r, not a mule team," Miller said,
laughing.

Steve loosened the center-fire cinch of his pony's saddle. He noted that
there was no real geniality in the fat man's mirth. It was a surface
thing designed to convey an effect of good-fellowship. Back of it lay
the chill implacability of the professional gambler.

The usual give-and-take of gay repartee was missing at supper that night.
Since they were of the happy-go-lucky, outdoor West it did not greatly
distress the D Bar Lazy R riders to lose part of their pay checks. Even
if it had, their spirits would have been unimpaired, for it is written in
their code that a man must take his punishment without whining. What hurt
was that they had been tricked, led like lambs to the killing. None of
them doubted now that the pack-horse of the gamblers was a "ringer."
These men had deliberately crossed the path of the trail outfit in order
to take from the vaqueros their money.

The punchers were sulky. Instead of a fair race they had been up against
an open-and-shut proposition, as Russell phrased it. The jeers of Doble
did not improve their tempers. The man was temperamentally mean-hearted.
He could not let his victims alone.

"They say one's born every minute, Ad. Dawged if I don't believe it," he
sneered.

Miller was not saying much himself, but his fat stomach shook at this
sally. If his partner could goad the boys into more betting he was quite
willing to divide the profits.

Audibly Hart yawned and murmured his sentiments aloud. "I'm liable to
tell these birds what I think of 'em, Steve, if they don't spend quite
some time layin' off'n us."

"Don't tell us out loud. We might hear you," advised Doble insolently.

"In regards to that, I'd sure worry if you did."

Dave was at that moment returning to his place with a cup of hot coffee.
By some perverse trick of fate his glance fell on Doble's sinister face
of malignant triumph. His self-control snapped, and in an instant the
whole course of his life was deflected from the path it would otherwise
have taken. With a flip he tossed up the tin cup so that the hot coffee
soused the crook.

"Goddlemighty!" screamed Doble, leaping to his feet. He reached for his
forty-five, just as Sanders closed with him. The range-rider's revolver,
like that of most of his fellows, was in a blanket roll in the wagon.

Miller, with surprising agility for a fat man, got to his feet and
launched himself at the puncher. Dave flung the smaller