The leader was a thin, dark-faced, fierce-looking man, who covered Merry with a revolver.
"I rather 'lowed you'd come to it," he said, in satisfaction. "But I told ye to bring that old Injun along."
"And I told you there was no Indian with me. I spoke the truth."
"Say, youngster, did you ever hear of Cimarron Bill?"
Frank looked the fellow over with his calm eyes. He saw a cruel, straight slit of a mouth, a thin black mustache, with traces of gray, and sharp, cruel eyes,[Pg 24] set altogether too near together. He had heard of Cimarron Bill as the most dangerous "man-killer" in all the Southwest.
"Yes," he said quietly, "I have heard of him."
"Well, you're lookin' at him. I'm Cimarron Bill. The butts of my guns have seventeen notches in 'em. You may make the eighteenth."
Merriwell knew what the ruffian meant, yet he showed no signs of fear.
"I have heard," he said, "that Cimarron Bill has never yet shot a man in cold blood or one who was unarmed."
"I opine that's right, young man; but this case is a leetle different. It's not healthy to irk me up under any conditions, and so I advise you to go slow."