would effectually
separate her from her offspring.

But while he was so sure in his own mind, the Cross-Triangle man--as it
had so often happened before--had arrived on the scene too late. He had
no positive evidence that the animal just branded was not the lawful
property of Nick Cambert.

As Patches stepped from the bushes, Yavapai Joe faced him for a moment
in guilty astonishment and fear; then he ran toward his horse.

"Wait a minute, Joe!" called Patches. "What good will it do for you to
run now? I'm not going to harm you."

Joe stopped, and stood hesitating in indecision, watching the intruder
with that sneaking, sidewise look.

"Come on, Joe; let's have a little talk about this business," the
Cross-Triangle man said in a matter-of-fact tone, as he seated himself
on a large, flat-topped stone near the little fire. "You know you can't
get away, so you might as well."

"I ain't tellin' nothin' to nobody," said Joe sullenly, as he came
slowly toward the Dean's cowboy.

"No?" said Patches.

"No, I ain't," asserted the Tailholt Mountain man stoutly. "That there
calf is a Four-Bar-M calf, all right."

"I see it is," returned the Cross-Triangle rider calmly. "But I'll just
wait until Nick gets back, and ask him what it was before he worked over
the iron."

Joe, excited and confused by the cool nerve of this man, fell readily
into the verbal trap.

"You better go now, an' not wait to ask Nick no fool questions like
that. If he finds you here talkin' with me when he gets back, hell'll be
a-poppin' fer sure. Me an' you are friends, Patches, an' that's why I'm
a-tellin' you you better pull your freight while the goin's good."

"Much obliged, Joe, but there's no hurry. You don't need to be so
rushed. It will be an hour before Nick gets back, if he drives that cow
as far as he ought."

Again poor Yavapai Joe told more than he intended. "You don't need to
worry none 'bout Nick; he'll sure drive her far enough. He ain't takin'
no chances, Nick ain't."

With his convictions so readily confirmed, Patches had good ground upon
which to base his following remarks. He had made a long shot when he
spoke so confidently of the brand on the calf being worked over. For, of
course, the calf might not have been branded at all when the Tailholt
Mountain men caught it. But Joe's manner, as well as his warning answer,
told that the shot had gone home. The fact that the brand had been
worked over established also the fact tha