“You wait right here till I get old Ace of Spades,” he continued solemnly when he had rasped the raw liquor from his throat.  “If you ain’t here when I come back I’ll swallow-fork your ears with this here gat just to see if my shootin’ eye is in practice.  The last time I done any fancy shootin’ I was kind of wild—­kep’ a-hittin’ a little to one side an’ the other—­not much, only about an inch or so—­but it wasn’t right good shootin’.”

The half-breed grinned:  “A’m stay here till you com’ back.  A’m fin’ dat you ma frien’.  A’m lak’ you, bien!”

When the Texan returned, fifteen minutes later, the man of many names was gone.  “It’s just like I said, you can’t trust no gambler,” he muttered, with a doleful nod of the head.  “He’s pulled out on me, but he better not infest the usual marts of midnight.  ‘Cause I’m a-goin’ to start out an’ take in everything that’s open in this man’s town, an’ if I find him I’ll just nachelly show him the onprincipledness of lyin’ to a friend.”

Stepping to the bar he bought a drink and a moment later swung onto the big rangy black and clattered down the street.  At the edge of the town he turned and started slowly back, dismounting wherever the lights of a saloon illumined the dingy street, but never once catching a glimpse of the figure that followed in the thick blackness of the shadows.  Before the saloon of the surly proprietor the cowpuncher brought his big black to a stand and sat contemplating the sorrel that stood dejectedly with ears adroop and one hind foot resting lightly upon the toe.

“So that’s the cayuse Fatty wanted to trade me for Ace of Spades!” he snorted.  “That dog-legged, pot-gutted, lop-eared patch of red he offers to trade to me fer Ace of Spades!  It’s a doggone insult!  I didn’t know it at the time, havin’ only a couple of drinks, an’ too sober to judge a insult when I seen one.  But it’s different now, I can see it in the dark.  I’m a-goin’ in there an’—­an’ twist his nose off an’ feed it to him.  But first I got to find old Bat.  He’s an Injun, but he’s a good old scout, an’ I hate to think of him walkin’ all the way to Montana while some damn Greaser is spendin’ my hard earned samolians that I give him for carfare.  It’s a long walk to Montana.  Plumb through Colorado an’ Wyomin’ an’—­an’ New Jersey, or somewheres.  Mebbe he’s in there now.  As they say in the Bible, or somewheres, you got to hunt for a thing where you find it, or something.  Hold still, there you black devil you!  What you want to stand there spinnin’ ’round like a top for?  You be’n drinkin’, you doggone old ringtail!  What was I goin’ to do, now.  Oh, yes, twist Patty’s nose, an’ find Bat an’ shoot at his ears a while, an’ make him get his ticket to New Jersey an’——­

“This is a blame slow old town, she needs wakin’ up, anyhow.  If I ride in that door I’ll get scraped off like mud off a boot.”

He spurred the black and brought him up with a jerk beside the sorrel which snorted and reared back, snapping the reins with which he had been tied, and stood with distended nostrils sniffing inquiringly at Ace of Spades as the cowpuncher swung to the ground.