finished as quickly as possible without exciting remark, and went his way.

He had not, however, been two minutes in the office before De Garmo
entered. From that time on through the whole evening Fred was never far
distant; wherever he went, Kent could not shake him off though De Garmo
never seemed to pay any attention to him, and his presence was always
apparently accidental.

"I reckon I'll have to lick that son of a gun yet," sighed Kent, when a
glance at the round clock in the hotel office told him that in just twenty
minutes it would strike nine; and not a move made toward getting those
horses saddled and out to the stockyards.

There was much talk of the wedding, which had taken place quietly in the
parlor at the appointed hour, but not a man mentioned a _charivari_. There
were many who wished openly that Fleetwood would come out and be sociable
about it, but not a hint that they intended to take measures to bring him
among them. He had caused a box of cigars to be placed upon the bar of
every saloon in town, where men might help themselves at his expense.
Evidently he had considered that with the cigars his social obligations
were canceled. They smoked the cigars, and, with the same breath, gossiped
of him and his affairs.

At just fourteen minutes to nine Kent went out, and, without any attempt
at concealment, hurried to the Hawley stables. Half a minute behind him
trailed De Garmo, also without subterfuge.

Half an hour later the bridal couple stole away from the rear of the hotel,
and, keeping to the shadows, went stumbling over the uneven ground to the
stockyards.