Garner grunted as he thrust his hand deep into his breast-pocket for his plug of tobacco and began to twist off a corner of it. “The most maddening thing on earth,” he said, “is to have a close friend who is a darned fool. I'm tired of the whole business. Old Dwight is out of all patience with Carson for the reckless way he has been living, but the old man is really carried away with pride over the boy's political chances. He had that sort of ambition himself in his early life, and he likes to see his son go in for it. He was powerfully tickled the other day when I told him Carson was going in on the biggest wave of popularity that ever bore a human chip, but he will cuss a blue streak when the returns come in, for I tell you, boys, if Carson has a row with Dan Willis to-night over this negro business, it will knock him higher than a kite.” “Do you know whether Carson has anything to shoot with?” Tingle asked, thoughtfully. “Oh yes, I saw the bulge of it under his coat just now,” Garner answered, still angrily, “and if the two come together it will be raining lead for a while in the old town.” “I was just thinking about his sick mother,” Keith Gordon remarked. “My sister told me the other day that Mrs. Dwight was in such a low condition that any sudden shock would be apt to kill her. A thing like this would upset her terribly--that is, if there is really any shooting. Don't you suppose if we were to remind Carson of her condition that he might agree to go home?” “No, you don't know him as well as I do,” Garner said, firmly. “It would only make him madder. The more reasons we give him for avoiding Willis the more stubborn he'll be. I guess we'll have to let him sit there and make a target of himself.” Just then a tall mountaineer, under a broad-brimmed soft hat, wearing a cotton checked shirt and jean trousers passed through the light of the entrance to the hotel near by and slouched through the intervening darkness towards them. “It's Pole Baker,” said Keith. “He's a rough-and-ready supporter of Carson's. Say, hold on, Pole!” “Hold on yourself; what's up?” the mountaineer asked, with a laugh. “Plottin' agin the whites?” “We want to ask you if you've seen Dan Willis to-night,” Garner questioned.