d passed through
the doorway his head went up abruptly and his whole manner changed.
Darting to his bunk, he snatched the blankets out and unrolled them with a
jerk. Scrambling his clothes and other belongings into a rough mound, he
swiftly spread the blankets over them, patted down a place or two to
increase the likeness to a human body, dropped his hat on the floor beside
the bunk, and then made a lightning exit through a window at the rear.

It was all accomplished with such celerity that before the dawdling
punchers had entered the bunk-house, Buck was out of sight among the
bushes which thickly lined the creek. From here he had no difficulty in
making his way unseen around to the back of the barns and other
out-buildings, one of which he entered through a rear door. A moment or
two later he found Jessup, as he expected, squatting on the floor of the
harness-room, busily mending his broken saddle-girth.

"Hello, Bud," he grinned, as the youngster looked up in surprise. "Thought
I'd come up and have a chin with you."

"But how the deuce--I thought they--yuh--"

"You thought right," replied Stratton, as Jessup hesitated. "Tex and his
friends have been sticking around pretty close for the past week or so,
but I gave 'em the slip just now."

Briefly he explained what he had done, and then paused, eying the young
fellow speculatively.

"There's something queer going on here, old man," he began presently.
"You'll say it's none of my business, maybe, and I reckon it isn't. But
unless I've sized 'em up wrong, Lynch and his gang are a bunch of crooks,
and I'm not the sort to sit back quietly and leave a lady like Miss Thorne
to their mercy."

Jessup's eyes widened. "What do yuh know?" he demanded. "What have yuh
found out?"

Buck shrugged his shoulders. "Found out? Why, nothing, really. But I've
seen enough to know that bunch is up to some deviltry, and naturally the
owner of the outfit is the one who'll suffer, in pocket, if not something
worse. It's a dirty deal, taking advantage of a girl's ignorance and
inexperience, as that gang sure is doing some way--specially a girl who's
as decent and white as she is. I thought maybe you and me might get
together and work out something. You don't act like you were for 'em any
more than I am."

"I'll tell a man I ain't!" declared Jessup emphatically. "They're a rotten
bunch. Yuh can go as far's you like, an' I'll stick with yuh. Have yuh got
anything on 'em?"

"Not exact