aid I should
come and tell you."

For a moment Mrs. Haines looked at him in doubt.

"Is this another joke, Will?" she asked. "There hasn't been a hold-up
in this section for ten years."

"I guess the jokin' is all knocked out've all of us," answered Bill,
turning shamefacedly away. "No, ma'am, this is the truth and--and I
wish the Boss had took some one else's horse instid of mine."

"Never mind. They'll have all the men in Montana out to find that
girl, if this isn't a hoax," cried Mrs. Haines in a voice that choked.
"Go tell the other boys to get ready. The Sheriff will want them, if
Hal doesn't."

She sped back to the house and with a trembling hand rang the bell of
the old-fashioned telephone that furnished a new blessing to the
ranches.

A moment later Curt Sikes, the telegraph operator at Rockvale, almost
fell from his chair as he took the following message over the wire at
Mrs. Haines's dictation:

Harry Marvin,

Fifth Avenue, New York:

Pauline kidnapped. Come at once.

Mary Haines.

"What--what's it mean, Mrs. Haines?" he gasped into the transmitter.
"It ain't the young lady that Hal Just took off the express, is it?"

"Yes, that's who it is, Curt. Cabot and the boys are coming into town
as fast as they can ride; but you call Sheriff Hill and get as many men
as you can-in case we need them. You'll hurry, won't you, Curt?"

"Yes, ma'am; and I'll get your message right on the wire. They'll put
it ahead all along the line."

If Curt's speed in getting the telegram away was inspired partly by
burning need of telling the news to Rockvale that did not reflect on
Curt. He flashed after the New York message a terse call up and down
the line to "Find the Sheriff," and then bolted out to the platform.
His shout was heard not only at the little hotel across the street from
the station, but at the city limits of Rockvale a good mile away.
Rockvale answered the shout as a clan answering the beacozes flare.
When Curt Sikes shouted it meant news.

His messages along the line had little effect. He had spent the
morning flaunting the news to fellow operators and rival communities
that the Express had stopped at Rockvale. They had only half believed
that, and now this added flourish was too much. Even Sheriff Hill,
whom the message overtook at Gatesburg, fifteen miles south, laughed
when he read it, and started for Rockvale only because he was going
there anyway to get Case Egan.

"There ain't m