The cigarette was made finally, and then the stray-man lighted it and looked again at Leviatt, ignoring his question, asking another himself. "You workin' down the creek yesterday?" he said.
"Up!" snapped Leviatt. The question had caught him off his guard or he would have evaded it. He had told the lie out of pure perverseness.
Ferguson took a long pull at his cigarette. "Well, now," he returned, "that's mighty peculiar. I'd have swore that I seen you an' Tucson ridin' down the river yesterday. Thought I saw you in a basin in the hills, talkin' to some men that I'd never seen before. I reckon I was mistaken, but I'd have swore that I'd seen you."
Leviatt's face was colorless. Standing with his profile to Tucson, he closed one eye furtively. This had been a signal that had previously been agreed upon. Tucson caught it and turned slightly, letting one hand fall to his right hip, immediately above the butt of his pistol.
"Hell!" sneered Leviatt, "you're seein' a heap of things since you've been runnin' with Mary Radford!"
Ferguson laughed mockingly. "Mebbe I have," he returned. "Ridin' with her sure makes a man open his eyes considerable."
Now he ignored Leviatt, speaking to Stafford. "When I was in here one day, talkin' to you," he said quietly, "you told me about you an' Leviatt goin' to Dry Bottom to hire a gunfighter. I reckon you told that right?"
"I sure did," returned Stafford.
Ferguson took another pull at his cigarette—blowing the smoke slowly skyward. And he drawled again, so that there was a distinct space between the words.
"I reckon you didn't go around advertisin' that?" he asked.