ared
near the middle of the paper.

"Use her like that! You'd want a mighty steady hand to hold her dead on
the mark while you pull off."

"Sit down and tell us why you think Mr. Brandon ought to have the
pistol," Jake remarked. "I go to Santa Brigida now and then, but you
haven't offered to lend it me."

Payne sat down on the steps and looked at him with a smile. "You're all
right, Mr. Fuller. They're not after you."

"Then you reckon it wasn't me they wanted the night my partner was
stabbed? I had the money."

"Nope," said Payne firmly. "I allow they'd have corralled the dollars if
they could, but it was Mr. Brandon they meant to knock out." He paused
and added in a significant tone: "They're after him yet."

"Hadn't you better tell us whom you mean by 'they'?" Dick asked.

"Oliva's gang. There are toughs in the city who'd kill you for fifty
cents."

"Does that account for your buying the pistol when you came here?"

"It does," Payne admitted dryly. "I didn't mean to take any chances when
it looked as if I was going back on my dago partner."

"He turned you down first, and I don't see how you could harm him by
working for us."

Payne did not answer, and Dick, who thought he was pondering something,
resumed: "These half-breeds are a revengeful lot, but after all, Oliva
wouldn't run a serious risk without a stronger motive than he seems to
have."

"Well," said Payne, "if I talked Spanish, I could tell you more; but I
was taking my siesta one day in a dark wine-shop when two or three
hard-looking peons came in. They mayn't have seen me, because there were
some casks in the way, and anyhow, they'd reckon I couldn't understand
them. I didn't very well, but I heard your name and caught a word or two.
Their _patron_ had given them some orders and one called him Don Ramon.
You were to be watched, because _mirar_ came in; but I didn't get the
rest and they went out soon. I lay as if I was asleep, but I'd know the
crowd again." Payne got up as he concluded: "Anyway, you take my gun, and
keep in the main _calles_, where the lights are."

When he had gone Jake remarked: "I guess his advice is good and I'm
coming along."

"No," said Dick, smiling as he put the pistol in his pocket. "The trouble
is that if I took you down there I mightn't get you back. Besides, there
are some calculations I want you to make."

Lighting his pipe, he took his seat on the hand-car and knitted his brows
as two colored laborers drove