iders of the Plains
Will some sinner please to pass around the hat?"

As he reached the last two lines of the verse the door opened and
Sergeant Tom entered. Pretty Pierre did not stop singing. His eyes
simply grew a little brighter, his cheek flushed ever so slightly, and
there was an increase of vigour in the closing notes.

Sergeant Tom smiled a little grimly, then he nodded and said: "Been at
it ever since, Pretty Pierre? You were singing the same song on the same
spot when I passed here six months ago."

"Eh, Sergeant Tom, it is you? What brings you so far from your straw-bed
at Fort Desire?" From underneath his hat-brim Pierre scanned the face of
the trooper closely.

"Business. Not to smile on virtue, but to collar what is wrong. I guess
you ought to be ready by this time to go into quarters, Pierre. You've
had a long innings."

"Not yet, Sergeant Tom, though I love the Irish, and your company would
make me happy. But I am so innocent, and the world--it cannot spare me
yet. But I think you come to smile on virtue, all the same, Sergeant
Tom. She is beautiful is Jen Galbraith. Ah, that makes your eye
bright--so! You Riders of the Plains, you do two things at one time. You
make this hour someone happy, and that hour someone unhappy. In one
hand the soft glove of kindness, in the other, voila! the cold glove of
steel. We cannot all be great like that, Sergeant Tom."

"Not great, but clever. Voila, the Pretty Pierre! In one hand he holds
the soft paper, the pictures that deceive--kings, queens, and knaves;
in the other, pictures in gold and silver--money won from the pockets of
fools. And so, as you say, 'bien,' and we each have our way, bedad!"

Sergeant Tom noticed that the half-breed's eyes nearly closed, as if to
hide the malevolence that was in them. He would not have been surprised
to see a pistol drawn. But he was quite fearless, and if it was not his
duty to provoke a difficulty, his fighting nature would not shrink from
giving as good as he got. Besides, so far as that nature permitted, he
hated Pretty Pierre. He knew the ruin that this gambler had caused here
and there in the West, and he was glad that Fort Desire, at any rate,
knew him less than it did formerly.

Just then Peter Galbraith entered with the coffee, followed by Jen.
When the old man saw his visitor he stood still with sudden fear; but
catching a warning look from the eye of the half-breed, he made an
effort to be steady, and sai