“I’ve got ye whar I’ve long wanted to see ye—at the end of my rifle. Look at the stars, look at the gal, an’ say yer pray’rs, for my finger’s on the trigger, an’ I’m goin’ to send the bullet home.”
There was no mercy in his voice, no hope in the expression of his face that confronted the boy.
He stood before, and in the power of, Tom Terror, the Gulch Tiger.
The boy judge was in a situation of imminent peril; not only this, but Myra, the waif, also stood before the deadly repeater which the Canyon Terror kept against his shoulder.
“He says he has long wanted to catch me napping,” said Hal, to himself. “Is it for the Thugs I have strung up, or does he possess the secret that Rosebud Dan refused to divulge? I need not expect mercy at his hand; but Myra! What will the villain do with her?”
The boy’s sentence was broken by a startling voice which did not fall from the Tiger’s tongue.
On the contrary, it came up from below, and was followed by the furious galloping of a single horse.
“Now for the big bonanza. Hurrah for the claim that hes but one big share.”
Tom Terror, starting violently, lifted his head and listened to the tread of the unseen horse.
“Fair play!” cried Hal, as he sprung forward with a drawn revolver. “Now, my good fellow, be so obliging as to fling your repeater over the wall. Quick! or there’ll be a riderless horse where you now sit.”