Jed Parker straightened his back, rolled up the bandana handkerchief,
and thrust it into his pocket, hit flat with his hand the touselled
mass of his hair, and thrust the long hunting knife into its sheath.

"You're the man I want," said he.

Instantly the two-gun man had jerked loose his weapons and was covering
the foreman.

"Am I!" he snarled.

"Not jest that way," explained Parker. "My gun is on my hoss, and you
can have this old toad-sticker if you want it. I been looking for you,
and took this way of finding you. Now, let's go talk."

The stranger looked him in the eye for nearly a half minute without
lowering his revolvers.

"I go you," said he briefly, at last.

But the crowd, missing the purport, and in fact the very occurrence of
this colloquy, did not understand. It thought the bluff had been
called, and naturally, finding harmless what had intimidated it, gave
way to an exasperated impulse to get even.

"You -- -- -- bluffer!" shouted a voice, "don't you think you can run
any such ranikaboo here!"

Jed Parker turned humorously to his companion.

"Do we get that talk?" he inquired gently.

For answer the two-gun man turned and walked steadily in the direction
of the man who had shouted. The latter's hand strayed uncertainly
toward his own weapon, but the movement paused when the stranger's
clear, steel eye rested on it.

"This gentleman," pointed out the two-gun man softly, "is an old friend
of mine. Don't you get to calling of him names."

His eye swept the bystanders calmly.

"Come on, Jack," said he, addressing Parker.

On the outskirts he encountered the Mexican from whom he had borrowed
the knife.

"Here, Tony," said he with a slight laugh, "here's a peso. You'll find
your knife back there where I had to drop her."

He entered a saloon, nodded to the proprietor, and led the way through
it to a boxlike room containing a board table and two chairs.

"Make good," he commanded briefly.

"I'm looking for a man with nerve," explained Parker, with equal
succinctness. "You're the man."

"Well?"

"Do you know the country south of here?"

The stranger's eyes narrowed.

"Proceed," said he.

"I'm foreman of the Lazy Y of Soda Springs Valley range," explained
Parker. "I'm looking for a man with sand enough and sabe of the
country enough to lead a posse after cattle-rustlers into the border
country."

"I live in this country," admitted the stranger.

"So do plenty of oth