“Money down, on the nail,” repeated Thorn, as if he had not heard. His old cap was hovering over his long hair, its flaps down like the wings of a brooding hen. There were clinging bits of broken sage on it, and burrs, which it had gathered in his skulking through the brush.
“I’ll send a man up the river right away, and find out about this last one,” Chadron told him, nodding slowly. “If you’ve got Macdonald—”
“If hell’s got fire in it!”
“If you’ve got him, I’ll put something to the figure agreed on between you and me. The other fellers you’ve knocked over don’t count.”
“I’ll hang around—”
“Not here! You’ll not hang around here, I tell you!” Chadron cut him off harshly, fairly bristling. “Snake along out of here, and don’t let anybody see you. I’ll meet you at the hotel in the morning.”
“Gittin’ peticlar of your company, ain’t you?” sneered Thorn.
“You’re not company—you’re business,” Chadron told him, with stern and reproving eyes.
Chadron found Mark Thorn smoking into the chimney in the hotel office next morning, apparently 107 as if he had not moved from that spot since their first meeting on that peculiar business. The old man-killer did not turn his head as Chadron entered the room with a show of caution and suspicion in his movements, and closed the door after him.