“What’s it to you?” he demanded.  “Huh?  Ain’t you never seen a guy hit the hop before?”

He stared at me so truculently that I was moved to righteous wrath; and I answered him back.  I told him what I thought of him and his clothes and his conduct at quite some length.  When I had finished he seemed to have gained a new attitude of aggravating wise superiority.

“That’s all right, kid; that’s all right,” he assured me; “keep your hair on.  I ain’t such a bad scout; but you gotta get used to me.  Give me my hop and I’m all right.  Now about this Hooper; you say you know him?”

“None better,” I rejoined.  “But what’s that to you?  That’s a fair question.”

He bored me with his beady rat eyes for several seconds.

“Friend of yours?” he asked, briefly.

Something in the intonations of his voice induced me to frankness.

“I have good cause to think he’s trying to kill me,” I replied.

He produced a pocketbook, fumbled in it for a moment, and laid before me a clipping.  It was from the Want column of a newspaper, and read as follows: 

     A.A.B.—­Will deal with you on your terms.  H.H.

“A.A.B. that’s me—­Artie Brower.  And H.H.—­that’s him—­Henry Hooper,” he explained.  “And that lil’ piece of paper means that’s he’s caved, come off, war’s over.  Means I’m rich, that I can have my own ponies if I want to, ’stead of touting somebody else’s old dogs.  It means that I got old H.H.—­Henry Hooper—­where the hair is short, and he’s got to come my way!”

His eyes were glittering restlessly, and the pupils seemed to be unduly dilated.  The whiskey and opium together—­probably an unaccustomed combination—­were too much for his ill-balanced control.  Every indication of his face and his narrow eyes was for secrecy and craft; yet for the moment he was opening up to me, a stranger, like an oyster.  Even my inexperience could see that much, and I eagerly took advantage of my chance.

“You are a horseman, then?” I suggested.

“Me a horseman?  Say, kid, you didn’t get my name.  Brower—­Artie Brower.  Why, I’ve ridden more winning races than any other man on the Pacific Coast.  That’s how I got onto old H.H.  I rode for him.  He knows a good horse all right—­the old skunk.  Used to have a pretty string.”

“He’s got at least one good Morgan stallion now,” said I.  “I’ve seen him at Hooper’s ranch.”

“I know the old crock—­trotter,” scorned the true riding jockey.  “Probably old Tim Westmore is hanging around, too.  He’s in love with that horse.”

“Is he in love with Hooper, too?” I asked.

“Just like I am,” said the jockey with a leer.

“So you’re going to be rich,” said I.  “How’s that?”

He leered at me again, going foxy.

“Don’t you wish you knew!  But I’ll tell you this:  old H.H. is going to give me all I want—­just because I ask him to.”