to the barn.

The cowboy's heart was heavy with remorse. He blamed himself for all the
trouble. Had he not wanted to make a fool of himself and get drunk the
Ramblin' Kid would not have come to Eagle Butte, the fight would not
have occurred, the friend he had ridden with through storm and
sunshine--whom he had stood "night guard" and fought mad stampedes into
"the mill"--would not now be an outcast sought by the hand of the law.

News of the beating the Ramblin' Kid gave Sabota traveled fast.

It was flashed over Eagle Butte that the Greek was dead.

"So th' Ramblin' Kid killed old Sabota, did he?" the hostler at the
livery barn asked Skinny as he stepped out to care for the cowboy's
horse. "What was it over? Sabota having th' Ramblin' Kid 'doped' the day
of the sweepstakes?"

Skinny looked keenly, searchingly, at the stableman.

"What do you mean--'Sabota having th' Ramblin' Kid doped?'" he asked
sharply.

"Why, didn't you know?" the hostler replied. "I thought everybody
knowed. Gyp Streetor told me about it the day of the race--I used to
know Gyp when he was a kid back east. I saw him as he was beating it to
get out of town. He borrowed five dollars from me. Said Sabota hired him
to put 'knock-out' in some coffee for th' Ramblin' Kid and he reckoned
the dose wasn't big enough or something. Anyhow, it didn't hold him
under long as they thought it would and when he saw the Gold Dust
maverick show up on the track he got scared--was afraid it would leak
out or th' Ramblin' Kid would suspect him and try to 'get' him after the
race, so he ducked out of town--"

"You ain't lying about that?" Skinny asked.

"What would I want to lie about it for?" the other replied. "Wasn't
that what made th' Ramblin' Kid kill the Greek?"

"No, it was something else," Skinny answered; "but Sabota ain't dead.
He's just crunched up pretty bad--th' Ramblin' Kid jumped on him, like
Captain Jack did on that feller from the Chickasaw that tried to steal
him!"

Skinny's mind was in a whirl.

So the Ramblin' Kid was not drunk the day of the race! He was drugged--
sick--yet, in spite of everything, rode the Gold Dust maverick and beat
the black wonder-horse from the Vermejo! Lord! and they had all thought
he was on a tear!

The bottle of whisky was still in the bosom of Skinny's shirt.

He had not touched it. He felt a sudden revulsion for the vile stuff.

"Here," he said, jerking the flask from its hiding-place and handing it
to t