"I ain't," said Loudon, "but I s'pose I've got to be. It makes me sick! Lot o' work gone for nothin'. We grabbed the 88 range-boss on the off-chance he'd chatter, but he won't say a word. He's tied up in Jack Richie's storeroom right now."
"Blakely's range-boss, huh? Well, yuh can't hang him without proof, Tom."
"I know that. Got to turn him loose, o' course. Did yuh see anythin' o' Block or Blakely or that gang when yuh come through Farewell?"
"We didn't strike Farewell. We rode here the shortest way. Why—what's the matter?"
For Loudon had ripped out an amazed oath.
"Yore rope!" exclaimed Loudon. "Where did yuh get that rope?"
"Oh, Doubleday found it down by the little corral the mornin' after him an' the boys rode in from the Bend—after them hosses was stole."
"Why didn't yuh tell me about it then? That rope was all I needed. Say, Johnny, djever see this rope before?"
Loudon held up the end of the rope. The holdfast was missing, and the end had been lapped with many turns of whip-cord. Johnny squinted at the rope's end. Jack Richie and the others crowded in.
"Yeah," said Johnny Ramsay, "now I think of it, you an' me was in Mike Flynn's store in Farewell when Sam Blakely bought him that rope with the whip-cord on the end. That was the day you bought a green necktie. Shore, I remember. Blakely he asked Mike what that whip-cord was, an' Mike called it whippin'."