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Updated: May 8, 2025
Packard and Barbee, frowning unavailingly toward each little noise, could only guess at what went forward so few inches from them. A scraping foot might be either Royce's or Blenham's; a long, deep sigh or quick breathing now here, now there, might emanate from either man.
All you got to do is fire me." And now the pure wonder of the moment was that Blenham did not discharge Royce in three words. It was his turn for hesitation, for which there was no explanation forthcoming. Then, gripped by a rage which made him inarticulate, he whirled upon Barbee. Yellow-haired Barbee at the table promptly stood up, awaiting no second invitation to that look of Blenham's.
"A man can win a jack pot on a pair of deuces, if he plays the game right!" At this point Packard's Creek is narrow; the distance between the spot where he stood and the door of the cook-shed was not over forty feet. He shifted Woods's gun to his left hand, taking into his right Blenham's old-style revolver which was more to his fancy.
Steve smiled; by wagon road his grandfather's ranch home was fifty miles to the northward. "You won't think of going back before noon." "Won't I? But I will, though, son; Blenham's sticking aroun', waitin' for my say-so what he'll do nex'." He snapped open a big watch and stared at it a moment with pursed lips. "I'll be back home in jus' one hour an' a half.
The door was shut, and, of course, barred from within. "Terry!" called Steve. Terry sought to answer; he heard her voice in inarticulate terror, little more than a gasp, choked back in her throat. Steve went dead white. He visualized Blenham's hands upon her. He came on to the door, his rifle clubbed.
As the days went by Packard's fame grew. There were tales that in a savage mêlée with Blenham he had eliminated that capable individual's right eye; and though there were those who had had it from some of the Ranch Number Ten boys that Blenham's loss was the result of an accident, still it remained unquestioned that Blenham had suffered injury at Packard's ranch and had been driven forth from it.
The big bulks rolled and threshed and whipped here and there "Hell!" It was a cry of mingled rage and pain; it came bursting explosively from Blenham's lips. Royce's laugh followed it; Packard shivered. "Bill!" he cried. "Bill!" Royce did not answer; perhaps for the very good reason that he did not hear. There were other matters now engaging his attention solely and exclusively.
He stared after her a moment, shrugged, turned his back, and strode rapidly toward the Ranch Number Ten corrals. He had planned correctly; he had correctly measured Blenham's impulses and desires. Further, he had come in time, just in time. The light was in the ranch-house. Though but little after eleven o'clock it was dark within the bunk-house, the men long ago asleep.
An' it was Blenham as gave me both barrels of Johnny Mills's shot-gun? It was Blenham for sure, wasn't it, Steve?" "Yes, Bill. It was Blenham." "An' an' Blenham's right across there now? It's him I can hear breathin', Steve?" "Yes, Bill." "An' an' what for did you sen' for me, Steve? What are you goin' to do to him?" Packard beckoned to Barbee.
For "yets" and "ifs" and "howevers" had already begun to intrude, befogging many a consideration hitherto clear as cut glass. He had not lied about a horse being shot under him; he had been party to Blenham's departure from the ranch; he had been man enough in Red Creek to whip Joe Woods; and, single-handed, he had driven a crew of rough-and-ready timberjacks off his property.
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