. I wanted to wipe 'em out an' get back my cows; but I didn't have men enough to go about it right, an' that cussed Barrier spoiled every plan."

"Yes," said the puncher. "But it's funny that none of th' boys, watchin' nights, never got a sign of them fellers. They must be slick. Well, all right; there'll have to be another plan tried, an' that'll be my job. I told you that I found traces of lead over near Twin Buttes? Well, I'm goin' prospectin', an' try to earn that seventy dollars a month. Any time you see a green bush lyin' at th' foot of th' Barrier, just north of Little Canyon, keep th' boys from ridin' near there that same night. I may have some business there an' I shore don't want to be shot at when I can't shoot back. It's too cussed bad Hoppy an' Red are married."

Logan laughed: "Then don't you make that mistake some day! But what about that feller Pete Wilson that Cassidy wants to get rid of?"

"Don't you worry about me gettin' married!" snorted Johnny. "I saw too much of it. An' as for Pete, he's too happy wallerin' in his misery. Anyhow, he wouldn't leave Hoppy an' th' boys; an' they wouldn't let him go. You couldn't drag him off the Tin Cup with a rope. Then we've settled it, huh? I'm to leave you tomorrow, with hard words?"

"Hard words ain't necessary. I know every man that works for me an' they'll stick, an' keep their mouths shut. Now, I warn you again: I wouldn't give a dollar, Mex., for yore life if you go through with your scheme. An' it'll be more dangerous because you look like me, an' have worked for me. You can give it up right now an' not lose anythin' in my opinion. Think it over tonight."

Johnny laughed and shook his head.

"Well," said the foreman, "I'm lettin' you into a bad game, with th' cards stacked against you; but I'll come in after you when you say th' word; an' th' outfit'll be at my back."

"I know that," smiled Johnny. "I'll be under a handicap, keepin' under cover an' not doin' any shootin'; but If I make a gun-play they'll begin to do some figgerin'. Gosh, I'm sleepy. Reckon I'll hunt my bunk. Good night."

"No gun-play," growled Logan. "You know what I want. How many they are, where they round up my cows, an' when they will be makin' a raid, so I can get 'em red-handed. We'll do the fightin'. Good night."

They shook hands and parted, Johnny entering the house, Logan wandering out to the corral, where he sat on a stump for an hour or more and slowly smoked his pipe. When he finally arose he found that it was out, and cold, much to his surprise.

"Go 'round! Go 'round!" said the pond. "Better go 'round! Go 'round!"

Logan turned and sighed with relief at a problem solved. "Yo're a right smart frog, Big Mouth," he grinned. "'Go 'round' is th' medicine; an' I've got th' doctor to shove it down their throats! There's a roundup due in th' Twin Buttes, an' it's started now."

CHAPTER IV
A FEINT

Pop Hayes sighed, raised his head and watched the door as hoof-beats outside ceased abruptly.

"Dearly Beloved!" said an indignant voice. "If you tries any more of yore tricks I'll gentle you with th' butt of a six-gun, you barrel-bellied cow! Oh, that's it, huh? I savvy. You yearns for that shade. Go to it, Pepper."

"'Dearly Beloved'!" snorted Pop in fine disgust. "You'd think it was a weddin' tower! Who th' devil ever heard a cayuse called any such a name as that?" he indignantly demanded of Andrew Jackson; but Andrew paid no attention to him. The bird's head was cocked on one side and he sidled deliberately toward the door.

A figure jumped backward past the door, followed by a pair of hoofs, which shot into sight and out again. Andy stopped short and craned his neck, his beady eyes glittering with quick suspicion.

"I can shore see where you an' me has an argument," said the voice outside. "If you make any more plays like that I'll just naturally kick yore ribs in. G'wan, now; I ain't got no sugar, you old fool!" And the smiling two-gun man stepped into the room, with a wary and affectionate backward glance. "Hello, Pop!" he grinned. "You old Piute, you owes me a drink!"

"Like h—l I do!" retorted Pop with no politeness, sitting up very straight in his chair.

"You shore do!" rejoined Johnny firmly. "Didn't you tell me that th' CL was a nice ranch to work for?"

"Yo're loco! I didn't say nothin' of th' kind!" snapped Pop indignantly. "I said they'd work you nigh to death; that's what I said!"

"Oh; was that it?" asked Johnny dubiously. "I ain't nowise shore about it; but we'll let it go as it lays. Then I owe you a drink; so it's all th' same. Yo're a real prophet."

Pop hastily shuffled to his appointed place and performed the honors gracefully. "So you went an' got a job over there, huh?" he chuckled. "An' now yo're all through with 'em? Well, I will say that you stuck it out longer than some I knows of. Two weeks with Logan is a long time."

"It's so long that I've aged considerable," admitted Johnny, smiling foolishly. "But I'm cured. I'm cured of punchin' cows for anybody, for a while. Seems to me that all I've done, all my life, was to play guardian, to fool cows. I've had enough for a while. Th' last two weeks plumb cured me of punchin'."

He looked down and saw Andy, feathers ruffled, squaring off for another go at the spur, stooped suddenly, scooped the squawking bird into his hand, tossed it into the air, caught it, and quickly shoved it headfirst into a pocket. Andy swore and backed and wriggled, threatened to eat his black heart and to do other unkind and reprehensible things. Giving a desperate heave he plopped out of the pocket and struck the floor with a thud. Shaking himself, he screamed profane defiance at the world at large and then made his clumsy and comical way up the chaps and finally roosted on the butt of one of the six-guns, where he clucked loudly and whistled.

Johnny gave a peculiar whistle in reply, and almost instantly Pop let out a roar and jumped toward the door to drive back a black horse that was coming in.

"Get out of here!" he yelled pugnaciously. Pepper bared her teeth and slowly backed out again. Turning, Pop glared at the puncher. "Did you see that? Mebby Andy ain't th' only animal that drinks," he jabbed, remembering a former conversation.

Johnny laughed and scratched the bird, which stood first on one foot and then on the other, foolish with ecstatic joy.

Pop regarded the bird with surprise. "Well, if that don't beat all!" he marveled. "There ain't another man can do that, 'cept me, an' get off with a whole hand. Andy'll miss you, I reckon."

"He won't miss me much," responded Johnny, comfortably seating himself in Pop's private chair. "I ain't leavin' th' country."

"You won't have to. There's other ranches, where they treats punchers better'n cows. There's another chair, over there."

"No more ranches for me," replied Johnny, ignoring the hint. "I'm through punchin', I tell you. I'm goin' to play a while for a change."

"Gamblin's bad business," replied Pop, turning to get the cards.

"Mebby some gamblin' is; but there's some as ain't," grinned Johnny. "I ain't meanin' cards."

"Oh," said Pop, disappointed. "What you mean—shootin' craps?"

"Nope; I'm goin' prospectin'; an' if that ain't gamblin' then I never saw anythin' that was."

Pop straightened up and stared. "Prospectin?" he demanded, incredulously. "Regular prospectin'? Well, I'll be cussed! If yo're goin' to do it around here, lemme tell you it won't be no gamble. It'll be a dead shore loss. A flea couldn't live on what you'll earn on that game in this country."

"Well, I ain't aimin' to support no flea, unless Andy leaves me one," laughed Johnny, again scratching the restless bird. "But I'm tired of cows, an' I might as well amuse myself prospectin' as any other way. I like this country an' I'm goin' to stay a while. Besides, when I was a kid I shore wanted to be a pirate; then when I got older I saw a prospector an' hankered to be one. I can't be a pirate, but I'm goin' to be a prospector. When my money is gone I'll guard cows again."

"Lord help us!" muttered Pop. "Yo're plumb loco."

"How can I be plumb an' loco at th' same time?"

"Andy!" snapped Pop. "Come away from there! Lord knows you ain't got no sense, but there ain't no use riskin' yore instinct!"

Johnny laughed. "Leavin' jokes aside, me an' Pepper are goin' off by ourselves an' poke around pannin' th' streams an' bustin' nuggets off th' rocks till we get a fortune or our grub runs out. We can have a good time, an'—hey! You got any fishhooks?"

"Fishhooks nothin'!" snorted Pop. "Lot of call I got for fishhooks. Why, I ain't heard th' word for ten years. Say!" he grinned sheepishly. "Mebby you'll get lonesome. Now, if we went off together, with some fishhooks—but, shucks! I can't leave this here business."

Johnny hid his relief. "That's th' worst of havin' a business. You certainly can't go off an' let everythin' go to smash."

"Cuss th' luck!" growled Pop. "Gosh, I'm all het up over it! I ain't done no fishin' since I was a kid, an' there must be lots of trout in these streams." Then he brightened a little. "But I dunno. You look too cussed much like Logan to be real comfortable company for me. I reckon I'll pay attention to business."

Johnny showed a little irritation. "There you go again! You do a lot of worryin' about my looks. If they don't suit you, start right in an' change 'em!"

"There you go!" snapped Pop disgustedly. "On th' prod th' first thing! You'd show more common sense if you did some of th' worryin'. But then, I reckon it'll be all right if you does yore prospectin' an' fishin' south of here."

"No, sir! I'm goin' to do it north of here, in th' Twin Buttes country."

Pop's expression baffled description, and his Adam's apple bobbed up and down like a monkey on a stick. "Good Lord! You stick to Devil's Gap, an' south of there!"

Johnny's eyes narrowed and he sat up very straight. "This is a free country an' I goes where I please. It's a habit of mine. I said north, an' that's where I'm goin'. I wasn't so set on it before; but now I'm as set as a Missouri mule."

Pop growled. "There ain't no chance of you havin' my company; an' you leave th' name an' address of yore next of kin before you starts."

Johnny laughed derisively. "I ain't worryin'. An' now let's figger out what a regular prospector needs. Bein' new at th' game I reckon I better get some advice. What I'm dubious about are th' proper things to pry th' nuggets loose with, an' hoist 'em on my cayuse," he grinned. "Ought to have a pick, shovel, gold pan for placer fussin'—'gold pan' sounds regular, don't it?—an' some sacks to tie it up in. A dozen'll do for a starter. I can allus come back for more."

"Or you can borrow a chuck waggin; that would be handy because it would make it easy to get yore body out, 'though I reckon they'll just bury you an' let it go that way."

"They? Meanin' who?"

"I ain't got a word to say."

"There's some consolation in that," jeered Johnny.

"Yo're a fool!" snorted Pop heatedly.

"An' so that's went an' follered me down here, too," sighed Johnny. "A man can't get away from some things. Well, let's get back on th' trail. All th' prospectors I ever saw wore cowhide boots, with low, flat heels. Somehow I can't see myself trampin' around with these I'm wearin'; an' they're too expensive to wear 'em out that way. What else? Need any blastin' powder?"

"Cussed if I wouldn't grub-stake you if you wasn't goin' up there," grinned Pop. "It takes a fool for luck; an' it'll be just like you to fall down a canyon an' butt th' dirt off'n a million dollar nugget. I got a notion to do it anyhow."

"You needn't get no notions!" retorted Johnny. "I'm goin' to hog it. Prospectors never get grub-staked unless they're busted; an' I ain't got there yet. Oh, yes; I got to get them fishhooks—you see, I ain't aimin' to cripple my back workin' hard all th' time. I'll fill a sack in th' mornin', eat my dinner an' rest all afternoon. Next day I'll fill another sack, an' so on. Now, what am I goin' to get for my outfit? I'll need a lot of things."

"Go see Charley James, acrost th' street. He keeps th' general store; an' he's got more trash than anybody I ever saw."

"Mebby he can tell me what I need," suggested Johnny, hopefully.

As Pop started to answer, the doorway darkened and a man stepped into the room. Pop's face paled and he swiftly moved to one side, out of range. The newcomer glanced at Johnny, swore under his breath and his hand streaked to his holster. It remained there, for he discovered that he was glaring squarely down a revolver barrel.

"Let loose of it!" snapped Johnny. "Now, then: What's eatin' you?"

"Why—why, I mistook you for somebody else!" muttered the other. "Comin' in from th' sunlight, sudden like, I couldn't see very well. My mistake, Stranger. What'll you have?"

Johnny grunted skeptically. "Yo're shore you can see all right now?"

"It's all right, Nelson," hastily interposed the anxious proprietor, nodding emphatic assurance. "It's all right!"

"My mistake, Mr. Nelson," smiled the stranger. "I shouldn't 'a' been so hasty—but I was fooled. Yore looks are shore misleadin'."

"They suits me. What's wrong about 'em?" demanded Johnny.

"There you go again!" snorted Pop in quick disgust. "A gent makes a mistake, says he didn't mean no harm in it, an' you goes on th' prod! Didn't I tell you that yore looks would get you into trouble? Didn't I?"

"Oh! Is that it?" He arose and slipped the gun back into its holster. "I'll take th' same, Stranger."

"Now yo're gettin' some sense," beamed Pop, smiling with relief. "Mr. Nelson, shake han's with Tom Quigley. Here's luck."

"Fill 'em again," grinned Johnny. "Not that I hankers for th' kind of liquor you sells, but because we has to do th' best we can with what's pervided."

"Pop's sellin' better liquor than he used to," smiled Quigley. "Am I to thank you for th' improvement?"

"I refuse to accept th' responsibility," laughed Johnny.

"Well, he had some waggin varnish last year, an' for a long time we was puzzled to know what he did with it. One day, somebody said his whiskey tasted like a pine knot: an' then we knew th' answer."

"You both can go to th' devil," grinned Pop.

"Aimin' to make a long stay with us, Mr. Nelson?" asked Quigley.

"That all depends on how soon I gets all th' gold out of this country."

"Ah! Prospectin'?"

"Startin' tomorrow, I am: if this varnish don't kill me.

"There ain't never been none found around here, 'though I never could understand why. There was a couple of prospectors here some years ago, an' they worked harder for nothin' than anybody I ever saw. They covered th' ground purty well, but they was broke about th' time they started south of town, an' had to clear out. They claimed there was pay dirt down there, but they couldn't get a grub-stake on th' strength of that, so they just had to quit."

"That's where it is if it's any place," said Pop hurriedly. "Th' river's workin' day an' night, pilin' it ag'in them rock ledges above th' ford; an' it's been doin' it since th' world began."

Johnny shook his head. "Mebby; but there ain't no way to get it, unless you can drain th' river. I want shallow water—little streams, where there's sand an' gravel bars an' flats. I'm aimin' to work north of here."

Quigley forced a smile and shook his head. "I'm afraid you'll waste yore time. I've been all through that section, in fact I live up there, an' some of my men have fooled around lookin' for color. There ain't a sign of it anywhere."

"Well, I'm aimin' to go back north when I get tired of prospectin'," replied Johnny, grinning cheerfully; "an' I figgers I can prospect around an' gradually work up that way, toward Hope. I'll drop in an' see you if I run acrost yore place. I reckon prospectin' is a lonesome game."

"Didn't you ever try it before?" asked Quigley in surprise.

"This is my first whirl at it," reluctantly admitted Johnny. "I'm a cow-puncher, got tired of th' north ranges an' drifted down here. An' I might 'a' stayed a cow-puncher, only I got a job on th' CL an' worked there for th' last two weeks; an' I got a-plenty. It soured me of punchin'. Outside of bein' cussed suspicious, that man Logan is loco. I don't mind bein' suspected a little at first; but I ain't goin' to work like a fool when there ain't no call for it. I might 'a' stuck it out, at that, only for a fool notion of his. That's where I cut loose."

Quigley looked curious. "New notion?"

"Yes," laughed Johnny contemptuously. "He got th' idea that th' night air, close to th' river, ain't healthy for th' cows! Told us to drive all of 'em back from th' river every evenin' before we rode in. I said as how we ought to blanket 'em, an' build fires under 'em. I reckon mebby I was a mite sarcastic, at that. Well, anyhow; we had an argument, an' I drew my pay an' quit."

Pop let out a howl. "Good Lord!" he snorted. "Evenin' air too wet for cows! Drive 'em back every night! An' lemme tell you that outfit's just foolish enough to do it, too. He-he-he!"

Quigley laughed, and then looked at the proprietor: "Pop, we ain't forgettin'. We both has bought, an' it usually goes th' rounds before it stops."

"Oh, I'll set 'em up," growled Pop.

"You ranchin', Mr. Quigley?" asked Johnny.

"Well, I am, an' I ain't," answered Quigley. "I'm farmin' an' ranchin' both, on a small scale. I got a few head, but not enough to give me much bother. We sort of let 'em look after themselves."

"Oh," said Johnny regretfully. "I thought mebby if I got tired of prospectin', an' short of cash, that I might get a job with you."

"I ain't got cows enough to keep me busy," explained Quigley. "We let 'em wander, an' get 'em as we need 'em. Well," he said, turning as if to leave, "I'm sorry about that fool break of mine, Mr. Nelson; an' to prove it I'm goin' to give you some real good advice: Keep away from th' Twin Buttes country. So long, boys."

Johnny looked after him, and then faced Pop, shrugging his shoulders. "I don't quite get th' drift of that," he said slowly; "but he ought to know th' country he lives in. I'll try Devil's Gap first; but I got a cussed strong notion not to!"

Pop sighed with relief. "Let's go over an' see what Charley's got for yore kit," he suggested.

Charley James was playing solitaire on a box laid across a nail keg and he smiled a welcome as they entered.

"Charley," said Pop. "This cow-puncher's aimin' to change his spots. He's a amatchure prospector an' wants us to pick out his outfit."

"I can believe that he's an amatchure if he's goin' to try it in this part of th' country," smiled Charley. "Nobody's ever tried it down here before."

Johnny was about to mention the two prospectors referred to by Mr. Quigley, but thought better of it.

"Oh, it's been tried," said Pop casually. "But they didn't stay long. What you got in that line, Charley?"

"I ain't shore; but first you want an axe. Come on; we'll saunter aroun' an' pick things out as they hit our eye. Here's th' axe—double bitted, six-pounder."

"Too big," chuckled Pop. "There ain't none of them there redwood trees out here; they're in Californy."

"Huh!" grunted Charley. "Mebbyso; but that's a good axe."

"Pop's right; it's too heavy," decided Johnny. "An' I don't want it double bitted because I may want to drive stakes with it."

"All right," said Charley, who had hoped to at last get rid of the big axe. "Here's a three-pounder—'Little Gem'—an' it shore is. All right; now for th' next article."

In half an hour the outfit was assembled and they were turning to leave the store when Johnny suddenly grabbed his companions. "What about some fishhooks?" he demanded anxiously.

Charley rubbed his head reflectively. "I think mebby I got some; don't remember throwin' 'em away. There was some with feathers, an' some without; plain hooks, an' flies. Brought 'em with me when I first came out here, an' never used 'em. Ought to have some line, too; an' a reel somewheres. I'll hunt 'em up an' put 'em with yore duffle. You can cut yoreself a pole. They'll be a little present from me."

"Thank you," beamed Johnny, and forthwith Pop dragged them to his place of business.

Johnny left the following morning, and one week later he returned, trudging along beside his loaded horse, and he was the owner of a generous amount of gold, the treasure of a "pocket" upon which he had blundered. He determined to keep this a secret, for if he let it be known that he had found "color," what excuse could he offer for leaving that field? It fit too well into his plans to be revealed.

Pop grinned a welcome: "Have any luck?"

"Fishin', yes," laughed Johnny. "Bet I moved ten acres of gravel. I wasted a week; now I'm goin' north."

Pop frowned. "I reckon you'll have yore own way; but put in yore time fishin' an' prospectin', an' mind yore own business."

"Shore," said Johnny. "Look here," unrolling a bundle and producing two of the gold sacks, which were heavy and bulging. Pop stared, speechless, until his new friend opened one of them and dumped four dressed trout on the bar.

"Slip 'em in a fryin' pan with some bacon," grinned Johnny.

"Get 'em in th' river?" demanded Pop incredulously.

"You know that draw runnin' east from th' Gap—th' one with them two dead pines leanin' against each other?"

"Yes; 'tain't more'n a mile from th' ford!"

"I found 'em up there, hidin' in a bush."

"Reckon you think that's funny," grunted Pop. "Why them's brook trout! I ain't had any since I was a boy. Th' devil with business! I'm goin' fishin' one day a week. Now where you goin'?"

"Got some for Charley," laughed Johnny from the door.

Charley looked up from his eternal solitaire: "Hello, Nelson!"

"Look what I got," exulted Johnny, extending the bag.

"God help us!" exclaimed Charley. "Did you—did you—"

"I did. Brook trout, Pop says. Prospectin' ain't nothin' compared to fishin'. Pop's goin' one day a week, an' after you eat these mebby you'll be with him."

"Pop can't put on no airs with me," chuckled Charley. "If he can afford to close up, so can I. But you shouldn't 'a' poked no bulgin' gold sack at me like that! It was a shock. Come on; let's take somethin' for it." He grabbed the fish and led the way across the street; and for the rest of the afternoon three happy men discussed prospecting and trout fishing, but the latter was by far the more important.

CHAPTER V
PREPARATIONS

The next morning Johnny said good-bye to Pop and walked by Pepper's side, watching the big pack on her back, while Pop, shaking his head, entered his place of business and forthwith began work on a crude sign which, one day a week, would hang on his locked front door.

Well to the north of Hastings, Johnny came to a brook flowing through a deep ravine, and, forsaking the trail, followed the little stream westward and evening found him encamped in a small clearing. He spent several days here, panning the stream and fishing during daylight, and scouting in his moccasins at night. He paid a visit to Little Canyon and explored the valley he was in, and at the head of the valley he found a deep-walled pasture above a short, narrow canyon. Deciding to erect a cabin at the canyon entrance as a monument to the innocence of his activities, he prospected a sand bar near by and rediscovered the gold which he had found at Devil's Gap, which served as an excellent excuse for locating there permanently; and after a week of hard work, the cabin became a reality.

His every movement had been made upon the supposition that he was being watched; and the supposition became a fact when he discovered boot-prints along the opposite bank of the creek. These promised him a trail by which he could easily locate the rustlers' ranch, and at daylight the next morning he was following them and finally reached a great ridge, which he ascended with caution.

Below him was a deep valley, through which a stream moved sluggishly, and at the upper end was a narrow canyon, not more than ten paces wide, through which the stream escaped from another valley above. Twin Buttes were several miles to the east of him, lying a mile or more north of the valley. He looked through the deep canyon and at the corner of a stone house at its other end, and as he watched he saw several men come into view. One of them motioned toward the south and paused to speak to his companions, whereupon Johnny wriggled down the slope and set out for his camp.

Back again in his own valley, he built a sapling fence across the little canyon, cut a pile of firewood near by, and then rode to Hastings, where he nearly gave Charley heart failure by displaying a pleasing amount of virgin gold. He did not see Pop because on the saloon door he found a sign reading: "Back at 4 P. M."

It was a very cheerful cow-puncher who rode to the new cabin that evening, for he was matching his wits against those of his natural enemies, he was playing a lone hand in his own way against odds, and the game was only beginning.

In perfect condition, virile, young, enduring, he had serene confidence in his ability to take care of himself. He admitted but one master in the art of gun-play, and that man had been his teacher and best friend for years. Even now Hopalong could beat him on the draw, but barely, and he could roll his two guns forward, backward and "mixed;" but he could shoot neither faster nor straighter than his pupil.

Johnny could not roll a gun because he never had tried very hard to master that most difficult of all gun-play, regarding it as an idle accomplishment, good only for exhibition purposes, and, while awe inspiring, Johnny had no yearning for it. He clove to strict utility and did not care to call attention to his wooden-handled, flare-butt Frontiers. There was no ornamentation on them, no ivory, inlay, or engraving. The only marks on their heavy, worn frames were a few dents. He had such a strong dislike for fancy guns that the sight of ivory grips made his lips curl, and such things as pearl handles filled him with grieving contempt for the owner.

He never mentioned his guns to any but his closest friends, and they were as unconscious a part of him as his arms or his legs. And it was his creed that no man but himself should touch them, his friends excepted. He wore them low because utility demanded it; and to so wear them, and to tie them down besides, was in itself a responsibility, for there were men who would not be satisfied with the quiet warning.

In other things, from routine ranch work to man-hunting, from roping and riding to rifle shooting, the old outfit of the Bar-20 had been his teachers and they had taken him in hand at an early age. His rifle he had copied from Hopalong; but Red had taught him the use of it, and to his way of thinking Red Connors was without a peer in the use of the longer weapon.

Johnny was a genius with his six-guns, one of those few men produced in a generation; and he did not belong to the class of fancy gun-workers who shine at exhibitions and fall short when lead is flying and the nerves are sorely tried. He shot from his hips by instinct, and that is the real test of utility. Had he turned his talents to ends which lay outside the law he would have become the most dangerous and the most feared man in the cow-country.

John Logan awoke with a start, sat up suddenly in his bunk and grunted a profane query as his hand closed over his Colt.