The body of Fox relaxed and the rifle slid from his nerveless fingers.  Teddy stopped bucking as if a spring had been touched.  Dingwell was on his own feet before the other knew what had happened.  His long arm plucked the little man from the saddle as if he had been a child.

Still jarred by the blow, Fox looked up with a ludicrous expression on his fat face.  His mind was not yet adjusted to what had taken place.

“I told you to keep the brute away,” he complained querulously.  “Now, see what you’ve done.”

Dave grinned.  “Looks like I spilled your apple cart.  No, don’t bother about that gun.  I’ll take care of it for you.  Much obliged.”

Chet’s face registered complex emotion.  Incredulity struggled with resentment.  “You made that horse buck on purpose,” he charged.

“You’re certainly a wiz, Chet,” drawled the cattleman.

“And that business of being sore at yourself and ashamed was all a bluff.  You were laying back to trick me,” went on Fox venomously.

“How did you guess it?  Well, don’t you care.  We’re born to trouble as the sparks fly upward.  As for man, his days are as grass.  He diggeth a pit and falleth into it his own self.  Likewise he digs a hole and buries gold, but beholds another guy finds it.  See, Second Ananias, fourteen, twelve.”

“That’s how you show your gratitude, is it?  I might ‘a’ shot you safe and comfortable from the mesquite and saved a lot of trouble.”

“I don’t wonder you’re disgusted, Chet.  But be an optimist.  I might ‘a’ busted you high and wide with that quirt instead of giving you a nice little easy tap that just did the business.  There’s no manner of use being regretful over past mistakes,” Dave told him cheerfully.

“It’s easy enough for you to say that,” groaned Fox, his hand to an aching head.  “But I didn’t lambaste you one on the nut.  Anyhow, you’ve won out.”

“I had won out all the time, only I hadn’t pulled it off yet,” Dingwell explained with a grin.  “You didn’t think I was going up to the horse ranch with you meek and humble, did you?  But we can talk while we ride.  I got to hustle back to Battle Butte and turn in this sack to the sheriff so as I can claim the reward.  Hate to trouble you, Chet, but I’ll have to ask you to transfer that gunnysack back to Teddy.  He’s through bucking for to-day, I shouldn’t wonder.”

Sourly Fox did as he was told.  Then, still under orders, he mounted his own horse and rode back with his former prisoner to the park.  Dingwell gathered up the rifle and revolver that had been left at the edge of the aspen grove and headed the horses for Battle Butte.

“We’ll move lively, Chet,” he said.  “It will be night first thing we know.”

Chet Fox was no fool.  He could see how carefully Dingwell had built up the situation for his coup, and he began at once laying the groundwork for his own escape.  There was in his mind no intention of trying to recover the gold himself, but if he could get away in time to let the Rutherfords know the situation, he knew that Dave would have an uneasy life of it.