LITMIR.BIZ

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sure like to see some of this money that’s bein’ bet that Pete Cable won’t get his neck stretched,” Windy announced to the world.

      “Yuh wanta see it? Take a look at this.” A wad of bills dropped on the bar. The three punchers swung about to stare at the money and at the man with the high, cackling voice who had produced it.

      They met the toothless leer of old Baldy Flynn. Behind Baldy lounged the Yuma Kid, twenty-one-year-old, two-gun killer. The Kid’s pale eyes met theirs, and his two buck teeth shone in a menacing sneer. Most men could easily whip the narrow-chested Yuma Kid in a hand-to-hand encounter, but he did not fight that way; and he was feared along the border.

      Baldy and the Kid, Garcia’s two hired slayers, were inseparable. They were bound together by the bond of skill with a Colt and by their unscrupulous cruelty, despite their varying characters. The Yuma Kid seldom talked, never laughed, and never drank. He avoided quarrels, save for profit. Baldy, on the contrary, loved his liquor, his own jokes, and above all loved to quarrel with those who failed to laugh with him.

      Toothpick realized that he and Windy stood no chance against these two killers; he knew their reputation. Yet the bar was crowded; people were listening and were already commencing to shuffle to one side in the hope of a fight.

      “Yuh gents is talkin’ loud. I’m bettin’ yuh my roll that Pete don’t get his neck stretched,” Baldy cackled.

      Toothpick saw the menace in the killer’s eyes, and it sobered him. He tried to gather his scattered wits. He glanced at his friends and saw that they were incapable of action. Tad Hicks, with drooping head, clung to the rail of the bar. Toothpick knew that Baldy would push the affair and try to force Windy to take water. This, no matter what the consequences, Toothpick would not permit; certainly not, with that crowd of spectators all watching and listening. Windy had been a fool; Toothpick would have to use his wits to get him out of it. He chose his words carefully.

      “That roll of yallerbacks sure makes me hungry like a coyote, ’cause it’s three days to pay day,” he said, grinning. Both he and Windy moved to the left. If it came to gun play, their right hands would not be hampered in the draw.

      Baldy cackled derisively again. He turned to the hushed bystanders and grinned. Out of the tail of his eye Toothpick saw Jim Anson squirm through the crowd toward them.

      Baldy spoke slowly and raised his voice: “Gents, I’m askin’ yuh to step up an’ – ”

      Boom! A Colt roared behind Toothpick. Like flashes of light, guns leaped into the hands of Baldy and the Yuma Kid.

      “What the hell?” snarled Baldy.

      Toothpick swung about and saw Jim Anson looking foolishly at a smoking Colt on the floor.

      “Darn it!” the hobo wailed. “The durn thing was loaded.”

      He looked so foolish as he stared at the gun that the crowd rocked with mirth, but Baldy spat like a wild cat.

      “What did yuh expect, yuh bum?” he shrieked.

      Tad Hicks had been aroused from his sleep by the shot and stared stupidly at Jim Anson.

      “When yuh guv it to me, yuh didn’t say it was loaded,” Anson stuttered reproachfully.

      Tad held out a wavering hand and picked up the gun.

      “Kick that hobo out o’ here,” cried Baldy. Hands seized Jim Anson and sent him spinning to the sidewalk.

      Jim Anson disposed of, Baldy turned again to Toothpick and Windy; but before he could speak, Bill Anderson shoved his way to the bar between the killer and the two riders.

      “It’s right kind of you, Baldy,” he remarked.

      “Huh?” Baldy blinked with surprise. “What yuh mean?”

      Bill Anderson looked at him blandly.

      “Didn’t you say, just as that fool hobo learned that guns are loaded: ‘Gents, I’m askin’ you to step up and name your poison’? There’s your money on the bar.”

      The crowd chuckled and moved a step closer to the bar. Anderson, without waiting for a reply, called to the bartender:

      “I’ll take straight whisky for mine.”

      After one look into Anderson’s eyes, Baldy grinned ingratiatingly.

      Toothpick and Windy decided that discretion was the better part of valor. Dragging Tad Hicks with them, they slipped out of the bar.

      “Huh!” Windy complained, as the cool air refreshed him. “I was lit up considerable, but now I’m plumb sober.”

      “Me, too. Baldy scared me sober,” Toothpick agreed. “I’m goin’ to buy that hobo drinks aplenty, ’cause he sure stopped Baldy from hurtin’ my feelings.”

      “Sure did. But I’m tellin’ yuh that Bill Anderson is some nervy hombre, runnin’ in on a sidewinder rattler like that toothless old ape. Folks says he’s a grafter, but I’ll vote for a coyote, if he tells me to, just because he made that Baldy draw in his horns,” Windy confided.

      Toothpick did not reply. He was puzzling out an answer to a riddle. Why had Baldy backed down, when Anderson confronted him? He left Windy and Tad Hicks at the Lone Star and then went to look for Jim Anson.

      “That little runt sure saved my reputation, an’ he can have half of my bed, even if he is a dirty little tramp,” he told himself.

      He wandered about, searching bar after bar. At last he discovered the hobo asleep in Maria’s. Before him on the table stood a half-empty bottle. Toothpick shook him awake. However, Anson refused to move until they had finished the bottle. Toothpick was agreeable because he was now stone sober. They had emptied the bottle when, to their surprise, Anderson stepped out of the back room. His face clouded when he saw them.

      “Darned good of yuh, Mr. Anderson, to steer Baldy away to-night,” Toothpick called.

      Anderson smiled genially.

      “That’s nothing. Is that the little bum who just discovered guns are loaded?” he asked.

      Toothpick nodded.

      “Who is he?”

      “A hobo what got hisself thrown off the train this evenin’.”

      Anderson called good night and left. The moment he was gone Jim Anson grasped Toothpick’s arm and staggered out with him. To better support the drunken hobo, Toothpick slipped a hand beneath his armpit. He jerked the hand away suddenly.

      “Say, who are you?” he demanded. “Yuh got a gun there in a shoulder holster, and yuh made believe yuh didn’t savvy guns.”

      The hobo dropped his stagger and stood erect.

      “Where’s my hosses, Toothpick?” he asked softly.

      Toothpick jumped; the whine had left that voice, and he knew it now.

      “Gosh! Jim-twin Allen!” he whispered.

      Allen laughed.

      “Huh! That’s what Snippets meant by callin’ me stupid,” said Toothpick. “Yuh sure got everybody fooled except her.”

      “Maybe so,” Allen said indifferently. “I give the brakeman five bucks to throw me off that train.”

      The two rode together out of town toward the lava fields.

      “Why for did yuh watch Anderson at Maria’s to-night?” asked Toothpick.

      “’Cause I was plumb curious to savvy why Anderson went in that back room and come out with straw on his boots. Is there a stable in that block?”

      “Yeh. They’s one behind the Red Queen.”

      “Thought so,” Allen grunted sleepily.

      CHAPTER IV

      SONS OF THE DEVIL

      By eight o’clock the following morning, every seat in the courtroom was taken; men crowded the aisles and perched on the window sills. At eight thirty

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