“So?” The young rider’s smile was pleasant. “Now, how’d you all like to have back your guns and an even break, you to begin right now to cut that Del Sol herd?”
“I know there’s cows in that herd that ain’t in the T. L. Brand.”
“Well, they’ll all be in our road brand before sundown two days,” cut in Jim Nabours now. “You lying, low-down dog, I wish to God these boys hadn’t came! There’s only one way to handle people like you. Git out of jail—and come back! That’s all we hope.
“McCullough, do you want any more men?” he added.
“Why?” The youth laughed and rode away. “Fall in there, prisoners!” he commanded. “Ride for the ferry trail. I wouldn’t try to ride too fast.”
“Oh, we’ll be back!” called the gang captain, defiant still.
“I certainly do hope you will!” replied Nabours fervently. “I’ll come all the way back from Aberlene, ef I ever get there, just to be around here when you-all do come!”
A chorus of jeers and curses came back from the prisoners. The Rangers said never a word, but herded their men on ahead.
Jim Nabours jerked up his mount—a sign to the herd riders, and the latter swung away, glad enough to have the herd still under control. The animals began to edge out, to thin, to spread, to graze. Old Jim Nabours rode to the edge, singing a song of his own, as he sometimes did when especially wrathful:
“Bud Dunk, he was a Ranger, a Ranger of renown,