ake the
girl into the Hideout now. That tenderfoot'll be lucky if he drifts back
to the Three Star by nightfall afoot. We'll be out of the place long
before that. And we'll put her where they can't find her till they come
through. I'm running this."

The cook had ridden on ahead. Now he was waiting for them, looking back.
Parsons shrugged his shoulders.

"How do we split?" asked Hahn.

"Three ways," said Plimsoll. "We'll take her to the cabin. The rest'll
be at the other end. We'll keep Cookie with us--for the present. No need
for the boys to know about it. We can manage that all right. Three
ways, and I handle the girl."

Butch Parson grinned at him.

"I thought you'd lost all your nerve, Jim, but I guess I was wrong. All
right, it goes as it lays. You handle the lady. You ought to know how.
Now then, how'll we bring it off?"

Plimsoll talked glibly, convincingly. Butch Parsons had no extra share
of brains, those he had had never been developed beyond the ordinary.
Hahn was a good faro dealer. There his intelligence specialized and
ended. Plimsoll was the master-mind of his crowd; they appreciated and
acknowledged his capacity for details. That he had been unsuccessful of
late they set down to his lack of nerve, dissipated in his encounter
with Sandy. Their present lack of cash, the doubtfulness of being able
to sell and deliver the horses, made ransom a glittering possibility.
Hahn had some objections, but Plimsoll overruled them plausibly enough.

"I don't see the sense of letting the kid go," questioned Hahn. "He's
good for a big split as well as the girl."

"You're a fool when it comes to looking ahead, Hahn. You always were,"
answered Plimsoll. What with the chance of revenge in sight over which
he had brooded until it became a part of his consciousness, and the
liquor still stirring potently within him, he felt that his ascendancy
had become reestablished, "Keith--the old man--is too big a fish to
monkey with. Got too many pulls and connections. He'd have the whole
country out and the trick played up big in every dinky newspaper. That's
part of his business--publicity. We've got one fish--or will have--no
sense straining the net. We don't want the kid. Let him string along
back best way he can. We'll get all the start we need. What else would
you do with him?"

"Stow him away somewhere and send a tip where they can find him in a day
or two."

Plimsoll shot a look of contempt at Butch, making the prop