“He’s dest a-swingin’ his horns and goin’ ‘Mrrr! Mrrr!’” sputtered the excitable Jinnie, while Tod came in grandly. “’F I’d had a rope, I’d ’a’ snaked him out o’ that mighty quick.” “S’pose we sa’nter up there and have a look at him?” suggested Lefty Adams, throwing away his cigarette butt and reaching around for his saddle, of which he had been making a pillow. He cinched it on the pony deliberately. “Hi, fellers, what do you say? Shall we go and pull a steer out of the mud?” “You boys mind what you’re doing,” said Colonel Marchbanks from where he lay under a big juniper, his hands clasped behind his head, a cigar between his teeth. “Those fellows are due to go on the prod when you drag ’em out of the mud. Don’t turn any cavorting steer down the creek here on us.” Three or four young men had hastily saddled, mounted and wheeled to follow Adams. “All right, Colonel,” Lefty called back over his shoulder. “Us girls’ll be powerful careful. We’re kind o’ scairt o’ cow-brutes ourselves.” Then he caught his hat from his head, slapped it down in a loud “flop” on the pony’s neck, and clattered out of sight along the trail, leading the way with a long “Yip-pee!” Among the group that rode at his heels were both Pearse Masters and Fayte Marchbanks. Maybelle caught Hilda’s arm and without a word dragged her in their wake. “Now,” she whispered urgently, “now’s your time to get a word alone with him—and help me. I want to slip across to that town crowd without Pa or Ma seeing me. Won’t take me but a minute. You wait for me here by the creek, and we’ll go back together afterward. They’ll think we’ve been together all the time.” No time to debate. The girls ran blindly up the trail beside the creek. It was the quickest way for Maybelle’s enterprise too. Rough, twisty going; breathless, they swung around a clump of scrub—and there right before them was the steer, sunk nearly to his knees in the soft mud. The young fellows sitting their ponies about him, joking over the enterprise, hadn’t gotten sight of the two girls. Maybelle pulled back a little, out of range; it was no part of her plan to be caught by her brother in what she was doing. Lefty Adams was rolling a fresh cigarette, one leg thrown over the saddle horn. He slanted a glance at the unfortunate one in the mud who was still, as Tod had said, shaking his head and grumbling, rolling bloodshot eyes. “Huh! One of old man Hipp’s lazy H’s,” drawled Lefty in a disgusted tone. “That’s what he is.” Fayte Marchbanks began to re-coil the rope he’d been loosening from his saddle horn. “Old man Hipp!” sniffed Sam Cole. “Anybody that wants to, can pull a steer out of the mud for that old skeezicks!” “Aw—we ain’t going to pull it out for Hipp,” argued Lefty. “Just going to snake the long-horn out for fun. Go to it, fellows. First one speaks has got first go. Who wants to dab a rope on him?”