"What the hell …" he began. And then with a shade of relief in his tone and yet half hesitatingly, the frown still on his face as Thornton rode close up, "It's you, is it? I thought for a minute…."
"That it was Broderick?" laughed Thornton. "You didn't think so, did you, Blackie?"
Blackie drew back and slipped his hand covertly into his coat pocket.
Thornton, giving no sign that he had seen, said briefly to Hap Smith:
"You've talked things over with Banker Templeton? And with Comstock?"
"Yes," said Hap Smith, his thick, squat figure growing tense where he sat as though with a sudden nervous bracing within. "Yes."
"And you expected me here? You will give me a free hand?"
"Yes," cried Smith ringingly. "Damn 'em, yes. Go to it, Buck!"
Thornton turned stern eyes upon Blackie.
"I can shoot twelve holes through you before you get your hand out of your pocket," he said crisply. "You damned stool-pigeon! Now, suppose you pull your hand out … empty! … and stick it up high above your head. Think it over, Blackie, before you take any fool chances."
His left hand held Comet's reins gathered up close as he spoke; his right rested lightly on the horn of his saddle. Blackie plainly hesitated; a tinge of red warmed his swarthy cheek; his eyes glittered evilly…. Then suddenly he whipped out his hand, a revolver in it….