tle for a livin'?"

"You belong to the West. You're of it," Ridley said. "If you'd seen the
fine grasslands of the East, the beautiful, well-kept farms and the fat
stock, you'd understand what I mean. A fellow gets homesick for them."

Roberts nodded. "I've seen 'em an' I understand. Oncet I went back East
an' spent three months there. I couldn't stand it. I got sick for the
whinin' of a rope, wanted to hump over the hills after cows' tails. The
nice little farms an' the nice little people with their nice little ways
kinda cramped me. I reckon in this ol' world it's every one to his own
taste." His eye swept the landscape. "Looks like there's water down
there. If so, we'll fall off for a spell an' rest the hawsses."

[Footnote 7: A man is said to be "dry-gulched" when he mysteriously
disappears,--killed by his enemies and buried under a pile of rocks.]

CHAPTER XXIX

BURNT BRANDS

At the end of the third day of scouting Jack came back to camp late, but
jubilant.

"I've found what we're lookin' for, Art. I drifted across a ridge an'
looked down into a draw this evenin'. A fellow was ridin' herd on a
bunch of cows. They looked to me like a jackpot lot, but I couldn't be
sure at that distance. I'm gonna find out what brands they carry."

"How?"

"The only way I know is to get close enough to see."

"Can you do that without being noticed?"

"Mebbe I can. The fellow watchin' the herd ain't expectin' visitors.
Probably he loafs on the job some of the time. I'm gamblin' he does."

Roberts unloaded from the saddle the hindquarters of a black-tail deer
he had shot just before sunset. He cut off a couple of steaks for supper
and Ridley raked together the coals of the fire.

"Throw these into a fry-pan, Art, while I picket old Ten-Penny," said
Jack. "I'm sure hungry enough to eat a mail sack. I lay up there in the
brush 'most two hours an' that fellow's cookin' drifted to me till I was
about ready to march down an' hold him up for it."

"What's the programme?" asked Arthur later, as they lay on their
tarpaulins smoking postprandial cigarettes.

"I'll watch for a chance, then slip down an' see what's what. I want to
know who the man is an' what brand the stock are carryin'. That's all.
If it works out right mebbe we'll gather in the man an' drive the herd
back to town."

"Then I go along, do I?"

"Yes, but probably you stay back in the brush till I signal for you to
come down. We'll see how the thing wo