r y'r Ridge, limpin', the one
armed man rockin' in the saddle an' spittin' out blasphemous filth for
th' others to wait. A've kept guard all night, yellin' an' howlin'
like a vigilantee, knowin' they're not the gentry to run into the arms
of them good old-time neck-tie com'tees; an' not dreamin' A hadn't
another cartridge to my name!" The old man swabbed the sweat from his
brow.

"A left m' coat and togs back at yon chuck wagon!" Wayland noticed he
was riding stocking soled.

"I have an extra hat for you here." Wayland tossed the soft felt from
the pocket of his leather coat.

"Oh, A saw 'em plain enough; same ill-lookin' six that y'r hell-kite
laws hatch on a bad frontier! Make no mistake. Yon white vest is at
the bottom o' this deviltry! Who is he, Wayland?"

Wayland related the visit of a white-vest to his Ridge cabin; and they
trotted forward towards a sheep wagon.

"How did y' come up here?" asked the old frontiersman.

"Where did you get that horse?" retorted the Ranger.

"One of the chuck wagons' teams--"

"Herders all right?" asked Wayland. He knew what the answer must be;
the same answer that had been disgracing the West these twenty years.

The old man jerked his horse to a dead stop, drew himself erect and
looked straight at the Ranger.

"Wayland, man, is this Russia--or Hell? Is there another country in
the world calls itself civilized would allow four herder men to be
burned to death? Does the country know what is doing? Do you know
what happened? Do you know that last wagon is left there only because
the rains put out the fire? Y'll find the iron tires of the other
wagons with skeletons of men chained to the wheels. A came up just as
they were settin' aboot firin' the second wagon. They'd ripped all the
flour bags open and loosed the horses. This one, A caught full pelther
down the trail."

The old man shook his head.

They trotted their horses across the Mesas in silence towards the
glaring white canvas wagon. Broken harness, half-burned spokes, the
charred hub of a wheel, snapped whiffle-trees, the white dust of
scattered flour littered the ground. A brown scorch of flame up the
back of the tent above the remaining wagon marked where the rains had
extinguished the fire. A smouldering ill-smelling ash heap told the
fate of the other wagons.

"Hell-devilish work, hell-devilish work! Th' beasts of the field
couldna' conceive such baseness, Wayland! 'Tis the work o' devi