and braves and
the buckskin cayuse.

"Are you ready?" shouted Colonel Waller.

"Ho," said Red Cloud, and with an imperious wave of his hand he
indicated "Go ahead!"

The light racing pad was put on Red Rover, the jockey mounted and rode
him at a canter for a hundred yards and back, amid an outburst of
applause as the splendid creature showed his pace. Then the groom
approached and tightened the cinch.

The buckskin cayuse was brought to the front. Red Cloud made a gesture.
A sixteen-year-old boy, armed with a quirt, appeared; an Indian gave him
a leg up, and, naked to the breech clout on the naked horse, he sat like
a statue. Jim got a strange thrill as he recognized him for the
vigil-keeper of Cedar Mountain.

"Well," grumbled the Colonel, as he noted the jockey, "that's a
twenty-five pound handicap on us, but I guess we can stand it." Yet,
when they saw the two horses together, there was less disparity in size
than they had supposed. But there was something about the buckskin that
caught Hartigan's eye and made him remark: "It isn't going to be such a
walk-over as our fellows think." And the trainer of Red Rover, as he
noted the round barrel, clean limbs, and flaring nostrils of the
buckskin, had for a moment just a guilty twinge as he recalled how lax
he had been in the training after that run at Yellowbank Canyon.

But all was ready. The white men won the toss for choice and got the
inside track; not that it mattered very much, except at the turn. The
crowd was sent back to the lines, the riders held the racers to the
scratch and, at a pistol crack, they bounded away.

Those that expected to see something spectacular at the start were
disappointed. The English jockey leaned forward, touched Red Rover with
his whip, and alongside the Indian boy on the buckskin did the very same
thing. The Indian boy smiled and the Englishman responded, but in a
superior way. He felt it was almost unfair to run against such a child,
and in such a race, which wasn't a real race at all, in spite of the
heavy stakes.

Thus they rode side by side at a good pace for half a mile, during which
the buckskin drifted behind a little, now a length, now a length and a
half. Next the copper-coloured jockey touched him up and, before the
white man knew it, the bounding buckskin closed again and came right up,
but now on the inside track. If the Englishman had not felt so
confident, he would have stopped this well-known trick. It might no