The superb contempt of the man, his readiness to give the sheriff a chance to pump out of Dailey all he knew, served to warn Collins that his life was in imminent danger. On no hypothesis save one—that Leroy had already condemned them both to death in his mind—could he account for such rashness. And that the blow would fall soon, before he had time to confer with other officers, was a corollary to the first proposition.
“He’ll surely kill me on sight,” Scotty burst out.
“Yes, he’ll kill you,” agreed the sheriff, “unless you move first.”
“Move how?”
“Against him. Protect yourself by lining up with me. It’s your only show on earth.”
Dailey’s eyes flashed. “Then, by thunder, I ain’t taking it! I’m no coyote, to round on my pardners.”
“I give it to you straight. He means murder.”
Perspiration poured from the man’s face. “I’ll light out of the country.”
The sheriff shook his head. “You’d never get away alive. Besides, I want you for holding up the Limited. The safest place for you is in jail, and that’s where I’m going to put you. Drop that gun! Quick! That’s right. Now, you and I are going out of this saloon by the back door. I’m going to walk beside you, and we’re going to laugh and talk as if we were the best of friends, but my hand ain’t straying any from the end of my gun. Get that, amigo? All right. Then we’ll take a little pasear.”
As Collins and his prisoner reappeared in the main lobby of the Gold Nugget, a Mexican slipped out of the back door of the gambling-house. The sheriff called Hawkes aside.