ht be brought out to take Andy in to the ranch and the
ministrations of the Little Doctor. Also, he must notify the crew and
get them out searching for Blink.

All that night and the next day the cowboys rode, and the next. They
raked the foothills, gulley by gulley, their purpose grim. It would
probably be a case of shoot-on-sight with them, and nothing saved
Blink save the all-important fact that never once did any man of the
Flying U gain sight of him. He had vanished completely after that
fleeting glimpse Happy Jack had gained, and in the end the Flying U
was compelled to own defeat.

Upon one point they congratulated themselves: Andy, bandaged as he
was, had escaped with a furrow ploughed through the scalp, though it
was not the fault of Blink that he was alive and able to discuss the
affair with the others--more exactly, to answer the questions they
fired at him.

"Didn't you recognize him as being the murderer?" Weary asked him
curiously.

Andy moved uneasily on his bed. "No, I didn't. By gracious, you must
think I'm a plumb fool!"

"Well, yuh sure hit the mark, whether yuh meant to or not," Pink
asserted. "He was the jasper, all right. Look how he was glaring at
yuh while you were telling about it. _He_ knew he was the party, and
having a guilty conscience, he naturally supposed yuh recognized him
from the start."

"Well, I didn't," snapped Andy ungraciously, and they put it down to
the peevishness of invalidism and overlooked the tone.

"Chip has given his description in to the sheriff," soothed Weary,
"and if he gets off he's sure a good one. And I heard that the sheriff
wired down to the San Simon country and told 'em their man was up
here. Mama! What bad breaks a man will make when he's on the dodge! If
Blink had kept his face closed and acted normal, nobody would have got
next. Andy didn't know he was the fellow that done it. But it sure was
queer, the way the play come up. Wasn't it, Andy?"

Andy merely grunted. He did not like to dwell upon the subject, and he
showed it plainly.

"By golly! he must sure have had it in for that fellow," mused Slim
ponderously, "to kill him the way Andy says he did. By golly, yuh
can't wonder his eyes stuck out when he heard Andy telling us all
about it!"

"I betche he lays for Andy yet, and gits him," predicted Happy Jack
felicitously. "He won't rest whilst an eye-witness is running around
loose. I betche he's cached in the hills right now, watching his
chan