Sorenson smiled grimly.
“We’ll wait till we’re sure he has the proofs, then–––”
“Then we’ll act quick and sure,” Vorse shot out.
“And quietly,” the cattleman added. “We’ll take no 51 more chances this time. It will be arranged carefully beforehand; all four of us will be in it, of course,––equal responsibility; and there’ll be no witnesses.”
Judge Gordon’s face wore a pallid, sickish look.
“I hope to God there’s some other way out of it,” he muttered.
“So do all of us,” Burkhardt snarled. “But if there isn’t, it means guns. For you, too, along with the rest of us.”
Sorenson leaned forward and gazed from under his heavy brows, compelling Gordon to meet his fixed look.
“You were keen enough at the time for your share of Joe Weir’s stuff,” he said. “So you’ll play the hand out to the end now, the bad cards as well as the good. You’re no better than the rest of us, and it was you who hatched the scheme for cleaning him up and who put over the story.”
“I know, I know. But––but this would be too much like cold-blooded murder.”