The dying man was already gray to the lips, but his nerve did not falter. “It had to come some time. And it was Luck ought to have done it too.” He waved aside Sweeney, who was holding a flask to his lips. “What’s the use? I’ve got mine.”
“Shall we take him to the house?” Maloney asked.
“No. I’ll die in the open. Say, there’s something else, boys. Curly has been accused of that Bar Double M horse rustling back in the early summer. I did that job. He was not one of us. You hear, boys. Curly was not in it.”
A quarter of an hour later he died. He had lied to save from the penitentiary the lad who had brought about his death. Curly knew why he had done it—because he felt himself to blame for the affair. Maybe Bad Bill had been a desperado, a miscreant according to the usual standard, but when it came to dying he knew how to go better than many a respectable citizen. Curly stole off into the darkness so that the boys would not see him play the baby.
By this time the men from the Flatiron were appearing, armed with such weapons as they could hastily gather. The situation was explained to them. Neighboring ranches were called up by telephone and a systematic hunt started to capture Blackwell.
Luck left his three riders to help in the man hunt, but he returned with Curly and Maloney to Saguache. On the pommel of his saddle was a sack. It contained the loot from the express car of the Flyer. Two lives already had been sacrificed to get it, and the sum total taken amounted only to one hundred ninety-four dollars and sixteen cents.