Harris and Evans took three poles that were slung under the wagon, looped the top-rope of a little teepee round the small ends of them and erected the three, tripod fashion, after having first pegged down the teepee sides. Harris brought the girl's bed roll and war bag from the wagon and placed them inside.
"There's your house," he said. "All ready to move in."
The men repaired to the creek bank and splashed faces and hands. The big voice of the cook bellowed angrily from the wagon.
"Downstream! Downstream!" he boomed. "Get below that water hole!"
Two men who had elected to perform their ablutions above the point from which the culinary water supply was drawn moved hastily downstream.
It was not long before Waddles was dispensing nourishment from the lowered tail-gate, ladling food and hot coffee into the plates and cups which the men held out to him. They drew away and sat cross-legged on the ground. The meal was almost finished when six horsemen rode down the valley and pulled up before the wagon.
"What's the chance for scraps?" the leader asked.
"Step down," Waddles invited. "And throw a feed in you. She's still a-steaming."
Four of the men differed in no material way from the Three Bar men in appearance. The fifth was a ruffian with little forehead, a face of gorilla cast, stamped with brute ferocity and small intelligence. The last of the six was a striking figure, a big man with pure white hair and brows, his pale eyes peering from a red face.
"The roasted albino is Harper, our leading bad man in these parts," Evans remarked to Harris. "And the human ape is Lang; Fisher, Coleman, Barton and Canfield are the rest. Nice layout of murderers and such."