ain't been out of the Academy only two years, and he's been telling me
how card-playing ain't good for you. And what do you suppose he's been
and offered Jarvis Cutler for a job? I'm to be wagon-master." He paused,
and the half-breed's attention to his next words increased.
"Wagon-master, and good pay, too. Clean up to the Black Hills; and the
troops'll move soon as ever them reinforcements come. Drinks on it, boys!
Set 'em up, Joole Loomis. My contract's sealed with some of Uncle Sam's
cash, and I'm going to play it right here. Hello! Somebody coming to join
us? He's in a hurry."

There was a sound of lashing straps and hoofs beating the ground, and
Cutler looked out of the door. As he had calculated, the saddle had
gradually turned with Duster's movements and set the pony bucking.

"Stampeded!" said the scout, and swore the proper amount called for by
such circumstances. "Some o' you boys help me stop the durned fool."

Loomis and Kelley ran. Duster had jerked the prepared reins from the
cottonwood, and was lurching down a small dry gulch, with the saddle
bouncing between his belly and the stones.

Cutler cast a backward eye at the cabin where Toussaint had stayed behind
alone. "Head him off below, boys, and I'll head him off above," the scout
sang out. He left his companions, and quickly circled round behind the
cabin, stumbling once heavily, and hurrying on, anxious lest the noise
had reached the lurking half-breed. But the ivory-handled pistol, jostled
from its holster, lay unheeded among the stones where he had stumbled. He
advanced over the rough ground, came close to the logs, and craftily
peered in at the small window in the back of the cabin. It was evident
that he had not been heard. The sinister figure within still sat on the