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shrugged his shoulders and settled back to wait.

Minutes passed and then another lumbering blot emerged out of the dark, became a cow, and found reassurance in numbers as it willingly joined the herd. The escorting rider kept on, pushed back his sombrero and growled: “They’re scattered to h—l an’ gone tonight; but,” he grudgingly admitted, “they acts plumb do-cile. S’long.”

Another wait, long and fruitless, edged anew the nerves of the herders. Then Quigley, Ackerman, and Purdy moved out of the obscurity of the night and took up positions around the herd, urging it forward. When they had it started on its way, Ackerman dropped back and became lost to sight, engaged in his characteristic patroling, suspicious and malevolent.

The little herd, skilfully guided over clean patches of rock which led deviously to the water’s edge and left no signs on its hard surface, at last reached the river, where a shiver of hesitancy rippled through it and where the rear cows pushed solidly against the front rank, which appeared to be calling upon its inherent obstinacy. The craft and diplomacy of Quigley’s long experience won out and the uncertain front rank slowly and grudgingly entered the stream, the others following without noticeable hesitation. As the last cow crossed and scrambled up the western bank, Ackerman rode down to the water’s edge, pushed in and crossed silently, only the lengthening ripple on the black surface telling of his progress. As he climbed out he squirmed in his wet clothes and swore from sudden anger, which called forth a low ripple of laughter from the base of the Barrier, where the others took their discomforts lightly.

“Scared you’ll shrink, Jim?” softly said an ironic voice.

“Or dissolve, like sugar?” inquired another scoffingly.

“Sugar?” jeered a third. “Huh! He’s about as sweet as a hunk of alum!”

Ackerman’s retort caused grins to bloom unseen, and the miseries of wet clothes and chilled bodies were somewhat relieved by the thought that Ackerman felt them the most.

Up the crevice in orderly array, docile as sheep, climbed the cattle, and when they reached the top of the plateau they moved along stolidly under guidance and finally gained the outer valley leading to the QE by a trail west of arid parallel to the one which showed the way to Hastings.

Back on the QE, Fleming and his friends, having awakened the cook at an unseemly hour by their noise, finally turned in and found some trouble in getting to sleep, thanks to the energetic efforts of the boss of the kitchen, who most firmly believed in the Mosaic Law, and had the courage of his convictions. But things finally quieted down and peace descended upon the ranch.

Outside the bunk-house and behind it, a blot on the ground stirred restlessly and slowly resolved itself into a man arising. He moved cautiously along the wall toward the lighted cook shack and then sank down again, hand on gun, as the door opened.

Cookie threw out a pan of water, scowled up at the starry sky and then peered intently at a chicken-coop, visible in the straggling light from the door, from which a sleepy cackle suddenly broke the silence. Muttering suspiciously he reached behind him and then slipped swiftly toward the shack, a shotgun in his hands. Going around the coop he stood up and shook his fist at the darkness.

“You can dig up my traps, an’ smell out my strychnine, but you can’t dodge these buckshot if ever I lays th’sights on you. Dawg-gone you, I owes you a-plenty! “he growled. Striking a match he looked in the coop and around it. “Had two dozen as nice pullets as anybody ever saw, only three weeks ago; an’ now I only got sixteen left. There, blast you! 11 he swore, as the second match revealed the telltale tracks. “There they are! O, Lord! Just let me get my gun on that thievin I ki-yote! Just once!”

He stared around belligerently and went slowly back to the house, swearing and grumbling under his breath. It is the cook’s fate to be the sworn enemy of all coyotes, and let it be said without shame to him that he seldom is a victor in that game of watchfulness and wits. And also let it be said that often with tears of rage and mortification, and words beyond repetition, he pays unintentional tribute to the uncanny cunning of the four-legged thieves. With guns, dogs, traps, and poison is he armed, but it availeth him naught. And as bad as the defeat are the knowing grins of the rest of the outfit who, while openly cheering on the doughty cook, are ready to wager a month’s wages on the coyote.

The man on the ground moved again, this time toward the canyon, and soon was feeling his way along the great eastern wall. Reaching the other end, he stopped a moment to listen, and then went on again, groping along by the edge of the stream until he stumbled over a dead branch, which he picked up. Then feeling for and finding a certain rock, he stepped on it and with his foot felt for and found another, which was partly submerged in the creek; and by means of this and others he crossed dry-shod to the opposite bank, using the branch as a staff.

Daylight was near when Johnny wriggled to the edge of the cliff opposite the houses and hid behind a fringe of grass on the rim. An hour passed and then his keen ears caught distant sounds. Below him the cook was rearranging his traps and swearing at the cleverness of his four-footed enemy. Suddenly he arose and hastened to the kitchen to serve a hot breakfast to the men who soon drove a bunch of cattle out of the canyon and into the small corral.

While the others hastened in for their breakfast, Quigley and Ackerman loitered at the corral.

“Purty good for five men, with one of ‘em playin’ sentry,” said Quigley. “We’d do better if we didn’t have to scout around first.”

“Scoutin’s necessary,” replied Ackerman. “It’s too wide open. This bunch ain’t worth gettin’ wet for. That river’s cussed cold! “

Quigley chuckled. “Huh! I’ve swum it when tk’ ice was comin’ down.”

“You did,” retorted Ackerman. “That was th f night Logan burned our houses. You had to swim an’ freeze, or stay out an’ get shot. You went in pronto, that night!”

“You beat me in by forty yards, an’ out by sixty! ” snapped Quigley.

Ackerman ignored the remark. “Not satisfied with nestin’ on a man’s range, you had to start a little herd. We didn’t bring no cows with us, nor buy any afterward but what’s th’ use? Let’s eat,” and he led the way toward the cook shack.

Johnny waited a few minutes and then, returning to his horse, started for his camp. He was puzzled, for no place near Big or Little Canyons was devoid of shelter, and he knew of no other places where cattle could pass the Barrier. He had noticed that the backs of the cows were dry, which meant that they had forded the river, and he was certain that the crossing had not been made at the ford near Devil’s Gap. He had to learn the location of the place they visited and that unknown ford; and he wanted to learn the date of their next raid.

“We’ll have to trail ‘em, Pepper,” he growled. “An’ then bust all runnin’ records to get Logan an’ th’ boys. Get agoin’; I’m sleepy.”

CHAPTER XII YEASTY SUSPICION

AKERMAN walked to the small corral, where two straight irons were in a fire and where three men were cinching up in preparation. Fleming, Harrison, and Gates, lolling on the ground, kept up a running fire of comment, and Ackerman stopped and looked down at them.

“Three cheerful fools,” he grinned.

“Here’s Little Jimmy,” remarked Fleming; “an’ by all th’ Roman gods, he’s actually grinnin’! Look, fellers! Behold an I ponder! Mr. Ackerman wears a smile!”

“Sick?” solicitously inquired Harrison.

“Drunk?” suspiciously questioned Gates.

“Three children,” grunted Ackerman. “An’ scabby. Two sentries an’ a hunter.”

Holbrook poked the fire. “Kit Carson, Dan’l Boone, an’ Californy Joe. Three scouts. Th’ ambushin’ trio.”

“Faith, Hope, an’ Charity,” chuckled Purdy.

“You called it,” grinned Holbrook.

“If Custer had only had ‘em,” said Ackerman, “there’d been no massacre.”

“Huh!” grunted Gates. “What could I do, with diem two fools herdin’ with me?”

“Not so much herdin’ with you, as tryin’ to herd you,” said Harrison blithely.

Gates sought escape by creating a diversion, and shouted: “Hey, look at him!” and pointing at the cook, who staggered past under a great load of saplings and poles.

“Hey, Cookie!” he shouted stentoriously. “Why don’t you put them birds in th’ house nights, an I sleep in th’ coop, yoreself?”

“Or give him some of that there strychnine that we got for you?” yelled Sanford. “There’s a lot of it left,” he chuckled, remembering the cook’s futile rage when he had found the poisoned carcass half covered -over with dirt.

The cook, his glistening face crimson, carefully lowered the forward end of the poles to the ground, eased them upright with his shoulder and wiped the perspiration from his face with a grimy sleeve. Turning a red countenance toward his grinning friends he started to speak, muttered something, spat forcibly, shouldered carefully under his load again and staggered away with as much dignity as he could command.

“That’s right, Cookie,” commended Gates. “Don’t you waste no words on ‘em a-tall. They’re a lazy, worthless, shiftless lot. If they wasn’t they’d help you tote them trees. But I wish you’d tell me what yo’re aimin’ to do, because if yo’re goin’ to rig up a scaffold for that ki-yote, I want to be around when he’s hung.” He turned and surveyed the group. “You ought to be ashamed of yoreselves, lettin’ him tote that load hisself. He works harder than any man on this ranch, an’ I can prove it. I can prove it by him. What with buildin’ stockades an’ scaffolds, diggin’ holes for his traps, poisonin’ baits, an’ settin’ up nights with his shotgun, he’s a hard workin’ member of this outfit. He ain’t got no time to set around an’ loaf all day like some-I could name if I had a mind to.”

“Hard workin’!” snorted Purdy. “That ain’t work-; that’s fun! He’s as happy doin’ that as others is playin’ cards or somethin’. He’d get mopey if that ki-yote died. A man allus works harder at hi funthan he does at his work. Allus!”

“Shore!” grunted Holbrook. “I’ve seen men so’ lazy that they growled because th’ sun kept ‘em movin’ to stay in th’ shade; but show ‘em a month’s good huntin’ an’ they’d come to life quick! They’ll climb an’ hoof it all day to get a shot at somethin’; but if their wife asked ‘em to rustle a bucket of water you. could hear ‘em holler, clear over in th’ next county.”

“Would you look at him settin’ them poles!” chuckled Gates. “He’s shore goin’ down to bedrock!”

Holbrook pulled an iron out of the fire, glanced at it, shoved it back again and arose. “Let her go,” he said.

At the word two men vaulted into their saddles and rode into the corral. A cow blundered out and was deftly turned toward the fire, and at the right instant a rope shot through the air, straightened and grew taut; and the cow, thrown heavily, was hogtied, branded, its ears cut to conform to the QE notch, and released in a remarkably short time. Arising it waved its lowered head from side to side and started to charge Holbrook. Gates stepped quickly forward, kicked a spurt of dirt in its face and a clever cow-pony sent

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