“There! Two hundred miles in considerably less than forty-eight hours. I guess Henderson can’t beat that. Seen anything of him around, have you?”
The men all answered in the negative.
“I wish you boys would take these horses back to the stable,” said he, “and the rest of you stay by when I call you. When you come back go into the living room with the rest of the boys. Lem, you and Frank seat yourselves on the porch and keep a lookout for Henderson. If you see him I needn’t remind you that you are to pop him over.”
“Oh, Mr. Chisholm!” exclaimed Bob.
“It has to be done,” said Mr. Chisholm earnestly. “We have stood as much nonsense as we can. He has tried his level best to steal our money from us, and now we have got to a place where we can’t be driven any further. I’ve got a little business of my own to attend to. Mr. Wallace, who has a thousand dollars or two of mine, is, I think, a man I can trust.”
So saying Mr. Chisholm started off, and we all departed on our errands—Frank and Lem to the porch to keep a bright outlook for Henderson, the most of the men to the sitting room of the hotel to wait Mr. Chisholm’s return, and us boys to take the horses to the stable. I was surprised when I saw how Bob took Mr. Chisholm’s order to heart—to pop Henderson over. I declare I didn’t feel so about it at all. If Henderson so far neglected his personal safety as to continue to pursue Mr. Chisholm when he was on the very eve of getting the money, why, I said, let him take the consequences. Bob didn’t say anything, but I well knew what he was thinking about. If he had had a fair opportunity he would have whispered to Henderson to keep away from the porch.
“You musn’t do it, Bob,” I said to him.
“Why, Carlos, I can’t bear that anybody should get shot,” he answered. “And then what will they do to Lem and Frank for obeying that order of Mr. Chisholm’s?”
“They won’t do anything to them. Mr. Chisholm is willing to take his chances. Don’t you know that they never do anything to anyone who shoots a man in this country?”
When we had put the horses away we returned to the porch, and found Lem and Frank there keeping a lookout for Henderson; but I would have felt a good deal more at my ease if we had known of the interview that Henderson had held with Coyote Bill in regard to putting the Indians on Bob. We took a look at them and then went into the sitting-room to wait for Mr. Chisholm. He was gone about half an hour and then he showed himself. He stopped to exchange a few words with Lem and Frank, and then coming into the sitting-room ordered us to “catch up!” We knew by that that he was ready for us, so we fell in two abreast and followed Mr. Chisholm down the street.