run across a fine herd with your brand on the same, they wait around for a certain night to come along, run them off like it was common rustlers doing the job, round them up somewhere, change the brand to one of their own, and inside of forty-eight hours your cattle are feeding on their range with all signs blotted out. And I just about reckon Mrs. Fred is fixing things so her dear hubby don’t dare lift a hand to prevent this robbery! Blood is thicker than water, they say.”
Adrian ground his teeth savagely.
“That’s the bitterest pill I ever had to swallow in all my life!” he declared. “To think of me squatting here and watching those cowardly thieves run off with a big bunch of my best cattle, and not able to lift a hand to prevent the raid! It makes me mad to the core.”
“I should say it might,” Billie asserted. “Why, even my blood is boiling with indignation; and I ain’t near so hot-tempered as you, Adrian. Can’t something be done about it?”
“Oh! what wouldn’t I give to have some of the bully Keystone boys around right now,” said Donald; “suppose we could just run across Si Ketcham, Cooney, Alkali, Magpie, Bunch and the rest, wouldn’t I yell with joy though; and say, what we’d do to these onery rustlers would be a caution.”
“But we’re only three boys after all!” sighed Billie, sadly.
“Three boys though, who have been used to taking care of themselves this long while, don’t forget to add, Billie,” Adrian burst forth; “and right now I’m wondering whether it would be such a very mad scheme for us to trail after those punchers to try and get my cattle back! What d’ye think of that, boys? Have we got the nerve to make a try?”
“Oh! my stars!” ejaculated Billie, rather overwhelmed by the mere thought; but the prairie boy did not seem to be staggered at all.
“Adrian, if you say the word I’m itching to give you my hand on that, and go you!” Donald exclaimed with thrilling emphasis.
“Do you really mean it?” demanded the other, eagerly.