Daisy Nixon was thinking rapidly. She had been neither humbled nor daunted by Mr. Markey's attitude. In fact, the point uppermost in her mind, at the moment, was how to get back Beatty's purse--less because of its contents than for the reason that she did not want to let Markey score. However, there was no need of appearing too spunky, now that Mr. Hogle had appointed himself her ally. Daisy cast down her eyes, therefore, and merely answered the old man's query with a meek little affirmative nod. "That's my girl!" said Old Man Hogle, approvingly, patting her on the side of the shoulder; "and now, what's the rumpus _here_? Has this lad been sassin' ye?" Again Daisy bobbed her head without speaking. After a moment she added, contriving a little catch in her voice, "He took my purse, with all my money in it, so he did." "Took your _what_?" roared her champion. Then he swung around toward Markey. "You give that up," he said, "and do it quick!" "The blame little skirt lies," spit out Markey; "that purse belongs to Fred. She grabbed it off o' him. Anyway, it's none o' your business. You get to hell out o' here, and get your team out. You got to meet that south train in fifteen minutes". Old Man Hogle, with great deliberation, pulled out an immense old silver watch, rubbed his thumb-ball over the crystal, and set the timepiece on the counter. "An' you," he said, "have got to give this little gal's purse up in fifteen _seconds_. If ye don't--I'll take a hand in it. Ye know what that means, Markey." Markey stared, his eyeball in the corner of his eye and his elbow bracing him laterally. Then he canted his head across the counter and slid an epithet out of the side of his mouth. Old Jim Hogle did not even raise his eyes from the face of the watch. He waited till the second-hand had travelled one-quarter of the way around its dial. Then, in a leisurely way, he slipped the watch into his vest-pocket, glancing casually over Markey's head at the keys hanging on the numbered rack behind the counter. Then--he sprang into action! So swiftly, that the eye could scarcely follow the movement, his arm shot out, then jerked back toward him; bringing with it Markey, whom he had secured by the coat-collar. Taken so much by surprise that he was for the moment speechless, the clerk, helpless as a fish on a hook, was dragged by that one strong arm until he lay across the counter. Then the ex-father and farmer who was now the driver of the omnibus of this Wheat-Land city's pioneer hotel, caught up from the chair where he had temporarily laid it down, a corrective device known in country circles as a "rawhide". Markey, recovering from his astonishment, jerked furiously about as he sprawled, scrabbling for some missile. Then, out of the corner of his eye, he saw the rawhide. "Yeh touch me with that," he said, in his cat-like nasal snarl, "and I'll kill yeh."