e pointed out to him from the rims.

For hours they rode at a shuffling trot that covered the miles. It was
well after sundown when they halted in a sheltered valley. Waddles
cooked a meal over an open fire. Bed rolls were spread and the men
were instantly asleep. Three hours before sunup the cook was once more
busy round a fire. The men slept on, undisturbed by the sounds, but
when he issued the summons to rise they rolled out. In a space of five
minutes every man was eating his meal; for they were possessed of that
characteristic which marks only the men who live strenuously and much
in the open,--the ability to fall instantly asleep after a hard day and
to wake as abruptly, every faculty alert with the opening of their eyes.

The meal was bolted. The men detailed to guard the horses hazed them
into a rope corral. Saddles were hastily cinched on and the men rode
off through the gloom, leaving Waddles and three others to pack and
follow later in the day. Each man lashed a generous lunch on his
saddle before riding off.

They held a stiff trot and in an hour out from camp they struck rough
going, the choppy nature of the country announcing that they were in
the edge of the Breaks. The horses slid down into cut-bank washes and
bad-land cracks, following the bottoms to some feasible point of ascent
in the opposite wall. Daylight found them twenty miles from camp and
the horses were breathing hard. They turned into a coulee threaded by
a well-worn trail. Three miles along this Bentley turned to the right
up a branching gulch with eight men. Another mile and Carp led a
similar detachment off to the left. Billie rode with the sheriff and
Harris at the head of the rest, holding to the beaten trail.

"They had hours the start of us," Harris said. "They'd catch up fresh
horses on the range and keep on till they got in sometime in the night."

He motioned to Billie.

"You fall back," he said. The men had drawn their rifles from the
scabbards. "They never did post a guard. It wouldn't occur to Lang
that such a force could be mustered and start out short of a month. If
he thought so they'd be out of here and scattered instead of having a
lookout along the trail. But there's just a chance. So for a little
piece you'd better bring up the rear."

She started to dissent but the sheriff seconded Harris's advice.

"You move along back, Billie," he said. He patted her shoulder and
smiled. "I'm a-running th