Harry's sudden movement.

"Educate Duke, of course. We'll put him and Jenny to the drag and give them their first lesson. You be driving Duke in and I'll talk with Jenny."

Away hustled Harry, at his rapid limp, for a halter and Jenny, where in a stall she was munching a feed of hay as reward after her trip to town. With the interested Shep (shaggy black dog) at his heels, prepared to help, Terry hastened into the pasture and rounded up Duke, the half-buffalo, from amidst the other animals. Duke was now a yearling—grown to be a sturdy, stocky youngster since Terry had captured him and his brindled cow mother during the buffalo hunt with the Delaware Indians last summer.

Knowing Terry well, and tamed to everything except work, Duke submitted to being driven out. In the ranch yard Harry was waiting with big, gaunt Jenny, already attached by collar and traces to the drag. The drag was only an old rail, heavy and spike-studded, used to uproot the brush when the ranch land was cleared.

It required considerable maneuvering to fit an ox-bow around Duke's short neck, and yoke him to the drag. He seemed dumbly astonished. Jenny laid back her long ears in disgust with her strange mate.

"Be patient with him, Jenny," pleaded Harry. "He's only a boy, and part Indian, while you're a cultured lady. I think," he said, to Terry, "that I'll do the driving, for the first spell on this Pike's Peak trail." Holding the lines attached to Jenny's bit (but Duke, ox-fashion, had no lines), he fell a few paces to rear. "No," he added, "that won't answer. You drive Duke and I'll drive Jenny. Get your whip."

Terry stationed himself with the ox-whip at Duke's flank. Harry stepped upon the drag, and balanced.

"Gid-dap, Jenny!" he bade.

"G'lang, Duke!" bade Terry.

Jenny, sidling as far as she could in the traces, her ears flat, started. Duke stayed. Consequently, Jenny did not get very far.

"Duke! G'lang, Duke!" implored Terry, desperately, cracking his whip.

"Pull, Jenny! Pull!" encouraged Harry, balancing on the drag now askew.

Up went Jenny's heels, down went Duke's head, away went Harry on the drag and Terry on the run. Shep, thinking it great sport, barked gaily.

"Whoa, Jenny! Whoa now!"

"Haw, Duke! Whoa-haw! Gee! Whoa!"

And from the cabin doorway Father Richards clapped and shouted, and Mother Richards called warnings.

Harry was speedily thrown from the bouncing drag, but he clung to the lines. Having careered, plunging and tugging and side-stepping, until she was astraddle of the outside trace, Jenny stopped. Duke, who had been bawling and galloping, half hauled, half frightened, stopped likewise, the yoke crooked on his neck; and all stood heaving.

"This'll never do," panted Harry. "Jenny's too fast for him—either her legs are too long or his are too short. We'll have to train them singly and hitch them tandem. That's it: tandem."

"You mean one in front of the other?" wheezed Terry.

"Yes."

"Which where, then?"

"Oh, Jenny for the wheel team and Duke for the lead team, I think," decided Harry. "By rights, Jenny ought to have the lead, because she's faster; and Duke ought to have the pole, because he's heavier. But Jenny is quick-tempered with her heels, you know, and Duke is quick-tempered with his head, so we'd best keep their tempers separated. We can teach Duke to 'haw' and 'gee,' but Jenny's main accomplishment is simply to 'haw-haw.'"

"Here comes George," announced Terry. "Now he'll 'haw-haw,' too."

Through the gloaming another boy was loping in, on a spotted pony. He was a wiry, black-eyed boy—George Stanton, from the Stanton ranch some two miles down the valley.

"Whoop-ee! Which way you going?" he challenged. "What is it—a show?"

"Going to Pike's Peak," retorted Terry.

"Tonight? With that team? Aw——!"

"Pretty soon, though. We're practising."

"Watch us, and you'll see us drive to the corral," invited Harry. "Let's turn 'em around, Terry. Easy, now. I'll hold Jenny back and you hurry Duke."

"I'll help," proffered the obliging George. "Gwan, Duke."

"Duke! Gwan!" ordered Terry.

"Whoa, Jenny! Steady, Jenny!" cautioned Harry.

With Harry hauling on the lines, George, pony-back, pressing against Duke's shoulder, and Terry urging him at the flank, they all managed to achieve a half circle. Duke, his eyes bulging with rage and alarm, occasionally balked; Jenny flattened her ears and shook her scarred head; but finally the corral bars were really reached. It seemed like quite a victory.

"First lesson ended," decreed Harry. "Too dark, and we're tired if they aren't. We'll put 'em in together and they can talk it over."

Released into the corral, neither Jenny nor Duke appeared to be in very good humor. Duke rumbled and pawed, flinging the dirt; Jenny laid her ears and bared her teeth. Suddenly Duke charged; whereat Jenny nimbly whirled, and met him with both hind hoofs. Aside staggered Duke, to stand a moment, glaring at her and rumbling; then he turned and stalked stiffly to the other end of the enclosure. Jenny "hee-hawed" shrill and derisive, and kneeling down, rolled and kicked; scrambled up, shook herself, and began to nose about for husks.

"Now they understand each other," remarked Harry. "They've agreed to pull singly."

"Say—are you fellows really going to Pike's Peak?" asked George. "With that team?"

"Yes, sir-ee. We're in training, aren't we, Terry?" responded Harry.

"That's right. Dad said if we'd find our own outfit we could strike out."

"We've got the fever, too, sort of, down at our house," confessed George. "That's what I rode up about. Now I guess I'd better go back and tell the folks. Maybe I can join you," he added, waxing excited.

"The more the merrier. That will make twenty-five thousand and three," laughed Harry.

"If I can't, I'll be coming later," called back George.

"We'll locate a claim for you," promised Terry, grandly—as if he and Harry were already on the way.

CHAPTER II

THE "PIKE'S PEAK LIMITED"

"I'll tell you what I'll do," spoke Terry's father, finally. "I'll lend you $100—'grub-stake' you, as they say, from the dust that I fetched back last winter. That's half. And I'm to have half interest in whatever you find."

"Hum! This sounds like a good business proposition, if you mean it," accepted Harry, scratching his nose.

"Do you mean it, Dad?" cried Terry, overjoyed. "Supposing we find your mine. Do we get half of that?"

"That's part yours, anyway. But I don't think you'll find it unoccupied. Doubt if you find it at all. You'll likely meet up with some of the Russell brothers out there, though. You might ask Green Russell or Oliver or the doctor if they have any recollection of my being along with 'em, one of their Fifty-eighters, by name of Jones, and if they remember where I got the dust. Yes, I mean it: you and Harry'll need supplies, and you ought to have a little cash in hand besides."

"But we can go to digging gold, the first day we get there, can't we?" argued Terry.

"You might be a bit awkward and break a pick or shovel, and want a new one," remarked his father, drily.

Anyway, the $100 was not to be sneezed at. To be sure, Harry, with Terry assisting, had proceeded right ahead making ready. He was a wonder, was Harry. He had brought the two wagon-wheels from the mud-hole, and (Terry helping) had constructed a two-wheeled cart: had fitted a shallow body on the axle-tree and attached a pair of long heavy shafts. Jenny was to haul in the shafts, and the chains of Duke were to be run back to stout eye-bolts.

"You see," reasoned Harry, "some days when Jenny is tired and wishes to stop, Duke will be pulling the cart and she'll have to come along whether or no."

Jenny's collar and Duke's wooden bow and single yoke (manufactured to suit the case, from cast-off materials) were rough and