“Plan or not, I want my ten thousand bucks,” the man answered stubbornly. “A friend of mine, who I’ll find when I need him, was standin’ outside the tent when this bird walked out with my nuggets. That’s one witness. Then all of you heard me say I had twelve thousand worth of nuggets, an’ I wanted help to carry ’em to the flivver. Look, didn’t I give seven hundred for the flivver without battin’ an eye? Think I’d do that if I hadn’t struck it pretty rich?”
“Man, you sure got things figgered out,” Gus said. “But what makes you think we’ll testify? We’re not crazy, you know!”
“Oh, you’ll testify all right. The boys’ll see to that.”
“Ah, they will, huh?” Gus exclaimed. “They won’t see to nothin’, let me tell you! Why, you ornery, low-down—”
“Take it easy, Gus,” Roy advised. “It won’t do any good to talk that way. Listen, Allen. You may have friends in this camp, but we have, too. Four or five of our men from the X Bar X—and I guess you heard of that—are around here some place. We haven’t seen ’em yet, but they won’t be hard to find if it comes to a show-down. Now my advice to you is this, and I mean it. You slide out of here as quick as you can. Get on your pony and vamoose. We won’t follow you or try to make trouble for you. And that’s my advice.” A moment’s silence. “Well, are you taking it?”
Allen stared at Roy. For a second those about him thought he was going to back down. But suddenly his face grew red and he shouted:
“That’s your advice; is it? Well, you can take your advice an’ hang yourself with it—see! I want my ten thousand bucks, an’ I’ll get ’em or your friend here will do a little dance in the air! An’ that’s my advice—take it!”
“You—” Nick began, and stepped toward Allen, his fist clenched. But before he could strike Silent seized him by the arm.
“Wait a second,” the puncher said quietly. “Where’d you get that gun, Nick?”
“This one?” Nick pulled the weapon from his holster. “Why, it belongs to our little friend here. He took mine an’ threw it into the bushes, so when Bug Eye came I took his. Why?”