“We’re waiting,” snapped Reed, and voice and manner showed that he had prejudged the case.
The young man met his look with one of cold hostility.
“You can keep on waiting—till the sheriff comes.”
“Suits me,” snapped the ranchman. “Hustle along, Lon. No use wasting time.”
The foreman and his prisoner departed. Betty stayed with her father, miserably conscious that she had failed to avert the clash of inimical temperaments. None the less she was determined to keep the young man out of the hands of the law.
She began at once to lay siege to her father.
“I knew he didn’t do it. I knew he couldn’t. It was that one they call Cig. I know it was.”
“All three of ’em in it likely.”
“No. They had quarreled. He wouldn’t be in it with them. That Cig thought he had told you about his attacking me. He threatened this Tug. I think he’d have shot him just as he did you—if he’d got a chance.”
“If he did shoot me. That’s not been proved.”