it ain't a bad morning's haul."

Sautee now stared at him with a new look in his eyes--a look in which
doubt struggled with terror.

"I don't believe you _are_ The Coyote!" he blurted out.

"Who do you reckon I might be, if I ain't?" Rathburn asked quietly.

"You might be some kind of a deputy or something."

Rathburn laughed harshly. "It just happens I'm the man some folks call
The Coyote," he said. "I don't like the name, but it was wished on me,
an' I can't seem to shake it off. If I wasn't the man you think I am
you wouldn't be in such a tight fix, Sautee."

Rathburn's words conveyed a subtle menace which was not lost on the
mine manager. Sautee cringed and rubbed his hands in his nervous
tension.

"What are you going to do?" he asked.

"Listen!" exclaimed Rathburn.

From below came the echoes of shouts and other sounds which conveyed
the intelligence that a large body of men was on the move up to the
mine and the mountain slope above.

"They're after me," said Rathburn bitterly. "They think I stole the
pay-rolls. They can't get me, Sautee--not alive. An' if they get me
the other way I'm goin' to see to it somehow that I don't get blamed
for these jobs up here. Now, do you begin to see daylight?"

Sautee wet his dry lips. The figure on the floor stirred. The shouts
from below sounded more distinct.

Rathburn's gun leaped into his hand. "You better start hoping the
shootin' don't begin till we understand each other, Sautee," he said
grimly. "We've come to the show-down!"

CHAPTER XXIII

QUICK FACTS

Disregarding the sounds which continued to come from below, Rathburn
stood, gun in hand, regarding Sautee with a grim countenance and a
cold look in his keen, gray eyes.

"I saw that truck driver held up, Sautee. I was on a ridge below the
divide. I saw the tall man in the black slicker, his pardner, an' the
boy. I didn't figure it would do any good to tell Mannix I'd taken in
the show, an' I was on my way to the desert. I'd be there now if
Carlisle hadn't overstepped the mark in that Red Feather place."

Sautee pricked up his ears. "You let them arrest you," he said.
"Why----"

"Because I knew Mannix didn't know who I was an' didn't have anything
on me," said Rathburn quickly. "An' I got peevish at Carlisle an'
plumb suspicious when he tried to make things look bad for me right
there at the start. I began to wise up to the whole lay when you got
me out of jail."

Sautee's face went whit