punchers, were perfectly
free to withdraw, but in doing so they forfeited their membership in the
association. But one man had taken advantage of this--Billy Speaker.

"If there's any damage to be done, those sheep have already done it. Why
don't yuh let 'em through, yuh ol' fat-head?" said Speaker to Bissell as,
with his cowboys, he threw his leg over the saddle and started homeward.

Despite the havoc to their numbers occasioned by the battle with Jimmie
Welsh, all the others stood by. With the cowboys this matter of war and
its hazards was a decided improvement over the dangerous monotony of
spring round-ups. Moreover, as long as one remained able to collect it,
five dollars a day was several pegs better than forty dollars a month and
all found.

To-day as the late sun drooped low toward the horizon revolvers and guns
were being oiled, and other preparations made for a vigorous campaign. The
camp backed directly on the river at the only fordable spot within ten
miles, the stream forming the fourth side to a square, the other three
sides of which were breastworks of earth and trenches.

A rope stretched from the three cook-wagons served as a coral for the
horses, and in it were gathered fully sixty-five animals, waiting
impatiently to be hobbled, and turned out to feed. They waited in vain,
however, for it was a matter of course that they should stand saddled and
ready for instant use.

Directly before the front of these earthworks were the pits and _chevaux
de frise_ of sharp stakes that had been reported to Bud. The intention was
to stampede the animals if possible, and run them into the pits and upon
the stakes while a force of men, protected by the trenches, poured a
withering and continuous fire into the on-surging mass. Meanwhile the
greater force on horseback would be engaging the sheepmen.

That the cowboys knew the location of the flocks goes without saying, for
had they not had spies on the lookout, the telltale pillar of dust that
ever floated above the marching thousands would have betrayed their exact
position.

The sun had just dropped below the horizon, when a man in the cowpunchers'
camp discerned a weary horse bearing a hump-shouldered rider
disconsolately in the direction of the ford. The man, bore strange-looking
paraphernalia, and could be classified as neither fish, flesh, nor
fowl--that is, cowboy, sheepman, or granger.

Without pausing the man urged his horse into the water at the ford,