Ted got to the spot where he had last seen the man, the cattle were
still milling, but were getting calmer, and had no hesitancy in
scattering when he rode among them slashing right and left with his
quirt and firing his revolver over their heads.

When he had cleared an open space he rode back into it, and instantly
recoiled from the sight presented to him.

On the ground lay the hamstringer, a mass of bloody clothes in which
were torn flesh and broken bones. He was quite dead, and had been not
only gored but had been trampled hundreds of times.

The vengeance of the maimed animals was complete.

CHAPTER VII.

A NIGHT RAID.

Ted bent over the mangled body of the hamstringer and turned him over.
Then he leaped back with an exclamation of horror.

He had recognized the miscreant.

It was Sol Flatbush, the traitorous cow-puncher, member of the gang of
cattle rustlers and gamblers headed by Shan Rhue, who had run off about
five hundred head of cattle of the Circle S brand into the Wichita
Mountains in Indian Territory.

But how had Sol Flatbush got into this part of the country? And where
was he stopping? It was evident that the cow-puncher and desperado had
hamstrung the cattle out of revenge for having been discovered and
driven out of the broncho boys' camp.

Now that he was dead, however, Ted lost all his resentment, and was
genuinely sorry for the poor chap because of the horrible means of his
death.

Ted hardly knew what to do with him. It were better if his friends could
take charge of his body and bury it, but where were his friends?

Suddenly a thought occurred to Ted. Perhaps Sol Flatbush, following his
instincts and habits, had come north after he and Shan Rhue had been
outwitted by the boys at the Hole in the Wall in the Wichita Mountains,
and allied himself with the Whipple gang in the Sweet Grass Mountains.

If this were true, the simplest thing to do was to send the body of
Flatbush to the gang. It would serve, Ted hoped, as a terrible warning
to the other members of the gang not to meddle with the affairs of the
broncho boys.

Not far away Ted saw a pony, saddled and grazing quietly.

Mounting his pony, he rode up to it. Tied to the cantle of the saddle
was a pair of blankets.

This was the very thing! Ted carried the blankets to where the body of
Flatbush lay. Spreading them out, he rolled the remains of Flatbush into
them, and bound them securely with a rope.

With some diffi