unsigned note from MacRae. It ran:

"Get after Lessard and see if he won't send an escort with you to
Writing-Stone. If he does, and you find anything, I needn't warn
you to be careful. I don't think he believed our yarn, at all. If
he refuses to act, stay here till I get out. This money will hold
you for a while. It's all I could rustle. If you need more, maybe
Bat can stake you--he will if he can."

That was all. Not a word about Lyn. The stiff-necked devil!

"You know what this is, don't you?" I said to Bat. "How the dickens did
he manage it?"

Bat's grin became even more expansive. "There ain't a buck trooper on
the job," he replied, "that wouldn't help Mac if he got half a show;
he's a white man. It's easy for a prisoner t' slip a note to a friend
that happens t' be mountin' guard. He sent it t' me because I'd be apt
t' know where yuh was. _Sabe?_"

I did. Mac's suggestion was right in line with my own idea. Lessard
could scarcely refuse to do that much, I thought; and it would be rather
unhealthy for those prairie pirates to match themselves against a bunch
of Mounted Policemen who were on their guard--provided we found anything
that was worth fighting over.

A little later Bat spread a bed for me on the kitchen floor, and I
turned in. But my sleep resolved itself into a series of cat-naps. When
the first sunbeam gleamed through the window of Bat's tiny kitchen, I
arose, pulled on my boots and went to feed my horse. And when we had