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 were thieves who had heard of Coburn's loss, and it must be considerably more than the horse, he knew, to set them so keenly on his trail.

It flashed to him that it was Coburn himself who had raced after hinr shooting last night. The damn fool must have been carrying money in that battered old brown bag.

This he summed up as two of the gunmen marched him with mother and daughter to the corral, which was fifty yards or more from the kitchen door. Eudora looked back dumbly to where they were throwing Coburn's saddle on her horse. The packages were scattered on the porch, but the leader had taken charge of the little handbag. He was standing by with the evident design of riding away on her horse.

"Git in there, and stay there till you see us ride out of that gate!" their guard ordered, herding them into the corral with his gun. He pulled the gate shut and stood by on guard.

Simpson was thinking a lot but getting nowhere. He saw the tall, mustached villain put the handbag in the grain sack, as Coburn had done last night. He was lashing it to the back of his saddle, the rest of the packages ignored.

"I'll not let them take my horse! They can kill me before I'll let them take my horse!"

Eudora pushed at the gate, which the fellow held laughing at her vehemence. She ran along the fence, defiant of his gun, threw a long leg to the top and scrambled over, heedless of her mother's sharp call to come back,