Stone's companions under instructions had left him and returned to Doubleday's before the shot across the Crazy Woman. Stone himself got back to Doubleday's ranch at about the time that Laramie started for Sleepy Cat in the evening. But Barb Doubleday and Van Horn, he was told, were in town. He followed them and discovered Van Horn in the bar room at the hotel. "I hear you got him," muttered Van Horn, bending his keen eyes on Stone. "Who said so?" demanded Stone. "His horse came into Kitchen's barn this afternoon, all saddled. McAlpin is telling he heard a rifle shot on the Crazy Woman. They're wild down at the barn over it. Did you get him?" Stone paused over a glass of whisky; his face brightened: "I tumbled him off his horse, if you call that getting him." Van Horn asked questions impatiently. Stone answered with the indifference of the man that had turned a big trick. But Van Horn insisted on knowing what had become of Laramie. "He tumbled into a hole," said Stone. "I didn't cross the creek to look for him." "Why didn't you?" asked Van Horn nervously. Stone dallied with his glass: "I watched the hole all day. He didn't come out. That was enough, wasn't it?" "No," snapped Van Horn. "Well, I'll tell you, Harry; next time you and the old man want a job done, do it yourself. I never liked Laramie: I didn't care for getting too close to the hole he tumbled into. After he was hit, he stuck to his horse a little too long to suit me," said Stone shrewdly. Van Horn's retort was contemptuous and pointed. He laughed: "Afraid of him, eh?" Stone regarded him malevolently: "Look here!" he exclaimed harshly, "I'll make you a little proposition. When I get shaved we'll ride over to the Crazy Woman and you c'n look in the hole for yourself." The uncertainty irritated Van Horn. When Stone, newly plastered, emerged from the barber shop, Van Horn took him with his story to Doubleday whom they found in his room, chewing the stub of a cold cigar and looking over a stock journal. He did not appear amiable, nor did his face change much as the news was cautiously conveyed to him. When Van Horn announced he would ride out with Stone to examine the road hole, Doubleday, whose expression had grown colder and colder, broke in: "Needn't waste any time on that," he said with a snap of his jaw. Stone snorted: "Maybe _you_ think he wasn't hit." "Hit!" exclaimed Barb. "Hit!" he repeated, raising a long forefinger with deep-drawn disgust. "He's sittin' in that room across the hall right now----" "What's he doin'?" "Playin' poker," muttered the old cattleman grimly, "with Doc. Carpy and Harry Tenison." CHAPTER XXIII KATE RIDES In strict point of fact, Laramie had left the room across the hall and at that particular moment was sitting down for a late supper at Belle Shockley's whither Sawdy and Lefever had dragged him from the hotel. Carpy had come with them.