a great checker-board whereon black
cloud-shadows chased each other madly over prairies yellow with the hot
August sun and gray-green in the hollows where the grass took on a new
lease of life.

That night we camped west of Lost River, lying prudently in a
brush-grown coulee, for we were within sight of the Police camp--by
grace of the field-glasses. At sundown the ground had dried to such a
degree that a horse could lift foot without raising with it an abnormal
portion of the Northwest. The wind veered still farther to the south,
blowing strong and warm, sucking greedily the surplus moisture from the
saturated earth. So we resolved ourselves into a committee of ways and
means and decided that since the footing promised to be normal in the
morning the troop would likely scatter out, might even move camp, and
therefore it behooved us to get in touch with them at once; accordingly
Piegan rode away to spend the night in the Police tents, with a tale of
horses strayed from Baker's outfit to account for his wandering. From
our nook in the ridge he could easily make it by riding a little after
dark.

"Goodell and Gregory and Hicks you know," said MacRae. "Bevans is a
second edition of Hicks, only not so tall by two or three inches--a
square-shouldered, good-looking brute, with light hair and steel-gray
eyes and a short brown mustache. He has an ugly scar--a
knife-cut--across the back of one hand; you can't mistake him if you get
sight of him. Stick around the camp in the morning if you can manage it,
till they start, and notice which way all those fellows go. The sooner
we get our hands on one or more of them the better we'll be able to get
at the bottom of this; I reckon we could find a way to make him talk. Of
course, if anything out of the ordinary comes up you'll have to use your
own judgment; you know just as much as we do, now. And we'll wait here
for you unless they jump us up. In that case we'll try and round up
somewhere between here and Ten Mile."

"Right yuh are, old-timer," Piegan responded. "I'll do the best I can.
Yuh want t' keep your eye glued t' that peep-glass in the mornin', and
not overlook no motions. Yuh kain't tell what might come up. So-long!"
And away he went.

When he was gone from sight we built a tiny fire in the scrub--for it
was twilight, at which time keen eyes are needed to detect either smoke
or fire, except at close range--and cooked our supper. That done, we
smothered what few embers r