ething that needs explaining."

He stood straight as a soldier, rigid, but the fingers of his right hand
twitched, twitched, twitched; the hand itself stole higher. Very calmly,
Vic hunted for his words, found them.

"A cattle rustler is bad," he pronounced, "a hoss thief is worse, but
you're the lowest sneak of the lot, Blondy."

Again that silence with the pulse in it, and Vic Gregg could feel the
chill which numbed every one except himself.

The lower jaw of Captain Lorrimer sagged, and his whisper came out in
jerking syllables: "God Almighty!" Then Blondy went for his gun, and Vic
waited with his hand on the butt of his own, waited with a perfect, cold
foreknowledge, heard Blondy moan as his Colt hung in the holster, saw
the flash of the barrel as it whipped out, and then jerked his own
weapon and fired from the hip. Blondy staggered but kept himself from
falling by gripping the edge of the bar with his left hand; the right,
still holding the gun, raised and rubbed across his forehead; he looked
like a sleeper awakening.

Not a sound from any one else, while Vic watched the tiny wraith of
smoke jerk up from the muzzle of his revolver. Then Blondy's gun flashed
down and clanked on the floor. A red spot grew on the breast of Hansen's
shirt; now he leaned as if to pick up something, but instead, slid
forward on his face. Vic stepped to him and stirred the body with his
toe; it wobbled, limp.

Chapter V. The Fight

There were three spots of white in the dim saloon, the faces of Stewart,
Lorrimer, and old Lew Perkins, and at the feet of Vic grew a spot of
red. Knowing with calm surety that no hand would lift against him even
if he turned his back, he walked out the door without a word and swung
into the saddle. There, for an instant, he calculated chances, for the
street stretched empty before and behind with not a sound of warning
stirring in the saloon. He was greatly tempted to ride to Dug Pym's
for his blanket roll and a few other traveling necessities, but he
remembered that the men of Alder rose to action with astonishing speed;
within five minutes a group of hard riders would be clattering up his
trail with Pete Glass at their head. An unlucky Providence had sent Pete
to Alder on this day of all days. There stood his redoubtable dusty
roan at the hitching rack, her head low, one ear back and one flopped
forward, her under lip pendulous--in a pasture full of horses one might
pick her last either for sto