“That tried to kill Jimmy?” Hashknife finished for her.
“Oh, Tex couldn’t do a thing like that, Hashknife!”
“No?” Hashknife smiled slowly. “Yuh don’t think so?”
Marion shook her head quickly.
“Not even if he was mad. He might be mad enough for a moment to kill some one, but not to shoot from ambush.”
“Well,” grinned Hashknife, “I’ll have to mark Tex Alden off my list of customers. It seems that Tex lost eight thousand dollars to Antelope Neal, in a poker game. This was before we came here. Now I’ve been wonderin’ how Tex could afford it.”
“Yes, I heard about it, Hashknife. Tex works on a salary—the salary of a foreman—and he surely couldn’t afford to lose that amount of money. In fact, I don’t see where he got it.”
“I know where he got it,” smiled Hashknife. “But I don’t see where he’ll ever be able to pay it back.”
Further than that Hashknife would not say, although Marion was curious to hear more about Tex Alden.
That evening Hashknife and Sleepy decided to visit Blue Wells, and talked things over with Jimmy.