against me."

"Ahuh! Wal, then, don't you go huntin' fer trouble. Try an' make White
Slides one place thet'll disprove your name. All the same, don't shy at
sight of anythin' suspicious round the ranch."

The old man plodded thoughtfully away, leaving the hunter likewise in a
brown study.

"He's gettin' a hunch that I'll tell him of some shadow hoverin' black
over White Slides," soliloquized Wade. "Maybe--maybe so. But I don't see
any yet.... Strange how a man will say what he didn't start out to say.
Now, I started to tell him about that amazin' dog Fox."

Fox was the great dog of the whole pack, and he had been absolutely
overlooked, which fact Wade regarded with contempt for himself.
Discovery of this particular dog came about by accident. Somewhere in
the big corral there was a hole where the smaller dogs could escape, but
Wade had been unable to find it. For that matter the corral was full of
holes, not any of which, however, it appeared to Wade, would permit
anything except a squirrel to pass in and out.

One day when the hunter, very much exasperated, was prowling around and
around inside the corral, searching for this mysterious vent, a rather
small dog, with short gray and brown woolly hair, and shaggy brows half
hiding big, bright eyes, came up wagging his stump of a tail.

"Well, what do you know about it?" demanded Wade. Of course he had
noticed this particular dog, but to no purpose. On this occasion the dog
repeated so unmistakably former overtures of friendship that Wade gave
him close scrutiny. He was neither young nor comely nor thoroughbred,
but there was something in his intelligent eyes that struck the hunter
significantly. "Say, maybe I overlooked somethin'? But there's been a
heap of dogs round here an' you're no great shucks for looks. Now, if
you're talkin' to me come an' find that hole."

Whereupon Wade began another search around the corral. It covered nearly
an acre of ground, and in some places the fence-poles had been sunk near
rocks. More than once Wade got down upon his hands and knees to see if
he could find the hole. The dog went with him, watching with knowing
eyes that the hunter imagined actually laughed at him. But they were
glad eyes, which began to make an appeal. Presently, when Wade came to a
rough place, the dog slipped under a shelving rock, and thence through a
half-concealed hole in the fence; and immediately came back through to
wag his stump of a tail and look as if