from you like that? Makes you
think yo're a-losing yore mind almost."

"He looked at you almighty strong," proffered Racey. "Maybe _he'll_
remember. Why don't you ask him?"

"Maybe I will at that," said she.

"Didja know he was a friend of Nebraska's?" he asked, watching her
face keenly.

She shook her head. "Nebraska knows a lot of folks," she said,
indifferently.

"He knows Punch-the-breeze Thompson, too."

"Likely he would, knowing Nebraska. He belongs to Nebraska's bunch."

"What does Nebraska do for a living?"

"Everybody and anything. Mostly he deals a game in the Starlight."

"What does Peaches Austin work at?" he pursued, thinking that it might
be well to learn what he could of the enemy's habits.

"He deals another game in the Happy Heart."

"'The hand is quicker than the eye,'" he quoted, cynically, recalling
what the stranger had said to Punch-the-breeze Thompson.

"Oh, Peaches is slick enough," said she, comprehending instantly. "But
Nebraska is slicker. Don't never sit into no game with Nebraska Jones.
Lookit here," she added, her expression turning suddenly anxious, "did
I take my ride for nothing?"

"Huh?... Oh, that! Shore not. You bet I'm obliged to you, and I hope I
can do as much for you some day. But I wasn't figuring on staying here
any length of time. Swing--he's my friend--and I are going down to try
Arizona a spell. We'll be pulling out to-morrow, I expect."

"Then all you got to look out for is to-night. But I'm telling you you
better drag it to-morrow shore."

Racey smiled slowly. "If it wasn't I got business down south I'd
admire to stay. I ain't leaving a place just because I ain't popular,
not nohow. I'm over twenty-one. I got my growth."

"It don't matter why you go. Yo're a-going. That's enough. It's a good
thing for you you got business, and you can stick a pin in that."

"I'll have to do something about them friends of his alla same, before
I go," Racey said, thoughtfully.

"Huh?" Perplexedly.

"Yeah. If they're a-honing to bushwhack me for what I did to Nebraska,
it ain't fair for me to go sifting off thisaway and not give 'em
some kind of a run for their alley. Look at it close. You can see it
ain't."

"I don't see nothing--"

"Shore you do. It would give 'em too much of a chance to talk. They
might even get to saying they ran me out o' town. And the more I think
of it the more I'm shore they'll be saying just that."

"But you said you was going away. You