"Surrender? Surrender? What are you talkin' about?"
It was Agent Ladd's voice as he strode nervously through the crowd of ranchmen. He stopped in front of Kal and Curley, his eyes blazing with excitement.
"Surrender this ranch to a couple of bluffs? You're a nice chicken-hearted lot!"
CHAPTER IX
As the cowboys turned and saw Hal and Bill with their arms pinioned and in the custody of Appah's men, they suffered a revulsion of feeling that boded no good to the men whose bluff had been called.
"And two of 'em, two of 'em hold you up. Why, you'll be the laughing stock of the country."
Ladd lost no time in fanning their smouldering pride into a relentless blaze.
"Gosh-a-mighty; ain't these your men?" gasped Kal.
It seemed such a useless question at this juncture to Ladd that he didn't stop to answer it.
"You lynch cattle thieves out in this country, but you 'surrender' to land thieves."