"Look at him go!" he chuckled. "Scared stiff." "Get yore hosses!" commanded the marshal. "Don't stand here gassin'! We'll go after him right away!" "Oh, let him go," drawled Loudon. "He ain't worth chasin'." "But he's a road agent, ain't he?" said Jim Mace. "No, I just said he was," grinned Loudon. "He ain't nothin' but a right good cook, so far as I know." "Ain't he done nothin'?" inquired the perplexed marshal. "Only jerked a glass of whisky at me," replied Loudon. "Yuh see, I ain't right popular with him." "From the way he's splittin' the breeze," said Jim Mace, "it looks like he don't care for yore society none." "I'd ought to go after him," grunted the marshal, vengefully, tenderly feeling a skinned elbow. "I don't mind a reg'lar gun-play, but this here chuckin' glasses round promiscuous an' bumpin' folks over ain't right. It's agin' law an' order. He'd ought to be arrested. The calaboose has been empty for a week, too." Loudon left Jim Mace and Dan Smith explaining matters to the gathering crowd, and walked back to where he had left his horse. Ranger was not behind the freighter's wagon. Loudon ran into the Chicago Store. "Shore," said the proprietor. "I seen a feller climbin' aboard that hoss a few minutes ago. Seemed in a hurry, too. What? Yore hoss!" The proprietor ducked under the counter for his spurs and his rifle, and Loudon hurried out. Cutting's mount, the bay he had bought from Doubleday, was of course standing where he had been left among the other horses. Loudon threw the dropped reins over the bay's head and swung up. "He's a hoss thief!" he shouted to Dan Smith and Jim Mace. "He got away on my hoss!" Quirting and spurring, Loudon tore down the street. Before the horse's hoofs spattered the water of the ford the proprietor of the Chicago Store and the marshal were galloping in his wake. Jim Mace and a score of others followed at intervals. A horse was not stolen in Paradise Bend every day. The inhabitants were bent on making the most of their opportunity. The bay was a good horse, but Ranger was the better, and Loudon knew it--knew, too that, unless Ranger fell down, Cutting would escape. "Ranger's good for all day," groaned Loudon. "All day an' not strain himself a little bit." As the bay flashed across the top of a rise two miles beyond the Dogsoldier, Loudon glimpsed two specks four miles ahead. "Block! He's with Block!" exclaimed Loudon, and drove in the spurs. The bay leaped madly forward and rocketed down the long slope. A high-lipped swell concealed the two specks, and for a long ten minutes Loudon rode between the sides of the draw. The bay charged at the high-lipped swell with undiminished vigour. He was doing his level best, but his gait was tied in. It bore not the remotest resemblance to Ranger's free-swinging stride. When Loudon reached the crest of the swell the specks had vanished.