"I don't like snoopers. Which means that I don't like you none too well. Besides, who in thunder are you? A wanderin' vagrant you look to me, and we got a law agin' vagrants. You amble along on your trail pretty pronto, and no harm'll come to you. But if you're around town tomorrow—well, you've heard me talk!"
It was very familiar talk to Bull; not the words, but the commanding and contemptuous tone in which they were spoken. Crestfallen, he submitted. Of one thing he must make sure: that no harm befell him before he faced Pete Reeve and Pete Reeve's gun. Then he could only pray for courage to attack. But the effect of the sheriff's little gunplay entirely disheartened Bull at the prospect of facing Pete.
With a noncommittal rejoinder he started down the road, and the sheriff put the spurs to his horse and plunged by at a full gallop, flinging the dust back into the face of the big man. Bull wiped it out of his eyes and went on gloomily. He had been trodden upon in spirit once more. But, after all, that was so old a story that it made little difference. It convinced him, however, of one thing; he could never do anything with the sheriff man to man. Certainly he would need the help of a crowd before he faced the tall man and his cavalier mustaches.
He waited until after the supper at the hotel. It was a miserable meal for Bull; he had already eaten, and he could not find a way of refusing the invitation of the proprietor to sit down again. Seated at the end of the long table he looked miserably up and down it. Nobody had a look for him except one of contempt. The sheriff, it seemed, had spread a story around about his lack of spirit, and if Bull remained long in the village, he would be treated with little more respect than he had been in the house of his uncle. Even now they held him in contempt. They could not understand, for instance, why he sat so far forward. He was resting most of his weight on his legs, for fear of the weakness of the chair under his full bulk. But that very bulk made them whisper their jokes and insults to one another.
When the long nightmare of that meal was ended, Bull began making his rounds. He had chosen his men. Every man he picked was sharp-eyed like Uncle Bill Campbell. They were the men whose inlooking eyes would baffle the sheriff; they were the men capable of suspicions, and such men Bull needed—not dull-glancing people like himself.
He went first to the proprietor of the hotel. "I got something to say to the sheriff," he declared. "And I want to have a few important gents around town to be there to listen and hear what I got to say. I wonder, could you be handy?"
He was surprised at the avidity with which his invitation was accepted. It was a long time since the hotel owner had been referred to as an "important man."
Then he went with the same talk to five others—the blacksmith, the carpenter and odd-jobber, the storekeeper, and two men whom he had marked when he first halted near the hotel veranda. To his invitation each of them gave a quick assent. There had been something mysterious in the manner in which this timid-eyed giant had descended upon the town from nowhere, and now they felt that they were about to come to the heart of the reason of his visit.
The invitation to the sheriff was delivered by the proprietor of the hotel, and he said just enough—and no more—to bring the sheriff straight to the hotel. Anderson arrived with his best pair of guns in his holsters, for the sheriff was a two-gun man of the best variety. He came with the aggressive manner of one ready to beat down all opposition, but when he stepped into the room, his manner changed. For he found sitting about the table in the dining room, which was to be the scene of the conference, the six most influential men of the town—men strong enough to reelect him next year, or to throw him permanently out of office.
At the lower end of the table stood Bull Hunter, his arms folded, his face blank. Standing with the light from the lamp shining upon his face, the others seated, he seemed a man among pygmies.