h his companion.

"We've got to have a foreman on the Cedar Branch, Dick," he began, "and
you're the fellow."

To this Darrell offered a profane, emphatic and contemptuous negative.
With consummate diplomacy Tally led his mind from sullen obstinacy to
mere reluctance. At the corner of Main Street the three stopped.

"But I don't want to go yet, Jim," pleaded Darrell, almost tearfully. "I
ain't had all my 'time' yet."

"Well," said Tally, "you've been polishing up the flames of hell for
four days pretty steady. What more do you want?"

"I ain't smashed no rig yet," objected Darrell.

Tally looked puzzled.

"Well, go ahead and smash your rig and get done with it," he said.

"A' right," said Darrell cheerfully.

He started off briskly, the others following. Down a side street his
rather uncertain gait led them, to the wide-open door of a frame livery
stable. The usual loungers in the usual tipped-back chairs greeted him.

"Want m' rig," he demanded.

A large and leisurely man in shirt sleeves lounged out from the office
and looked him over dispassionately.

"You've been drunk four days," said he, "have you the price?"

"Bet y'," said Dick, cheerfully. He seated himself on the ground and
pulled off his boot from which he extracted a pulpy mass of greenbacks.
"Can't fool me!" he said cunningly. "Always save 'nuff for my rig!"

He shoved the bills into the liveryman's hands. The latter straightened
them out, counted them, thrust a portion into his pocket, and handed the
rest back to Darrell.

"There you are," said he. He shouted an order into the darkness of the
stable.

An interval ensued. The stableman and Tally waited imperturbably,
without the faintest expression of interest in anything evident on their
immobile countenances. Dicky Darrell rocked back and forth on his heels,
a pleased smile on his face.

After a few moments the stable boy led out a horse hitched to the most
ramshackle and patched-up old side-bar buggy Bob had ever beheld.
Darrell, after several vain attempts, managed to clamber aboard. He
gathered up the reins, and, with exaggerated care, drove into the middle
of the street.

Then suddenly he rose to his feet, uttered an ear-piercing exultant
yell, hurled the reins at the horse's head and began to beat the animal
with his whip. The horse, startled, bounded forward. The buggy jerked.
Darrell sat down violently, but was at once on his feet, plying the
whip. The crazed man and the craz