u've played off on me before, and I won't stand no
more of it. Jest bekase you've bin a Lieutenant-Colonel and me only a
teamster you've played the high and mighty with me. I'm jest as good as
you are any day. I wouldn't give a howl in the infernal regions for your
promises. You come down now with $100 in greenbacks and I'll go along
and help you all I kin. If you don't--"

"If I don't what'll you do, you lowlived whelp?" said Billings, in his
usual brow-beating manner. "I only let you into this as a favor, because
I've knowed you before. You hain't brains enough to make a picayune
yourself, and hain't no gratitude when someone else makes it for you.
Git out o' here; I'm ashamed to be seen speakin' to a mangy hound like
you. Git out o' here before I kick you out. Don't you dare speak to one
o' them boys, or ever to me agin. If you do I'll mash you. Git out."

Si and Shorty's dismay when they returned and found their squad entirely
disappeared was overwhelming. They stood and gazed at one another for a
minute in speechless alarm and wonderment.

"Great goodness," gasped Si at length, "they can't have gone far. They
must be somewhere around."

"Don't know about that," said Shorty despairingly. "We've bin gone some
little time and they're quick-footed little rascals."

"What fools we wuz to both go off and leave 'em," murmured Si in deep
contrition. "What fools we wuz."

"No use o' cryin' over spilt milk," answered Shorty. "The thing to
do now is to find 'em, which is very much like huntin' a needle in a
haystack. You stay here, on the chance o' them comin' back, and I'll
take a circle around there to the left and look for 'em. If I don't find
'em I'll come back and we'll go down to the Provo-Marshal's."

"Goodness, I'd rather be shot than go back to the rijimint without 'em,"
groaned Si. "How kin I ever face the Colonel and the rest o' the boys?"

Leaving Si gazing anxiously in every direction for some clew to his
missing youngsters, Shorty rushed off in the direction of the sutler's
shanties, where instinct told him he was most likely to find the
runaways.

He ran up against Groundhog.

"Where are you goin' in sich a devil of a hurry?" the teamster asked.
"Smell a distillery somewhere?"

"Hello, Groundhog, is that you? Ain't you dead yit? Say, have you seen
a squad o' recruits around here--all boys, with new uniforms, and no
letters or numbers on their caps?"

"Lots and gobs of 'em. Camp's full of 'em. More