e's little
eyes met his.

"You saw this stranger, Luke?" he asked.

Luke Tweezy nodded. "We all saw him."

"He was playing draw with Honey Hoke and Peaches Austin and me," Doc
Coffin offered, oilily.

"And the stranger?" amended Racey.

"And the stranger," Doc Coffin accepted the amendment.

"What was the trouble?" pursued Racey.

"Well, we kind of thought"--Doc Coffin's eyes slid round to cross an
instant the shifty gaze of Peaches Austin--"we thought maybe this
stranger dealt a card from the bottom. We ain't none shore."

"Dale said he did, anyhow," said Peaches Austin.

"He said so twice," put in Lanpher.

Racey turned deliberately. "You here," said he, softly. "I didn't see
you at first. I must be getting nearsighted. You saw the whole thing,
did you, Lanpher?"

"Yeah," replied Lanpher.

"Who pulled first?"

"The stranger." The answer came patly from at least five different
men.

Racey looked grimly upon those present. "Most everybody seems shore
the stranger's to blame," he observed. "Besides saying the stranger
was dealing from the bottom did Dale use any other fighting words?"

"He called him a--tinhorn," burst simultaneously from the lips of
McFluke and Peaches Austin.

"Only two this time," said Racey, shooting a swift glance at Jack
Harpe and overjoyed to find the latter dividing a glare of disgust
between McFluke and Austin. "But you'll have to do better than that."

Mr. Saltoun shivered inwardly. He was a man of courage, but not
of foolhardy courage, the species of courage that dares death
unnecessarily. He was getting on in years, and hoped, when it came his
time to die, to pass out peacefully in his nightshirt. And here was
that fool of a Racey practically telling Harpe and the other rascals
that he was on to their game. No wonder Mr. Saltoun shivered. He
expected matters to come to push of pike in a split second. So, being
what he was, a fairly brave man in a tight corner, he put on a hard,
confident expression and hooked his thumbs in his belt.

Racey Dawson spread his legs wide and laughed a reckless laugh. He
felt reckless. He likewise felt for these men ranged before him the
most venomous hate of which he was capable. These men had killed the
father of Molly Dale. It did not matter whether any one or all of
them had or had not committed the actual murder, they were wholly
responsible for it. They had brought it about. He knew it. He knew it
just as sure as he was a foot high.