o done it?" inquired one of the fools that infest every group of
men.

"He didn't leave any card," the blacksmith replied with sarcasm.

The fool asked no more questions. Came then Jake Rule and Kansas
Casey. Jake, a rather heavy, well-meaning officer, old at the
business, began to sniff about for clues. Kansas Casey laid the body
down on its back and thoroughly searched the pockets of the clothing.

"One thing," said Kansas Casey, looking up from what he had found--a
handful of silver dollars, a pocket knife, and a silver watch,
"robbery wasn't the motive."

Racey looked sidewise from under his eyebrows at Jack Harpe. The
latter was staring down unmoved at the dead body.

"Somebody must 'a' had a grudge against Bull," offered the fool.

"You think so?" said Piney. "Yo're a real bright feller."

The fool subsided a second time.

"Lookit here, Jake," Piney continued to the sheriff's address, "you
don't have to kick my wood all over the county, do you?"

"I'm lookin' for the knife," explained the sheriff, ceasing not to
stub his toes against the solid chunks. "Feller after doing a thing
like this gets flustrated sometimes and drops the knife. And finding
the knife might be a help in locating the feller."

All of which seemed sufficiently logical to the bystanders.

Racey decided he had seen enough. Besides, he wanted to camp closer to
his warbags. He should have been in his room before this, and he would
have been had he cared to make himself conspicuous by not going along
with the crowd to see what Piney Jackson had found.

Declining Swing's earnest invitation to drink he returned to the
hotel. Swing went grouchily to the Happy Heart, wondering what was the
matter with his friend. It was not like the Racey he knew to play the
hermit.

Once in his room Racey again explored his own and Swing's saddlebags
and _cantenas_, looked under the cots and through the bedclothes. But
he found nothing that did not belong to either himself or Swing.

"They didn't make a second trip," he said to himself. "I'm betting
it's Jack Harpe. Shore it is, the polecat."

Then in order to have a water-tight reason for remaining in the room
he pulled off his boots and trousers, fished a housewife from a
_cantena_, and set about repairing a rip in his trousers. It was a
perfectly good rip. He had had it a long time. What more natural that
on this particular day he should wish to sew it up?

It was an hour later that he heard the t