her ate with his guests
nor waited upon them, save to refill the tin coffee cups as they were
emptied.

Neither of the two young men stayed longer than they were obliged to in
the dirty, leather-smelling kitchen. There was freedom outside, with the
morning world of fresh, zestful immensities for a smoking-room; and when
they had eaten, they went to sit on a flat rock by the side of the
little stream to fill and light their pipes, Ballard crumbling the
cut-plug and stoppering the pipe for his crippled companion.

"How is the bullet-gouge by this time?" he questioned, when the tobacco
was alight.

"It's pretty sore, and no mistake," Bigelow acknowledged frankly.
Whereupon Ballard insisted upon taking the bandages off and re-dressing
the wound, with the crystal-clear, icy water of the mountain stream for
its cleansing.

"It was a sheer piece of idiocy on my part--letting you come on with me
after you got this," was his verdict, when he had a daylight sight of
the bullet score. "But I don't mean to be idiotic twice in the same
day," he went on. "You're going to stay right here and keep quiet until
we come along back and pick you up, late this afternoon."

Bigelow made a wry face.

"Nice, cheerful prospect," he commented. "The elder cattle thief isn't
precisely one's ideal of the jovial host. By the way, what was the
matter with him while we were eating breakfast? He looked and acted as
if there were a sick child in some one of the dark corners which he was
afraid we might disturb."

Ballard nodded. "I was wondering if you remarked it. Did you hear the
sick baby?"

"I heard noises--besides those that Carson was so carefully making with
the skillet and the tin plates. The room across the passage from us
wasn't empty."

"That was my guess," rejoined Ballard, pulling thoughtfully at his short
pipe. "I heard voices and tramplings, and, once in a while, something
that sounded remarkably like a groan--or an oath."

Bigelow nodded in his turn. "More of the mysteries, you'd say; but this
time they don't especially concern us. Have you fully made up your mind
to leave me here while you go on down to the railroad? Because if you
have, you and the boy will have to compel my welcome from the old
robber: I'd never have the face to ask him for a whole day's
hospitality."

"I'll fix that," said Ballard, and when the boy came from the corral
with the saddled horses, he went to do it, leaving Bigelow to finish his
pipe on the