h he was in honor bound to
preserve from mutilation, Tubbs blinked at Babe and inquired peevishly:

"What's the matter with you?" He had forgotten that he was a thief.

"Shove up your hands!" yelled Babe.

With an expression of annoyance, Tubbs did as he was bid, but dropped them
again upon seeing Ralston.

"Oh, hello!" he called cheerfully.

"Put them hands back!" Babe waved his rifle-barrel significantly.

"What's the matter with you, feller?" inquired Tubbs crossly. Though he
now recollected the circumstances under which they were found, Ralston's
presence robbed the situation of any seriousness for him. It did not occur
to Tubbs that any one who knew him could possibly do him harm.

"Keep your hands up, Tubbs," said Ralston curtly, "and, Babe, take the
guns."

"What for a josh is this anyhow?"--in an aggrieved tone. "Ain't we all
friends?"

"Shut up, you idjot!" snapped Smith irritably. His glance was full of
malevolence as Babe took his guns. The yellow of his skin was now the only
sign by which he betrayed his feelings. To all other appearances, he was
himself again--insolent, defiant.

When it thoroughly dawned upon Tubbs that they were cornered and under
arrest, he promptly went to pieces. He thrust his hands so high above his
head that they lifted him to tiptoe, and they shook as with palsy.

"Stack the guns and get our horses, Babe," said Ralston.

"Mine's hard for a stranger to ketch," said Smith surlily. "I'll get him,
for I don't aim to walk."

"All right; but don't make any break, Smith," Ralston warned.

"I'm not a fool," Smith answered gruffly.

Ralston's face relaxed as Smith sauntered toward his horse. He was glad
that they had been taken without bloodshed, and, now the prisoners' guns
had been removed, that possibility was passed.

Smith's horse was a newly broken bronco, and he was a wild beggar, as
Smith had said; but he talked to him reassuringly as the horse jumped to
the end of his picket-rope and stood snorting and trembling in fright, and
finally laid his hand upon his neck and back. The fingers of one hand were
entwined in the horse's mane, and suddenly, with a cat-like spring made
possible only by his desperation, Smith landed on the bronco's back. With
a yell of defiance which Ralston and Babe remembered for many a day, he
kicked the animal in the ribs, and, as it reared in fright, it pulled
loose from the picket-stake. Smith reached for the trailing rope, and they
were go