“Don’t do anything rash,” Mr. Richie advised, and took advantage of a friend’s privilege to be insulting.  “I helped lynch a road-agent only last month.”

“Which the huh-holdup business is too easy for a live man,” opined Mr. Dawson.  “We want somethin’ mum-more diff-diff-diff’cult, me an’ Swing do, so we’re goin’ to Arizona where the gold grows.  No more wrastlin’ cows.  No more hard work for us. We’re gonna get rich quick, we are.  What you laughin’ at?”

“I never laugh,” denied Mr. Richie.  “When yo’re stakin’ out claims don’t forget me.”

“We won’t,” averred Mr. Dawson, solemnly.  “Le’s have another.”

They had another—­several others.

The upshot was that when Mr. Richie (who was the lucky possessor of a head that liquor did not easily affect) departed homeward at four P.M., he left behind him a sadly plastered Mr. Dawson.

Mr. Tunstall, of course, was still sleeping deeply and noisily.  But Mr. Dawson had long since lost interest in Mr. Tunstall.  It is doubtful whether he remembered that Mr. Tunstall existed.  The two had begun their party immediately after breakfast.  Mr. Tunstall had succumbed early, but Mr. Dawson had not once halted his efforts to make the celebration a huge success.  So it is not a subject for surprise that Mr. Dawson, some thirty minutes after bidding Mr. Richie an affectionate farewell, should stagger out into the street and ride away on the horse of someone else.

The ensuing hours of the evening and the night were a merciful blank to Mr. Dawson.  His first conscious thought was when he awoke at dawn on a side-hill, a sharp rock prodding him in the small of the back and the bridle-reins of his dozing horse wound round one arm.  Only it was not his horse.  His horse was a red roan.  This horse was a bay.  It wasn’t his saddle, either.

“Where’s my hoss?” he demanded of the world at large and sat up suddenly.

The sharp movement wrung a groan from the depths of his being.  The loss of his horse was drowned in the pains of his aching head.  Never was such all-pervading ache.  He knew the top was coming off.  He knew it.  He could feel it, and then did—­with his fingers.  He groaned again.

His tongue was dry as cotton, and it hurt him to swallow.  He stood up, but as promptly sat down.  In a whisper—­for speech was torture—­he began to revile himself for a fool.

“I might have known it,” was his plaint.  “I had a feelin’ when I took that last glass it was one too many.  I never did know when to stop.  I’d like to know how I got here, and where my hoss is, and who belongs to this one?”

He eyed the mount with disfavour.  He had never cared for bays.

“An’ that ain’t much of a saddle, either,” he went on with his soliloquy.  “Cheap saddle—­looks like a boy’s saddle—­an’ a old saddle—­bet Noah used one just like it—­try to rope with that saddle an’ you’d pull the horn to hellen gone.  Wonder what’s in that saddle-pocket.”