Francis lay for a time thinking. There was something bothering him and it took him almost five minutes to realize what it was. Then he got up, quietly, and fished one of his rifle balls out of his “possibles” sack. He found the antelope’s head where Mr. Grimes had left it, and in the moonless dark he turned it over and put the ball in the hole in the back of the head.

As he suspected, it was much too large a hole to have been made by his rifle. He dropped the head and returned to his bed. From now on, he thought, if that man says up is down and day is night, I’ll believe him. Anybody who can make a shot like that, timing it to go off at the same time as another rifle, and hit a running antelope at two—no, three hundred yards, can’t be wrong.

It was a comforting thought. Francis went to sleep smiling.

——— Chapter Twelve ———

FOR A WEEK they rode at an easy pace, saving the horses. Still they made close to a hundred miles before Mr. Grimes pulled up on the seventh evening.

“How do you feel about a little night riding, Mr. Tucket?” he asked.

“All right,” Francis answered. “Why?”

“I sort of figured we could make Spot Johnnie’s before turning in. Be nice to have a decent meal and sleep loose for a change.”

Francis had no idea what he was talking about. Not once had he mentioned this Spot Johnnie, but Francis decided not to question the mountain man.

“And we can grain the horses. Especially that mare of yours.”

So they rode on. There was half a moon to furnish some light and sometime toward midnight Mr. Grimes pointed down at a light in a shallow valley.

“Spot Johnnie’s,” he said. “Now when we go in, you stay right out to the side of me—so’s it doesn’t look like you’re sneaking. Okay?”

Francis nodded. They started down, angled across a flat meadow, and approached three log buildings. When they were still a hundred feet from the cabins, Mr. Grimes stopped.

“Ease that hammer down with your thumb, Spot,” he said in a voice so low it was almost a whisper. “It’s Jason Grimes.”

Francis hadn’t seen or heard a thing, so it was to his utter and complete surprise that the figure of a man arose suddenly beside him—not five feet away. He jumped.

“Dang it all, Jason,” the man said, laughing and shaking his head. “You sure do ruin a man’s fun. I was planning to let you get all the way up to the building, and then take that pretty hat of yours off, feather and all.”

“That’s why I stopped,” Mr. Grimes answered. “Got me a friend here who doesn’t understand that kind of fun. He might just put a ball in your gizzard by mistake.”