"We'll have to step right along," Harris said. "It's forty miles." They held the horses to a stiff swinging trot that devoured the miles without seeming to tire their mounts. For four hours they headed south and a little east, never slackening their pace except to breathe the horses on some steep ascent. The buckskin and the paint-horse had lost the first snap of their trot and it was evident that they would soon begin to lag. Another hour and they had slowed down perceptibly. The two men dismounted and tied the horses to the brush in a sheltered coulee, then started across a broad flat on foot. Out in the center a spot showed darker than the rest,--the old cabin where Carpenter had elected to start up for himself after being discharged from the Three Bar. When within a hundred yards of the cabin a horse, tied to a hitch post in front, neighed shrilly and Harris laid a restraining hand on Waddles's arm. They knelt in the brush as the door opened and a man stood silhouetted against the light. After a space of two minutes Carp's voice reached them. "Not a sound anywheres," he said. "Likely some horses drifting past." He went inside and closed the door. The two men circled the cabin and came up from the rear. A window stood opened some eight inches from the bottom. Through the holes in the ragged flour sack that served as a curtain Harris secured a view of the inside. Carp and Slade sat facing across a little table in the center of the room. "I want to clean up and go," Carp was saying. "This damn Harris put me on the black list." "You've been on it for three months," Slade said. "Nothing has happened yet. But don't let me keep you from pulling out any time you like." "But I've got a settlement to make," Carp insisted. "Let's get that fixed up." "Settlement?" Slade asked. "Settlement with who?" Carpenter leaned across the table and tapped it to emphasize his remarks. "Listen. Morrow gave me a bill of sale from you calling for a hundred head of Three Bar she-stock, rebranded Triangle on the hip." Slade nodded shortly. "I gave Morrow that for two years' back pay when he quit. He could sell out to you if he liked." "And now I want to sell out," Carp said. "And be gone from here." "How many head have you got?" Slade asked. "Three hundred head," Carp stated. "You've increased right fast," Slade remarked. "I'd think you'd want to stay where you was doing so well. How much do you want?" "Five dollars straight through," Carp said. "Cheap enough," Slade answered. "If only a man was in the market." He looked straight at Carp and the man's eyes slipped away from Slade's steady gaze. "But I'm not buying. Likely Morrow will buy you out." "Morrow ought to be here now," Carp stated. "He's coming to-night." "Then I'd better go," Slade said. "I don't like Morrow's ways."