he cave--west
side--crack in the rock wall." The man was so evidently sincere that the
Texan grinned at him:

"An' you think when I go bustin' in on 'em, they'll just naturally fill
me so full of holes my hide won't hold rainwater--is that it? You wait
till I tell Cass Grimshaw you're sneakin' around tippin' folks off to
his hang-out. Looks to me like Long Bill Kearney's got to kiss the bad
lands good-bye, no matter which way the cat jumps."

A look of horror crept into the man's face at the words. He advanced a
step, trembling visibly: "Fer Gawd's sakes, Tex, you wouldn't do that!
I'm a friend of yourn. You wouldn't double-cross a friend. Cass, he'd
kill me just as sure as he'd kill a rattlesnake if it bit him!"

"An' that's jest about what's happened." Both men started at the sound
of the voice and glancing upward, saw a man standing at almost the
exact spot where the Texan had stood upon the edge of the cutbank. He
was a squat, bow-legged man, and a tuft of hair stuck grotesquely from a
hole in the crown of his hat. With a shrill yaup of terror Long Bill
jerked a gun from its holster and fired upward. The report was followed
instantly by another and the tall form in the coulee whirled half
around, sagged slowly at the knees, and crashed heavily forward upon its
face.

"Glad he draw'd first," remarked Cass Grimshaw, as he shoved a fresh
cartridge into his gun. "It give him a chanct to die like a man, even if
he ain't never lived like one."

CHAPTER XXII

CASS GRIMSHAW--HORSE-THIEF

Lowering himself over the edge, Cass Grimshaw dropped to the floor of
the coulee, where he squatted with his back to the cutbank, and rolled a
cigarette. "Seen the smoke, an' come over to see who was campin' here,"
he imparted, "then I run onto McWhorter's roan, an' I knowed it was
you--seen you ridin' him yesterday. So I slipped over an' tuk a front
row seat--you sure worked him over thorough, Tex--an' if anyone needed
it, he did. Set down an' tell me what's on yer mind. I heard you'd
pulled yer freight after that there fake lynchin' last year."

The Texan squatted beside the horse-thief. "Be'n over on the other
side--Y Bar," he imparted briefly. "Cass, I need your help."

The other nodded: "I mistrusted you would. Name it."

"In the first place, is Purdy one of your gang? Long Bill said so--but I
didn't believe him."

"Why?"

"Well--he ain't the stripe I thought you'd pick."

The outlaw grinned: "Make a mistake so