good quarter of a mile away) his anger blazed forth, and yelling, he
ran for the drenched Sioux, who was just crawling out of his bath.
When the unfortunate saw the irate man bearing down on him he
sputtered in rage and fear, and, turning, he ran down the street, with
Cowan thundering flatfootedly behind on a fat man's gallop, to the
hysterical cheers of the delighted outfit, who saw in it nothing but a
good joke.

When Cowan returned from his hopeless task, blowing and wheezing, he
heard sundry remarks, sotto voce, which were not calculated to
increase his opinion of his physical condition.

"Seems to me," remarked the irrepressible Hopalong, "that one of
those cayuses has got th' heaves."

"It shore sounds like it," acquiesced Johnny, red in the face from
holding in his laughter, "an' say, somebody interferes."

"All knock-kneed animals do, yu heathen," supplied Red.

`Hey, yu, let up on that and have a drink on th' house," invited
Cowan. "If I gits that durn war whoop I'll make yu think there's been a
cyclone. I'll see how long that bum hangs around this here burg, I
will."

Red's eyes narrowed and his temper got the upper hand. "He ain't no
bum when yu gives him rotgut at a quarter of a dollar a glass, is he?
Any time that `bum' gits razzled out for nothin' more'n this, why, I
goes too; an' I ain't sayin' nothin' about goin' peaceable-like,
neither."