Sucatash, against the lamp-post, lolled negligently and rolled a cigarette. He did not even look at De Launay, but spoke out of a corner of his mouth. "How'd you make it, old-timer?" "Walked out," said the other, dryly. "Huh? Well, them blue bellies are right bright, now. You'll find pack hosses and an outfit at the spring west of the Lazy Y. Know where it is?" De Launay nodded as he felt the cinch of the horse's saddle. "But how the deuce will you get them there? It's nearly ninety miles." "We got a telephone at pa's ranch," said Sucatash, complacently. "Better hit the high spots. There's a row back there, now." De Launay swung into the saddle. "See you at Shoestring, this side the Crater," he said, briefly. "Adios!" "So long," said Sucatash, indifferently. De Launay spurred the horse and took the middle of the road on a run. Sucatash looked after him reflectively. "That hombre can ride a whole lot," he remarked. "He's a sure-enough, stingin' lizard, I'll say. Walked out! Huh!" A few moments after De Launay had rounded a corner and disappeared with his ill-gotten habiliments, excited policemen and citizens came rushing to where Sucatash, with nothing on his mind but his hat, strolled along the sidewalk. "Seen an escaped prisoner? Came this way. Wasn't there a horse here a minute ago?" The questions were fired at him in rapid succession. Sucatash was exasperatingly leisurely in answering them. "They was a hoss here, yes," he drawled. "Was it yours?" "Not that I know of," answered Sucatash. "Gent came along and forked it. I allowed it was hisn and so I didn't snub him down none. Was he the gent you was lookin' for?" "Which way did he go?" "He was headin' south-southeast by no'th or thereabouts when I last seen him," said Sucatash. "And he was fannin' a hole plumb through the atmosphere." They left the unsatisfactory witness and rushed to the corner around which De Launay had vanished. Here they found a man or two who had seen the galloping horse and its rider. But, as following on foot was manifestly impossible, one of them rushed to a telephone while others ran back to get a police automobile and give chase. De Launay, meanwhile, was riding at a hard pace through the outlying streets of the town, heading toward the south. The paved streets gave way to gravel roads, and the smoke of the factories hung in the air behind him. Past comfortable bungalows and well-kept lawns he rushed, until the private hedges gave place to barbed-wire fences, and the cropped grass to fields of standing stubble. The road ran along above and parallel to the river, following a ridge. To one side of it the farms lay, brown and gold in their autumn vesture. At regular intervals appeared a house, generally of the stereotyped bungalow form.