e Tabor Opera House as far as California Street. Here they swung to the
left to Fourteenth, where Miller disappeared into a rooming-house.

The amateur detective turned back toward the business section. On the way
he dropped guiltily the telescope grip into a delivery wagon standing in
front of a grocery. He had no use for it, and he had already come to feel
it a white elephant on his hands.

With the aid of a city directory Dave located the livery stables within
walking distance of the house where Miller was staying. Inspired perhaps
by the nickel detective stories he had read, the cowboy bought a pair of
blue goggles and a "store" collar. In this last, substituted for the
handkerchief he usually wore loosely round his throat, the sleuth nearly
strangled himself for lack of air. His inquiries at such stables as he
found brought no satisfaction. Neither Miller nor the pinto had been seen
at any of them.

Later in the evening he met Henry B. West at the St. James Hotel.

"How's that business of yore's gettin' along, boy?" asked the cattleman
with a smile.

"Don' know yet. Say, Mr. West, if I find a hawss that's been stole from
me, how can I get it back?"

"Some one steal a hawss from you?"

Dave told his story. West listened to a finish.

"I know a lawyer here. We'll ask him what to do," the ranchman said.

They found the lawyer at the Athletic Club. West stated the case.

"Your remedy is to replevin. If they fight, you'll have to bring
witnesses to prove ownership."

"Bring witnesses from Malapi! Why, I can't do that," said Dave,
staggered. "I ain't got the money. Why can't I just take the hawss?
It's mine."

"The law doesn't know it's yours."

Dave left much depressed. Of course the thieves would go to a lawyer, and
of course he would tell them to fight. The law was a darned queer thing.
It made the recovery of his property so costly that the crooks who stole
it could laugh at him.

"Looks like the law's made to protect scalawags instead of honest folks,"
Dave told West.

"I don't reckon it is, but it acts that way sometimes," admitted the
cattleman. "You can see yoreself it wouldn't do for the law to say a
fellow could get property from another man by just sayin' it was his.
Sorry, Sanders. After all, a bronc's only a bronc. I'll give you yore
pick of two hundred if you come back with me to the ranch."

"Much obliged, seh. Maybe I will later."

The cowpuncher walked the streets while he thought it