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Updated: June 4, 2025
"Do you suppose he's " "Trying to locate old Shanklin's mine," he said. "That's what he's after. If there's copper on that piece the Governor will get it, even if his son doesn't live to share with him. The difference of a figure or two in the description of a piece of land might be revised on the books, if one had the influence."
"What tract have you selected, Dr. Slavens?" asked the clerk with the blank. Dr. Slavens drew from the pocket of his coat a crumpled yellow paper, unfolded it, and spread it on the shelf. "The northwest quarter of Section Six, Township Twelve, Range Thirty-three," he replied, his eyes on Hun Shanklin's figures. Jerry Boyle almost jumped at the first word.
There was a great deal owing to him yet from that man, in spite of what he had forced Shanklin to pay, and he meant to collect the balance before he left that state. So the rifle practice went ahead, day by day, supplemented by a turn now and then with Hun Shanklin's old black pistol, which Mackenzie had turned over to Slavens as part of his lawful spoil. While Dr.
"But, vicious as it was, neither Shanklin nor you, his side-partner, has ever made a squeal. If it was a holdup, why haven't you sent one of your little sheriffs out after me?" "I'm no partner of Hun Shanklin's!" denied Boyle. "Maybe you've parted company since the night you slugged me and nailed me up in that box for the river to hide your work."
"You had the wrong figgers, and you filed on the wrong claim!" Pressed for an explanation of how he knew, Ten-Gallon told them that he had been Shanklin's partner at the beginning, and that Shanklin had deceived and cheated both him and Boyle. "Ah, then he did double-cross my son!" cried the Governor triumphantly, seizing this vindication for the young man's deed with avid eagerness.
True, Shanklin was a thin man; but he was wide. The doctor put on the garment. It was a very comfortable fit; the sleeves were a little long, but there was room enough in the shoulders. Surprising, said he, how wide that old rascal was in the chest. He transferred his money to Hun Shanklin's pockets, chuckling at the thought that he was returning it whence it came.
Slavens never had carried arms in his life, and he had no means of buckling Hun Shanklin's old revolver about him, but he felt that he must take it with him when he left the tent. Big and clumsy as it was, he thrust it under the belt which sustained his trousers, where it promised to carry very well, although it was not in a free-moving state in case an emergency should demand its speedy use.
Boyle could not be left alone, and Shanklin's body must be brought up out of the gully and covered. This ran through his mind in erratic starts and blanks as he bent over the wounded man, listening to his respiration with more of a humane than professional fear that the next breath might tell him of the hemorrhage which would make a sudden end of Boyle's wavering and uncertain life.
With a return of the heartsickness which he had felt that day, he unfolded it far enough to see the date. It was the day of the drawing. He dropped the half-folded sheet to the floor and took up the telegrams. One, dated the day before, was from Meander. The other was evidently Shanklin's reply, which perhaps had not been filed, or perhaps was a copy.
A little stone which he dislodged tumbled down the side of a four-inch gully with a noise that seemed the sound of an avalanche. With that alarm Shanklin's arm moved swiftly. Like a reflection in a glass, Boyle's arm moved with it. Two shots; such a bare margin between them that the ear scarcely could mark the line. Then one.
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