interferin',
now? Anyhow, they're better'n coyotes."

"They was purty well heeled," suggested Tex, glancing at a bunch of
repeating Winchesters of late model which lay stacked in a corner.
"Charley here said he thought they was from th' way yore cayuse looked,
didn't yu, Charley?" Charley nodded and filled his pipe.

"'Pears like a feller can't amble around much nowadays without havin' to
fight," grumbled Lefty Allen, who usually went out of his way hunting up
trouble.

"We're goin' to th' Hills as soon as our cookie turns up," volunteered
Tenspot Davis, looking inquiringly at Frenchy. "Heard any more news?"

"Nope. Same old story--lots of gold. Shucks, I've bit on so many of them
rumors that they don't feaze me no more. One man who don't know nothin'
about prospectin' goes an' stumbles over a fortune an' those who know it
from A to Izzard goes 'round pullin' in their belts."

"We don't pull in no belts--we knows just where to look, don't we,
Tenspot?" Remarked Tex, looking very wise.

"Ya-as we do," answered Tenspot, "if yu hasn't dreamed about it, we do."

"Yu wait; I wasn't dreamin', none whatever," assured Tex.

"I saw it!"

"Ya-as, I saw it too onct," replied Frenchy with sarcasm. "Went and
lugged fifty pound of it all th' way to th' assay office--took me two
days! an' that there four-eyed cuss looks at it and snickers. Then
he takes me by di' arm an' leads me to th' window. 'See that pile, my
friend? That's all like yourn,' sez he. 'It's worth about one simoleon a
ton at th' coast. They use it for ballast.'"

"Aw! But this what I saw was gold!" exploded Tex.

"So was mine, for a while!" laughed Frenchy, nodding to the bartender
for another round.

"Well, we're tired of punchin' cows! Ride sixteen hours a day, year in
an' year out, an' what do we get? Fifty a month an' no chance to spend
it, an' grub that'd make a coyote sniffle! I'm for a vacation, an' if I
goes broke, why, I'll punch again!" asserted Waffles, the foreman, thus
revealing the real purpose of the trip.

"What'd yore boss say?" Asked Frenchy.

"Whoop! What didn't he say! Honest, I never thought he had it in him.
It was fine. He cussed an hour frontways an' then trailed back on a dead
gallop, with us a-laughin' fit to bust. Then he rustles for his gun an'
we rustles for town," answered Waffles, laughing at his remembrance of
it.

As Frenchy was about to reply his sombrero was snatched from his
head and disappeared. If he "got mad" h