Squint, still arguing, had a Colt in his upraised, waving hand, and was making so much noise with his mouth, and was so interested in and spellbound by his own eloquence that he failed to hear the rolling hoofs behind him until too late. As he turned, the sailing loop dropped over his upraised arm, tightened and pulled him from his horse which, slowing down, soon stopped and fell to grazing. Squint landed on his back, the gun exploding and flying from his hand, his sombrero going to the other side. Johnny came up along the taut rope, swung down, and scooped up the gun, and then released the lariat, recoiling it for future use. Squint opened his eyes, considerably more sober than he had been for twelve hours, and sat up, dazed and angry. "What th'--" he began. "Shut yore face!" snapped Johnny. "Pick up yore hat an' hoof it to yore cayuse. You was headed wrong, so I stopped you. Move rapid, or I'll provide some dance music!" Squint tried his legs and arms, found them still to be working, and sullenly plodded to his horse. Mounting, he surrendered his rifle in compliance to orders, and then loped back the way he had come, Johnny riding one length in his rear. "Squint," said his captor in a hard, level voice, "if you give me the least excuse I'll blow you apart. I've seen some mangy humans, but I never run across a two-laigged polecat like you. I hate to tell you anythin' that'll save yore life, an' I'm hopin' you'll forget it. I'll tell you just once: You behave yoreself like you never did before, an' move lively when I speak. _Keep looking ahead!_ You don't have to look around to hear, do you?" Squint preserved an unbroken silence and soon they reached the scene of his outrage and stopped. Johnny ordered him to ride on for a hundred feet. "That's him, Mister!" excitedly cried Charley. "That's th' big bum!" "I agree with you, buddy," answered Johnny. "Now you tell me all of it, over again." He listened in grave silence until the pitiful tale was told and then pointed to Pepper's back, behind him. "Climb up, sonny. Squint an' me are passin' close to yore house an' we'll take you as far as we can. You don't mind walkin' a few miles, do you?" "But I can't go!" protested Charley. "I got to go to Highbank for th' doctor. I only hope he ain't drunk when I get there." "How you goin'?" quizzically demanded Johnny. "Don't know; but that don't make no difference--I just _got_ to go, _somehow_! Mebby I could take Squint's horse," he suggested, emboldened by desperation. Johnny shook his head. "You don't never want to ride a Bar H cayuse; 'tain't healthy. But, say, bud, we don't have to go to Highback at all--we can get th' Doc at Gunsight. You been eatin' loco weed?" "He won't come," said the boy, whispering, and looking at Squint. "Did you ask him?" asked Johnny in a low voice, taking the cue. "No; but he wouldn't come when Peggy was sick--an' dad says to get Dr. Treadwell from Highbank."