“Soapy and Dan trained together in them days and went through a lot of meanness as side pardners. One day the Arivaca stage was held up by two men and the driver killed. In the scrap one of the men had his mask torn off. It was French Dan. Well, the outlaws had been too damned busy. Folks woke up and the hills were sprinkled with posses. They ran the fellows down and hunted them from place to place. Two—three times they almost nailed them. Shots were exchanged. A horse of one of the fugitives was killed and they could not get another. Finally one dark night the outlaws were surrounded. The posse lay down in the zacaton and waited for morning. In the night one of them heard a faint sound like the popping of a cork. When mo’ning broke the hunters crept forward through the thick grass. Guess what they found.”
Curly’s answer was prompt. “Gimme a harder one. There were two men and only one horse. The only chance was to slip through the line before day arrived. My guess is that they found French Dan with a little round hole in his skull—and that the bullet making it had gone in from behind. My guess also is that the posse didn’t find the horse and the other man, just a trail through the zacaton back into the hills.”
“Go to the head of the class. There was one man too many in that thicket for the horse. French Dan’s pardner was afraid they might not agree about who was to have the bronch for a swift getaway. So he took no chances. There’s only one man alive to-day can swear that Soapy was the man with French Dan lying in the zacaton. And he’ll never tell, because he pumped the bullet into his friend. But one thing is sure. Soapy disappeared from Arizona for nearly two years. You can pick any reason you like for his going. That is the one I choose.”
“Same here. And the man that would shoot one partner in the back would shoot another if he had good reasons. By his way of it Soapy has reasons a-plenty.”
“I’m satisfied that is his game. Question is how to block it. Will you go to the sheriff?”
“No. Bolt would fall down on it. First off, he would not believe the story because I’m a rustler myself. Soapy and his friends voted for Bolt. He would go to them, listen to their story, prove part of it by me, and turn them loose for lack of evidence. Sam would go back to Dead Cow with them, and Stone would weave another web for the kid.”
“You’ve got it about right,” Slats admitted. “How about warning Sam?”
“No use. He would go straight to Soapy with it, and his dear friend would persuade him it was just a yarn cooked up to get him to throw down the only genuwine straight-up pal he ever had.”
“Cullison then?”
“You’re getting warm. I’ve had that notion myself. The point is, would he be willing to wait and let Soapy play his hand out till we called?”