go
to the devil an' won't be fit to live in. Besides, I've heard of your
fellers before--I'll tie to the Bar-20 any day."

"Well, I reckon you must if you must; yo're welcome enough," laughed
Hopalong, and he strode off to his picketed horse, leaving the others to
discuss the fence, with the assistance of the cook, until Pete rode in.

CHAPTER XXI

THE FENCE

When Hopalong rode in at midnight to arouse the others and send them out
to relieve Skinny and his two companions, the cattle were quieter than
he had expected to leave them, and he could see no change of weather
threatening. He was asleep when the others turned in, or he would have
been further assured in that direction.

Out on the plain where the herd was being held, Red and the three other
guards had been optimistic until half of their shift was over and it was
only then that they began to worry. The knowledge that running water was
only twelve miles away had the opposite effect than the one expected,
for instead of making them cheerful, it caused them to be beset with
worry and fear. Water was all right, and they could not have got along
without it for another day; but it was, in this case, filled with the
possibility of grave danger.

Johnny was thinking hard about it as he rode around the now restless
herd, and then pulled up suddenly, peered into the darkness and went
on again. "Damn that disreputable li'l rounder! Why the devil can't
he behave, 'stead of stirring things up when they're ticklish?" he
muttered, but he had to grin despite himself. A lumbering form had
blundered past him from the direction of the camp and was swallowed up
by the night as it sought the herd, annoying and arousing the thirsty
and irritable cattle along its trail, throwing challenges right and left
and stirring up trouble as it passed. The fact that the challenges were
bluffs made no difference to the pawing steers, for they were anxious to
have things out with the rounder.

This frisky disturber of bovine peace was a yearling that had
slipped into the herd before it left the ranch and had kept quiet and
respectable and out of sight in the middle of the mass for the first
few days and nights. But keeping quiet and respectable had been an awful
strain, and his mischievous deviltry grew constantly harder to hold in
check. Finally he could stand the repression no longer, and when he gave
way to his accumulated energy it had the snap and ginger of a tightly
stretched ru