s we can. From what you say, there ain't been no class to the
hay-hounds the Siwashes has started other years, and so an Injun entry
is a joke entry. Nobody knows this horse, and seein' him the way he is
now, not many'd pipe what he really is unless they was wised up. But you
let some of these wise local birds lamp him after I've had him a couple
of weeks, and they might smell something. Then I may's well keep dark
myself. Not that I'm ashamed of myself more'n I ought to be, but
somebody might remember me, though I ain't ridden for years. So I'll be
an extra hand you've hired, see? Me and Chief will take our work-outs on
the quiet as long as we can."

So Dorgan gave the horse his exercise on a little prairie a mile back of
the ranch. As he had predicted, a couple of weeks made a vast difference
in his appearance. Groomed till his chestnut coat was gleaming, dappled
satin, his feet trimmed and cleaned and polished and shod by Dorgan
himself, fed bright, clean grain and savory mashes and bedded to the
knees nightly in sweet straw, Chief tasted for the first time the joys
of the equine aristocracy to which he belonged.

But somehow the rumor that the Indians had a mysterious horse and rider
got going, and one day Dorgan, who had been to town, came to Angus.

"Say," he said, "do you know a hard-faced bird, near as big as you are
but older and heavier, that looks like a bad actor and likes the juice?
He seems to be the king-pin of a bunch of young rye-hounds that think
they're sports."

"Do you mean Blake French?"

"That's the outfit that owns this Flambeau horse, ain't it?"

"Yes. What about it?"

"Nothin' much. He'd have bought me a lot of friendship sealers if I'd
let him. Then there was a feller, name of Garland, that thinks he's a
warm member, and claimed he'd seen me ridin' long ago when he was a kid.
He might of, at that. They sorter fished around to find out what I was
doin' here. But they know, all right. If I was crooked I b'lieve I could
do business with them two."

"I've never heard that they would do anything crooked. Of course they
might try to find out all they could."

"If I'd taken all the crooked money I've been offered," said Dorgan,
"and got away with it, I wouldn't need to be worryin' about apples and
chickens now. I know when a feller's feelin' me out, same as I know when
a couple of young burglars is holdin' a pocket open for me to ride
into."

"But they don't know if Paul Sam's horse can r