arge.

A visible stir answered the statement.

"For stealing cattle from other men"--he did not trouble to mention
the fact the crime had occurred thirty years previous--"and for that
and other things Sheriff Madden has arrested them. Because they are
rich, their guilt is all the worse. Perhaps they have taken cattle
belonging to you, who knows? That may come out in their trial; if they
have taken them, you shall have them back."

From the rear of the grounds came the low sounds of automobile engines
being started. Weir dared not look about to learn if Madden and his
party were safely on their way thither. As for the Mexicans, the
speaker's words had created a sensation. For men were there who owned
small herds now feeding on the range, and from anger their minds
yielded to sudden anxiety; each saw himself a possible sufferer from
cattle depredations; and in the minds of these, at least, thought of
loss supplanted thought of Sorenson and Burkhardt.

"I helped Sheriff Madden arrest these men because they stole cattle,
possibly some of your steers among them. Is that why you would like to
lynch me, as I've heard you wanted to do?" he demanded, savagely.
"Because I save your animals? Or is it because I shot that renegade
Mexican whom Ed Sorenson hired to try and kill me? Ed Sorenson, yes.
Sheriff Madden has the knowledge of it. Not only would Sorenson the
father like to see me die because I know about his cattle-stealing,
but Ed Sorenson, the son, hired that strange Mexican to shoot me from
the dark because I stopped him from trying to steal a girl. Has Ed
Sorenson left your daughters alone? I would save your daughters from
his evil hands, as I would your cattle from his father's."

A man all at once pushed forth from the crowd, wrathfully elbowing his
way among neighbors. He was Naharo, the Mexican who had chatted once
with Martinez in the latter's office.

"It is true," he shouted, facing his countrymen. "I, Naharo, vow it
the truth. For I saw this engineer take a young girl away from Ed
Sorenson in the restaurant at Bowenville that the scoundrel intended
to seduce. It is so, the truth; the engineer saved her. And are there
not men among you"--his voice gained a savage, rasping note--"whose
girls have been betrayed by the cattle-stealing Sorenson's son?"

"Where is he--where is he now?" some one shouted, angrily. It might
have been a father who stood in Naharo's case.

"He lies crippled," Weir stated. "Last nigh