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"I'm not forgettin' how you rode up Escondido when I asked you to go." "You got a lot of sabe, too. You don't go bullin' Into a fight when there's a good reason for stayin' out. At Tolleson's if you had drawn yore gun when the shootin' was on, the whole Lazy S M would have pitched in an' riddled us both. They kept out because you did. That gave me a chance to come through alive."
Plainly they were advertising the fact that they had come to paint the town red and did not care who knew it. The riders pulled up abruptly in front of Tolleson's Gaming Palace & Saloon, swung from their horses, and trailed with jingling spurs into that oasis of refreshment. Each of them carried in his hand a rope. The other end of the rawhide was tied to the horn of a saddle.
In an admiring trance Bud had followed the two friends from the office of the doctor. Now he was in the seventh heaven at being taken into friendship by one of these heroes. At last he screwed up his courage to refer to the affair at Tolleson's. "Say, Daniel Boone ain't got a thing on yore friend, has he? Jiminy, I'd like to go with you both when you leave town." Billie spoke severely.
"He's ridden on to the Fort to make arrangements for receiving the herd," answered the man sulkily. "Who's the big auger left?" "I'm the foreman, if that's what you mean?" "Well, I've come to tell you that two of yore men are hidin' in the chaparral below Los Portales. There was trouble at Tolleson's. Two of the Lazy S M men were gunned an' one of yours was wounded." "Which one was wounded?"
"Bad man" was writ on every line of the sullen, dissipated face of the bully. It was a safe bet that he was used to having his own way, or failing that was ready to fight at the drop of the hat. Swiftly the drinks were prepared. "Here 'show!" "How!" Every glass was tilted and emptied. It was high noon by the sun and Tolleson's was practically deserted.
Already his eyes had narrowed and over them had come a kind of film. They searched every dark spot on the road. "Let's go to Tolleson's," he proposed abruptly. There was a moment of silence before Billie made a counter-proposition. "No, let's go back to the hotel." "All right. You fellows go to the hotel. Meet you there later." The eyes of Prince and Roubideau met. Not another word was spoken.
Both of them knew that Clanton intended to show himself in public where any one that wanted him might find him. They turned toward Tolleson's, but took the precaution to enter by the back door. The sound of shuffling feet, of tinkling piano and whining fiddle, gave notice in advance that the dancers were on the floor.
And so it will go on." "I reckon. But I'm not startin' the war. He did that. It was the boldest piece of cheek I ever heard tell of those two gunmen goin' into Tolleson's and shootin' up my riders. They got to pay the price." Lee cried out in passionate protest. "It'll be just plain murder, dad. That's all." "What's got into you, girl?" he demanded, seizing her by the arms.
Chap-clad punchers galloped through the streets at all hours of the day and night letting out their joyous "Eee-yip-eee." The keys of Tolleson's and half a dozen other gambling places had long since been lost, for the doors were never closed to patrons. At games of chance the roof was the limit, in the expressive phrase of the country. Guns cracked at the slightest difference of opinion.
One of Webb's men had deliberately and defiantly killed two of his riders when the town was full of his employees. The man had walked into Tolleson's a place which he, Snaith, practically owned himself and flung down the gauntlet to the whole Lazy S M outfit. It was a flagrant insult and Wallace Snaith proposed to see that it was avenged. "I'm going duck-hunting to-morrow, dad," Lee told him.
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