“You rascal!” exclaimed the delighted rancher, vaulting upon his back in a twinkling.  “Now we’ll settle with the chap that tried to part you and me.”

All this consumed but a few moments.  The Indian could not have gone far.  He would not dash among the cattle, who, now that they were stampeded, were as dangerous as so many wild beasts.  He had hardly time to conceal himself, and Grizzly was certain that he had him.

All the same, however, the cowman made a miscalculation.  When he wheeled Cap about to run down the daring redskin he was nowhere to be seen.  There were no trees near, but there were boulders, rocks and depressions, with the rich grass everywhere, and the dusky thief was as safe as if beyond the Assinaboine, in British territory.

“I’m glad of it,” thought Weber, a moment later; “a redskin that can show such a performance as that desarves to save his scalp.”

In the dizzying flurry Grizzly had no time to think of his companion, who had enough to attend to his own matters.  He now looked around for him, but he, too, was invisible.

“I wonder whether he got his horse back, for Dick must have been stole, the same as was Cap.”

And, grateful for having regained possession of his horse, he patted the silken neck of the noble animal.

Grizzly’s years of experience with cattle apprised him of a gratifying truth.  The course of the stampeded herd was changing.  Instead of fleeing away from the main body they were veering around, so that, if the change of course continued, they would return to the neighbourhood from which they started.

Panic-smitten cattle are not apt to do a thing of that kind of their own accord.  Some cause, and a strong one, too, must have effected this diversion in the line of flight.  All at once, above the din, sounded the penetrating voice of a man, who was striving with herculean energy to change the course of the wild animals.

One sound of that voice was sufficient to identify it as Budd Hankinson’s.  He must have played his cards well to have done all this in so brief a space of time.

And such had been the case beyond a doubt.  Budd suspected from the first what did not enter Grizzly’s mind until it flashed upon him as described.  The fact that neither of their horses appeared when summoned convinced Budd that they had been stolen.  True, even in that case they would have obeyed the signal, had they been near enough, and had the circumstances allowed them to identify it; but, although not far off, the noise immediately around them shut out the call of Grizzly from their ears, until he repeated it, as has been told.

Hankinson anticipated his friend in this act.  In his case, the thief in the saddle of Dick gave it up at once.  He leaped off, and whisked out of sight.  It was then Budd called to Grizzly that the thieves had their horses; but the other did not catch his words, and, therefore, gave them no further heed.