“Whom are you talking about?” demanded Patches.  “Nick?  Don’t be a fool, Joe; Nick will be there right alongside of you.”

“I ain’t meanin’ Nick; I mean him over there at the Cross-Triangle—­Professor Parkhill.  I’m a-tellin’ you that he wouldn’t let you do nothin’ to me.”

“Forget it, Joe,” came the reply, without an instant’s hesitation.  “You know as well as I do how much chance Professor Parkhill, or anyone else, would have, trying to keep the boys from making you and Nick dance on nothing, once they hear of this.  Besides, the professor is not in the valley now.”

The poor outcast’s fright was pitiful.  “You ain’t meanin’ that he—­that he’s gone?” he gasped.

“Listen, Joe,” said Patches quickly.  “I can do more for you than he could, even if he were here.  You know I am your friend, and I don’t want to see a good fellow like you sent to prison for fifteen or twenty years, or, perhaps, hanged.  But there’s only one way that I can see for me to save you.  You must go with me to the Cross-Triangle, and tell Mr. Baldwin all about it, how you were just working for Nick, and how he made you help him do this, and all that you know.  If you do that, we can get you off.”

“I—­I reckon you’re right, Patches,” returned the frightened weakling sullenly.  “Nick has sure treated me like a dog, anyway.  You won’t let Nick get at me, will you, if I go?”

“Nobody can get at you, Joe, if you go with me, and do the square thing.  I’m going to take care of you myself, and help you to get out of this, and brace up and be a man.  Come on; let’s be moving.  I’ll turn this calf loose first, though.”

He was bending over the calf when a noise in the brush caused him to stand suddenly erect.

Joe was whimpering with terror.

Patches said fiercely, but in a low tone, “Shut up, and follow my lead.  Be a man, and I’ll get you out of this yet.”

“Nick will kill us sure,” whined Joe.

“Not if I get my hands on him first, he won’t,” retorted Patches.

But it was with a feeling of relief that the cowboy saw Phil Acton ride toward them from the shelter of the timber.

Before Patches could speak, Phil’s gun covered him, and the foreman’s voice rang out sharply.

“Hands up!”

Joe’s hands shot above his head.  Patches hesitated.

“Quick!” said Phil.

And as Patches saw the man’s eyes over the black barrel of the weapon he obeyed.  But as he raised his hands, a dull flush of anger colored his tanned face a deeper red, and his eyes grew dark with passion.  He realized his situation instantly.  The mystery that surrounded his first appearance when he had sought employment at the Cross-Triangle; the persistent suspicion of many of the cowboys because of his friendship for Yavapai Joe; his meeting with Joe which the professor had reported; his refusal to explain to Phil; his return to the ranch when everyone was away and he himself was supposed to be in Prescott—­all these and many other incidents had come to their legitimate climax in his presence on that spot with Yavapai Joe, the smouldering fire and the freshly branded calf.  He was unarmed, but Phil could not be sure of that, for many a cowboy carries his gun inside the leg of his leather chaps, where it does not so easily catch in the brush.