urage?"

The schoolteacher sighed. "I'm afraid not, Sally. I guess my only
courage comes in waiting and seeing how things turn out."

He turned and went gloomily back to his room.

12

With the first brightness of dawn, Sinclair wakened even more suddenly
that he had fallen asleep. There was no slow adjusting of himself to
the requirements of the day. One prodigious stretching of the long
arms, one great yawn, and he was as wide awake as he would be at noon.
He jerked on his boots and rose, and not until he stood up, did he see
John Gaspar asleep in the big chair, his head inclining to one side,
the book half-fallen from his hand, and the lamp sputtering its last
beside him. But instead of viewing the weary face with pity, Sinclair
burst into sudden and amazed profanity.

The first jarring note brought Gaspar up and awake with a start, and he
stared in astonishment at the uninterrupted flood which rippled from
the lips of the cowpuncher. It concluded: "Still here! Of all the
shorthorned fatheads that I ever seen, the worst is this Gaspar--this
Jig--this Cold Feet. Say, man, ain't you got no spirit at all?"

"What do you mean?" asked Gaspar. "Still here? Of course I'm still
here! Did you expect me to escape?"

Sinclair flung himself into a chair, speechless with rage and disgust.

"Did you think I was joking when I told you I was going to sleep eight
hours without waking up?"

"It might very well have been a trap, you know."

Sinclair groaned. "Son, they ain't any man in the world that'll tell
you that Riley Sinclair sets his traps for birds that ain't got their
stiff feathers growed yet. Trap for you? What in thunder should I want
you for, eh?"

He strode to the window, still groaning.

"There's where you'd ought to be, over yonder behind them mule ears.
They'd never catch you in a thousand years with that start. Eight hours
start! As good as have eight years, kid--just as good. And you've
throwed that chance away!"

He turned and stared mournfully at the schoolteacher.

"It ain't no use," he said sadly. "I see it all now. You was cut out to
end in a rope collar."

Not another word could be pried from his set lips during breakfast, a
gloomy meal to which Sally Bent came with red eyes, and Jerry Bent
sullenly, with black looks at Sinclair. Jig was the cheeriest one of
the party. That cheer at last brought another explosion from Sinclair.
They stood in front of the house, watching a horseman win