“Now, Emerson, be reasonable about this matter and give yourself up. You know I’ve got to take you in, and I don’t want to have any gun-fight over it. The best thing you can do is to stand trial, and clear yourself, if you can. That’ll end the whole business.”
Antone Colorow turned and came galloping back, his lariat in his hand. Mead’s revolver was still untouched in his holster, and his horse, standing with drooping mane and tail, faced Halliday and the others. The cow-boy came galloping through the rain from Mead’s left, and so far behind him that he could barely see the man from the corner of his eye. He was apparently unconscious of Antone’s approach as he quietly replied to Halliday, but his fingers tightened on the bridle, and the horse, answering a closer pressure of heel and knee, suddenly lifted its head and stiffened its lax muscles into alertness.
“I’d hate to make you lose your job, Jim,” said Mead, smiling, “but you can’t expect a fellow to let himself be arrested for nothing, just so you can keep a soft snap as deputy sheriff. You get some evidence against me, and then I’ll go with you as quiet as any maverick you ever saw.”
As Mead spoke he was listening intently. He heard Antone’s horse stop a little way behind him, and, as the last word left his lips, the hiss of the rope through the air. With a dig of the spurs and a sharp jerk of the bridle the horse reared. The noose fell over Mead’s head, but his revolver was already in his hand, and with a turn as quick as a lightning flash he swung the horse round on its hind legs in a quarter circle and before the astounded Mexican could tighten the loop there were two flashing reports and a bullet had crashed through each wrist. Antone’s arms dropped on his saddle, and through the shrill din of the mingled Spanish and English curses he shrieked at Mead came the sharp cracking of three revolvers. Emerson Mead felt one bullet whistle through his sleeve and one through the rim of his sombrero, as, with the rope still on his shoulders, he whirled his horse round again with his smoking revolver leveled at Halliday.
“Whoo-oo-oo-ee-ee!” Ellhorn’s long-drawn-out yell came floating down from the top of the hill and close on its heels the report of a pistol.
“That was a very pretty trick, Emerson,” said the foreman, in a voice which tried hard to sound unconcerned, “even if it was my man you played it on.”
“It will be played on you if you make another break,” Mead replied in an even tone, with his revolver still leveled at Halliday. He turned his horse slightly so that a sidewise glance up the hill showed Tom Tuttle and Nick Ellhorn, guns in hand, both astride one horse, coming toward them on a gallop. Tuttle’s deep-lunged voice bellowed down the slope:
“We’re a-comin’, Emerson! Hold ’em off! We’re a-comin’!” and another pistol ball sung through the rain and dropped beside Halliday’s horse. Mead flung the rope from his shoulders and grinned at Halliday and his party.
“Well, what are you going to do now? Do you want to fight?”
Halliday put his gun in its holster: “I don’t want any pitched battle over this business. We’ll call the game off for this morning.”