"Nope," said Hardy, "I've only been in the Territory a little over a year, this trip, and I'm learning, myself. Funny how much you can pick up from some of these Indians and Mexicans that can't write their own names, isn't it?" "Umm, may be so," assented Creede doubtfully, "but I'd rather go to a white man myself. Say," he exclaimed, changing the subject abruptly, "what was that name the old man called you by when he was makin' that talk about sheep--Roofer, or Rough House--or something like that?" "Oh, that's my front name--Rufus. Why? What's the matter with it?" "Nothin', I reckon," replied Creede absently, "never happened to hear it before, 's all. I was wonderin' how he knowed it," he added, glancing shrewdly sideways. "Thought maybe you might have met him up in California, or somewheres." "Oh, that's easy," responded Hardy unblinkingly. "The first thing he did was to ask me my full name. I notice he calls you Jefferson," he added, shiftily changing the subject. "Sure thing," agreed Creede, now quite satisfied, "he calls everybody that way. If your name is Jim you're James, John you're Jonathan, Jeff you're Jefferson Davis--but say, ain't they any f'r short to your name? We're gittin' too far out of town for this Mister business. My name's Jeff, you know," he suggested. "Why, sure," exclaimed Hardy, brushing aside any college-bred scruples, "only don't call me Rough House--they might get the idea that I was on the fight. But you don't need to get scared of Rufus--it's just another way of saying Red. I had a red-headed ancestor away back there somewhere and they called him Rufus, and then they passed the name down in the family until it got to me, and I'm no more red-headed than you are." "_No_--is that straight?" ejaculated the cowboy, with enthusiasm, "same as we call 'em Reddy now, eh? But say, I'd choke if I tried to call you Rufus. Will you stand for Reddy? Aw, that's no good--what's the matter with Rufe? Well, shake then, pardner, I'm dam' glad I met up with you." They pulled their horses down to a Spanish trot--that easy, limping shuffle that eats up its forty miles a day--and rode on together like brothers, heading for a distant pass in the mountains where the painted cliffs of the Bulldog break away and leave a gap down to the river. To the east rose Superstition Mountain, that huge buttress upon which, since the day that a war party of Pimas disappeared within the shadow of its pinnacles, hot upon the trail of the Apaches, and never returned again, the Indians of the valley have always looked with superstitious dread.