e horses for nothing when we leave."

Torrance extended his hands helplessly. "That ends it, you see. She's
boss. We can't sell, but we'll hand 'em over f.o.b. when we go--and if
you've oats enough in your tribe for that red fellow I wish you'd give
me your address and let me know when nobody's home."

The eyes of the Indian and his squaw met. The latter sighed. The
Indian slowly thrust the wallet within his blanket. Then without
another word he took her hand and they started back across the trestle.

Torrance watched them with amazement "Hi--say!"

The Indians stalked on.

"I might be able to scare up a bottle of fire-water--"

No response. Torrance sank into a chair and drew his sleeve across his
forehead.

"Talkative? By hickory, they reek with it. They sure got my goat.
All the squaws I ever saw before were so thick with grease, and the
things that stick to it. . . . I'm beginning to feel for the squaw-man
after seeing that girl."

"Wasn't she pretty?" Tressa was staring regretfully after the receding
couple. "I didn't know they were so dainty---"

"Wasn't I telling you they aren't--"

Conrad spoke for the first time: "I've seen that chap before."

"Me, too," said Torrance. "But I can't imagine not picking him out of
any Indians I ever met. They don't grow 'em like him. Our fire-water,
with here and there a missionary for good measure, sees to that. Oh,
hello, Sergeant!" Unheard, Sergeant Mahon had come along the soft
grade and was watching the Indians now almost at the other end of the
trestle. "You missed the fun. Highest velocity conversation on two
words ever."

The Sergeant whipped out his binoculars. He did not move again until
the Indians had galloped out of sight.

"What d'you make of 'em, Sergeant?"

"Strange!" muttered the Policeman, slowly replacing the glasses.

CHAPTER XIV

THE FIGHT IN THE SHACK

Big Jim Torrance was thrilling with incipient twinges of a great
triumph, though the superstitions of his kind struggled against their
display. For two weeks his eager, hopeful eyes had been fixed on those
twin lines of steel above the trestle, and not an atom of bend could he
detect.

What if at last he had choked that insatiable maw on the river bottom!
What if his great task was nearing its end!

A timetable, against his inclination, began to form in his mind.
Another week of foraging for those omniverous jaws, of bolstering up
the structure of the trestle