"We'll have to make a time, eh?"

"Sure," said Fyles, looking him squarely in the eyes.

Charlie moved his horse away.

"Well, so long, for the present. Guess I'll remember that challenge.
Thanks for helping me with the rack. You're stopping?"

Fyles nodded.

"Yes--for awhile."

Charlie rode away with the air of a man with not a care in the world.
But he was thinking swiftly, and his thoughts were of that hidden
cupboard, and what it contained. Hope and fear struggled for paramount
place in his heart. Was the secret of that hiding place sufficiently
simple to defy Stanley Fyles, or was it not? Was he the man he
was reputed to be, or was he merely a clever man backed by a big
authority? In the end he abandoned the troublesome point. Time alone
would give him his answer.

CHAPTER XXI

WORD FROM HEADQUARTERS

Two horses ambled complacently, side by side, down the village trail.
Each was ridden by the man it knew best, and was most willing to
serve. Peter's affection for Stanley Fyles was probably little less
than his master's affection for him. The same thing applied to
Sergeant McBain, whose hard face suggested little enough of the
tenderer emotions. But both men belonged to the prairie, and the long
prairie trail inspires a wonderful sympathy between man and beast.

The men were talking earnestly in low voices, but their outward
seeming had no suggestion of anything beyond ordinary interest.

"He's surely leaving a trail all over the valley," said Sergeant
McBain, after listening to his superior's talk for some moments. "It's
a clear trail, too--but it don't ever seem to lead anywhere--definite.
You've made nothing of that corral place, sir?"

Fyles's eyes roamed over the scene about him in the quick, uneasy
fashion of a groping mind.

"I don't know yet," he said slowly, "I've got to windward of that
haying business. The fellow's haying all right. He's got a permit for
cutting, and he generally puts up fifty tons. Maybe he keeps that
wagon out there all the time for convenience. I can't say. But even if
he doesn't I can't see where it points."

"We can watch the place," said McBain quickly.

"That's better than speculation, but--it's clumsy."

"How, sir?"

"Why, man alive," replied Fyles sharply. "Do you think we're going to
fool a crook like him by just watching? Besides----"

"Yes, sir?"

Fyles had broken off. A woman was moving down the trail ahead of them.
She was a good distance