Ted bent over the mangled body of the hamstringer and turned him over. Then he leaped back with an exclamation of horror.

He had recognized the miscreant.

It was Sol Flatbush, the traitorous cow-puncher, member of the gang of cattle rustlers and gamblers headed by Shan Rhue, who had run off about five hundred head of cattle of the Circle S brand into the Wichita Mountains in Indian Territory.

But how had Sol Flatbush got into this part of the country? And where was he stopping? It was evident that the cow-puncher and desperado had hamstrung the cattle out of revenge for having been discovered and driven out of the broncho boys' camp.

Now that he was dead, however, Ted lost all his resentment, and was genuinely sorry for the poor chap because of the horrible means of his death.

Ted hardly knew what to do with him. It were better if his friends could take charge of his body and bury it, but where were his friends?

Suddenly a thought occurred to Ted. Perhaps Sol Flatbush, following his instincts and habits, had come north after he and Shan Rhue had been outwitted by the boys at the Hole in the Wall in the Wichita Mountains, and allied himself with the Whipple gang in the Sweet Grass Mountains.

If this were true, the simplest thing to do was to send the body of Flatbush to the gang. It would serve, Ted hoped, as a terrible warning to the other members of the gang not to meddle with the affairs of the broncho boys.

Not far away Ted saw a pony, saddled and grazing quietly.

Mounting his pony, he rode up to it. Tied to the cantle of the saddle was a pair of blankets.

This was the very thing! Ted carried the blankets to where the body of Flatbush lay. Spreading them out, he rolled the remains of Flatbush into them, and bound them securely with a rope.

With some difficulty he lifted the bundle to the back of the outlaw's pony, and bound it securely with a lariat.

Then he tied the pony's reins to the horn of the saddle, gave the beast a slash with his quirt, and it started, snorting and jumping, toward the distant mountains.

Thus was the body of Sol Flatbush sent to his friends.

"What was it?" asked Stella, when Ted, having finished his gruesome task, returned to her side.

"The chap who was mutilating the cattle is dead," he replied. "The bulls turned upon him and gored and trampled him to death."

"Horrible! Do you know who he was?"

"Yes, I recognized him."

"Is that a fact! Who was he?"

"An old enemy of yours."

"An enemy of mine! I didn't know I had one."

"Not really of your own, for no one who knows you could feel any animosity toward you, Stella. But you have enemies through me. Those who would seek to hurt me do so by making trouble for you, knowing that they can hurt me worse by injuring you than they could by torturing me personally."

"That's why you have so often warned me to be careful where I go alone."

"That is why. It is not fair that you should be put to discomfort or in danger of death merely because I make enemies by trying to force men to obey the laws."

"I understand. But who was the man who was killed?"

"Sol Flatbush."

"Sol Flatbush! How does it happen that he is in this country?"

"I'm sure I don't know, unless he and Shan Rhue, after escaping from the Wichita Mountains, came directly here, having previously been members of the notorious Whipple gang."

"Then I suppose we shall see Shan Rhue one of these days. Ted, I'm afraid of that fellow. When they had me in the Hole in the Wall I heard him make the most horrible threats against you."

"Threats don't hurt, Stella. The threatened man lives long. You know the old proverb: 'The man I most fear is he who says nothing, but smiles in your face while he is planning to stab you in the back.'"

They were turned toward the ranch house, and as darkness was falling swiftly, conversation was suspended as they put their ponies to their highest speed, galloping across the snow-covered range toward where they could see the lantern of the house shining like a beacon through the gloom.

For the safety of the boys and the cow-punchers traveling toward the ranch house in the dark, Ted had placed a large lantern on the top of the flagstaff which stood in the front yard, so that it could be seen for miles at night to guide wanderers.

This had been suggested by his experience the first night they had spent at the house.

Those of the boys who were not riding line were stopping at the house, and they were all in the big living room awaiting the coming of Ted and Stella.

When Stella was late in arriving at the house, Mrs. Graham began to grow anxious and worried, and this was communicated to the others.

But when they heard Ted's ringing yell outside, as he and Stella galloped up, there were shouts of gladness inside, and the big door was thrown open, allowing a broad path of light to fall across the prairie, as two cow-punchers came bounding down the steps to take the ponies to the corral.

After supper Ted told of the maiming of the cattle and the death of Sol Flatbush.

It was part of the life at the ranch that bad news of any sort was never told at the table during meals, and if any of the fellows had a grievance or was in trouble he tried to keep that fact out of his face and look as merry as he could while the others were eating. If he wanted to tell his troubles later, and any one was willing to listen, all right and good, but mealtime was glad time where the broncho boys and their friends sat down together.

While they were sitting before the great fireplace after supper, Clay Whipple was looking into the flames with a preoccupied air.

He had been silent all evening, an unusual thing for him, for usually he injected humorously dry comments into general conversations.

"What's the trouble, Clay?" asked Stella, who was always the first to notice when one of the boys was not his usual self.

"Oh, I don't know," said Clay uneasily.

"Reckon he's worryin' some on account o' this yere mountain bandit bein' ther same name as him," laughed a cow-puncher named "Pike" Bander.

"I reckon you're only joshin', Pike," said Clay quietly, but growing a shade paler.

"Why, shore, Clay. Yer didn't think I wuz in earnest?" Pike hastened to say.

Clay's Kentucky blood would not permit him to receive without resentment any reflections against the South or the people of his family, while he could stand any amount of personal joshing without growing in the least touchy or angry.

"Then what's the matter?" asked Ted, as Clay returned to his gloomy contemplation of the fire.

"I'm worried some, that's all," was the reply.

"Tell your troubles to the policeman, that's us."

"Well, I might as well out with it. Only I don't want to appear as if I was gettin' panicky over nothing."

"What is it, Clay? You are so provoking when I am just dying to hear about it," cried Stella with a laugh. "Out with it."

"Injuns!" said Clay explosively.

"Indians!"

Every one around the fire sat up with a jump.

Clay nodded his head slowly without taking his eyes from the fire.

There was silence for a few minutes, for every one was turning this new menace over in their minds.

The danger from Indians in this far-away Northern country was very real. It was not that the Indians would make any open or daring attacks, but that they were lawless and fearless of the authority of the United States, and despised the "buffalo soldiers" at the near-by army posts.

"Buffalo soldiers" is a name of contempt given by the Indians to the negro troops who had been stationed near the Blackfeet and Crow Indian agencies, on account of their curly, woolly hair, which, in the fantastic minds of the Indians, resembled the short, curly hair on the shoulders of the buffalo.

The negro troops were too near their own color to demand much respect from the Indians.

But the danger did not come so much from the reservation Indians, as from the fugitive Indians who had left the reservations and had become outlaws, allying themselves with the white bandits in the mountains, and living by thievery from the ranchmen and sheep-herders.

Some of these Indians had rallied around Running Bear, a young Blackfeet, son of a chief, a graduate of the Indian School at Carlisle, in Pennsylvania.

Running Bear was a young fellow of magnificent physique, for he had been a member of the famous Indian football team of Carlisle that had a year or two previously cleared all white teams from the gridiron.

Running Bear was well educated also, and a man of fine address and manners, when he wished to be so. But he was unprincipled, and when he returned to the tribe lost no time in breaking all the laws imposed by the United States for the government and welfare of the Indians.

This brought him into conflict with the Indian agent, and certain penalties were imposed on him. This he would not stand, and soon persuaded other of the young men of the tribe to mutiny against the agent.

This led to further trouble, and after committing some unforgivable offense against the United States, Running Bear rallied his young men, and they fled the reservation and the ways and protection of the white men, and took to the mountains, where they lived by raiding the ranches in the neighborhood, and maintaining a sort of defensive partnership with Whipple's band of white outlaws.

After a silence, during which every one was turning these facts over in his mind, Ted turned to Clay, and said:

"What about the Indians, Clay?"

"I saw their tracks."

"Where?"

"In the coulee back of the house."

"Near the house!" exclaimed Ted. "That's getting pretty close to home. Did they see you?"

"I reckon they did. I took a shot at one of them, an' he left a red trail in the snow."

"That's bad, Clay. You shouldn't have shot at him."

"Shouldn't, eh? Well, you never saw a fellow from ole Kaintuck that would stand up an' let a man shoot at him without sending his compliments back—if he happened to be packin' his gun at the time."

"Did they shoot at you, then?"

"One of them did. It was like this: I was ridin' in from the west, where I had seen a small bunch of strays which I turned back to the main herd. As I was comin' up to the big coulee I saw something move against the snow. At first I thought it was a grouse, and was just going to take a shot at it when I looked again. Then, by jinks, I saw that it was the head of an Indian shoved up over the edge of the coulee.

"His back was turned to me, and he was watching the house. I pulled in my pony and kept my eye on him for several minutes.

"Then I saw Mrs. Graham come out of the house and stand for a moment on the back porch.

"The Indian rose up and brought a rifle to his shoulder. At that I let out a yell, and he turned to me like a flash, and pulled his trigger. But he was in too much of a hurry, an' the ball whistled over my head.

"I had my gun out, an' blazed away. The Indian yawped as if he had been hit, and disappeared. I got to the coulee as fast as I could, but he had disappeared."

"Was he the only one?" asked Ted.

"I reckon not, for there were any number of moccasin tracks in the coulee, and the footprints of white men or Indians who wore boots. There was a splotch of blood where the Indian had been, and a red trail leading to where there had been ponies. Then I came on to the house."

Ted was thinking deeply. At last he raised his head.

"This has been a day full of things that may mean a great deal to us," he said. "Follansbee has been shot by a member of the Whipple gang, Sol Flatbush was killed after mutilating our cattle, more Whipple gang; and an Indian prowler has been shot, some more of the Whipple gang. Boys, the war is on, and it depends on us whether it is going to last all winter and cause us to lose all our cattle, or whether we are going to be able to stamp it out right now. Which shall it be?"

"I reckon we'd better get busy. It'll be easier ter do the job now than fuss along with it all winter," said Pike Bander, who was an old Northern cow-puncher, and had had lots of experience with the Indians in Montana, the Dakotas, and Wyoming.

"I think you're right, Pike," said Ted. "And now off to bed with you. There'll be something doing to-morrow."

In half an hour the house was dark, and every one was asleep.

The moon which had been shining brightly during the early part of the night had become obscured by a heavy bank of snow clouds, which had been driven over the mountains by a north wind, and it had grown much darker outside.

In his sleep Ted seemed to hear the well-known voice of Sultan, whinnying shrilly. It was a dream, and Ted tossed uneasily. But again and again he heard Sultan's voice. It had a note of alarm in it, and Ted knew that Sultan seldom gave an alarm of this sort unless something serious was the matter. Ted's dream was of Indians, and the call of Sultan was very natural, for the little black stallion hated Indians, and whenever one came within smelling distance of him he grew uneasy and fretful, and always gave voice to his fear.

The dream had such a disquieting influence on Ted that it woke him, and he sat up in bed grinning to himself in the dark to find that, after all, it was only a dream, and that he was safe in bed.

But what was that?

He was awake now, and he distinctly heard Sultan. Then he had heard his pet give a warning, even in his dream.

Leaping from bed, Ted groped around the room, getting into his clothes, without lighting the lamp.

Grasping his rifle from the corner, and buckling on his belt and holster, he left the room.

As he passed Clay's room he entered and shook the sleeping Kentuckian, who was on the floor with a bound. Ted told him of the continued voicing of an alarm by Sultan, and Clay hurriedly dressed.

They passed into the living room, and Ted went to the windows on one side, while Clay went to the other side.

Hidden by the curtains, they stood looking out on the snow-covered plain.

"Hist!" It was Clay trying to attract Ted's attention.

Ted went swiftly to his side.

"What's that down by the corral?" whispered Clay.

Ted looked sharply.

"It's the Indians," said Ted. "They're trying to steal our horses. Sultan knows what he's about. Come on, we'll have to rush them."

Ted heard a rustling noise behind him and turned.

It was Stella, fully dressed, and with her rifle resting in the hollow of her arm.

"I heard Sultan, too," she said. "We'll have to hurry if we're going to save the horses."

"You go back to bed," said Ted. "Yi-yi-yipee!"

His voice rang out in the old Moon Valley yell.

It was like a fire bell to a fireman, and brought the boys out of their beds like a shot, and they scrambled into their clothes and were in the living room with their arms in a jiffy.

In the corral a great commotion was taking place, to judge from the noise that came to them.

At the word of command they rushed through the door, and raced for the corral, turning loose the long yell.

They heard guttural shouts in the distance, and a band of ponies came through the gateway of the corral, scattering over the prairie.

Behind them rushed a band of Indians, who, seeing that there was no further occasion for silence, gave forth whoops of defiance.

Then Ted saw Sultan gallop out, and on his back was an Indian.

This was more than Ted could stand, and his rifle flew to his shoulder. There was a flash and a crash, and the Indian fell to the ground, over which he writhed in agony.

Ted whistled, and Sultan trotted to his side.

The ponies had scattered, and the corral was empty.