Guerilla looked bewildered. "What did Conley have against Tip?"
"I don't know," said Billy. "But I intend to find out."
"That's the trick," chipped in Dawson. "In cases like this it pays to dig into the innards of everything you don't understand. You're almost sure to find out somethin'."
"Maybe friend Simon can tell us somethin'," Billy said. "Let's go. It'll be sunrise in two hours."
Simon Reelfoot, riding the range that day, met a horseman who said he was strayman for the Wagonwheel outfit north of the West Fork. Did Simon know where Park Valley was? Simon knew, and gave the strayman minute directions.
"Shucks," said the strayman, "I can't carry all that in my head. Here's a envelope and a pencil. Make a li'l map like, will you?"
Simon was not an adept with the pencil. To use either it or a pen required the most perfect concentration and his tongue in his cheek. Wondering greatly at the strayman's claimed inability to remember a few simple landmarks, Simon took the pencil and envelope and bent over his saddle horn.
"Here," he said, after three minutes' work, holding out the envelope, "This ought to fix you up."
To this horror, the well-known voice of Billy Wingo at his back concurred readily. "It ought to," said Billy Wingo. "We're obliged to you, Simon. Kindly clasp your hands over your hat."
The envelope and pencil fell to the ground as Simon obeyed. The strayman dismounted and picked them up.