The "Wild West" Collection. William MacLeod Raine

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      Still frowning, he thrust the sheets back into the envelope and licked the flap. He was on the point of stubbornly scrawling a man's name on the outside when he realized how foolish he would be not to carry out his first and much more sensible intention.

      He wanted an excuse for asking permission to ride to town to post a letter. This, in itself, was an extremely nervy request and under ordinary conditions almost certain to be profanely refused. But Buck had a shrewd notion that after the failure of Lynch's plans, the foreman might welcome the chance of talking things over with his confederates without danger of being observed or overheard. On the other hand, if there should be the least suspicion that his letter was not of the most innocent and harmless sort, he would never in the world be allowed to get away with it.

      The result was that when he strolled out of the harness-room a little later the envelope bearing the name of Sheriff Hardenberg reposed within his shirt, while the other, addressed now to a mythical "Miss Florence Denby," at an equally mythical street number in Dallas, Texas, protruded from a pocket of his chaps.

      "I don't s'pose you've got a stamp you'll sell me," he inquired of Lynch, whom he found in the bunk-house with McCabe. "I'd like to get this letter off as soon as I can."

      Balancing the envelope in his hand, he held it so that the foreman could easily read the address.

      "I might have," returned Lynch briefly. "Looks like that letter was heavy enough to need two."

      Buck allowed him to weigh it in his hand for an instant, and then, in simulated confusion, he snatched it back.

      "Must be writin' to yore girl," grinned McCabe, who had also been regarding the address curiously.

      Stratton retorted in a convincingly embarrassed fashion, received his stamps and then proffered his request, which was finally granted with an air of reluctance and much grumbling.

      "I wouldn't let yuh go, only I don't know what the devil's keepin' that fool Bud," growled Lynch. "Yuh tell the son-of-a-gun I ain't expectin' him to stop in town the rest of his natural life. If them wagon-bolts ain't come, we'll have to do without 'em. Yuh bring him back with yuh, an' see yuh both get here by dinner time without fail."

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