“What you done to my dog?” A woman’s voice broke on Racey’s ears.  But he did not remove his slightly narrowed eyes from the face of the burly youth.

“What you done to my dog?” The question was repeated, and the speaker came close to the burly youth and looked down at him.  Now that the woman was within his range of vision Racey perceived that she was the Happy Heart lookout, a good-looking creature with brown hair and a lithe figure.

The girl’s fists were clenched so tightly that her knuckles showed whitely against the pink.  Two red spots flared on the white skin of her cheeks.

“Dam yore soul!” swore the lady.  “I want my dog!  How many tunes I gotta ask you, huh?  Where is he?  Say somethin’, you dumb lump of slum gullion!”

“He ain’t yore dog!” denied the burly youth.  “He never was yores!  He’s mine, you—!”

Which last was putting it pretty strongly, even for the time, the place, and the girl.  She promptly swung a brisk right toe, kicked the burly youth under the chin, and flattened him out.

“That’ll learn you to call me names!” she snarled.  “So long as I act like a lady, I’m a-gonna be treated like one, and I’ll break the neck of the man who acts different, and you can stick a pin in that, you dirty-mouthed beast!”

Muttering profanely true to form, the aforementioned beast essayed to rise.  But here again Racey and his ready gun held him to the ground in a sitting position.

“You leave her alone,” commanded Racey.  “You got what was coming to yuh.  Let it go at that.  The lady says it’s her dog, anyway.”

“It’s my dog, I tell yuh!  I—­”

“Yo’re a liar!” averred the girl.  “You kicked the dog out when he was sick, and I took him in and tended him and got him well.  If that don’t make him my dog what does?”

“Correct,” said Racey.  “Call him.”

The girl put two fingers in her mouth and whistled shrilly.  Forth from the Canton came the dog on the jump and bounced into the girl’s arms and began to lick her ear with despatch and enthusiasm.

“You see how it is,” Racey indicated to the man on the ground.  “It’s the lady’s dog.  You can go now.”

The burly youth stared stupidly.

“You heard what I said,” Racey told him, impatiently.  “G’on.  Go some’ers else.  Get outa here.”

“Say,” remarked the burly youth in what was intended to be a menacing growl, “this party ain’t over yet.”

“Ain’t you been enough of a fool already to-day?” interrupted Racey.  “You ain’t asking for it, are you?”

“You can’t run no blazer on me,” denied the other, furiously.

Racey promptly holstered his sixshooter.  “Now’s yore best time,” he said, quietly.

When the smoke cleared away there was a rent in the sleeve of Racey’s shirt and the burly youth sat rocking his body to and fro and groaning through gritted teeth.  For there was a red-hot hole in his right shoulder which hurt him considerably.