"Risky for an unprotected girl to be travellin' about when there are such characters as Nick-By-Night on the trail," he said. "I wonder nobody warned her against the possibility of bein' held-up by bandits."
"There is certainly that danger," Silk said with a tone of anxiety in his voice. "It was only half-a-dozen miles beyond where we are now that the bandits, as you call them, escaped from the patrol a week ago. Nick's secret hiding-place is somewhere over the hills there, on Ghost Pine Creek."
"Then that is where you are bound for?" Percy Rapson inquired. He had met the two Riders of the Plains unexpectedly, earlier in the day, and had continued to ride in their company, intending to break off from them on reaching the cross trail leading to his home at Rattlesnake Ranch.
"Exactly," Silk answered.
"Are you going to allow me to stand in with you?" the boy asked.
The sergeant shook his head.
"It would hardly be wise," he responded. "You might get hurt. There's sure to be some shooting, and I don't figure that I shall need you to identify him. I shall know him when I see him."
"You ought to," rejoined Percy. "You've seen him before."
"Eh?" Sergeant Silk looked aside at him in curious surprise. "I've seen him before, you say? When? Where?"
"Six months ago," Rapson answered, "at Calgary Races. I was there at the time, only you didn't know me very well then. It was in the Golden Bar saloon. I dare say you would have arrested him then, only there was a nasty scuffle; you were wounded, and he gave you the slip."