“What was done?”
“They decided to act quick and do any odd jobs of lynchin’, claim-jumpin’, or such as needs doin’. There’s a lot of law sharps and storekeepers in the bunch who figure McNamara’s gang will wipe them off the map next.”
“It was bound to come to this.”
“They talked of ejectin’ the receiver’s men and puttin’ all us fellers back on our mines.”
“Good. How many can we count on to help us?”
“About sixty. We’ve kept the number down, and only taken men with so much property that they’ll have to keep their mouths shut.”
“I wish we might engineer some kind of an encounter with the court crowd and create such an uproar that it would reach Washington. Everything else has failed, and our last chance seems to be for the government to step in; that is, unless Bill Wheaton can do something with the California courts.”
“I don’t count on him. McNamara don’t care for California courts no more’n he would for a boy with a pea-shooter—he’s got too much pull at headquarters. If the ‘Stranglers’ don’t do no good, we’d better go in an’ clean out the bunch like we was killin’ snakes. If that fails, I’m goin’ out to the States an’ be a doctor.”
“A doctor? What for?”
“I read somewhere that in the United States every year there is forty million gallons of whiskey used for medical purposes.”