ted. As long as he was going to stay at the
Lazy Y he might as well keep on. Betty would surely laugh at him if he
refused to go on. He fought it out and took a long time to it, but he
finally pulled the saddle from Blackleg and hitched the two horses to the
wagon. When he drove out of the ranchhouse yard he saw Betty watching
him from one of the kitchen windows. He felt like cursing her, but did
not.

"I reckon," he said as he curled the lash of the whip viciously over the
shoulders of the horses, "that she's got me locoed. Well," he cogitated,
"any woman's liable to stampede a man, an' I ain't the first guy that's
had his doubts whether he's a coyote or a lion after he's been herd-rode
by a petticoat. I'm waitin' her out. But Taggart--" The frown on his
face indicated that his intentions toward the latter were perfectly clear.

CHAPTER XV

A MEETING IN THE RED DOG

Of the good resolutions that Calumet had made since the night before,
when he had re-read his father's letter in the moonlight while standing
beside the corral fence, none had survived. Black, vicious thoughts
filled his mind as he drove toward Lazette. When the wagon reached the
crest of a slope about a mile out of town, Calumet halted the horses
and rolled a cigarette, a sullen look in his eyes, unrelieved by the
prospect before him.

By no stretch of the imagination could Lazette be called attractive.
It lay forlorn and dismal at the foot of the slope, its forty or more
buildings dingy, unpainted, ugly, scattered along the one street as
though waiting for the encompassing desolation to engulf them. Two
serpentine lines of steel, glistening in the sunlight, came from some
mysterious distance across the dead level of alkali, touched the edge
of town where rose a little red wooden station and a water tank of the
same color, and then bent away toward some barren hills, where they
vanished.

Calumet proceeded down the slope, halting at the lumber yard, where he
left his wagon and orders for the material he wanted. Across the
street from the lumber yard was a building on which was a sign: "The
Chance Saloon." Toward this Calumet went after leaving his wagon. He
hesitated for an instant on the sidewalk, and a voice, seeming to come
from nowhere in particular, whispered in his ear:

"Neal Taggart's layin' for you!"

When Calumet wheeled, his six-shooter was in his hand. At his
shoulder, having evidently followed him from across th