over the brink and lay gasping on the grass above. For ten minutes or more he remained prone on the ground, taking in great gulps of air, and oblivious to everything save the fact that the necessity for violent, incessant effort had ceased. Presently he stood up.
`Gosh, out it's grand to stand on a solid bit o' earth again!' he said. `Never did like the notion o' dancin' on nothin'. Wonder how far that blamed boss o' mine went?'
He put his fingers to his mouth and gave a shrill whistle. Getting no result, he coiled the rope and made his way down the trail which had led to his undoing. When he reached the spot where he had been roped, he whistled again, and waited. Presently came the sound of something forcing its way through the brush and his pony appeared.
`Yu son of a gun,' said the cowpuncher, and his tone betrayed a whimsical affection, `I shore didn't waste my time trainin' yu.'
A drink from his canteen refreshed him, and, mounting the horse, he climbed the cliff again to see if he could pick up the trail of his assailants. In this he was successful, and followed it for some miles, until it became lost in a wide cattle-trail which he took to be the one leading to the Double X, but whether the horsemen had gone to that ranch, or turned the other way, he could not discover.
`Reckon I'll call it a day,' he concluded, and turned his horse in the direction of the Y Z.
At the corral he encountered Larry, and soon learned that the outfit had been no more successful than he himself. They had followed him to the blind canyon, crossed the stream and the stretch of shale to the big trail, and then the foreman had decided that the quest was hopeless, and ordered them all back to the ranch.
`We was shore worried about yu--'specially Rattler,' the boy concluded. `Where in 'ell did yu get to?'
`Oh, I was around,' replied Green. `Any feller answerin' to the name of 'Snub' in these parts?'
`Shore is. One of the Double X lot. Don't know anythin' of him. Yu don't think--'
`Yes, I do, sometimes,' smiled Green. `It don't hurt, when yu get used to it. Yu oughtta try it.'
`If I didn't feel scared it would make me look like yu, I might,' countered Larry. `Say, I near forgot it--the Old Man wants to see yu. I met Miss Norry just now an' she told me.'
`An' yu near forgot her message,' reproved Green, with twinkling eyes. `Larry, I'm plumb ashamed of yu.'
`Aw, yu go to--' But Green was already on his way to the ranch-house.
He found Simon, with his daughter and Blaynes, sitting on the verandah, and, at the request of his employer, gave a bald account of what had happened to him. When he had finished, the foreman burst into a loud laugh, which was cut short when Noreen said indignantly :
`I don't see anything amusing about a cold-blooded attempt at murder.'
`Aw, Miss Noreen, yu got it wrong,' protested the offender. `Them Double X boys--if it was them--was just playing a joke. They meant to leave him there to cook in the sun for an hour or two, until they come back to pull him up again. They certainly seem to have got yu scared, Green.'
`Scared? Why, I'm near grey-headed now,' returned Green, and grinned. `Yu think it was just a joke, eh?'
`Shore of it,' replied the foreman.
`Well, yu know 'em better than I do,' was the meaning retort. `Next time yu see yore friend Snub, tell him from me that practical jokin' is a game two can play at.'
'Yo're callin' the wrong card,' snapped the foreman. `I ain't got no friends at the Double X, but if ever I meet this feller Snub I'll shore deliver yore message.'
`A pretty sort of practical joke,' the girl said contemptuously. `It mades me shudder to think of those horrible birds.'
`They musta forgot to tell the vultures it was only a game,' Green said gravely, and had the satisfaction of seeing the foreman squirm when Noreen laughed at him. `I understand yu lost the trail again?'
`We follered it as far as it went,' snorted the other. `I'm as good as the next at teadin' sign, but I don't claim to be able to see it when it ain't there.'
`Well, we don't appear to be gettin' any forrader,' interposed Old Simon. 'Yu'd better turn in, Blaynes; yu've had a long day.'
This was a dismissal, and the foreman, very unwillingly, had to take his departure. When he had gone, the ranch-owner turned to the cowpuncher.
`The joke idea don't appeal to yu none?'
Green smiled. `I reckon my sense o' humour must be some shy,' he said.
`Think the Double X is mixed up in the rustlin'?'
`I dunno, I got nothin' on them--yet; but have yu ever thought what a nice convenient brand the Double X might be? See here.'
He took pencil and paper from his pocket, drew something, and handed the result to Old Simon. `There's yore brand,' he said, `an' by the side of it is what a smart feller with a runnin' iron an' a wet blanket might do to it.'
The ranch-owner gave one glance at the paper and swore softly. `By heaven, it's as easy as takin' a drink ! I've a mind to call Dexter's hand to-morrow.'
`That won't get yu nowhere,' Green pointed out. `If they're doin' it, yu can bet they're coverin' their tracks, an' my hunch is that they ain't in it alone. We gotta get more evidence; yu couldn't hang a dog on this.'
`Mebbe yo're right,' Simon admitted. `So yu guess it's whites passin' as Injuns? Blaynes warn't so wide o' the mark then.' `It is only a guess, an' we'd better keep it under our hats for the present,' Green replied. `Any other ranch round here been losin' cattle?'
`There's only the Frying Pan, thirty mile to the west of us. I saw Leeming, the boss, in Hatchett's a week or so back, an' he didn't have any complaints.'
Several times during the conversation Green's glance had unconsciously rested on Noreen, and he had been disconcerted to find that on each occasion she had been regarding him steadily. Sitting there in the fading light, she made a picture to content any man. The recent tragedy had left its mark upon her, and instead of a merry, laughing girl, he now saw a serious, sweet-faced woman. `Larry will be a very lucky chap,' he thought, and was instantly conscious that he did not believe it.
`Well, I'll be driftin' along,' he said, rising. `Let yu know if there's anythin' fresh.'
`Don't you think, Daddy, that Mr. Green ought to have help?' Noreen asked quietly.
`Why, that's a good notion, girl,' her father said instantly. `What about takin' one o' the boys with yu, Green?'
`It's shore kind o' Miss Noreen to suggest it, an' I hope the time's comin' when I'll need assistance, but till it does come I'd rather go it single-handed,' the cowpuncher replied. `I guess Barton would jump at the invite. Mebbe yu were thinkin' of him?' he added with a smile.
`I hadn't anyone in particular in mind,' Noreen returned. `I should have thought Larry had not sufficient experience; he is only a boy.'
`He's a mighty good one--I wouldn't ask for a better,' said Green, and the girl wondered at the sudden warmth in his tone.
`Oh, I'm sure of that; but he's so--young,' she explained lamely.
`Well, I guess he'll grow out o' that soon enough,' chuckled Simon. `Anyways, yu can have him, or any o' the others when yu say, Green.'
Walking back to the bunkhouse, the puncher turned the conversation over in his mind, and came to the conclusion that Larry would not be lucky. `Only a boy ! An' he's a coupla years older than she is,' he murmured. `Women shore age quicker'n we do.'
His entrance into the bunkhouse was the signal for a burst of merriment from the older men, and he immediately divined that the foreman had been relating the story of his discomfiture. Durran was the first to fire a shot.
`I hear as how yu bin havin' a look at the country, Green,' he said, with a wide grin.
`An' that yu found the rustlers' hang-out,' added Nigger, with a marked emphasis on the last word.
Will yu walk into my parlour, said the spider to the fly,' hummed another. `An' the fly wasn't fly enough to.'
