“I know where it is,” said Sagebrush, scratching his wealth of whiskers. “All right. Where do you come in on the program? Want to be left out?” Sagebrush produced his pipe and sucked at it. At length he made slow answer. “Perfesser, there’s some folks around here jest pining to be left alone, and most gen’ally they gets left alone. That _cholo_ Mendoza was one such, and killin’ him aint botherin’ me none. Most likely you’ve discounted Sidewinder Crowfoot?” “My guess is that he’s the head of the whole gang.” “Reckon ye aint far off. Now, so long as I aint bothered, I aint troublin’ nobody. My motter is never to bother a rattler what’s a gent and sounds his rattles—but if he acts like a sidewinder, then bash his head, and do it pronto! Yestiddy you asks if I’ll help keep this yere female from gettin’ skun, and I says no. I still aint int’rested nohow. But two of that danged crowd have set in on me with a cold deck this mornin’, and I’m plumb riled. Yessir, I’m riled!” Sagebrush stood up. His bent figure straightened a trifle, and a sudden savage expression showed in his eyes, half masked behind the hairy growth of whiskers. In a flash all his dirt and squalor, all his unkempt and sun-bleached appearance, was gone in the eyes of Tompkins; he saw there a desert man who cared nothing for externals, but who could cope daily with the bitterest and most fearful forces of nature—and who was now ready to turn his inward strength against men. The drab and plodding desert rat suddenly showed, for one flashing moment, what unsuspected depths of character lay within him; and a rush of anger unbarred the floodgates of his reticence. “Yessir, I’m riled! I’ve seen them goin’s-on and said nothin’. I’ve seen them outlaws rulin’ the roost around yere and said nothin’. ’Twan’t no skin off’m my nose. I hadn’t no call to butt in. I’ve seen folks come in yere right happy, and seen ’em go out skun and mis’able and busted. I’ve seen one feller after another come in yere with the law two jumps behind him, and he goes over to Hourglass Cañon and lives happy. No law reaches in yere; nobody dast to interfere; and nobody knows about it anyhow. Stovepipe Springs, dad blame it, is jest a blind! If any law-off’cer comes pirootin’ around, he gits steered plumb careful and goes away ’thout learnin’ nothin’. But now, by gosh, I’m riled! Yessir. Perfesser, I’m with ye six ways from Sunday. Them skunks have sold us chips in this yere game, and by gosh I’ll play them chips till hell freezes over! Name your ante, Perfesser, and let’s go.” Sagebrush relaxed. He stuck his pipe in his pocket, brought out his plug and bit off a large section. Tompkins, taking the cigarette case and pocketing it, nodded. “Good. I’m going to get a rifle in town and come back tomorrow morning without anyone suspecting what I have in mind. Then I’ll be Pat Ramsay once more. Want to go to town with me?”