At that moment the boys came loping around the end of the stable, riding loose and in no great hurry.
"Show's over," Tony bellowed, with possibly a shade of mean triumph in his voice—for Bud's benefit. "Bat and Ed, they're down there in the pasture deader'n last year. That Mex and ole Palmer's about all there is left to hang, and we glommed the Mex and Jelly's got Palmer. Bud, you might as well gwan home. Us boys have wound things up for yuh."
"Yes? Did you get the money back?" Bud was young enough and human enough to take that fling at them.
"Oh, no-o—but that's a mere detail. We ain't come to that yet." Tony's manner was still charged with triumph.
"Say, who shot Bat an' Ed White?" Gelle's mind pounced upon the one puzzling point in the affair. "You fellers didn't. There wasn't a shot fired after you boys passed the house."
"Why—we figured they shot each other. Bat's gun was still smokin' when we got there, and Ed's gun was warm. Bat had fired three shots and Ed White two—"
"Yeah? Who fired them other four or five shots? I counted nine er ten, I wasn't shore which. How many 'd you hear, Snowball?"
Sam had just arrived, puffing from haste and excitement.
"Jes' what yo'all heah, Mist' Meddalahk, yessuh. Me, Ah doan' count good nohow, but Ah's shuah Ah huhd shootin' lak dey nevah would run outa bullits. Ah counts mighty slow, but Ah huhd jes' as many as what yo'all huhd."
"Sounded like more than five to me," Bob Leverett declared, now that the subject was opened. "More like about four guns in action than two; three, anyway. Reckon there's more in the gang that we don't know about?"