go. Try a week or two in
one of the cow camps. I'll fix you up plumb comfortable. The ground,
and the air next to it--them's the things to cure you. I knowed a man
from Philadelphy, sicker than you are, got lost on the Guadalupe, and
slept on the bare grass in sheep camps for two weeks. Well, sir, it
started him getting well, which he done. Close to the ground--that's
where the medicine in the air stays. Try a little hossback riding now.
There's a gentle pony--"

"What've I done to yer?" screamed McGuire. "Did I ever doublecross
yer? Did I ask you to bring me here? Drive me out to your camps if you
wanter; or stick a knife in me and save trouble. Ride! I can't lift my
feet. I couldn't sidestep a jab from a five-year-old kid. That's what
your d--d ranch has done for me. There's nothing to eat, nothing to
see, and nobody to talk to but a lot of Reubens who don't know a
punching bag from a lobster salad."

"It's a lonesome place, for certain," apologised Raidler abashedly.
"We got plenty, but it's rough enough. Anything you think of you want,
the boys'll ride up and fetch it down for you."

It was Chad Murchison, a cow-puncher from the Circle Bar outfit, who
first suggested that McGuire's illness was fraudulent. Chad had
brought a basket of grapes for him thirty miles, and four out of his
way, tied to his saddle-horn. After remaining in the smoke-tainted
room for a while, he emerged and bluntly confided his suspicions to
Raidler.

"His arm," said Chad, "is harder'n a diamond. He interduced me to what
he called a shore-perplexus punch, and 'twas like being kicked twice
by a mustang. He's playin' it low down on you, Curt. He ain't no
sicker'n I am. I hate to say it, but the runt's workin' you for range
and shelter."

The cattleman's ingenuous mind refused to entertain Chad's view of the
case, and when, later, he came to apply the test, doubt entered not
into his motives.

One day, about noon, two men drove up to the ranch, alighted, hitched,
and came in to dinner; standing and general invitations being the
custom of the country. One of them was a great San Antonio doctor,
whose costly services had been engaged by a wealthy cowman who had
been laid low by an accidental bullet. He was now being driven back to
the station to take the train back to town. After dinner Raidler took
him aside, pushed a twenty-dollar bill against his hand, and said:

"Doc, there's a young chap in that room I guess has got a bad case of
con