He also explained to Hashknife his reasons for haste in coming to Turquoise City—to break off Jimmy’s engagement to a half-breed girl, who happened to be Conley’s daughter.
“That’s another one of Conley’s ideas of getting even with me,” he told Hashknife.
“He must kinda hate you,” observed Hashknife.
But Hashknife was really more interested in the fact that the sheriff of Black Horse had been frightened into resigning his office by the gambling element of Turquoise City; not that it made any difference to Hashknife, but it was in his blood to seek the reasons for things of this kind.
That was one of the reasons for Sleepy Stevens’ outburst against trouble, when Hashknife and Moran rode away from him at Sibley Junction. Sleepy knew what this word “trouble” would mean to Hashknife.
It would mean that the lean-faced cowboy would not rest until it was all straightened out, regardless of the cost. Since the day when George Hartley had ridden in at the ranch that gave him his nickname, he and Sleepy Dave Stevens had been inseparable. They had cast their lots together and had become wanderers of the open places, going nowhere in particular, but always heading for the next hill, just to see what might be on the other side.
Hashknife had been born with an analytical mind. Having had little schooling and having been born in the cattle country, he naturally became a cowpuncher, a rider of bad bronchos—a top hand with cattle. But there was always the urge to follow the trail of trouble, and when he found Sleepy Stevens, blue-eyed, grin-wrinkled, always looking beyond the distant ranges, they went away together, up and down the land, untangling the mysteries of range trouble, seeking no remuneration, asking no thanks.
In many places they were marked men, but this did not stop them from coming back. Life had made them confirmed fatalists, knowing that nothing could happen to them until their time came.
The West did not list them as gunmen; but strangely enough they had gone through many gun battles unscathed, when men faster with guns had gone down. Theirs was the psychology of being in the right.
“Run when you’re wrong; shoot when you’re right,” said Hashknife. “That’s why some of these fast gunmen get killed off’—they shoot when they’re wrong.”