ted him coolly: "Go ahead, Bill; I am going with
you."

"Who said you could go?" exclaimed the lineman. "You can't. Go back!"

Bucks stood his ground.

"Do you want to get killed?" thundered Dancing hotly.

"Two are better than one on a job like this," returned Bucks, without
giving way. "Go on, will you?"

With a volley of grumbling objections, Dancing at length directed
Bucks to stick close to him, whatever happened, and to fight the best
he could in case they were cornered.

Ahead of them the glare of the conflagration lighted the sky and the
air was filled with the shouts of the mob surrounding the fighting
vigilantes. Only half a block away, men were hurrying up and down
Front Street, while the two clambered along the obscure and
half-opened street leading to the jail and parallel to the main
thoroughfare.

Dancing, to whom every foot of the rocky way was familiar and who
could get over obstructions in the dark as well as if it were day, led
the way with a celerity that kept his companion breathing fast. Both
had long legs, but Dancing in some mysterious way planted his feet
with marvellous certainty of effect, while Bucks slipped and
floundered over rocks and brush piles and across gullies until they
took a short cut through a residence yard and found themselves on the
heels of the mob surrounding the burning jail and in the glare of the
fire in upper Front Street.

"Stick close, sonny," muttered the lineman, "we must push through
these fellows before they reco'nize us."

He stooped as he spoke and picked up a piece of hickory--the broken
handle of a spike-maul. "Railroad property anyway," he muttered. "It
might come handy. But gum shoes for us now till we are forced. Perhaps
we can sneak all the way through."

Without further ado Dancing, with Bucks on his heels, elbowed his way
into the crowd. The outer fringe of this he knew was not dangerous,
being made up chiefly of onlookers. But in another minute the two were
in the midst of a yelling, swaying mix-up between the aggressive mob
and a thin fringe of vigilantes, who, hard-pressed, had abandoned the
jail to its fate and were trying to fight their way down town.

Dancing, like a war-horse made suddenly mad by smoke of battle,
throwing caution and strategy to the winds, suddenly released a yell
and began to lay about him. His appearance in the fray was like that
of a bombshell timed to explode in its midst. The slugging gamblers
turned in astonishm