“Can’t do it. He’s beat it.”
“You mean that you’ve let him go?”
“Let him go?” Jim repeated. “I ain’t got no right to keep him. He took the job on at a moment’s notice and he left at a moment’s notice. There’s some of your party after him, all right.”
The deputies whispered to one another. The elder of the two turned around.
“Look here,” he said to the cowboys, glancing around for Long Jim, who had disappeared, “we’ve had about enough of your goings-on. I reckon we’ll take one of you back and see what seven days’ bread and water will do towards civilising you.”
There was a little mutter. The deputies stood side by side. With an almost simultaneous movement they had drawn their guns.
“Where’s Long Jim?” the older one asked.
There was a sudden whirring about their heads. A lariat, thrown with unerring accuracy, had gathered them both in its coil. With a jerk they were drawn close together, their hands pinned to their side. Two cowboys quickly disarmed them. Long Jim came sauntering round from the other side of the range wagon, tightening the rope as he walked.
“Say, you’ve got a hell of a nerve, butting into a peaceable camp like this. We ain’t broke no laws. So you’re a’going to civilise us, eh? Well, Mister Harris, we can play that civilising game, too. Hey boys, all together, tie ’em up against that wagon.”
A dozen willing hands secured them. The two men spluttered wildly, half in anger, half in fear of their tormentors, but in a few seconds they were secured firmly against the canvas-topped wagon.