up with that kind before. Is he hard to
get on the right side of?"

"Dunno," growled the youngster. "I never tried."

Buck chuckled again. "Well, kid, so long as you don't seem to think it's
worth while, I dunno why I should take the trouble. Who else is on the
outs with him?"

Jessup flashed a startled glance at him. "How in blazes do you know--"

"Oh, gosh! That's easy. That open-faced countenance of yours would give
you away even if your tongue didn't. I'd say you weren't a bit in love
with Lynch, or any of the rest of the bunch, either. Likely you got a good
reason, an' of course it ain't any of my business; but if that stunt with
the red-hot branding-iron is a sample of their playfulness, I should think
you'd drift. There must be plenty of peaceful jobs open in the
neighborhood."

"But that's just what they want me to do," snapped Jessup hotly. "They're
doin' their best to drive me----"

His jaws clamped shut and a sudden suspicion flashed into his eyes, which
caused Buck promptly to relinquish all hope of getting any further
information from the boy. Evidently he had said the wrong thing and got
the fellow's back up, though he could not imagine how. And so, when Jessup
curtly proposed that they return to the bunk-house, Stratton readily
acquiesced.

They found the five punchers gathered around the table playing draw-poker
under the light of a flaring oil lamp. McCabe extended a breezy invitation
to Buck to join them, which he accepted promptly, drawing up an empty box
to a space made for him between Slim and Butch Siegrist. With scarcely a
glance at the group, Jessup selected a tattered magazine from a pile in
one corner and sprawled out on his bunk, first lighting a small hand lamp
and placing it on the floor beside him.

Stratton liked poker and played a good game, but he soon discovered that
he was up against a pretty stiff proposition. The limit was the sky, and
Kreeger and McCabe especially seemed to have a run of phenomenal luck.
Buck didn't believe there was anything crooked about their playing; at
least he could detect no sign of it, though he kept a sharp lookout as he
always did when sitting in with strangers. But he was rather uncomfortably
in a hole and was just beginning to realize rather whimsically that for a
while at least he had only a cow-man's pay to depend on for
spending-money, when the door was suddenly jerked open and a tall,
broad-shouldered figure loomed in the opening.

"Well,