oats."

"Yes," drawled Ike, regarding the cayuse with contemptuous eyes, "he's
all right. You can't kill them fellers. But, as I remarked, you'd be
better inside."

He walked around the buckboard and his eyes fell upon the doctor.

"What the--" Ike checked himself, either out of deference to Shock's
profession or more likely from sheer amazement.

He turned down the buffalo, gazed at the sleeping figure with long and
grave interest, then lifting his head he remarked with impressive
solemnity, "Well, I be chawed and swallered! You HAVE got him, eh? Now,
how did you do it?"

"Well," said Shock, "it was not difficult. I found him asleep in the
International. I carried him out, and there he is."

"Say," said Ike, looking at Shock with dawning admiration in his eyes,
"you're a bird! Is there anythin' else you want in that town? Guess
not, else it would be here. The General said you'd kidnap him, and he
was right. Now, what you goin' to do when he comes to? There aint much
shelter in this bluff, and when he wakes he'll need someone to set up
with him, sure. He's a terror, a dog-goned terror!"

"Oh, we'll manage," said Shock lightly. "I mean to start early in the
morning."

"Before he gets up, eh? As I remarked before, you're a bird!"

For some moments Ike hung about the camp, poking the fire, evidently
somewhat disturbed in his mind. Finally he said in a hesitating tone,
"It aint much to offer any man, but my shack kin hold two men as well
as one, and I guess three could squeeze in, specially if the third is
in the condition he's in," nodding toward the doctor. "We kin lay him
on the floor. Of course, it aint done up with no picters and hangin's,
but it keeps out the breeze, and there aint no bugs, you bet."

Shock's experience of Western shacks had not been sufficiently varied
and extensive to enable him to appreciate to the full this last
commendation of Ike's.

Ike's hesitation in making the offer determined Shock.

"Thank you very much," he said cordially. "I shall be delighted to go
with you."

"All right, let's git," said Ike, proceeding to hitch up the pony,
while Shock gathered his stuff together. In a few minutes they were
ready to start.

"Guess he'll ride comfortable where he is," said Ike. "You can't kill a
drunk man. Strange, aint it?"

It was growing dusk as they drove through the town, but the streets,
the hotel stoops, and bars were filled with men in various stages of
intoxication. As they