Shurd with the
cocked gun. The man turned ghastly. He seemed just now to have realized
the nature of this gaunt flaming-eyed cowboy.

"Shore your mind ain't workin'," said Larry. "Get out of heah. Mozey
over to thet camp doctor or you'll never need one."

Shurd backed away, livid and shaking, and presently he ran.

"Red!..." expostulated Neale. "You--you shot him all up! You nearly
killed him."

"Why in hell don't you pack a gun?" drawled Larry.

"Red, you're--you're--I don't know what to call you. I'd have licked
him, club and all."

"Mebbe," replied the cowboy, as he sheathed the big gun. "Neale. I'm
used to what you ain't. Shore I can see death a-comin'. Wal, every day
the outfit grows wilder. A little whisky 'll burn hell loose along this
heah U.P. line."

Larry strode on in the direction Shurd had taken. Neale pondered a
moment, perplexed, and grateful to his comrade. He heard remarks among
the laborers, and he saw the flagman Casey remove his black pipe from
his lips--an unusual occurrence.

"Mac, it wus thot red-head cowboy wot onct p'inted his gun at me!" burst
out Casey.

"Did yez see him shoot?" replied Mac, with round eyes. "Niver aimed an'
yit he hit!"

Mike Shane, the third of the trio of Irish laborers in Neale's corps,
was a little runt of a sandy-haired wizened man, and he spoke up:
"Begorra, he's wan of thim Texas Jacks. He'd loike to kill yez, Pat
Casey, an' if he ever throwed thot cannon at yez, why, runnin' 'd be
slow to phwat yez 'd do."

"I niver run in me loife," declared Casey, doggedly.

Neale went his way. It was noted that from that day he always carried a
gun, preferably a rifle when it was possible. In the use of the long gun
he was an adept, but when it came to Larry's kind of a gun Neale needed
practice. Larry could draw his gun and shoot twice before Neale could
get his hand on his weapon.

It was through Neale's habit of carrying the rifle out on his surveying
trips that the second incident came about.

One day in early summer Neale was waiting near a spring for Larry to
arrive with the horses. On this occasion the cowboy was long in coming.
Neale fell asleep in the shade of some bushes and was awakened by the
thud of hoofs. He sat up to see Larry in the act of kneeling at the
brook to drink. At the same instant a dark moving object above Larry
attracted Neale's quick eye. It was an Indian sneaking along with a gun
ready to level. Quick as a flash Neale raised his own