“You’re going to Painted Valley, Nolan. You stay at the Triangle X, and the gang will be under your orders. The people there have a hunch what I’m going to do, and they’ll fight it tooth and nail. I’m going to break that bunch, Nolan. They’ve got nothing but cattle to fight with, and it’s your job to remove the cattle. You get ’em out of the valley, and I’ll attend to the rest.”
“You mean,” said Nolan slowly, “that I’m to rustle their cattle and send ’em over the Lost Trail.”
“That’s exactly what I mean. I’m paying you ten dollars apiece for every head you send over that trail, and you don’t have to split with anybody. Keep under cover all the time. The gang will put the cattle where and when you want ’em. I’ll handle ’em on the other side.”
Nolan laughed harshly.
“That’s how I pay you for gettin’ me out of prison, eh?”
“You’re the only man in the world who knows where that trail starts. The old Apaches knew, but they’re all dead and the trail is forgotten. They made two raids over the trail. I’ve heard that it was made by the cliff dwellers.”
“I dunno,” said Nolan absently. “You’ll have to have the JK outfit, if you ever get sheep over Red Horse Pass. Six men could hold off an army in the south of the pass. The last mile of it is uphill, Marsh, and not over fifty feet wide.”
“Oh, I know all about that. But when I get through with that outfit in there, where will they find six men to hold the Pass? I tell you, Nolan,” Marsh struck the desk-top with a clenched fist, standing up and leaning across toward Nolan, “I’m going to loot that valley, and then I’m going to⸺”
But his sentence was never finished. From behind Nolan, back behind those heavy portieres, came the thudding report of a revolver. Marsh threw up one hand, as though to ward off a blow from his head and pitched forward across his desk, the crimson spreading across the white papers.
Blaze Nolan sprang to his feet, staring at Marsh. Then he turned and went swiftly back to the portieres, jerking them aside. There was sort of a sun parlour behind them, a huge bank of ferns in one end, where a fountain trickled softly. The air was redolent of powder smoke. One of the big glass windows was open.