“An’ the little cuss likes to set here fer the view,” soliloquised the outlaw.

  Stone took satisfaction in convincing himself that the Hash-Knife had no more need of concern about the Diamond. Still, an afterthought was that he no longer controlled the Hash-Knife. Suppose that doughty old cattleman, Jim Traft, did throw a few thousand head of steers down into Yellow Jacket! He was fool enough, and bull-headed enough, to do it. And if he did, nothing but death could ever prevent Croak Malloy from stealing them. Wherefore the ghastly idea of death for Malloy again held sway over Jed Stone.

  Stone’s quick eye, ever roving from habit, detected movement of grey down in the foliage. He thought it was a deer until he saw brown and heard a distant thud of hoofs. Horses! Probably Malloy was returning. But Stone took no chances with suppositions, and his hand went to the rifle leaning against the bench.

  When three horses emerged from the green below he recognised the first of the riders to be Madden, but they were halfway up the hill before he made out that the second was Bambridge. The outlaw’s thought changed, and conjecture that was not friendly to this visit took the place of hard vigilance. Bambridge riding down into the Black Brakes must certainly have something to do with Malloy. It was unwise, especially for this pseudo rancher. Stone arose and walked to the high step.

  The dusty horses limped wearily up the hill, to be halted before the cabin. The men were travel-stained and tired. Bambridge’s big face appeared haggard, and it did not express any pleasure.

  “Hullo, Boss! I fetched a visitor,” called out Madden, busy with saddle packs.

  “So I see...Howdy, Mr. Bambridge!” replied Stone, coolly.

  “Mornin’, Stone. I expect you’re surprised to see me,” said Bambridge, bluntly.

  “Shore am. Glad, though, for more’n one reason,” answered the rustler.

  Bambridge unstrapped a coat from his saddle, and mounted to the porch, heavy of step and dark of eye. He flopped down on the bench, dropping his coat and sombrero. Evidently he had not slept much, and it was plain his sweaty and begrimed apparel had not been changed for days. He packed a gun, which Stone had taken note of first.

  “Malloy failed to show up,” he said, sourly.

  “Ahuh. It’s a way Croak has. But he’ll show up when you least expect him an’ don’t want him. Where’d you go to meet him?”

  “Tanner’s out of Winslow,” returned Bambridge, shortly, his dull grey eyes studying the outlaw, as if he was weighing that remark about Malloy.

  “Tanner’s. So Malloy meets you there, eh? — Wal, I reckon he might as well go into Winslow or Flag,” said Stone, dryly.

  Bambridge seemed uncertain of his ground here, but was indifferent to it. Stone grasped the fact that the cattle dealer did not take him for the dominant factor in the Hash-Knife.

  “You can bet I’d rather he had. Eighty miles’ ride, without a bed, an’ practically nothin’ to eat, is enough to make a man bite nails.”

  “What’s the reason you undertook it?”

  “It concerns me an’ Malloy,” said the other.

  Whatever sense of fair play Jed Stone felt toward this man — and he confessed to himself that it was little — departed here.

  “Any deals you make with Malloy concern me. I’m boss of this Hash-Knife outfit.”

  “Not so anyone would notice it,” rejoined Bambridge, with scant civility.

  The man was on dangerous ground and had no intimation of it. Steeped in his absorption of his greedy sordid plans, if he had the wit to understand Jed Stone he did not exercise it. Stone paced the narrow porch, gazing out over the brakes. For the moment he would waive any expression of resentment. Bambridge was in possession of facts and plans that Stone desired to know.

  “Wal, mebbee you’re right aboot Croak bossin’ the outfit pretty generally,” he said, at length. “But only in late deals that I had little to do with. What I don’t advise I shore don’t do. Thet deal of Diamond cattle last winter — thet was an exception. I’ve kicked myself often enough...By the way, you can fork over thet ten thousand you’ve owed me on thet deal. I sent Madden in to get it.”

  “Man alive! I gave the money to Darnell, with instructions to hand it to Malloy for you,” ejaculated Bambridge, in genuine surprise.

  “You did? When?”

  “Weeks ago. Let’s see. It was the ninth of April that I drew that ten thousand. Next day Darnell was to ride out to Tanner’s. He met Malloy there and delivered your money.”

  “Not to me,” declared Stone.

  “Why! — the man is reliable,” replied Bambridge, in exasperation. “Are you quite — honest about it?...Have you seen Malloy since?”

  “Wal, Bambridge, I’ve seen Malloy several times since then. He never mentioned no money — for me. Appeared to be pretty flush himself, though...An’ much obliged for the hint about my honesty.”

  Bambridge let the caustic rejoinder go by without apology.

  “Honesty is not your trade, Stone. I’ll say, though, you’ve kept your word to me, which is more than Malloy has...You suspect this new man of mine, Darnell?”

  “No, I don’t suspect him. I know him to be a Mississippi gambler, run out of St. Louis — accordin’ to his own statement. I’ve seen a few of his kind hit the raw West. They didn’t savvy us Westerners an’ they didn’t last. Darnell has double-crossed you. He’ll try it on Croak Malloy, which will be bad for his health.”

  “No wonder Darnell can’t savvy you Westerners. Who the hell can, I’d like to know?”

  “Wal, not you, thet’s shore.”

  “Give me proof Darnell has done me dirt?” demanded the other, impatiently.

  “Wal, I saw him right here after the tenth of April — along aboot the twentieth, I reckon, for it was after Malloy made a raid on Blodgett’s range...Darnell did not give me any money. He had a big roll, for I saw him flash it when he was gamblin’ with the men...Thet was the day Croak shot young Reed.”

  “Aw, I’d want more proof than that,” returned Bambridge. “You might have been drunk when Darnell gave it to you.”

  “Shore. I might have been anythin’. Us outlaws are pretty low-down, I reckon. But I, for one, am not as low-down as some who call themselves cattlemen...Bambridge, am I to hold you or Darnell responsible fer thet ten thousand?”

  “Not me, you can bet. Or Darnell, either. Malloy is your man. He seems to be runnin’ your outfit now, an’ no doubt appropriated your money.”

  “Nope. Croak is square aboot money,” said the outlaw, meditatively.

  “Bah! — What you givin’ me?” retorted Bambridge, harshly. “Stone, you talk queer for a rustler. Here you are, hidden down in this God-forsaken wilderness afraid to go near any town — with a price on your life, yet you talk of honesty in yourself an’ men. Thet’s a joke about honour among thieves.”

  “Wal, we needn’t argue aboot it,” replied Stone. A Westerner would have gauged something from the cool quality of his voice and the averting of his eyes. “I’ve served your turn. An’ now thet Malloy is doin’ it, why, you’ve no call to get nasty. What I’d like to know is — how’d you come to ride out here? Shore is a long hard ride fer anyone.”

  “I want action. That’s why I came,” almost yelled Bambridge, red in the face. “Malloy has failed me twice, both times because I didn’t pay first. Here I have a chance to sell ten thousand head of cattle — to the government buyer in Kansas City — an’ I haven’t the cattle.”

  “Chance to sell quick an’ get out of Arizona, huh?”

  “You’ve hit it, Stone. An’ that’s why I’m here. I want cattle. Old Traft lately drove a big herd down into Yellow Jacket. I’m after it. Malloy agreed to drive it. I’ve built a corral along the railroad, half-way between Winslow an’ Holbrook. Short-cut idea, see? An’ I can load there. He also agreed to make away with this damned young smart Alec, Jim Traft. Took the money quick enough, by damn.”

  “Took what money?” queried Stone, with no apparent interest.

  “What I offered for the job,” fumed the cattleman. “Then afterward he said it was the kind of job Croak Malloy couldn’t do. But he’d put his man Sonora on it. A Mexican.”

  “Job to do away with young Jim Traft,” mused Stone, drumming the bench with his fingers. “Wal, I reckon thet’s a fine idee — fer you. I’ll tell you somethin’, though. Sonora will never do it.”

  “More double-crossin’, eh?”

  “No. The greaser is straight. Funny fer a greaser, ain’t it? But he simply won’t, because Slinger Dunn will kill him. I wouldn’t go prowlin’ around Yellow Jacket for anythin’, an you can gamble Malloy wouldn’t, either.”

  “So that’s why he’s slow about drivin’ the Diamond cattle. Damn his crooked mug!...Stone, did you know Malloy was in with that Tanner outfit an’ has been workin’ on Blodgett’s stock?”

  “No. Thet’s news to me. Who told you?”

  “Darnell. In fact, he made the deal. This was against my orders, I’m bound to admit. I am pretty sore at him an’ I’m through with him. But Malloy has got to square himself with me.”

  “Your man is playin’ both ends against the middle,” observed the outlaw, thoughtfully. “He’s smart enough to try to use Malloy same as you — an’ get a big raid off. Then he, too, can jump Arizona. Wal, my advice is to be jumpin’ quick. We decent rustlers don’t work thet way. We never rob any cattleman of enough stock to ruin him. Thet’s why the Hash-Knife has lasted twenty years.”

  “My daughter married a cowboy in Flag last winter,” said Bambridge. “An’ I’m ready to get out quick, without any advice from you. Can you jack up Malloy on this job?”

  “Shore I can, if I like,” replied the outlaw, easily. “I can handle Croak on any deal, providin’ I give him the big share. I’m not keen, though, to egg him along — for nothin’.”

  Bambridge was no match for Stone in subtlety. He had been led on to tell his business with Malloy; now all the outlaw leader wanted to know was whether or not he had brought the money.

  “Malloy wanted twenty thousand dollars,” said Bambridge. “That was out of all reason. He can’t deliver cattle enough. So we jawed about it. He came down to fifteen — an’ I’ve got ten thousand with me. Suppose you persuade Malloy to make the drive — with as few men as can possibly be needed. An’ the day you land the cattle at my corral I’ll fork over the other five thousand.”

  “How many cattle?” asked Stone, tremendously interested, but not in any case in the query he made.

  “I don’t stipulate any number. Only as many as can be rounded up quick an’ driven out quick.”

  “Ahuh...Suppose you let me see the colour of thet ten thousand,” suggested the rustler, as if he needed a little more material persuasion.

  Bambridge unbuttoned his bulging vest, and from an inside pocket drew forth a packet of clean new greenbacks, with the bank wrapper still round them. He flipped it upon the bench. Money was only so much paper to him! His large features worked.

  “You’ve as much right to doubt me as I have you,” he said, blandly. “There you are! — Nice fresh green colour!”

  “Wal, it ain’t so much money, after all, considerin’,” reflected Stone.

  The cattleman’s face fell. He had calculated upon this last card.

  “I’ve got about five hundred more in gold. I’ll throw that in. Will you pull off the deal?” And he jingled the heavy coins, which evidently were what had made his vest bulge.

  Stone’s veins leaped as the released blood gushed hot and bursting along them. All his talk had been pretence, except wherein he had wanted to find out if Bambridge really carried the money with him.

  “Let me see thet, too...The gold! The good old yellow stuff with the music — an’ the hell hid in it.”

  Bambridge reacted slowly to that suggestion. Something wedged into his eager one-ideaed mind. Instead of complying with Stone’s request he ceased jangling the gold and snatched up the packet of bills, which he returned to his pocket. Then he buttoned up his vest.

  “Fork it all over!” suddenly called the outlaw, and in a single second such a remarkable transformation occurred in him that Bambridge’s eyes popped wide.

  “Wha-at?” he stammered.

  “Hand me thet money.”

  “I will not. No pay in advance, Malloy.”

  “Pay hell! I wouldn’t drive a steer for you. But I want the ten thousand. You owe it to me.”

  “See you in hell first,” burst out Bainbridge, furiously. He stood up, and stepped out as if to go off the porch.

  Stone gave him a sudden hard shove, which staggered him backward. “You — fool! You will brace me on my own ground? Fork over thet money or—”

  “You’re a low-down thief! No wonder Malloy’s quit standin’ for you...An’ if you want to know it — there’s talk of collectin’ the reward on your head.”

  Bambridge’s ignorance of such men as Jed Stone could not have been better expressed. And if he had known how to inflame this outlaw it was doubtful if he could have done so more subtly. For years that price on Stone’s head had been a thorn in his flesh. There were still a mother and a father living, not to forget a sacrificed sweetheart; and the thought of them hearing of this reward was torture.

  Stone drew his gun and struck Bainbridge over the forehead. Not a violent blow, though it brought blood! The cattleman fell over the bench, against the wall.

  “Get that through your thick skull?” demanded Stone, as he menacingly straddled the bench. “Hyar! Don’t pull—”

  But Bambridge, like a madman, his face ablaze, reached back toward his hip.

  “Take it then!” hissed the outlaw. His shot broke Bambridge’s draw. The gun slipped out on the floor and spun round. Bambridge uttered a horrible groan, sagged back, his huge face going out like an extinguished light.

  Stone stood an instant. Then with swift movement he picked up the gun from the floor, fired it into the wall, and dropped it again. Then, bending over the dead man, he ripped open his vest and extracted the money, which he transferred to his own pocket. That done, he stepped to the porch. The gun in his hand still smoked. Sheathing it, he glanced along the wall of the cliff to see Madden coming on a run. His next move was to light a cigarette, and his fingers were as steady as a rock. He had shot Bambridge as he would have a hydrophobia skunk, than which there was no more despised beast of the wilderness.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  MADDEN THUMPED UP to the cabin, breathless and alarmed. “Boss, I heerd — shootin’,” he panted.

  “Reckon you did,” replied Stone, removing his cigarette to puff a cloud of smoke.

  The right-hand man of Croak Malloy took his cue from that — no need for concern!

  “What come — off?”

  “Wal, you can see fer yourself.”

  Madden stamped up the high porch steps, his beady eyes working as if on points, until suddenly they fixed on the dead man, the little stream of red blood running out toward the gun lying on the floor. It seemed to be an accusing finger.

  “ —— ! Throwed on you?” ejaculated Madden, in amaze.

  Stone nodded.

  “What’s thet cut on his haid?” asked the other, curiously.

  “Wal, he fell all over the place,” replied Stone, casually. “I reckon he hit the bench...Better search him, Madden.”

  The outlaw picked up the gun, took a look at the chamber, and laid it on the bench. Then he extracted watch, papers, and a handful of gold coins from the pockets, which he placed beside the gun. His next move was to look for a money-belt.

  “Wasn’t well heeled,” he remarked, in disgust. “I recollect he an’ Croak had a hell of a row at Tanner’s. There was a game on. An’ Bambridge lost. Swore he’d never fetch any more money where there was a lot of robbers. Haw haw!”

  “You’re welcome to thet, Madden. I shore don’t want it.”

  “Thanks, Boss. An’ what about all these papers?”

  “Wal, I reckon you can keep them for Croak,” said Stone, with humour. “By the way, Madden, when do you expect him?”

  “Today, sure. Thet’s why I near rode Bambridge off his laigs gettin’ hyar...What’d you an’ Bambridge fight aboot?”

  “Wait till Croak comes,” replied the rustler leader. “I don’t want to tell it all over again.”

  “Shall we drag Bambridge an’ bury him, or wait fer thet, too?”

  “Reckon we’d better wait. Put thet gun back on the floor where you found it. An’ cover him over.”

  “Haw haw! Pertickler on Croak seein’ the evidence, huh?...Don’t blame you. Croak will be a-rarin’. But at thet he wasn’t so fond of Bambridge, an’ don’t you overlook it.”

  Call to supper at last brought the outlaw leader inside the cabin, where bright fire and smoking pans and pots attested to Madden’s practical application to duties surely neglected by others of the Hash-Knife.

  “No sign of Croak?” he asked.

  “Nary. An’ mebbe it’s jest as well,” replied Stone.

  “Shore. Tomorrer you’ll feel less testy...Wal, Croak’s been in a fight, you can lay to thet. Else he’d been hyar. I seen him at Tanner’s about a week ago — yep, jest seven days, an’ we set the day for me to get hyar with Bambridge...Thet feller Darnell has messed things up again, I reckon.”

  “Madden, I appreciate your cookin’, if not your company,” said Stone.

  “Shore kind of you, Boss,” replied the other, sarcastically. “But when the final row between you an’ Croak comes don’t take any of it out on me. I was Croak’s pard before we come to the Hash-Knife. An’ if I do see some queer deals I hardly approve of, I can’t do nothin’.”