d. A bullet crashed into
the wall of the dugout.

The cowboy's shoulder pinned the little man against the bolted door. One
hand gave a quick wrench to the wrist of the right arm and the revolver
clattered to the puncheon floor. The two hands of the jailer, under
pressure, came together. Round them the rope wound swiftly.

"I've got you, Yorky. No use strugglin'. I don't want to start that
misery in yore shoulder," warned Jack.

The little saddler, tears of mortification in his eyes, relaxed from his
useless efforts. Jack had no intention of humiliating him and he
proceeded casually to restore his self-respect.

"You made a good fight, Yorky,--a blamed good fight. I won out by a
trick, or I never could 'a' done it. Listen, old-timer. I plumb had to
play this low-down trick on you. Homer Dinsmore saved Miss Wadley from
the 'Paches. He treated her like a white man an' risked his life for
her. She's my friend. Do you reckon I'd ought to let him hang?"

"Whyn't you tell me all that?" complained the manhandled jailer.

"Because you're such a tender-hearted old geezer, Yorky. Like as not you
would 'a' thrown open the door an' told me to take him. You had to make
a fight to keep him so they couldn't say you were in cahoots with me.
I'm goin' to jail for this an' I don't want comp'ny."

Jack trussed up his friend comfortably with the slack of the rope so
that he could move neither hands nor feet.

From the nail upon which the two keys hung the jail-breaker selected
one. He shot back the bolts of the inner door and turned the key.

CHAPTER XLIV

DINSMORE GIVES INFORMATION

The inner room was dark, and for a moment Jack stood blinking while his
eyes accustomed themselves to the gloom.

A voice growled a question at him. "What do you want now, Mr.
Grandstander?"

"I want you."

"What for?"

"You'll find out presently. Come along."

For a moment Dinsmore did not move. Then he slouched forward. He noticed
that the Ranger was not armed. Another surprise met him when he stepped
into the outer room. The jailer lay on the floor bound.

The outlaw looked quickly at Roberts, a question in his eyes. Jack
unlocked his handcuffs. They had been left on him because the jail was
so flimsy.

"My rifle an' six-shooters are on the shelf there, Dinsmore. A horse
packed with grub is waitin' outside for you. Make for the short-grass
country an' cross the line about Deaf Smith County to the Staked Plains.
I reckon you'll