“I’ve got to find Ed—who ever he is, Sudden—because he’s the man who killed another man at Jack Hartwell’s place today, and took Mrs. Jack Hartwell along with him.”
“What in —— are you talkin’ about?” exploded the sheriff, getting to his feet.”
“Took Mrs. Hartwell and ——”
“Set down,” advised Hashknife. “Don’t get excited. She’s gone, thassall. The house looks like a cyclone had swept through it, and there’s a dead man propped up on the sofy. Ed shot him, so he said, before he died. And he lived long enough to say that Ed took the woman. The woman must have been Mrs. Hartwell.”
“For ——’s sake!” gasped Hale. “What is this country coming to, anyway? When they steal women——”
“Who was the dead man?” asked Sudden.
“I don’t know,” Hashknife shook his head. “He was one of King’s men, who was sent from the sheep camp to find out why King didn’t come back. Mebbe he tried to protect the woman and got killed.”
Yeah?” Sudden got to his feet, his jaw set tightly. “How in —— do you know all this, Hartley?”
Hashknife smiled at him, shoved his plate aside and rested his elbows on the table,
“Mebbe it’s because I haven’t lived here so long that I’ve got cobwebs in my brain and scales over my eyes, Sheriff. Another question: Who owns the JN brand?”