sure like to know where I seen that gent before, an’, if I ain’t seen him, who does he remind me of?” Dutchy muttered to himself.
Silent Moore was sent to town to gather a posse. The judge called Dutchy aside and whispered an order to him. Dutchy was known as a deadly fighter and a man who could be trusted.
“Dutchy, I want you to ride to the Frying Pan Ranch, and I don’t want you to let my daughter or Snippets out of your sight until this is over.”
The grizzled puncher mounted his horse and galloped off. The others remained.
Toward morning Silent Moore returned with the posse, and at the first streak of dawn they took up the trail of the murderers. For a time it led due south toward the Mexican border; then it headed sharply to the west, toward the lava fields. Here the trail was lost.
The lava fields were a maze of smooth slopes, abrupt ridges, and deep depressions. For seventy miles they roughly paralleled the border. And in all that expanse of rock there was no sign of verdure, save only an occasional cactus.
The posse scattered and searched for the trail. The sun blazed down and turned the desolate place into a furnace. The hunters were grim men, not easily turned aside. The sun baked them, they suffered from the lack of water, but they continued to search.
Toward noon, “Ace” Cutts, with five of the judge’s riders from the Bar X Ranch, joined the search. The men dismounted and climbed the jagged slopes. They cut their hands and tore their boots on the knifelike edges of the lava rock.
The sun rose past meridian. The rocks and sand were too hot to touch. All that day the men of the posse continued their search, but found nothing. At last, toward evening, they realized their hunt was in vain. Beaten, baffled, they gathered for the return trip to town.
“Yuh figure Jim Allen could track those devils?” Tom Powers asked of Toothpick.
“Sure could,” the lanky cow-puncher replied.
The sheriff reined in his horse. “Then if yuh know where he is, go get him.”
Toothpick was about to answer when he saw Ace Cutts and three other riders were closely watching him. He remembered Dutchy’s warning. He decided to remain silent. If he sought out Jim Allen, it would be well not to let people know it. He shook his head.
“The little devil is like a flea – no one knows where to find him,” he declared. The remark seemed plausible enough.
They were close to Cannondale when another of the judge’s riders joined them. The lathered flanks of his pony told of a hard ride. He swayed in his saddle as he sought out his boss.
“Judge, they jumped us an’ downed Hank and Bill. They got me in the shoulder – ”
“And those two hundred two-year-olds?”
The judge knew the answer even before he asked the question.
“They run ’em off.”
Judge Ransom gripped his saddle. No one there realized what this meant to him – financial ruin. The Lava Gang had made good their threat.
The sheriff had hoped that the wounded man they had found the night before would be able to identify one of the murderers. But this hope was dashed when he met Bill Anderson as they entered the town.
“That poor fellow,” Anderson told him, “got one of his bandages loose and bled to death. I never heard him move, but he was dead when I got to town.”
The sheriff, followed by Toothpick, hurried to the doctor’s house, where they were shown the dead man.
“Toothpick, yuh helped do him up; look them bandages over,” the sheriff said.
After a brief examination Toothpick straightened, caught the sheriff’s eye and nodded.
“I ain’t no match for sneaks. If yuh know where to find him, go fetch Jim-twin Allen!” the sheriff cried passionately.
“Yuh might tell folks I’ve gone north to see my mother,” Toothpick warned.
CHAPTER II
AN UNEXPECTED GUEST
In spite of the fact that Cannondale was the county seat, and that it had also the advantage of being on the transcontinental railroad, it had always remained just a cow town.
Main Street, little over a block in length, was the business center. It was paralleled by Madison and North Streets. Madison was given over to one or two boarding houses, a few cottages, and many empty lots. North Street was closely lined with Mexican shacks. State and Depot Streets intersected Main.
The town had three hotels, two large, combination dance-and-gambling halls, and ten smaller saloons. Of the gambling halls the Red Queen was far the most pretentious. Located in the center of the block on Main Street, it was really the hub of the whole town.
On the day before the trial of Pete Cable for murder the Red Queen was doing a land-office business, for Dame Rumor had been busy, and it was freely predicted that there was bound to be trouble at the trial.
Just what form this trouble would take no one seemed to know, but a murder trial, with the added attraction of a possible jail breaking or lynching, was sufficient to send every able-bodied man within riding distance scurrying into town.
Thus, on this occasion, every hotel was full and the hitching racks along Main Street were lined with horses and buckboards; crowds milled about the courthouse, surged in and out of saloons, gathered in hotel lobbies and in the street, drank, sang, and excitedly discussed the coming trial. The general opinion was that Pete Cable would hang. In spite of this, however, odds were offered freely in the Red Queen that the accused man would be acquitted.
In the late afternoon, “Tad” Hicks, “Windy Sam,” and “Kansas” Jones, three Frying Pan punchers, rode into town. They tied their horses to the hitch rack of Moe’s Emporium and went across the street to the Comfort House. They pushed through the crowd at the bar and shouted for a drink. But, having thirstily downed that, they refused a second round virtuously. They had been ordered by their boss, Sam Hogg, to remain sober until after the transcontinental train arrived. Now they swaggered down Main Street; and as they passed the Hogg Hardware Store, run by Sam’s brother, its owner greeted them.
“Howdy, boys. This town’s so durned full of strangers, and I’m so glad to see a gent what I know, that I’ll buy yuh a drink,” Jim Hogg said heartily.
“Yuh’re durn right. She’s so full of strangers I don’t know her,” Windy agreed.
“An’ they is all bad-lookin’ hombres,” Kansas said. Suddenly he was struck with an idea and he added hopefully: “Do yuh reckon there’s anything in this talk about the Lava Gang bustin’ up the trial to-morrow?”
“Hello, Toothpick, you ole hoss thief!” Kansas hailed a passing rider.
Toothpick Jarrick pulled in his pony and edged it toward the sidewalk. The pony’s head drooped; its coat was rough with dried sweat and dust. Its rider’s genial, grinning face was streaked with grime; dust covered his jeans. Both he and the pony bore evidence of having come far and fast that day.
“’Lo,” he greeted. “Mr. Hogg, ain’t yuh afraid of being seen with three mutton eaters like them jaspers?”
“Howdy,
