"If you'd sent us word when you did know, we'd have
had him."
"Well," said the man, "he was across the frontier by that time, and I
don't know that most folks would have done it, if they'd had the
warning the boys sent me."
Stimson appeared to consider for almost a minute, and then gravely
rapped his companion's arm.
"It seems to me that the sooner you and I have an understanding, the
better it will be for you," he said.
They were some time arriving at it, and the Sergeant's superiors might
not have been pleased with all he promised during the discussion.
Still, he was flying at higher game, and had to sacrifice a little,
while he knew his man.
"We'll fix it up without you, as far as we can, but if we want you to
give evidence that the man who lost his horse in the river was not
farmer Winston, we'll know where to find you," he said. "You'll have
to take your chance of being tried with him if we find you're trying to
get out of the country."
It was half an hour later when the rest of the troopers arrived and
Stimson had some talk with their officer aside.
"A little out of the usual course, isn't it?" said the latter. "I
don't know that I'd have countenanced it, so to speak, off my own bat
at all, but I had a tolerably plain hint that you were to use your
discretion over this affair. After all, one has to stretch a point or
two occasionally."
"Yes, sir," said Stimson. "A good many now and then."
The officer smiled a little and went back to the rest.
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