He had risen with them, but, without waiting for their answer, ran to where his horse stood at the open door.  He sank on his knees and began tugging violently at the stirrup-straps.  The two officers, their eyes filled with concern, pursued him across the room.  With Cahill twenty feet away, they dared not raise their voices, but in pantomime they beckoned him vigorously to return.  Ranson came at once, flushed and smiling, holding a hooded army-stirrup in each hand.  “Never do to have them see these!” he said.  He threw the stirrups from him, behind the row of hogsheads.  “I’ll ride in the stirrup-straps!” He still spoke in the same low, brisk tone.

Crosby seized him savagely by the arm.  “No, you won’t!” he hissed.  “Look here, Ranson.  Listen to me; for Heaven’s sake don’t be an ass!  They’ll shoot you, you’ll be killed—–­”

—­“And court-martialed,” panted Curtis.

“You’ll go to Leavenworth for the rest of your life!”

Ranson threw off the detaining hand, and ran behind the counter.  From a lower shelf he snatched a red bandanna kerchief.  From another he dragged a rubber poncho, and buttoned it high about his throat.  He picked up the steel shears which lay upon the counter, and snipping two holes in the red kerchief, stuck it under the brim of his sombrero.  It fell before his face like a curtain.  From his neck to his knees the poncho concealed his figure.  All that was visible of him was his eyes, laughing through the holes in the red mask.

“Behold the Red Rider!” he groaned.  “Hold up your hands!”

He pulled the kerchief from his face and threw the poncho over his arm.  “Do you see these shears?” he whispered.  “I’m going to hold up the stage with ’em.  No one ever fires at a road agent.  They just shout, ‘Don’t shoot, colonel, and I’ll come down.’  I’m going to bring ’em down with these shears.”

Crosby caught Curtis by the arm, laughing eagerly.  “Come to the stables, quick,” he cried.  “We’ll get twenty troopers after him before he can go a half mile.”  He turned on Ranson with a triumphant chuckle.  “You’ll not be dismissed this regiment, if I can help it,” he cried.

Ranson gave an ugly laugh, like the snarl of a puppy over his bone.  “If you try to follow me, or interfere with me, Lieutenant Crosby,” he said, “I’ll shoot you and your troopers!”

“With a pair of shears?” jeered Crosby.

“No, with the gun I’ve got in my pocket.  Now you listen to me.  I’m not going to use that gun on any stage filled with women, driven by a man seventy years old, but—­and I mean it—­if you try to stop me, I’ll use it on you.  I’m going to show you how anyone can bluff a stage full with a pair of tin shears and a red mask for a kicker.  And I’ll shoot the man that tries to stop me.”

Ranson sprang to his horse’s side, and stuck his toe into the empty stirrup-strap; there was a scattering of pebbles, a scurry of hoofs, and the horse and rider became a gray blot in the moonlight.