“No! no!  Yorkey!” Redmond almost shouted the disclaimer, “Slavin wised me up to that trick of his yesterday.  I forgot.  It was my own fault I got piled like that.  Forget it, old man!  I say forget it!”

He shook the other’s arm with a sort of savage gentleness.

A look of vague relief dawned on Yorke’s haggard face.  “Ay, so!” he murmured, and paused with brooding indecision.  “That’s absolved my conscience some, but not altogether.”

They remained silent awhile after this.  Presently Yorke pulled himself together and spoke briskly and decisively.  “Well, now! we’ll have to get busy.  Blair’s place is only about three miles from here—­nor’east—­they’re on the long-distance ’phone.  Doctor Cox of Cow Run’s the coroner for this district.  If I can get hold of him I’ll get him to come out right-away—­and I’ll notify Slavin.”

Catching up his horse he swung into the saddle.  “I’ll be back here on the jump.  You stick around, and say, Reddy, you might as well have a dekko at the lay of things while you’re waiting.  Where he came off the perch, how far he’s been dragged, and all that.  Be careful though, keep well to the side and don’t foul up the tracks.  And don’t get too far away, either!”

He galloped off and soon disappeared over a distant rise.  Left to himself George mounted Fox and set to work to follow out the senior constable’s instructions.

“Well?” queried Yorke, swinging wearily out of his saddle an hour or so later, “How’d you make out?  Find the place where he flopped?  Rum sort of perch you’ve got there—­you look like Patience on a monument!”

George, seated upon the rump of the dead horse, nodded and grunted laconic response:  “Sure.  ’Bout two miles down the trail there.  How’d you get along, Yorkey?  Did you raise Slavin and the coroner?”

“Got Slavin all hunkadory,” said the senior constable briefly, “he should be here soon, now.  Dr. Cox’d just left for Wilson’s, two miles this side of Cow Run.  They’re on the ’phone, too; so I left word there for him to come on here right away.”  He seated himself alongside the other.

Awhile they carried on a desultory, more or less speculative conversation anent the fatality, until they grew morbidly weary of contemplating the poor broken body.  Yorke slid off the dead horse suddenly.

“Wish Slavin were here!” he said, “let’s take a dekko from the top of the rise, Reddy, see’f we can see him coming.  I’m getting cold sitting here.”

Redmond, nothing loath, complied.  Mounting, they turned back to the summit of the ridge.  Reaching it, the jingle of bells smote their ears, and they espied the Police cutter approaching them at a rapid pace.

“Like unto Jehu, the son of Nimshi!” murmured Yorke, “he’s sure springing old T and B up the grade.”

Sergeant Slavin pulled up his smoking team along-side his two mounted subordinates.  “So ho, bhoys!” was his greeting, “fwhat’s this bizness?”