“I saved your life once,” pleaded the other. “Let me go.”
“You saved it so you could get more money out of me. Think I don’t know you, Caldwell?”
“Let me go and I’ll give you back all that money and all the rest you’ve ever given me. For God’s sake don’t let ’em hang me!”
The cowardice of the man was pitiful, but Bud was unmoved. For years his life had been dogged by this man. Now, an openly avowed rustler, he expected clemency from his victim.
“Ride ahead there,” ordered Bud. Caldwell, whimpering, took his position.
“Put your hands behind you.” The other made as though to comply with this command, 215 when suddenly with a swift motion he put something in his mouth.
Instantly Bud had him by the throat, forcing his mouth open. Caldwell, forced by this grip, spat out something that Bud caught with his free hand. It was a piece of paper. Larkin slipped it into the pocket of his shirt and released his clutch. Then he bound Smithy’s hands and started back toward the scene of the raid.
When he arrived, with his prisoner riding ahead on the limping horse, he found that all was over. Two of the rustlers were dead, but the rest were sitting silent on the ground by the side of the cook-wagon. One sheepman had been killed, and another’s broken shoulder was being roughly dressed by Sims.
Others of the sheepmen were riding around the herd, quieting it. That there had been no stampede was due to the fact that the shooting had come from all sides at once, and the creatures, bewildered, had turned in upon themselves and crowded together in sheer terror, trampling to death a number in the center of the herd.
Less than half a mile ahead were the banks of the Big Horn and the ford. A mile behind the leaders of the sheep were steadily advancing. There was only one thing to be done. 216