The two-gun man ...

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

I “A Jug and Thou ”. i

III Shirtsleeve Justice.20

CHAPTER I “a jug and thou”

A distance the rider seemed even less interesting than his ewe-necked travel-worn broncho. The scant bed roll wrapped in his slicker and the leanness of his horse told that he was not a local ranch hand. He slouched loosely in his saddle, a rather slightly built cowboy.

The first distinctive note to catch the eye was the scarlet band about his waist—a fancy Mexican sash-girdle of silk. It went oddly with his dusty over¬ alls and khaki shirt. So did the ornate silverfiligree band of his old sombrero. The hat was unusually large for this farm-converted Colorado mountain cattle country.

A still closer view brought the glint and jingle of the rider’s big-roweled silver-mounted Spanish spurs. Most distinctive of all — at the front of his sagging cartridge belt hung a pair of open-holstered Colts.

Yet aside from his weapons, nothing about this two-gun man suggested the desperado. His boyish face had a happy-go-lucky look. His dark eyes were as mild as a girl’s. His lips, though rather thin, quirked up at the corners.

The road rounded over the corner of a hill. The rider looked down the bright green valley of a small creek. Half a mile away he saw a roadside cluster of buildings — farmhouse, barn and sheds — that gave promise of refreshment to man and beast. A slight shift in his seat put the broncho into a jog.

On the front of the old log house had been built an ugly shack, divided into a rough garage, or oil station, and a country store. As the rider drew near he glimpsed a furtive face peering at him through one of the dirty windows of the store. But he turned to the old stone-curbed well that divided the road in front of the garage.

His horse’s dusty muzzle plunged into the trough beside the curb. He swung off to lower the bat¬ tered galvanized bucket. The well was not deep. The bucket came up brimming with cool pure water. He drank deeply.

Out of the store slouched a long, bony, loosejointed man. He leaned against one of the un¬ barked spruce posts of the store porch and spat a streak of tobacco juice into the dust.

“Howdy, feller,” he greeted. “You one them movie cowboys ? ”

The horseman dumped the bucketful of water into the trough and quietly faced his questioner.

“’Lo, Dorcy, you old hossthief. Thought they strung you up long ago.”

The gaunt man’s bleary eyes fixed upon the brace of revolvers on the front of the other’s belt. He stiffened as if he had touched a live wire.

“Sid — Sid Corveau! Good Lord, kid, you ain’t trailing me! I — I wasn’t in with O’Keefe, there at Tombstone, when the bunch stacked the cards on you. It was on’y A1 and Lefty. I didn’t get a cent of your roll. I-”

“ Choke your blatt, Gig. That’s all dead and buried — ’specially Pat O’Keefe. I’m just taking a pasear up this way. How about eats?”

“Sure — sure, kid. I ought to knowed ’tain’t like you to hold a grudge. Step right in. What’ll you have — ham, bacon-”

“Give the bronc a good feed of oats. I’ll bust myself a can or two.”

With ingratiating eagerness, Dorcy hastened to lead the horse to the barn. Corveau sauntered into the store, jingling his silver spurs. He was seated on the cluttered counter, feasting on sardines, crackers and cheese, when his host slid in at the door, more than ever anxious to please.

“Lord, Sid—a lot of dry chuck like that. Lemme-”

“You might open up your pickle kegs and bust me a can of tomatoes and peaches, if you like.”

The storekeeper narrowed one of his bleary eyes.

“How ’bout a slug of — uh — something with a kick in it, Sid?”

“Nothing doing, old hoss. I voted dry last year.”

Gig Dorcy rolled his quid in his cheek and winked knowingly.

“ Coldwell ain’t dry, though. Real stuff. None that wood alcohol or sympathetic gin you get in town. Might be a jug around that’s had time to age a bit — seeing as how you’re my old side-kick.”

“Told you I voted dry.”

Quietly as Corveau spoke, Dorcy w r as quick to note the white rims that appeared under the brown-black irises of his guest’s eyes. He almost Hurriedly hastened to open the cans of tomatoes and peaches.

“That’s more like,” said Corveau. “I was be¬ ginning to think your hearing had gone bad. Bad hearing is apt to get a man into trouble.”

He swallowed a vinegar pickle and took a drink of tomato juice out of the can.

“Um-m— Beats moonshine, Gig. Carries you back to the tail end of a blistering day’s round-up on the desert, when Cookie opens up his heart and the chuck box. Only I don’t see any alkali in this country —nor much stock.”

“ Thay’s a lot of Herefords in the hills,” replied Dorcy. “More’n you’d think. But the latest is

“A Jug and Thou”

Shorthorn dairying and head lettuce.”

“I see. Nesters have crowded out the brand owners.” '

“Not crowded. Owners cut up their holdings and took to farming. Sight of money in head let¬ tuce and milk.”

“To say nothing of bootleg,” put in Corveau. “ Beats rustling steers and horse stealing and tin¬ horn gambling all hollow, eh — you knock-kneed old brand-blotter.”

Dorcy grinned uneasily.

“You ain’t got no call to ride me, Sid, just ’cause I happened to have a drop of juice on hand for medic’nal use. How’d I know you’d swore off? Last time I seen you you’d ’a’ grabbed for a swig.”

Corveau’s eyes clouded.

“ Maybe you haven’t heard I gave O’Keefe what was coming to him.”

“Why, I — I did sort of hear something. So now you’ve come .... trailing A1 and Lefty.”

The surprise of the two-gun man was unmistak¬ able.

“That pair of black jacks! Up here, are they?”

“ We-ell — they was — a while back. Just going through, I guess, to-”

“ Cut out the lying, Gig. I’m not trailing them or anybody. Round here is a pleasurable change from Arizona sand and cactus. But since it’s no longer a real cow country, I’ve a mind to jog over West.”

The storekeeper could not hide his relief.

“Uh— The boys’ll be right glad to hear you ain’t after ’em. It’s just dairy and farm round these parts, though.”

“Except our bootleg joint.”

“You got me wrong, Sid. This here’s a reg’lar business — Coldwell Empor’um and Garridge, George Dorcy, manager. You seen the sign — There’s a toot for gas now.”

The auto horn squawked again. Dorcy shuffled out at a side door into the garage. By leaning to one side Corveau could see through the doorway to the gasoline pump at the open front corner of the station.

Beside the pump a ruddy, thickset, youngish man sat at the wheel of a battered flivver. He crooked his finger to Dorcy with the gesture of a master to an inferior.

A slight sound from the front of the store brought Corveau’s glance flashing around with the alertness of a hunted gray wolf’s. In the doorway stood a girl nearly as tall as himself. Her soft dark hair lay massed under her neat hat in thick unbobbed tresses. Her rich color had too much the freshness of dawn red to have come out of a rouge pot.

Corveau jumped down from his seat on the coun-

“A Jug and Thou ”

ter and swept the sombrero from his sandy head.

“ Buenos dias, sehorita. Gig just shied out. Any¬ thing I can get you?”

The girl gravely looked him up and down. Her gaze fixed upon the two guns slung at the front of his belt. Into her clear flax-blue eyes came a look of disapproval.

“ No, thank you,” she replied. “All I want is a jug of vinegar. I’ll help myself.”

She reached in behind the counter and drew out a gallon stoneware jug. Still calm and deliberate, she stepped over the threshold into the slab porch and disappeared. Corveau shook his head. Too bad! She did not look that sort.

After a few moments he heard the blare and racket of a rebellious engine. The uproar ended in the swoosh of the departing flivver. Dorcy insinu¬ ated himself through the garage doorway. His glance shifted uneasily around the store. His shot of tobacco juice at the sawdust cuspidor-box missed by more than a foot. Plainly something had dis¬ tressed him.

“ Let’s hear it,” invited Corveau. “ Did she high¬ jack the white mule?”

“What, that? Lord, no. She ain’t so all-fired smart as she figgered. It’s just what it’s labeled, cider vin’gar.”

“ Took her for one your moonshine customers.”

“Her? Ain’t you got no sense? She’s Jordan’s girl”

“Well?”

“Well nothing! Jordan’s the stiff we — the county—’Jected sheriff. He’s easy as a old boot. But Miss Kate, she’s one them goody-goody Sunday-go-to-meeting skirts thay’s no getting round.”

Corveau thoughtfully fished his last half peach from the “busted” can.

“ Must make you feel good and safe, Gig, hav¬ ing the sheriff close by to protect you. He looked young to be her dad.”

“Who? No, that was Bull —Bull Lort. He’s going to marry her. Jordan don’t live near here. What’s left of his old ranch is right next Elk. Mighty handy for him and Miss Kate. Both can stay home when thay’s nobody in jail.”

“You don’t say he acts as jailer, too?”

“No. Miss Kate got ’pointed. Said the dirty hole needed a good scrubbing.”

A silver dollar suddenly appeared in Corveau’s small hand.

“Guess I’d best trot along. Road map gives it fifteen miles on to Elk. What’s the damage for the chuck?”

“ Nary a red cent, kid. It’s on me. Mighty gladj to grub a old side-kick. Say, though, long as you’re! going to town— Can you drive a truck?”

“A Jug and Thou”

“So-so.”

“Well, a man I know hauls milk and lettuce to the railroad. He was took sick. I promised to run his truck in to Elk for him. I’ll lose trade, though, if I close up the garridge.”

“All right. Where’s your go-cart?”

Chapter II

D ORCY hurried ahead to the barn and backed out a medium-sized truck. From the stable end of the big building he brought the broncho. As he hitched the animal to the tailboard of the truck he lifted a corner of the heavy canvas tarpaulin that covered the load. Under it appeared a crate of crisp I head lettuces, each as big as a fair-sized cabbage.

“ From Lort’s ranch, over at Stack Falls,” he said. “The milk cans are in the middle. You’ll find the Elk Cream’ry down near the river, next the railroad. Just leave the truck there.”

As Corveau took the driver’s seat, Dorcy handed up a flask labeled “Ginger Ale.”

“ Case you feel dry between here and Elk, Sid, or get stummick ache from that cold truck.”

Corveau read the printed label, shoved the flask into his hip pocket, and gave the starter of the truck engine a shove.

“ S’long. Give my fond, fond love to A1 and Lefty. Tell ’em I saw your state pen when I came up through Canon City. Next year, if I go back that way, I’ll pay you all a visit.”

The truck rumbled out into the road, leaving 10

Dorcy with a wooden grin on his flat bony face. Corveau looked back only to make sure his horse had not broken loose. The snorts and plunges and side-jumps of the broncho were already moderating. As the speed of the truck increased he followed sub¬ missively at trot and lope.

The road twisted along the left side of the valley, sweeping around spurs of the brown-green flowerdotted hills. Three miles below Coldwell, Corveau slowed to take the old log bridge at the crossing of the creek.

Sight of the water reminded him of his ginger ale. He had a feeling that the three kinds of pickles he had sampled between the tomatoes and peaches were not associating altogether amicably with the rest of his cold lunch.

Beyond the bridge the road rose in a stiff climb. Not wishing to lose headway by stopping the truck at the foot of the steep grade, he hurriedly opened the flask between his knees with one hand and uptilted it to his lips. A full third of the fiery con¬ tents had gulped down his throat before he tasted anything else than the ginger.

Even then his mind remained fixed upon the need to shove on more power. The flask was recorked and back in his pocket before he thought to fling it away. A dangerous little wash gulley that cut half . across the road forced him to center all his attention upon swerving the truck around it.

By the time he was past the gulley and had the truck pulling steadily up the stiff grade the “ ginger ale ” had begun to make itself felt. His anger over Dorcy’s trick mellowed to tolerance in the glow of good feeling that flowed up with his heated blood to his brain.

“Ginger” was all right — only it was more like ninety-five per cent Jamaica ginger or rather, half that and half double-proof raw white mule. But old Gig had looked friendly. No doubt the ignorant cuss had meant well.

After all, what mattered one little slug of hooch when a fellow had been on the water wagon for over a year? One little slug, or maybe two or thr&e, to cheer up a lone, jobless, wandering cowboy, far, far from home and friends.

It was not his fault. He had not broken his promise. He had not intentionally taken the drink. Gig had tricked him — the slick old coyote! But on a thundering up-grade like this you couldn’t turn back to shoot his ears off. Besides, that would be returning to temptation. Besides, again, why shoot up an old side-kick when a fellow felt like busting into song?

He opened his ginger-and-alcohol-scorched mouth and struck into a favorite version of The Cowboy’s Lament:

“Oh, bury me not on the lone prairie Where the coyotes howl and - ”

The truck swung sharp around a dense clump of blue spruce. Close ahead, in the middle of the road, stood a battered old flivver. Corveau let out a blood-curdling yell, blared the truck horn, and burst again into song:

“ Clear the track for I am coming!- - ”

A girl straightened up beside the front of the car. She lifted her hand. It was the blue-eyed girl who had grabbed the vinegar jug. The truck creaked, shuddered, groaned, and stopped a short ten feet behind the flivver, with brakes screeching.

Corveau waved his sombrero to the girl with genial friendliness. She bent low again over the engine of the car. Far from rebuffed, Corveau jumped down to offer his sympathy and unskilled services.

A lady alone with a balky flivver— No, two big boots were sticking out from under the running board. That fellow—what was his name — Bull Lort—the man who was going to marry her, he was under the car. From where his top end must be, came noises that sounded like cussing, only there were no words you could make out.

The boots began to move. They shoved outwards, followed by thick legs, then a thick body, and, lastly, a thick head with a crimson, greasespotted face. Corveau did not see the metal badge on the inarticulate curser’s broad chest where the unbuttoned vest had pulled apart. He had stepped over the legs to address the girl.

“’Scuse me, ma’am. Your Rolls-Royce is hog¬ ging the highway.”

Kate Jordan looked up at him, soberly apologetic.

“I am sorry. The engine has gone dead, and _>»

“Ought to’ve been buried long ago,” said Lort. “What the matter is this time beats me. If it was mine, I’d run the old junk heap over a cliff. Have you found what’s off?”

“Not a thing, Bullen.”

“Just plumb locoed, uh?” put in Corveau. “What d’you say we shunt it clear, so I can get past and-”

“Don’t be in such a — dickens — of a hurry,” growled Lort.

His greenish gray eyes shot a glance at the truck, widened, narrowed, and turned back to stare at Corveau’s brace of revolvers and boyish liquor-flushed face.

“Who are you? What are you doing with that truck?”

Corveau was too fully aglow with alcoholic geniality to take offense at the other’s rough tone. He waved his hand airily.

“Me? I’m just a passing shadow adrift ’cross your happy vale of sunshine.”

“That truck, I say! ”

“ Oh, that. Old buddy of mine asked would I roll it to town. The cream’ll clabber if we stand here chinning all day. S’pose we hitch your flivver on behind? ”

“A very sensible suggestion, Bullen,” approved the girl. “ Better be towed in than spend hours looking for whatever is the matter.”

As she took the driver’s seat, Corveau kicked loose the stone that blocked one of the rear wheels. The car had no more than backed aslant to the side of the road before he was starting the truck. Barely past the car he jammed on the brakes. He came around to where Lort was hooking fast a woven wire towline.

Miss Jordan had led the broncho to the rear of the car.

“ I’ll sit in the back seat and hold him,” she said.

This struck Corveau as very kind. The warmth of his feeling extended to her future husband. He held out the pint flask.

“Try a shot of ginger ale, buddy. Finest kind of tonic for that sour feeling.”

Lort stared suspiciously from flask to offerer, then took a stiff drink. His eyes narrowed.

“ You’re right. That’s some tonic. If you don’t mind, I’ll keep what’s left.”

“ I do mind,” said Corveau. He plucked the flask out of Lort’s hand before the bigger man could tighten his grip on it.

“Hold on,” Lort protested. “If you drink all that you’ll ditch the whole outfit of us.”

Corveau took a nip and carefully pocketed what was left.

“ Buddy, even when I’m walking figure-eights, I can sit a saddle and hit a tack at twenty paces. It would pleasure me a whole lot to give you a spill. But we have a lady in the outfit. Watch me gentle this truck. Le’s go.”

“Hitch the bronc on behind, Kate, and take the wheel,” directed Lort. “ I’ll run the truck.”

“Not so fast, Mister Man,” said Corveau. “I promised to drive this truck. I don’t guess you’re going to ride it or me.”

Both his look and tone were softly ironical. Lort eyed the pair of front-holstered Colts and turned back to take the steering-wheel of the flivver. This was no time to force a quarrel with a stranger who packed two guns.

Miss Kate Jordan had not moved from the rear seat or let go her hold of the broncho’s reins. Cor¬ veau flourished his hat to her and jauntily mounted the truck. He sent it chugging on up the steep grade.

The road had not yet been made a state highway. It was crooked and narrow and rutty. But the truck proved -to be in good trim. It climbed steadily among the jack pines up the humping mountainside. The first long heavy grade eased off on an almost level stretch, only to be followed by a still longer and steeper climb.

But at last the twisting road crawled over a rocky ridge crest and, like a frightened snake, darted away, in and out among the pines and spruce and aspens, down the long descent of a mountain valley.

From the driver’s seat of the truck came an earsplitting yell.

Kate Jordan tightened her grip on the broncho’s reins. Lort grasped the steering-wheel of the car with both hands and set his foot for the brake. But the truck did not lurch into high speed.

Corveau had yelled merely to tell the world his pleasure at having reached the top. Instead of a burst into racing speed, he “bust” again into song. An occasional nip of the “ginger ale” had added to his inward and outward glow. Neither his broncho nor the lady would enjoy a rattle-te-bang hair-raising swoop downhill. That was barred. But he could at least entertain them vocally.

He wailed into a doleful ballad of lovelorn tragedy that Kate had not heard since her father had afflicted her with it as a cradle lullaby. How¬ ever, the truck headed down the long miles to Elk at only a slight increase of speed. It kept the same steady gait even when the singer shifted his vocal gears into a yell-punctured jazz song.

After that came a truly melodious lover’s serenade in Arizona Spanish. Through it all the truck rumbled on down-grade over ruts and bumps, with only one pause at a turnout to let pass a heavily loaded up-bound flivver.

Far down the valley, within a mile of Elk, the road angled into one of the broad smooth state high¬ ways. By this time the pint flask was almost empty. The raw liquor had hoarsened the singer’s throat. He closed the concert and proceeded to entertain his passengers by covering the rest of the distance to town with beautiful grapevine curves from ditch to ditch.

Beyond the far fence of the big old log-and-frame Jordan ranch house came scattered rows of houses; then a garage. An angry shout from Lort brought the truck to a halt. As Corveau, with deliberate, almost solemn dignity, descended from his high seat, Lort came striding from the flivver. Kate followed him closely, her eyes dark with mingled indignation and concern.

Corveau was in no condition to heed the fact that the smile on the lower part of Lort’s powerful face did not extend up to his eyes. The thickset man held out a hearty hand.

“You’re sure some driver, cowboy. Let’s have another drop of that ginger.”

Though somewhat past the mellow stage, Corveau steadied himself with a hand on the side of the truck and offered the flask. Lort raised it to his lips and paused to frown at the scant thimbleful of liquor in the bottom. Corveau’s bloodshot eyes fixed upon it in an apologetic look. Something small and hard and round thrust against his stomach.

“Stick ’em up!” ordered Lort.

Up went Corveau’s small wiry hands. With the hand that held the flask Lort drew aside his vest to show his deputy sheriff’s badge. Corveau smiled good-naturedly.

“ Y’ poor fizsh! ’M not wanned f’r anyshing.”

“You’re under arrest for having liquor in your possession— No, keep those hands up, or I’ll blow a hole through you. I’m taking no chances with a two-gun man.”

Chapter III

K ATE JORDAN stepped around beside Lort and his prisoner. She spoke with grave re¬ proach :

“ Why, Bullen, what do you mean?”

He showed her the flask before thrusting it into his pocket.

“Here’s the evidence. Ginger ale on the label and double-proof moonshine inside. The case is a dead cinch. Fool didn’t savvy enough to toss the flask out on the rocks, up-valley. Steady now, you bold, bad, two-gun kid. Try to be funny, and you’ll get leaded.”

White rims showed under the dark irises of Corveau’s eyes. But he stood very still. The muzzle of the deputy’s big automatic pistol pressed harder into his slim mid-body. Still staring him in the eye, Lort felt for the twin Colts and shifted them to his own belt. He changed the pistol to his left hand and drew a pair of handcuffs from his right hip pocket.

The alcoholic flush ebbed from Corveau’s face, leaving it white under the bronze of sun and wind. “ ’M willin’ t’ go quiet,” he said.

“Sure you will. Lower one hand — no, the right.”

Corveau’s face took on a hopeless, frightened, hangdog look. His lowering hand quivered as if afflicted with the shaking palsy.

“Oh, Bullen!” murmured Kate. “Don’t, please don’t! He said he’d give up. And to arrest him at all, after he towed us in! ”

“A sworn officer, Kate, must do his-”

Lort had permitted his glance to flick aside to the girl. In that split fraction of a second Corveau’s lowered hand clutched with the quickness of a cat’s spatting paw. An instant later Lort found the muzzle of his pistol at his nose. His hands went up.

He took back his own weapons and turned his shoulder to the prisoner. The contemptuous care¬ lessness of this deepened Lort’s florid color to crim¬ son. Once in the bear grip of his thick arms, Cor- \ veau would have been as helpless as a child. He was little more than a step away, and he had stag¬ gered as he turned. But Lort did not jump him. He stood rigid, with hands high.

Kate Jordan’s grave gaze changed from pity to stern reproof.

“Young man, she admonished Corveau, “two wrongs do not make a right. You are resisting an officer.”

Off went the silver-banded sombrero in a gallant flourish, accompanied by a bow that almost upset the unsteady saluter. He recovered his balance and drew himself up with great dignity to offer her not only Lort’s pistol but his two revolvers.

“Take ’em — ’m me, too. I’m y’r prishner.”

Without so much as blinking an eyelash, Kate took one deadly weapon after the other. But Corveau saw that they made an awkward armful for her. He took back his revolvers, put them into their holsters, unbuckled the cartridge belt, and handed all over with a flourish.

Down jerked Lort’s arms. He bent to jump at the self-disarmed prisoner. The girl stepped be¬ tween.

“No, Bullen. He has surrendered to me.”

“A two-gun man! You saw how he tricked me. The dirty-”

Something in Kate’s look checked the rage of the humiliated deputy. He curbed himself down to surliness.

“At least give me my gun, Kate. You’re not safe with a drunken-”

“ Hush! That is what made him resist. He will come along all right with me. If you’ll please ask Jake to repair the car— Go on, do! I’m as much responsible as an officer as you are. He’s my prisoner, Bullen.”

Lort frowned but started for the garage, from which came the ring of a hammer on steel.

The prisoner’s horse had sidled forward, with his neck curved to trail the reitis clear of his hoofs. He nuzzled his master’s shoulder with a dusty lip.

Kate reached for the reins, but Corveau flipped them over the horse’s head, back upon the ewe-neck. He started off along the grass-grown edge of the street. The broncho followed him like a dog. Kate smiled as she swung forward alongside her prisoner. No man whose horse liked him could be altogether bad.

Before many steps Corveau began to gain control of his wobbly feet. On beyond, where the little garden-patch homes crowded nearer together, Kate led him over to the weed-bordered sidewalk.

About two-thirds of the way down to the railroad that ran along the bank of the rumbling mountain river, officer and prisoner came to the quaint old-fashioned town hall. This cupolaed brick box stood at the upper end of Elk’s two-story frame and brick business section.

The half-mile walk in the blistering hot sun had sweat off most of the “kick” of Corveau’s ginger hooch. All the unsteadiness was gone from his legs and all thickness from his tongue. He paused to hitch his horse to the gnawed wooden rail at the edge of the sidewalk. He then offered Miss Jordan his arm up the worn stone steps of the town hall.

She accepted his assistance as seriously as it was offered. This act was repeated on the inside stair¬ way.

In the shabby courtroom the age-wizened baldheaded little judge had cleared up the day’s scant grist of business and was “swapping lies” with the attaches and lawyers before adjourning court.

At sight of the young couple he scrouged his cow¬ hide boots down from his judicial bench, knocked the ashes from his corncob pipe, and rubbed a red bandana over the billiard-ball dome of his head.

“Well, well, well, if ’tain’t Katie,” he drawled. “What you want now, Katie? ’Nother ’scription for the heathen Chinee, or— Can’t be you’ve come to get hitched to your young man! ”

He rubbed his half-moon steel-rimmed spectacles and pretended to peer through them.

“ Why, ’tain’t Bull, after all. I ought to known it, Katie. You’ll of course go to the parson with Bull, and not patronize me a-tall.”

The tolerant smile with which the girl met this banter gave place to a somewhat troubled look.

“Judge, I have to do my duty as a deputy, but I’m sorry. This young man came along when Bullen and I — when father’s car broke down. He towed us to town.”

The magistrate beetled his shaggy eyebrows at Corveau.

“Towed ’em in, heh? D’you plead guilty to the crime ? ”

“No, no, Uncle Drake! It was — it was—he had a flask of intoxicating liquor. Bullen has what’s left of the evidence. But it’s a shame, when the young man was so kind, towing us in.”

The old judge’s voice became dry and crackly.

“Just like Bull Lort — ’resting the boy, ’stead of chucking the evidence into the creek. Wonder he didn’t handcuff him.”

“Oh, no, I wouldn’t allow that. Couldn’t you hurry the trial and acquit him for lack of evidence?

: He’s not-”