Starlight Riders Boxed-Set 50 Western Classics in One Edition. Ernest Haycox
mess of no-accounts come in from the Wells. They'll be kicked out of town before sun sets if I've anything to say."
"Let 'em alone, Fear. We're not fighting them. We're shootin' for big game, not sparrows."
"So you fired the Wells?"
"Yeah," said Denver impassively.
Langdell threw his cigar out the window. "Ain't that a sort of sweepin' thing to do?"
"If so," replied Denver, "I'm prepared to stand the consequences. My way of doin' business is to make up my mind and then move. I don't call a meetin' of the county and try to pass the buck. If these big ranchers had stopped belly-achin' and done their dirty chores long ago, Cal Steele would be alive today."
Langdell's face turned sour. "For some queer reason," he blurted out, "you set yourself against every idea I bring up. I'm free to say I don't like it. I expect more of you, Dave."
"You expected me to lead the vigilantes once," pointed out Denver. "But now that I do the logical thing, which is hit at Redmain wherever I can, you back water. What do you want, anyway?"
"I know, I know. But this is different. You're laying yourself open to a charge of lawlessness."
"I don't see any particular legality in the acts of the vigilantes," was Denver's cynical rejoinder.
"It's got the approval of every important rancher in Yellow Hill," argued Langdell. "It's got the weight of the Association behind it."
"Then my acts ought to have the same approval. I'm doing neither less nor more than the vigilantes would do."
"Different altogether," insisted Langdell. "You're actin' as an individual. If there was somebody mean enough to stand on due form he could hook you bad at law."
"Was I you," drawled Denver, "I'd forget about law for a while. It's been pretty feeble around here lately."
"Oh, hell," exclaimed Langdell, "I was just trying to point out something for your own protection. Now it looks like I'm crawfishing on my published sentiments, which I'm not. But since you intend to go after Redmain you ought to throw in with Leverage."
"Disagree."
"Why?"
"I know what I'm doing and why I'm doing it. More than that, I know the kind of men riding with me. That's more than I can say for the vigilantes. I still maintain some party or parties unknown are grindin' axes with the vigilantes. I don't propose to help 'em. I fight my own way."
"Of all the cursed nonsense!" broke in Langdell, shaking his arm violently. "You ought to know better, Denver! You're the same as questioning my honesty. Good Judas!"
A wagon and a group of riders came clattering down Prairie Street. Denver rose and went to the window. Leverage, with a dozen or more men, made a sort of escort to the wagon, which was driven by Doc Williamson. In the bed of it lay a figure covered with blankets. Denver turned sharply away.
"Never mind how I go about this business," he said. "The point is, I'm after Redmain. And I'll get him if I go down in ruin. Never think I won't!"
"Have it your own way," grunted Langdell. "Now that you've burned out his quarters, what comes next?"
"I don't know," muttered Denver.
"You mean you're not telling," corrected Langdell.
"Leave it like that if you want."
Langdell's cold, hard formality returned to him. Denver lifted his shoulders and turned to leave, halting at the sound of somebody coming rapidly up the stairs. Leverage walked into the room. Seeing Denver, he nodded his head vigorously. "Good boy, Dave. I hear you burned the Wells. Now we can work together. Here, let me give you this confounded job of mine. I'm too old. I think I've aged ten years in the last two weeks."
"You waste your breath," interrupted Langdell. "Dave wishes to be the big toad in his own small puddle. He doubts the virtue of everybody but himself."
"Maybe," was Denver's laconic reply. "Or maybe I ain't built to dangle on the end of somebody's string. I'll leave the Christian charity to you, Fear. You seem to be drippin' with it."
Leverage caught the strained situation immediately. He had entered the office expectantly, but when he saw Denver still to be unchanged of opinion, that expectancy died. However, he made haste to ease off the tension.
"Well, I believe I've got wind of Redmain now. I've been ridin' fifteen and sixteen hours at a stretch. So's some of my men. And we've got a smell."
"Where?" asked Langdell with swift interest.
"Up behind my place. Across the Henry trail in the high meadows. I got a rumor he's makin' a run for the valley tonight with part of his bunch. I aim to ambush him, cut him off."
"Do it," snapped Langdell and pressed his lips together.
"Don't want to join me, Dave?" asked Leverage.
"I'm workin' it a little different," replied Denver. "Better for us to go separate. But for your own sake, trust no rumor and don't walk into any traps. Redmain's an Indian for that sort of hocus-pocus."
"I guess I can take care of myself," answered Leverage, with a trace of resentment.
"Sorry," said Dave. "I won't presume to advise you again. May see you tonight and may not. In either case, I'll be somewhere around your territory."
"Don't let's ram into each other by mistake," warned Leverage.
On the threshold of the door Denver paused and turned to catch Fear Langdell's frosty, intent glance and so received the definite knowledge of the man's personal antagonism to him. Going back to the street he reflected on this. "Queer combination of righteousness and bigotry. He despises anybody who don't track with him."
They were taking Steele's body into Doc Williamson's place. Denver veered off to Grogan's. A part of Leverage's men trailed to the bar with him. It was quite apparent to him that they knew about his recent activities and that they were anxious to find out if he meant to throw in with the vigilantes. Range etiquette forbade the open question, but it stood in their eyes, nevertheless. And so, drinking and turning away, he answered it in a roundabout fashion.
"Good luck to you boys," said he, and walked out of Grogan's. Presently he was cantering from town.
He left dissatisfaction behind him. "What the hell's the matter with that fella?" one of the vigilantes wanted to know. "Too proud to talk to us?"
Another of the bunch was quick to defend Denver. "Keep yore shirt on, Breed. He's got sense enough to keep his idees to himself. If we'd quit publishin' our intentions to the world mebbe we'd ketch a fish now and then. Don't worry about Dave Denver. He's up to somethin', you bet."
Grogan lounged up to them. By and by he grunted. "Funny thing. He comes right in, stays five minutes, and walks right out again. Now, does that make sense?"
"If he didn't have a purpose," maintained Denver's defendant, "he wouldn't 'a' been here. I know Dave."
"Well, what was his idee?" demanded Grogan.
"Yore guess is as good as mine," was the other man's abrupt answer.
A slim, olive-colored little man emerged from the Palace, climbed on a calico pony, and quietly left Sundown. He circled the town, crossed the stage road a half mile behind the vanishing Denver, and fell into a lesser trail. Twenty minutes later when Denver was running along the flat stretch beyond Shoshone Dome this fellow stood on a ridge and watched, and a little later began a solitary game of distant stalking.
Denver, meanwhile, was engaged in a mysterious game of his own. A few miles beyond Shoshone Dome he drew beside the road, dismounted, and went to a stump. He capsized a loose rock, and found a piece of paper. There was a scribble of words on it. With a pencil he added a line of his own, signed his initials and put the paper back. After that he raced up and down the hairpin curves until he arrived at the Sweet Creek bridge. Here again he imitated his first performance under the timbers of the bridge; and again travelled with the highway as