er.

At the sound of the shot, the ape uttered a plaintive cry,
relaxed its hold upon the lad and fell upon its knees on the
ground with its hands raised in supplication as previously.

"I ought to shoot you," declared the lad between his gasps for
breath as he drew the weapon from its holster and pointed it at
the animal, "but I won't. I'll take you with me and maybe I can
sell you for enough to pay me for the scare you've given me. Now,
march!"

He pointed with his finger down the track, but the beast would
not stir.

"Don't you intend to do what I tell you?"

The animal perked up his head and kept his eye upon the revolver.

"Well," exclaimed Billie as he drew a long breath, "this is the
limit. I can't make you mind and I won't hurt you. I guess the
only thing I can do is to go and leave you."

Suiting the action to the word, Billie turned and started down
the track, his revolver still in his hand.

He had not gone more than a dozen steps, before he heard the soft
pat-pat behind him, and on looking back could see nothing but the
waving grass to indicate the whereabouts of his erstwhile
assailant.

"So I am to be followed, am I? Well, all right." Then, as an
afterthought: "I wonder how I can catch him when I want him. I
wonder if this will do," and he raised his weapon and pointed it
toward the moving grass.

With the same plaintive cry which Billie had come to recognize
as one of fear, the animal ran toward him and sank to his knees.

Billie smiled.

"It's all right, old chap. As long as I know how to handle you,
why you can follow me right back to the train."

Again he started down the track at a brisk walk, it having just
occurred to him that there might be something doing at the other
end of his journey.

Twenty minutes later he reached the station at Pitahaya where he
had expected to find Adrian and the three Mexicans awaiting him,
but, as we know, they had gone on to the scene of the wreck. Not
realizing just what had happened, but always on the alert for the
unexpected, Billie, therefore, began an inspection of the
station.

It did not take him long to discover that Pitahaya was little
more than a siding with a one-room building, which was used as a
freight house and a waiting room. It did not even boast of a
station master.

"There must be some reason for having a building here," he mused.
"There must be some sort of a settlement around somewhere. But
what's that to me? I might as well