Scott glared at the man indignantly. “I am not talking about myself. Do you suppose I care what that gang thinks of me? But it occurred to me that they might take this opportunity to catch the Morgans unprepared and clean up what is left of them.”
“Oh, you mean that kind of trouble?” and the agent seemed greatly relieved to find it out. “There won’t be any fight unless old Jarred comes to town.”
“There will not be any at all if I can prevent it,” Scott replied resolutely. “If there is any fight it will be a fair one and not a murder of one old man by a gang like that. I wish I could find Hopwood. You have not seen him, have you?”
The agent looked cautiously behind him and shook his head. “No, I haven’t seen him since noon, but that is no reason why he may not be sitting right here somewhere staring at us.”
Scott turned away. “Well, maybe I’ll run on to him. He seems to turn up somehow when he is wanted.”
He dreaded passing that crowd at the store and yet he would not have gone home any other way this afternoon for a hundred dollars. There would almost certainly be some impudent remarks and Scott was almost afraid to trust himself, but he made up his mind that he would not fight with them no matter what happened till he had tried to persuade them to drop the feud.
Purposely he kept out of sight behind some trees till he was not more than fifty yards from the store. Then bracing himself for the coming trial he walked casually out of the shadow. His eye took in the situation at a glance, but he could not understand it.
Two lonely men sat silent and sullen on the porch of the Morgan store. At least twenty crowded the porch of the store across the street, laughing and gibing at a burly giant who was dragging a young girl across the street by the hair. The girl’s head was bent down so that Scott could not see her face, but he could imagine her expression. She was not uttering a sound, but she was fighting with the fury of a wildcat.
Scott’s blood boiled at the sight of a man mistreating a girl in this way. Moreover, he recognized the man as the big fellow who had spoken to him so insolently up on the mountain. Even before he realized what he was doing he had covered the short distance and grabbed the man by the arm. He had been a boxer all his life and had won the heavyweight championship at college. He was calm now, as calm as he had ever been when he stepped into the ring. This man was almost twice his size, but he did not even notice it.
“Let go of that girl,” Scott commanded, and as he spoke he let go of the man’s arm. He had grabbed it only to attract the man’s attention. He knew that he could not hold this man in any such way and he was too good a fighter to hold on and be jerked off his balance. The steely ring in his voice was enough to hold any one’s attention now.