se
of his own great vigilance, his night-riding over his herds. But what
would a jury say? He remembered that the last time he had seen old man
King, just a few days ago, when King had remarked drily upon the fact
that no cattle were missing from Thornton's range, there had been a
swift look of suspicion in the old cattle man's shrewd eyes. Already he
was suspected. How many men besides King were ready to believe the worst
of Buck Thornton, a man who had been in their midst only a year?

There were many days in the life of Buck Thornton as in the lives of
other cattle men hereabouts when he was absolutely alone with his horse,
when he rode far out day and night upon some range errand, when,
perhaps, he went two or three days together and saw no other man.
Thornton remembered suddenly that when he had first heard of the murder
of Bill Varney, the stage driver, he had just returned from such a
lonely ride, a three days' trip into the mountains to look for new
pasture lands. If these men planned to commit these crimes and then to
throw the burden upon him, he saw how simple a matter it would be for
them to select some such occasion as this when he could not prove an
alibi.

"They've come mighty close to getting me," he muttered sternly. "Mighty
damned uncomfortably close!"

He saw further. Winifred Waverly had said frankly that she had sworn to
the sheriff that she knew it was Buck Thornton who had robbed her. They
were managing to hold Cole Dalton off, and they had a reason. What?
Perhaps to work their game as long as they dared, to make a last big
haul, or to have their chain of evidence welded so strongly link by link
that Thornton could not free himself from it and that no faintest breath
of suspicion might reach them. Pollard would be in a position to prove
that Thornton had paid him this five thousand only to take it back; it
would give him a chance to break the contract, to regain possession of
the Poison Hole and to keep the other ten thousand dollars already paid
in as forfeited....

Why had they chosen him to bear the brunt of their manifold crimes?
That, too, was clear to him. With him in the penitentiary or gone to the
gallows the whole episode would be closed, the men who had put through
the monumental scheme would be in a position to enjoy their boldly
acquired profits with no fear of the law so much as searching for them.
It was necessary to them that some man suffer for their wrong doing.
Now: why Buck