“Well, them are the facts of the case, Mr. Evans, just as I have been telling ’em to you,” said Ike. “Will you come down and boss the hanging?”
“I will come down immediately; but there will be no hanging—no violence whatever. Do you understand me?” replied Mr. Evans, quietly, but firmly.
Old Ike was profoundly astonished.
“Do you mean to say that we honest men have got to live in the same valley with them rascals?” he demanded, fiercely. “I won’t do it, and that’s flat!”
“I don’t mean to say anything of the kind. Their presence will not trouble you after to-day. Leave everything to me, and don’t lisp one word to any of the boys about what you heard in the grove. You will only make trouble if you do.”
Ike was too angry to reply. He wheeled his horse and rode rapidly away, while Mr. Evans stood gazing after him with a face that was full of apprehension.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
A HURRIED FLIGHT.
Uncle Bob sat alone in his office, thinking over the events of the preceding night, when, all of a sudden, he was aroused from his reverie by the sound of a horse’s hoofs, and looked out at the window to see Mr. Evans coming toward the ranch at a furious gallop.
He rode up to the porch, turned his horse over to Ike, who was there to receive him, and, after saying a few earnest words to the man, and shaking his finger at him warningly, he came into the hall, and entered the office without ceremony.
Uncle Bob was astonished, and not a little alarmed as well. There was an expression on his visitor’s face that he did not like to see there.