ook for Pat," he told
one of his men. "If Waco shows up, keep him here till I get back. Those
horses didn't get away from Pat. Here's a signed check. Get what you
need and keep on with the work. You're foreman till I get back."

"If there's anything doing--" began the cowboy.

"I don't know. Some one rode in here to-day. It was along about noon
that Pat and Waco left. The bread was baked. I'd say they drove to town
for grub; only Pat took his gun--without the holster. It looks bad to
me. If anything happens to me, just send for Lorry Adams at the Ranger
Station."

Waring rode out, looking for tracks. His men watched him until he had
disappeared behind a rise. Bender, the new foreman, turned to his
fellows.

"I'd hate to be the man that the boss is lookin' for," he said, shaking
his head.

"Why, he's lookin' for Pat, ain't he?" queried one of the men.

"That ain't what I mean," said the foreman.

* * * * *

The wind died down suddenly. The sun, just above the horizon, glowed
like a disk of burnished copper. The wagon ruts were filled with fine
sand. Waring read the trail. The buckboard had traveled briskly. It had
stopped at the line. The tracks of the fretting ponies showed that
clearly. Alongside the tracks of the ponies were the half-hidden tracks
of a single horse. Waring glanced back at the sun, and put Dex to a
lope. He swung into the main road, his gaze following the
half-obliterated trail of the single horseman. Suddenly he reined up.
The horseman had angled away from the road and had ridden north across
the open country. He had not gone to Stacey. Waring knew that the
horseman had been riding hard. Straight north from where Waring had
stopped was the Starr Ranch.

He rode on, his heart heavy with a black premonition. The glowing
copper disk was now half-hidden by the western hills.

At the brink of the arroyo he dismounted. He could see nothing
distinctly in the gloom of its depths. Stooping, he noted the wagon
tracks as he worked on down. His foot struck against something hard. He
fumbled and picked Pat's gun from the sand. Every chamber was loaded.

"He didn't have a chance." Waring was startled by his own voice. He
thrust the gun in his waistband. The twilight deepened rapidly. Rocks
and ridges in the arroyo assumed peculiar shapes like those of men
crouching; men prone; men with heads up, listening, watching, waiting.
Yet Waring's instinct for hidden danger told h