They swung away from Farewell and entered a long draw, dark with the purple shadows of the twilight.
"Wasn't there nobody at all in Block's shack?" queried Johnny Ramsay, rolling a cigarette one-handed.
"Three," replied Loudon.
"Huh!" Johnny Ramsay was startled.
"Two was dead an' the third was dyin'," explained Loudon. "He cashed before we come out. His name was Tom Hallaway. You remember about Cutting stealin' my hoss. Well, him an' Block turned up in Rocket, an' Cutting was ridin' a blaze-face pinto. Come to find out, the pinto belonged to a fellah named Jim Hallaway, an' Jim was found murdered. The way I figure it: Cutting knowed better'n to ride in on my hoss, so he killed Jim an' took his pony, leavin' my hoss back in the hills some'ers. Later he went back after Ranger, an' sloped with the pair.
"This Tom Hallaway was Jim's brother. The two dead men in the shack was the sheriff an' Cutting. Yeah, Rufe Cutting. It'd been better for him if he'd gone south like the sheriff said he did. Rufe was carved up tremendous, an' Block had been plugged three times. Hallaway got 'em both. Two o' the Farewell boys got him though—through the window. But they didn't live long enough to tell about it. He got them plumb centre. Yep, four was Hallaway's tally. He shore paid 'em in full for killin' Jim."
"Which I should say as much," murmured Chuck Morgan, admiringly. "He was some man!"
"An' he had to die," said Loudon. "All on account o' them measly skunks. Well, by the time Scotty an' that crowd get through with Farewell a Sunday-school won't be in it with the town."
"Yo're whistlin'," said Johnny Ramsay.
The four pushed their mounts almost to the limit of their strength. At three in the morning they dismounted in a grove of singing pines. The 88 ranch buildings were a bare quarter-mile distant.