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Everybody was satisfied Hogan, Simpkins, Asche, McGurk, even Delany, because the fleas upon his back were satisfied and he was planning ultimately to get rid of the whole damn tangle by having the indictment quietly dismissed when nobody was looking, by his friend O'Brien, to whom the case had been sent for trial.
That is, he will be known familiarly at widely separated parts of the range, places which he has never visited. It has happened to a few of the famous characters of the mountain desert that they became traditions before their deaths. It happened to McGurk, of course. It also happened to Red Pierre.
All this Pierre conned slowly in his mind, until he was cold. Then he looked up and saw that the lamp had burned out and that the wood in the fireplace was consumed to a few red embers. He replenished the fire, and when the yellow flames began to mount he made his resolution and walked slowly up and down the floor with it. For he knew that he must go to meet McGurk.
"Did anybody ask you to waive examination?" The swelling in Hogan's fat neck grew larger. Suppose McGurk or Delany were trying to put something over on him! "No! Certainly not!" he replied unconvincingly. He didn't want to make the wrong answer if he could help it. "You have an associate, have you not? A Mr. Simpkins?" "Yes, Your Honor."
"No, the bad luck comes on the people who are with me, but never on me. It's struck them all down, one by one; your turn is next, Jack. If I could leave the cross behind " He covered his face, and groaned: "But I don't dare; I don't dare! I have to face McGurk. Jack, I hate myself for it, but I can't help it.
It was while she sat there, burying Pierre in her thoughts, a white shape came glimmering down to her through the moonlight. She was on her feet at once, alert and gun in hand. It could only be one horse, only one rider, McGurk coming down from his last killing with the sneer on his pale lips. Well, he would complete his work this night and kill her fighting face to face.
You've seen something, and we want to know what it is." "A ghost, Jim, that's all. Just a ghost." Bud Mansie said softly: "There's only one ghost that could make you look like this. Was it McGurk, Pierre?" Boone commanded: "No more of that, Bud. Boy's we're going to turn in, and to-morrow we'll climb the hills looking for the two we've lost. But there's something or some one after us.
"I've lived too long with the name of McGurk in my ears not to know the man. He'll never kill by stealth, but openly and man to man. I know him, damn him. He'll wait till he meets us alone, and then we'll finish as poor Gandil, there, or Patterson and Branch and Bud Mansie, all of them fallen somewhere in the mountains with the buzzards left to bury 'em.
Then he said through set teeth: "So you come up here trailin' him after you, eh?" "Who?" "McGurk!" The name came like a rifle shot and Mary rose in turn and shrank back toward the wall, for there was murder in the lighted black eyes which stared after her and crumbling fear in her own heart at the thought of McGurk hovering near, of the peril that impended for Pierre.
I could give you that, Dick, with all my heart." He stepped back and smiled somewhat grimly on her. She went on: "And this McGurk what do you mean when you say that Pierre is on his trail?" "Hunting him with a gun." She grew paler and trembled, but her voice remained steady. It was always that way; at the very moment when he expected her to quail, some inner strength bore her up and baffled him.
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