his head with the best of
them. No matter what his race or station if he will crawl a "snake"
and stay with him there is always room on the wagon for his
blankets; his fame will spread quickly from camp to camp, and the
boss will offer to raise him when he shows up for his time.
Jefferson Creede's face was all aglow when he finally rode up beside
Hardy; he grinned triumphantly upon horse and man as if they had won
money for him in a race; and Hardy, roused at last from his
reserve, laughed back out of pure joy in his possessions.

"How's that for a horse?" he cried, raising his voice above the thud
of hoofs. "I have to turn him loose at first--'fraid he'll learn to
pitch if I hold him in--he's never bucked with me yet!"

"You bet--he's a snake!" yelled Creede, hammering along on his
broad-chested roan. "Where'd you git 'im?"

"Tom Fulton's ranch," responded Hardy, reining his horse in and
patting him on the neck. "Turned in three months' pay and broke him
myself, to boot. I'll let you try him some day, when he's gentled."

"Well, if I wasn't so big 'n' heavy I'd take you up on that," said
Creede, "but I'm just as much obliged, all the same. I don't claim to
be no bronco-buster now, but I used to ride some myself when I was a
kid. But say, the old judge has got some good horses runnin' on the
upper range,--if you want to keep your hand in,--thirty or forty head
of 'em, and wild as hawks. There's some sure-enough wild horses too,
over on the Peaks, that belong to any man that can git his rope onto
'em--how would that strike you? We've been tryin' for years to catch
the black stallion that leads 'em."

Try as he would to minimize this exaggerated estimate of his prowess
as a horse-tamer Hardy was unable to make his partner admit that he
was anything short of a real "buster," and before they had been on the
trail an hour Creede had made all the plans for a big gather of wild
horses after the round-up.

"I had you spotted for a sport from the start," he said, puffing out
his chest at the memory of his acumen, "but, by jingo, I never thought
I was drawin' a bronco-twister. Well, now, I saw you crawl that horse
this mornin', and I guess I know the real thing by this time. Say," he
said, turning confidentially in his saddle, "if it's none of my
business you can say so, but what did you do to that bit?"

Hardy smiled, like a juggler detected in his trick. "You must have
been watching me," he said, "but I don't mind telli