“Sure.  Go ahead.”

“Jim Weston and his Indian gang were only bluffing.”

“Bluffing!”

“That’s what I said.  Look here, Curly, they did the same thing to me, and scared me nearly to death when I was prowling around Glen West.  I thought fer certain that I had escaped just by the skin of me teeth.  But since I’ve talked with several others who were treated in the same way, I know that the whole thing is a bluff, an’ nothin’ more.”

Curly’s eyes were big with amazement, and slowly he comprehended the meaning of it all.

“An’ ye think they wouldn’t burn a man alive?” he gasped.

“No.  Take my word fer it, they have never done such a thing yet, an’ never will.  Jim Weston wants to keep all white men away from Glen West, an’ so he puts up that bluff.  It’s on account of his daughter.  He knows that more than you an’ me have their eyes on her.  That’s what took you there, wasn’t it?”

“Sure.  D’ye think it’d be anything else than a woman that would put me into such a scrape?”

“An’ didn’t get her after all.  That’s too bad.”

“But I will get her,” Curly declared with an oath.  “That slick gentleman sucker isn’t going to have her.”

“Who d’ye mean?”

“Oh, you know, don’t ye?  It’s that guy who knocked off the bottles.  He’s at Glen West now, an’ very chummy with Jim Weston’s daughter.”

“How in h——­ did he get there?”

“Search me.  But he’s there, all right, an’ from all appearance he’s going to stay, for a while at least, until I show me hand.”

“What can you do?  It seems to me that you’ve had enough of that place already.”

“So I have, but not of the girl.  My, she’s worth riskin’ one’s neck for.  But, say, Dan, what are you doing out here?”

“Prospectin’, of course.  What else would I be doin’?”

“Strike anything?”

“Not yet, though I’ve good prospects in sight, ’specially since you’ve arrived.”

Seeing the look of surprise in Curly’s eyes, Dan laughed.

“Yes,” he continued, “I’m prospectin’ in the same way that you are.  I’m after Jim Weston’s gal.”

“You are!” Curly’s face brightened.  “How long have you been at it?”

“Oh, fer about a week.  Ye see, I got into the same scrape that you did, an’ was pitched this side of Golden Crest, with strict orders to head fer Big Draw at once.”

“An’ did ye?”

“Sure.  I did as I was told.  But I returned, built a shack in the hills, an’ have been prowlin’ around ever since waitin’ me chance.  Jim Weston’s daughter sometimes rides alone on this side of the Crest, but so far I’ve missed meetin’ her.  But I’ll get her one of these days, an’ then her devil of a father will know that Dan Hivers has some of the Old Nick in him as well as he has.  It’s a mighty poor game, to my way of thinkin’, at which two can’t play.”

“Yes, and more than two,” Curly eagerly replied.  “You’re just the man I need.  Let’s work together, Dan, an’ we’ll be company fer each other.  Have you any grub?”