You will admit that being wakened from a sound sleep, shot on to the back of an almost wild colt, and borne across a dark prairie at lightning speed does not tend to make one think clearly.  Whitey had only one lucid thought during that ride.  If any cowpunchers mistook his white-clad figure for a ghost, they couldn’t shoot him—­he was going too fast.  In a vague way he was thankful for this.

The distance was fourteen miles, and it seemed to Whitey as though he made it in thirteen jumps.  When the pony arrived at the Bar O Ranch, he still had the boy with him.  And when Whitey pulled up the restless colt, and roused the slumbering household, he had another sensation coming, for his father was there.

Mr. Sherwood had intended his coming to the ranch that day as a surprise, and it was.  And he had had a surprise coming to him.  He had laughed when Bill Jordan told him how he was hazing Whitey.  Then Walt Lampson, of the Star Circle, had arrived with Mart Cooley, who was now working for Walt.  They had dropped in to see if Whitey had arrived home safely, supposing that he had started for home when he left the Star Circle.

When it was learned that Whitey wasn’t at home, and no one knew where he was, Mr. Sherwood had his surprise, and it wasn’t pleasant.  And Bill Jordan looked crestfallen.  They had talked it over till late, and decided to start a search for Whitey in the morning.  Then, when Whitey, clad in a large night-shirt and riding a half-wild pony, came to summon the vigilantes—­well, it seemed a time for surprises.

The men hastily dressed and armed themselves, summoned all the others on the ranch, and saddled their horses.  While this is going on, at the risk of telling you something you already know, a word about the vigilantes.  In the Old West various bodies of men were formed to clean up the wilder elements.  Sometimes they enforced their law by being lawless themselves.  They made a man be good if they had to hang him to do it.  The law was weak.  By harsh, rough treatment—­as a tigress might treat its cub—­they made it strong.  And when the law was strong and able to care for itself—­again like the tigress—­they allowed it to do so; the vigilantes disbanded.

The Bar O mustered about ten men.  The rider of the fastest horse dashed ahead to the Junction, to get reenforcements to join the ranchmen on their way to the scene of action.  And now came bitter, oh, bitter! disappointment for Whitey.  He was not to be allowed to go.  He had been hero enough.  The only clothing that iron-gray pony had on during that fourteen-mile ride was a hackamore, and the only clothing Whitey had on was a night-shirt.  He was fit for nothing except to lie face downward and sleep—­no attitude for a hero.

Whitey begged, he appealed, he almost wept, but his father was firm.  He was willing to risk his own life; he would not risk his son’s.  So, with tears in his eyes, Whitey stood and watched the party gallop away in the darkness.  And beside him, a lantern in his hand, stood the cook, an elderly man who had taken Wong Lee’s place.  And he watched wistfully, too, for he wanted to go, but he had left one of his legs on a Southern battle-field.