oing to befriend him. He knew who he was, for there was the cut of
a leader about him; and when the man rode up and swung himself from his
horse with a "How are you, Tom?" it proved to him that Stanley and
Monroe had told him something about him.

"Howdy?" shouted a voice from the dugout; and Mr. Kelley stuck his head
up through the door. "We're still on hand, like a bad dollar bill. How
many cattle have you got out there?"

"Sixty-five; and pretty good luck, too, seeing that they have been
stampeded more than forty miles. Where did you pick up this youngster?"
added Mr. Parsons, giving Tom's hand a hearty squeeze. "I certainly do
not remember seeing him before."

"No, he's a tender-foot. As he didn't know what else to do, he came out
here for somebody to grub-stake him."

"Ah!"

"Everyone who knows him has gone back on him," continued Mr. Kelley,
"and so he has come out here to see if you won't stake him for a gold
mine."

"M-m-m!"

"And as he cured me of the dumb ague by giving me a pitcher of
ice-water, I thought I would bring him along."

"Aha!" said the ranchman, who had kept a firm hold of Tom while his
right-hand man was speaking. "You claim to be a doctor, do you? Well, we
must do something for you. I was a little older than you are when I went
into the mountains to seek for a gold mine, and, unfortunately for me, I
found it. I smell bacon. Is supper ready yet?"

Mr. Kelley made some sort of incoherent reply which Mr. Parsons and his
man understood, for they dived down the doorway, leaving Tom standing
alone.

"Unfortunately he got it," Tom kept repeating to himself. "I don't see
what there was unfortunate about it, unless he was cheated out of it. If
I had as many cattle as he has got out there, and as many men to obey my
orders, I should look upon myself as remarkably fortunate."

Tom did not have any opportunity to talk further with Mr. Parsons that
night, for as soon as he had eaten supper he went to bed and was soon
sleeping soundly. Tom felt the need of slumber, and when he thought he
could do so without disturbing anybody, he slipped quietly down the
stairs. There sat Mr. Kelley fast asleep on his dry-goods box, holding
in his hand the copy of a newspaper about a fortnight old, and which he
had been trying to read by the aid of the smoky candle that gave out
just light enough to show how dark it was; and as everybody else felt
the need of slumber, and gave over to the influence of it whereve