save from
the front, which did not concern them.

"I guess you don't know old Pop is about the ringeader of the
Catrockers. Er he was, till he began to git kinda childish about
hoarding money, and then Dave stepped in. And Mr. Birnie, I guess you'd
have been dead when you first came there, if it hadn't been that Dave
and Pop wanted to give you a chance to get a lot of money off of Jeff's
bunch. Lew was telling how you kept cleaning up, and he said right along
that they was taking too much risk having you around. Lew said he bet
you was a detective. Are you, Mr. Birnie?"

Bud was riding with his shoulders sagged forward, his thoughts with
Marian--wherever she was. He had been convinced that she was not at
Little Lost, that she had started for Laramie. But now that he was away
from that evil spot his doubts returned. What if she were still in the
neighborhood--what if they found her? Memory of Honey's vindictiveness
made him shiver, Honey was the kind of woman who would kill.

"I am, from now on, kid," he said despondently. "We're going to ride
till we find your sister. And if those hell-hounds got her--"

"They didn't, from the way Honey talked," Jerry comforted. "We'll find
her at Laramie, don't you ever think we won't!"

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE: TRAILS END

At the last camp, just north of the Platte, Bud's two black sheep
balked. Bud himself, worn by sleepless nights and long hours in the
saddle, turned furiously when Jerry announced that he guessed he and Ed
wouldn't go any farther.

"Well, damn you both for ungrateful hounds!" grated Bud, hurt to the
quick. "I hope you don't think I brought you this far to help hold me in
the saddle; I made it north alone, without any mishap. I think I could
have come back all right. But if you want to quit here, all right. You
can high-tail it back to your outlaws--"

"Well, if you go 'n put it that way!" Jerry expostulated, lifting both
hands high in the air in a vain attempt to pull the situation toward the
humorous. "You're a depity sheriff, and you got the drop." He grinned,
saw that Bud's eyes were still hard and his mouth unyielding, and
lowered his hands, looking crestfallen as a kicked pup that had tried to
be friendly.

"You can see for yourself we ain't fit to go 'n meet your mother
and your father like we was--like we'd went straight," Eddie put in
explanatorily. "You've been raised good, and--say, it makes a man want
to BE good to see how a feller don't have