The stranger turned in his saddle, grinning cheerfully, and favored his late host with a well-known, two-handed nose signal. Then he slapped the black horse and shot down the street without another backward glance. Pop, arms akimbo, watched him sweep out of sight around a bend. "Huh!" he snorted. "Wonder what yo're doin' down here? Galivantin' around th' country, insultin' honest, hard-workin' folks, an' wearin' two guns, low down an' tied! I reckon when you learns th' lay of th' country, if you stays long enough, you'll wind up by joinin' that gang up in th' Twin Buttes country. I allus like to see triggers on six-shooters, _I_ do." He had not noticed the triggers, but that was no bar to his healthy imagination. Shuffling back to his seat, he watched the indignant Andy pecking at a wet spot on the floor. "So you didn't chaw his finger, huh?" he demanded, in open and frank admiration of the bird's astuteness. "Strikes me you got a hull lot of wisdom, my boy. Some folks says a bird ain't got no brains; but lemme tell you that you've got a danged good instinct." CHAPTER II A QUESTION OF IDENTITY Meanwhile the stranger was loping steadily eastward, and he arrived at the corral of the CL ranch before sundown, nodding pleasantly to the man who emerged from it: "Howd'y," he said. "I'm lookin' for Logan." The CL man casually let his right hand lay loosely near the butt of his Colt: "Howd'y," he nodded. "Yo're lookin' right at him." "Do you need any more punchers?" asked the stranger. "H'm," muttered the foreman. "Might use one. If it's you, we'll talk money on pay-day. I'll know more about you then." A puncher, passing the corral, noticed the two guns, frowned slightly and entered the enclosure, and leaned alertly against the palisade, where a crack between two logs served him as a loophole. The two-gun man laughed with genuine enjoyment at the foreman's way of hiring men. "That's fair," he replied; "but what's th' high an' low figgers? I like to know th' limit of any game I sets in." Logan shrugged his shoulders. "Forty is th' lowest I'd offer a white man; an' he wouldn't draw that more'n a month. Any man as ain't worth more is in our way. It's a waste of grub to feed him. Th' sky is th' high limit--but you've got to work like h--l to pass th' clouds." "I'm some balloon," laughed the stranger. "Where's the grub shack?" "Hold on, young man! We ain't got that far, yet. Where are you from, an' what have you been doin' with yore sweet young life?" The stranger's face grew grave and his eyes narrowed a trifle. "Some folks allow that's a leadin' question. It ain't polite." "I allow that, too. An' I'm aimin' to make it a leadin' question, 'though I ain't lackin' in politeness, nor tryin' to rile you. You don't have to answer. Th' wide world, full of jobs, is all around you." The newcomer regarded him calmly for a moment, and suddenly smiled.