"We'll get her!" cried Joe.
"What do you want with her?" asked Jim curiously, "and him there?"
Joe looked disconcerted. His thick wits had no answer ready.
Stack spoke up. "Robbery," he said smoothly. "They broke into Mr. Mixer's store. There are no police in the country, so we have to bring them to justice ourselves."
"It's a lie!" cried Ralph scornfully. "That little lick-spittle confessed to me that he had trailed me all the way from the coast, because he thought I'd made a strike here in the country!"
Stack's eyes bolted; his little body writhed, and a curious, painful smile distorted his ashen face.
Jim shrugged and turned away. "It's nothing to me," he said. "Fight it out among yourselves."
As soon as Jim was safely out of hearing, Joe turned to Ralph with an evil smile. "Now I've got you where I want you!" he said triumphantly. He drew a significant line across his throat. "I can string you up to the tree over your head if I want, and go scot free for it! Setting a traveller's boat adrift is worse than murder up here! And I got three witnesses to swear to it. No jury in this country would convict. They'd thank me for strangling a coyote!"
Ralph proudly held his tongue.
His air of unconcern infuriated the ex-butcher. "Damn you! I'll lower your proud stomach!" he cried. "I'll give the night to it! I've been saving up for this! Before morning you'll be crawling and whining for mercy!"